My passion!!!

He he he! This is getting way tooo fun now!

In Memory...

Getting Really Creative Now...

Sunday, Playing Sunday...

Yeah I know...real bad U2 rip... o well...

Change is bad...

yeah I screwed up... I felt the need for a change as I neared the first month anniversary of my blog and I screwed up. I wanted a change and the change was bad. I'd go back to the old template but I lost all the settings that I had so I'll keep this for a few days and then play around. I'm gonna lose the "about me" stuff cause I hate that junk. Maybe I got the old settings somewhere. But I had spent hours editing the HTML coding and that was all wiped out so I gotta start over.

more later... when I wipe all this blue crap away.... LOL

Exercise in the year 2004...

Ok... Last week I gave you the list of how NOT to hold a garage sale...

Here's the list of how NOT to open a new YMCA fitness center...

1)Announce that the openning is Memorial day, but really open it a week early and post signs everywhere that say "We just couldn't hold our excitement so we have to let you in early!"

2) Open early, but only when 50% of the damn construction is done so you are walking around construction workers all the time!!!!!

3) Hold an open house for new members, announce you have signed up 4500 families, and then go to the men's locker room and learn there are 120 lockers for all the males.

4) Find out from your wife that there are 300 lockers for women. (Gender bias anyone?)

5)Open up the pool early but don't atleast clean up around the pool so you still have to walk around roof tiles and other equiptment. Oh, and the pool deck is full of mud cause you haven't sodded the grass yet.

6)Put a 1/10th mile running track on the 2nd floor, but with open lookouts below into the gym and pool area so when the pool is full or a basketball game is on, you'll have to hear (and smell) it the entire time. Granted most people run with headphones, but you don't want to have to drown out the other noise.

7) Offer membership cards that are initally crap pieces of paper and then take photos for credit card type ID's but not have the cards ready for 3-5 weeks. Hello? this is a multi-million $$ facility. They couldn't invest $200 in an instant ID printing maching? hell, I have one at work for employees and my highschool had one! 2 seconds, instant ID. I'm sure I could find probably 100 of those paper ID's on Ebay already.

8) Open a brand new facility and have no signs around so a new person has no clue where they are going.

9) Build a multi million $$ facility in the middle of a gigantic farm field yet build that facility smaller than the basement of my house!

10) "oh... that walking track? Sorry.. the steps aren't finished yet. You have to use the fire excape outside to get up there for now..." Yeah. that's where my quality membership dollars are going.

I'm sure I'll have a second top 10 list after my next visit too...

It's FRRIIIIDDDAAAAYYYYYY

'nuff said

Prayer Part 2...

Boss's surgery went fine. Only took 6 hours. oh yeah.. best part? She was awake the whole time... Not me... I need to be knocked out for dental work!

More tomorrow...

Living On A Prayer...

My boss is having major heart surgery tomorrow. In her honor, I request that you a little prayer for her today. Nothing else to post today.

Ultimate Torture

Take a guess where I'd rather be tonight... in a bar at happy hour with my coworkers or at an elementary school listening to a concert by 4th and 5th graders.

I will admit though, the orchestra was actually really good. The Band was REALLY good. Usually they are ear piercing. But they were darn good!

Now the chior was another story. See, the orchestra played maybe 10 minutes... and of the 5 songs they played, 2 were solos which I think kind of screwed the other kids cause they barely got to play anything...

The band played 4 songs which was too short also.

The chior? Clocked in at nearly 45 minutes!!!!! For some reason, they felt the need to perform this hugely elaborate production that went on and on and on... one song they repeated nearly 6 times. Granted, it was part of the storyline but overkill is an understatement....

Frankly, I'm too exhausted to write more... and I gotta get that song out of my head!

Sabbath Day

Comtemplate this today... Why do we drive on a parkway and park on a driveway???

See you tomorrow!

Closing of the Year...

Summer is finally here so the kids are having their closing programs at school practically every day now... the nursery schools were Sunday... Since they are affiliated with a church, the closing program was part of the Sunday service.

Which would have been nice, except that it's a realllyyyy small church, with no air conditioning, in 90 degree weather, that was packed to begin with, and now had 20 screaming children added to the mix. I think this would have been one day that God would have approved a shortened Sermon. But alas... no luck...

Had a birthday party in the afternoon that wasn't too bad. If I get pictures back from that, I'll elaborate cause the picture tells the whole story...

Remember, tomorrow is my Sabbath day so no post!

Rocktaxi's Moving And Storage Service

Spent all day today moving the in-laws furniture to 3 different houses today. They are moving after 29 years and giving away all their stuff to the kids. Of course, it was the one Saturday that the kids slept in, so I woke up late, didn't get breakfast, didn't get a shower for that matter. Packed up the truck by 11, off to house number 1... done there by 1pm... on to house #2... done there by 4... on to house number 3... done there by 6....back home for pizza and soda...

Decided to mow the lawn since I was already a major sweat bomb... except the mower didn't want to work. So handed that off to the brother in law who practically took the thing apart and rebuilt it. Borrowed the neighbors mower during that time and mowed BOTH our lawns. Fell on my ass a few times cause their backyard is a huge hill. So i'm soaking in the tub as this is being posted... Enjoy the visual!

When the Walls Come Tumblin Down pt 2...

Short post today... on the way home... chaos ensued today and objects were flying all over the room. Last report was my TV is on the floor upside down... gotta go check on my baby...

Cyclops Part 2...

Oh... as if last night's post wasn't enough... here's this morning's version...

Get a call this morning from the eye doctors office... (it's the bitch again)

Um... hello , can you tell me which lense we gave you last night so we know which one is the other one we need to order???

Excuse me???? You don't know which one you gave me??? Can't you tell by what is in my file????

Ugh... you know what... I'm too disgusted to even finish this post...

"C" Stands for Cyclops

Here's one post I never thought I'd have to put in...I really thought this adventure was over.

Last week, I posted how "Time is Money" and my adventures of a 3 hour tour at my eye doctors. Well, after the first visit like 3 weeks ago, it took 3 weeks for my contacts to come in. That visit was last Tuesday. I expected to have to wait probably another 3 weeks for the corrected pair (we decided that a different pair would give me even better vision.)

Well, to my surprise the new pair (#2 now... stay with me) came in in only 2 days...But due to my schedule it wasn't until last night that I could actually drive the hour to the eye doctor to pick them up. The good thing this time was no appointment needed, just walk in, pick them up, walk away.

Well, to get to the point, I walk in, the girl at the desk (who is really a bitch anyway), hands me the ONE vial with the contact in it. I took it and after a second asked... "Um... are both lenses in here?" And she gave me a weird look and said, "No... only one lense was ordered". So I said... ummm this was a trial pair... how can I TRY the lenses with only ONE lense??? Am I supposed to just alternate eyes every hour and try it that way??? Why would I just get ONE lense?

Well, that's all he ordered, I'll have to ask him after hours and have him call you." Well no sh*t sherlock! How idiotic would it be to get a single lense in, knowing fully well when you look at my chart to call me that it's in, and see very clearly (no pun intended) that it's a trial PAIR that was ordered. That's why I am getting to walk out of your office without having to pay for it!!!

I'll continue with this tomorrow.... gotta go wash my eye out now for this one trial......

Monday = Sabbath Day

Most of the blogs that I read have people who usually do not post on Sundays (using it as their day of rest).

However, since I am not normal, I can always find a way to make a post on Sundays, as has been the last two weeks for my blog. Therefore, I am offically ordering that MONDAYS will be my Sabbath day.

No matter how hard I try, or how much I say "Man I can't wait to post this in my blog first thing Monday morning".... it doesn't happen.

Therefore, I'm announcing that you should not waste your time reading my blog on Monday's cause you ain't gonna see anything new. So enjoy the previous week!

American Touristers...

Ever watch or hear of the movie "Babe - Pig in the City"? Well, this is our version of it. For some very odd reason, we decided to travel to downtown Philadelphia today with the whole family. Let me tell you what an adventure that was. Actually I won't tell you... too much to tell. Got a few more pics from our adventure too that I'll get up soon.  

Garage Sale - All items -5 cents!!

Here is my list of how to NOT have a garage sale.

1) Put all items out in the yard the night before.
2) Don't watch the weather reports to know that it's supposed to rain that same night.
3) Don't bother to price everything and expect to just take "best offers"
4) Only put out stuff that is 20-30 years old cause like ya know, the 70's were only 3 decades ago man!
5) Post signs of the garage sale, the morning of, and put at the bottom 8 am-3pm...no early birds.
6) When 6:30 rolls around and the whole town is rummaging through your stuff, don't just stand in your house cause "They are not paying attention to the NO early bird sign."
7) Don't bother to wash the 20-30 year old items cause "antiques" are all the rage, like ya know!
8) Don't have bottled tap water on sale for $1 and have a child selling the water to make a profit. Trust me, they'll drink the product before you can sell it all...
9) If you are going to list items as actually being free, then don't bury them under all the stuff for $50 cause when the sale is over, you'll be stuck with the $50 items and still have all the free shit that no one even knew was free!!!
10) I won't even post 10 because I can't believe I actually got 9 other reasons already!

Till Next Time!!!!

When the Walls Come Tumblin Down!!

iiiiitttttssss aaaaaaa sssssshhhhaaaakkkkyyyyy pppoooossssstttttt tttooodddaaayyy ccaauussee tthheerree iiss contruction going on next door to my office and they are literally tearing down the wall outside my offficcccceeee. ssssoooo eeevvveeerrryyy fffeeewww seconds they crank up the drills and dig into the walls. Aaaafffftttteeeerrrr allllll ttthhhheeee ssstttuuufff fell off my desk once, I took it allllllll offfffff and cleannnnnned uuuuuppppp. ssssssooooo atleast thereeeeeee iiiiissss snnnnooooo dust.

Phew!

It's a blurry pic, but a cute one of Sammy... He was sliding down a slide at the park and each time, his hair stuck up more and more!! 

New pictures

Playing around again... so bear with me...

Fine French Cuisine with an Oriental Flavor

I've been thinking of how to get that title into a post and this day seems to fit rather well. I was driving home from a funeral viewing the other night in one of the "better" parts of lovely Philadelphia and what did I see when I turned a corner? That sign on a restuarant window. Needless to say, I wasn't very anxious to go inside and sample their food at all...

Today is just as mixed up as the restuarant so it fit perfectly!

More posts later today!

More time is More $$$

Ok... here is the second part of the post from the other day. Twice in 24 hours I lost my patience.

I had an eye doctor appointment yesterday to get refitted for contact lenses. Appointment was at 8:30. I was hoping to be out of there by 9 and in to work by 10 so I didn't blow a whole day.

Stupid me

I didn't even get called up to register till 9... got in the chair and then they couldn't find my contacts that had been ordered. (My original appointment was three weeks ago, but my contacts were special ordered so I had to come back in for fitting and checkup.

Well, an hour later I had my contacts, but had to give them back. They want to order a stronger pair so I can see all the better. So back to another 3 week wait. Finally got into work at 11:30 which wouldn't have been bad except that my boss was leaving at noon and we had like 2 hours of work to go through. Lovely, yeah....

Time is $$

I am a patient person. Really. Seriously... I lose out on alot of stuff because I"ll just sit around and wait sometimes.

But 2 times now in 24 hours, I have totally lost my patience over little things. Monday I gratiously donated blood at my church for their Red Cross Blood Drive. (10th donation!) The problem is that our church has had a history of bad donations in that wait times can exceed 2 hours. Well, Monday broke that.

I got there at 5:15, 20 minutes before my scheduled time, and it was 6:45 before I actually was placed in a bed. So I get there, the nurse looks at my arm, and turns to the other worker, "Oh, I'm going to take my break now".... I was like "huh??" Ya ain't going to even hook me up first??? well, she didn't. Union rules I guess...

So finally a 7:10, when the other two people who were donating were finished, a different nurse came over and hooked me up. Needless to say she wasn't gentle. Took a good minute for her to get into the vein and when I would squeeze, she'd say, don't, and when I didn't, she said to squeeze... I couldn't win.

50% into the donation, the needle slipped. So they had to re-stick me and find the vein again. Again, she wasn't very gentle.

8PM I walk out of there with my arm practically in a friggen sling it's so bruised and battered. So to make a long story short, I'm not donating there again.

Whoa!!!

See what happens when you miss a day of posting! Geez! Blogger changed completly!!!

I'll have to see what this is all about but liking what I see so far!

Got some housecleaning to do as well so bear with me....

For my mom....

In respect for Mother's Day today, no post...

(oh... and my wife threatened to kill me if I got near the computer on "her" day...)

back to babysitting!

All we need right now is just a little bit of Soul....

Just got back from my second Philadelphia Soul game this year. They are the new AFL team from Philly that just happens to be owned by Jon Bon Jovi. And since I have always enjoyed the band, it was only natural that I was going to enjoy the football team.

For this being their very first season in the AFL, I think they have been doing pretty good. They are 5-7 and have held their own against other teams that have been around for 10-15 years. I went to my first game about a month ago and was blown away by the quality of the event that was given to the fans. If you've ever been to a minor league baseball game then you know what I'm talking about. There is NEVER a dull moment during the game. During any break, no matter how short, either the cheerleaders :) or the "pep" guys are on the field entertaining the crowd. They toss tee shirts, give out CD's, give away food.... you name it... they do it at AFL games.

So much fun that I decided to take my 7 year old son this week to his first professional sport event. I was a little worried since it was a night game, but he held his own! Towards the end he was a little tired but let me tell you. The minute the game ended and we could go towards the field for autographs, he was first in line!

I think he was even shocked that he could get as close to the players as he did. And when he was shy and THEY came over to him, he was even more shocked! He got atleast 6 player's autographs including the QB and their best players. It's so much nicer than a big NLF game where they don't have any time for you...

Well, this has definately been my biggest post and I could go on for a long time, but I'll end it here. I'll definately revisit this topic soon though...

Tinkering...

well, one week in and still going strong... working on a few things this morning so visit later for some excitement!

She Got Off The Plane!!!!

Woo Hoo!!! Rachel got off and stayed with Ross! LOL (hopefully no one on the West Coast is reading this and I just spoiled it for them. O-well... maybe you should move East!

Anyway, tonight was a real tough night! Friends finale, Extreme Makeover (Home edition) Live special and WWE Wrestling! Man talk about a tough choice! Atleast baseball was a day game today.

I stuck it out though for Friends, watched the Undertaker's Match on wrestling, and caught probably all the commercials for Extreme Makeover. Friends was good but I was pissed that they didn't have the curtain call! Every final episode of shows always have the last curtain call!!! And Friends of all shows didn't! What's up with that????? (Probably will be shown though on the DVD that comes out next week.) I'll be you the Frazier series finale next week will show it. Bet ya Bet ya Bet ya.

oh..forget the picture posts below. I can't figure it out for the life of me. The pics always show perfect in my little "preview" but the final upload seems to lose the image. So I'm going to spend the weekend on fixing it. Till next time....

Bird Watching????

I'll admit I'm not the best driver in the world, but 99% of the time I'm innocently minding my own business.

I'll honk my horn if it's neccessary...and I'll flip someone the bird if it's neccessary too...ok, well sometimes it's uncontrollable but....

This morning something new! I was driving to work in a car train of 4-5 cars... I was like 3rd in line with maybe two or three cars behind me. On one road, there are a series of traffic lights like every 5 feet basically...since I was in the middle of the pack, I was just following everyone else. We were all hitting every light when it was red so it was stop and go the whole way. What shocked me, and is the reason for this whoel post, is that when we got to the very last light, where there happens to be a side street turnoff, the guy behind me, starts flashing his lights, honking his horn, and flips me the double, yes DOUBLE bird!!!! I didn't realize it for maybe a second because we all started moving but when I saw his lights flashing in my rear view mirror, that's what caught my eye.

I figured maybe I was late for starting up at the light, but the car in front of me was right at my bumper still and we were all moving...the light was green so it's not like we were missing it, as we were all moving in unison... yet for some reason, he felt he needed to give me the double! bird.... Normally it wouldn't bother me, cuase I only return the favor if it's warranted. But today, it was NOT warranted and it's bugging me! (I got that problem these days with bugs! LOL)

I don't know... this ever happen to you??? Post your thoughts in the comments and we'll see where it goes!

I think this may work!

Here goes everything!!

((IMAGE REMOVED FOR RESIZING))

If this worked, above this, you'll see a pic of most of the family... sorry for the huge size... gotta work on that...

New shoes? What new shoes???

I hate to say it, but I'm switching back to the old shoes tomorrow... As long as the weather is nice, I'm wearing the old ones. Both of my ankles are swollen and I'm not going through that again. I'll wear the new ones when it rains but until then, it's back to the holy laceless shoes. Comfort wins over appearance in my book.

Playing around with things tonight again so bear with me... maybe that should be the title of this whole thing... "Bear With Me".... who knows...

I'm not giving out the real source of my title quite yet... Cool people will know the source... LOL... Maybe I'll run a contest or something next week. Right now I have plenty of topics to talk about so I don't need any filler space yet. Hope to have a real picture up by the end of the night too.

Until next time!!!

Walking Tall...

Gots me some brand spanking new shoes today! Well, really bought them last night, but wore them the first time today. I figured it was about time to get a pair since my last pair (which really only lasted me maybe 4 months) had two broken shoe laces and had holes in the bottom of both feet. Since we had horrible rain yesterday, I had to drive home in bear feet after squeezing the water out of my socks. It was not a pretty, nor unsmelly sight. So while shopping last night for some essentials I just happened to come across a pair that looked close to what I had and were relatively cheap. If this pair gives out before Christmas, then I'm just going to give up and stop buying cheap shoes.

This pair looks like it has a sturdier bottom to them though, heck, the soles are like 1 inch thick so I shouldn't break through these too quick. The last pair disintegrated overnight. So we'll see.

I'm still playing with this blog so bear with me. Yes, I know the picture in last night's post is broken... it's broken intentionally. (The picture that was there is for me to know and you to dream about! LOL)

I'll get a real picture up there maybe tonight or tomorrow. Got some details to work out between Blogger and my ISP for the hosting of the pics. A minor detail but one that isn't easy to fix when you're dealing with my ISP.

Send me some comments so I know you're reading this people! LOL

Till next time... I'll be walking tall and carrying a heavy bag... (insiders will know the joke...)

Test Picture Post!

I'm still playing LOL

Tinkering...

I am tinkering around with a few new things on the site tonight so just bear with me... things may look screwy for a few hours...

Ok...well, they are always screwy but hey....

It's Monday!!!

Oh yeah... this will be short till later...

It's cold, it's rainy... I was late for work...

Get the picture???

more later...

Insect 2, Rocktaxi 0...

Ok. How little did I know what woud happen in the last 24 hours... from my last post, you know I went to a party last night.. nothing special, but it did have good food....

Well, on the way home to pick up the kids, I was getting into the car and totally swallowed a bug. Don't know what kind of bug but something that was flying around the lightpost and went directly into my mouth. I gagged and hopefully got the bugger (no pun intended) out. My throat still killed for like 30 minutes and I was probably dehydrated from spitting so much cause I swore that something was still in there. No amounts of water were helping....

So if that wasn't enough, this morning as we're getting into the car to go to church, my son says he can't get in on one side of the car because there is a bee there, so I send him in the other door. Well, don't you know, I go over to that side of the car and before I can get in, would you believe the bee flies DIRECTLY into my eye and is stuck behind my glasses and my eye. I freak majorly cause I know it's stuck and I got stung somewhere but don't know where. I rip off my glasses and the bee is still stuck to me. I scream and run into the house and find that I was stung maybe 1/4 inch from the bottom of my right eye. And man, it's like 4 hours later and the SOB still hurts!!! Ouch!!! The swelling has gone down now but it still hurts to squint or move the eye muscles.

Hopefully I won't be blind tomorrow.

Ok.. well I really think I may have finally found my niche' in the world... I'll post when I can, but since this is online I can probably add even some from work during the day... look for updates more during the week, probably less on weekends.... getting ready for a party now... post the details later...

Just getting started! Bear with me!!! LOL