Chemical Doldrums

This is one loooong day. Last night I had to take a couple of muscle relaxers to deal with my back. It hates to travel and often lets me know just after crew-x. I was a bit loopy near the end of the shift but not as sleepy as I sometimes get on those little, white pills of joy and warm, fuzzy feelings. I tried to watch a movie after folding a bit of crew-x laundry but the movie stunk like dead monkey ass, so I finished a book written about one, three-month cruise on a Trident submarine. It too wasn’t very interesting, but I finished it and went to bed at a reasonable hour.

This morning, I found myself in stupor and eight hours later, I am still walking around like I haven’t slept in 5 days. I am tired, slow and stupid (no comments from the peanut gallery, please). Not a good state of mind when my computer system totally locked up on me ten minutes into the shift. Trying to get the architecture of a complex computer system straight in your head on something like a Quaalude buzz is a study in futility. I could get a picture in my mind after about 5 minutes of concentrating, but there were just no available brain cells left to do anything with it. I could not troubleshoot at all.

So, after a smoke, I resorted to banging on the various servers, routers and nodes. Nothing happened. I then jiggled about 342 connections. Same. Finally, I gave up and made the famous, “Houston, we have a problem” call. Six hours later, we get the dodgy system running again, but have no clue as to what was wrong with it. I hate shit like that.

Dinner was good and my new cooks are pretty fucking awesome. Last night was prime rib with béarnaise, gorgonzola and au ju sauces-take your freaking pick, boys. Tonight was dolphin fish with mango-pineapple-papaya salsa, or turkey with all the trimmings, followed by a whimsical rice crispy treat. These guys are alright.

Low morale

I'm onboard. The stress of traveling, uncomfortable seats, benches and decks while flying, driving and sailing out my ship, coupled with the stress of the first two shifts always wrench my back out of whack. I hate being crippled as soon as I arrive...

Mobile in Mobile

While in Mobile, I had to have my doctor call in a prescription for my deja voux strep. This also meant hoofing it to the nearest pharmacy to pick it up. It was 35 degrees warmer than home so I enjoyed the walk (only 7-8 blocks). I took my camera along for the walk and all of you, too.

I stopped at a park


Saw a statue


Read the plaque underneath


And found some cool stone work on the way out.


Which was done with little, granite tiles.


On the way back, I felt like the freaking gopher in Pa when I saw my shadow-a rare occasion back home.


Then, a couple of bums hassled the shit out of me so I couldn’t whip out my camera and get a shot of this really cool church-see it? No, you can’t-fucking bums.

Anyway, I also saw a sort of bizarre museum with big party dudes on the porch.

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, its off to work I go (or not)

UPDATE:
Lets see, how could it get worse? I woke up to this: NO fucking hot water! And my strep throat has returned-I should have taken the shot of penicillin instead of the Keflex, I guess. We’ll see how easy it is to get a prescription filled in Mobile, Al. Waiting 20-30 minutes to get it filled should add a nice chunk of change to the 1 hour, 40 minute cab ride to the hotel I have been stupidly booked into, ignoring the fact that there are 342 hotels within 1 mile of the airport. At least this high fever is keeping me happy and I’ve got all day to wander around Alabama. Now, do I pay 4 bucks for an hour on the Internet, or do I wait until this afternoon when I get it for free at the hotel? Decisions, decisions.

I waited.































Crew-x suks.
After a sleepless night and the pain of leaving my friends and family, I have to endure AIR TRAVEL. I know, everyone thinks, TSA, restrictions, security, lines and all that. No. All that is good and tolerable and is a small price to pay. Granted, the current security would NOT have stopped the reason we have the current security issues, but it’s still the right thing to do and not at all difficult if you stay current on the restrictions and take a small amount of time and effort to BE PREPARED.

No, what I hate are the fucking “mohans” (Nod to daughter) who have no common sense, no courtesy and think that they are more important than the other 15 million people traveling today. Every time I fly, I have to grit my teeth and fight the urge to do violence on some of these fuckwits. I called out one today and people stared and grumbled at him the whole fucking flight. HA!

Slop a shitty airline on top of that and you get one pissed off fucking pirate, stuck in a hotel that resides in a completely different state from the one that his favorite airline stranded him in and sprinkle in a little non-smoking hotel rule and a fucking hair in his cold, hour-old, mozzarella stick from Arbys and it has been a bad fucking day. All this and I’m still two days, a shuttle ride, two flights, two taxis and a crew boat away from getting to work. Fucking-A, how was your commute, today?

Yo Ho Fucking Ho and all that rot

That's it. The fun is over and I'm off to work. It's about 1am, I'm nearly packed and waiting on clothes in the dryer. My mood is as black as the night sky and it won't be any better tomorrow when I fly out.

Over the hills and thru the woods

yo ho everyone. This weekend I'm taking PW off to the Minnesota woodlands for an anniversery retreat to the most peaceful place we have ever been. It's time to be lulled gently to sleep by the sound of our little waterfall and the crackling fire. I'll try to post.

New Business

Yo ho ho, I've set up shop at the Queen's place for a few days to get a few pet projects up and running.

A special mission

Yo Ho Ho everyone. I know, I know, I have been remiss in posting regularly here, but Dang, I'm home and sick and now I'm busy hijacking the Queen's blog for a week. It aint easy fitting her head on "Ahhhnold's" body, let me tell you.

In the meantime, I assume everyone here knows KAT and all about the unbelievably awsome stuff she and her family do for our soldiers. Not much can make the Pirate cry like a baby, but she can, every damn time. She is truely wonderful, but before she starts throwing things at me for this, go HERE and see if you can't find it in your heart to help out with a very special mission. Peace.

ps. If anyone is interested in wholesale horsemeat, it will soon be available at The Queen's Cut-your one stop shop for horseshit and horsemeat

Link

Hey, this is kind of neat-an overview of humanity. It aint nice and it aint pretty, but it is interesting.

The Village

A Pirate's Tale

A friend told me her little girl likes pirate books and I can't sleep. Give my addled mind a set of idle hands and anything might appear. In this case, it's a pirate story, but not just any story. This is the toddler version of my life as a pirate.

Once upon a time a man left home to make his fortune in the world. He built great and wonderful things, but they tended to lean



and sometimes fall down. One day he built a house and it fell on him.


Ouch!

So then,


he tried to fly a desk



in an office,



but he couldn't work from 9 to 5.



Finally, he went to sea and became a pirate and he was happy but his head hurt in the morning a lot.



He sailed the stormy seas for many years in his pirate ship,



staying one step ahead of the royal navy and



collecting much booty;)


Finally, he met the most beautiful girl in all the world and they were married.



She became his pirate queen.


Soon, they had a baby girl and



she became a pirate princess.



And they gave her a pet. Black Beard, the pirate dog.

Alive

Hey, I'm alive. Getting back on my feet and posting will resume, forthwith. I promise. Depending on booze intake and heretofore ignored honey-do list. And weather. And future snowboarding accidents-still trying to get there!

UPDATE: I've been working on a book review for FTTW, but it seems we now have an official book reviewer onboard now, so I will try to tidy it up and hammer it up on the wall here, tomorrow. Meanwhile, Tuesday is Pirate Day over at FTTW, so go have re-read of the last half of my first pirate adventure and say hello to our new book reviewer and all the other loonies;) And Blondie? Give 'em hell if you see anything you don't like and ask 'em where in the hell my bio is:)

Oh, the Gauntlet article is particularly good, as well. Travis really bares his soul;)

Flu Blizzard

Hey. We are right in the middle of the blizzard. Not as bad as I thought it would be, but the winds are definitely up around 50mph and the snow is blowing sideways, along with a fair number of branches off my many trees. Despite having the flu, I managed to shovel, unload two snow blowers out of my pickup, get pizza and an adjustment from my big, hairy chiropractor. I’m now exhausted and cold, laying in bed trying to decide between watching any other inferior movie, or Apollo 13, for thousandth time. Tough call, since I just watched Apollo 13. You know, I think I watch it every time Blondie mentions Jim Lovell, which is quite often and cool for me since he’s my idol.

Well, the wind is howling so bad I am going to have to break out the headphones and hoe-shit, we nearly lost power just now. I think the tree in front is pulling the gooseneck off of the house just like last winter. Going to be a cold night, dammit. Later.

UPDATE: I will always remember this storm as the flu blizzard. My little girl has been sick for several days. My oldest girl started complaining yesterday. I've been down for 2-3 days and feel worse tonight than any time since getting sick. It's 4:30 in the morning right now, the blizzard is howling and my oldest just puked all over the place. PW tied a towel around her head like a vomit ninja and cleaned up the puke while I stumbled around on the legs of a rubber chicken, mumbling things like, "We need more towels" and "You missed a spot". We put buckets and towels next to the kids. PW is sleeping now and I am standing sentinel over the house and sick kids, or more accurately, sitting on the couch, blogging while I sneeze and blow my nose. My stomach is churning, but I'm not sure if it's from the flu, the half a large pizza I ate tonight, the sight of my son's half sprayed around the room, or from watching the last 20 minutes of a really stupid movie called Broken Arrow. Whatever, I'm gonna get some nachos and a cuppa coffee.