I'm Back

I've been away on vacation.  I love Arizona.  Someday we will retire and move back there to live.  Even in August, with the temperature around 105, we had a great time.  Thanks to our friends that live out there and keep an eye on our place when we are stuck here in NJ.  

I've made a decision to go on a diet.  Here is the plan.....short term goals.  My plan is to go hard core until Thanksgiving 2013.  That is about 10 weeks.  I will reevaluate at that time.  I'll try and post my ups and downs here as I fight the battle of the bulge.  Wish me luck...I'm going to need it.

Day one starts tomorrow........

Dead as a Doornail

Woke up this morning and one of the two garage door openers is dead as a doornail.  (interesting saying, "dead as a door nail").  I love when an unexpected expense rears it's ugly head.  It normally pops up just after you've spent lots and lots of money on something else.  In this case, we just finished painting and carpeting two rooms.  So when cash is tight you can always count on the "unexpected expense" to tag you and say, "You're It!".  Not only do you need to deal with the expense, but there is also the inconvenience of calling a repair guy, making an appointment, and getting them out to the house.  Then you can always get the dagger when they tell you the parts are "out of stock" and need to be ordered.  Well, there is not much you can do about things like these.  It is best to not get too worked up over these small annoyances.  You really need to take them in stride and move on.  They keep coming and all you can do is hope that none are too serious.

As far as "dead as a doornail" goes, this is what I found:

William and Mary Morris, in The Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins, quote a correspondent who points out that it could come from a standard term in carpentry. If you hammer a nail through a piece of timber and then flatten the end over on the inside so it can’t be removed again (a technique called clinching), the nail is said to be dead, because you can’t use it again. Doornails would very probably have been subjected to this treatment to give extra strength in the years before screws were available. So they were dead because they’d been clinched. It sounds plausible, but whether it’s right or not we will probably never know.

Birthday present from my daughter.  Now I'm really ready for opening day of the NFL season.

Thank God It's Friday

TGIF

I have had one heck of a week. Both at work and at home. I am so glad that Friday has arrived. Looking forward to getting together with some of my watch buddies on Saturday to hang out and show off my new Glycine Airman 08 Chrono. And, as an added bonus, my son will be visiting from Knoxville starting on Sunday. So, things are looking up. But getting this week behind me is my #1 priority. Just one of those weeks when I was never able to catch up. The heat has not helped either. Pushing 100+ here today with very high humidity. Seven days of this has been enough. When is vacation again? Soon, but not soon enough......

SiriusXM Radio

Hey now.....

For several years now I have had SiriusXM satellite radio in my car.  I listen to it exclusively.  I am a Howard Stern listener during my commute time Monday through Friday.  My drive in to work takes me about 40 minutes one way.  If I catch it just right, I can listen to 40 minutes on the way in and a different 40 minutes on the way home.  On the occasion, and much more frequently recently, that Howard and the gang are on vacation or hiatus or just working their 3 day work week, I like to listen to classic rock channels, coffee house, or a little Top 40. I'll even catch a baseball or football broadcast if we are out for a drive.

Today my car was in for routine service.  I really love the Infiniti service center that I use.  They do excellent work and provide a loaner car for the day.  The only problem is that the loaner cars do not have satellite radio in them.  As a result I was forced to listen to terrestrial radio for the the first time in a long time. Ouch, was it painful.  The silly banter mixed in with the never ending commercials, and the repetitive weather and traffic were almost too much to bear.  I don't know what I am going to do once Howard Stern retires for good.  I may need to plan my retirement around his.  The thought of the drive to work without some laughs and the much needed distraction is scary to say the least.

This is funny to my married watch collector friends....

1973 Yearbook Picture

Found this while cleaning out the closet while preparing to paint......this was a long, long, long, time ago.