Picture of the Day

This was taken July 17, 2003 at my brother, Dan's old house. It was the day after my nephew and god son, Josh was born. That is him in my arm. And that is Shelby on the floor. This is the Heisman pose with Josh as the football. I got this out a little earlier today. Tonight I have my first Professional Engineering Exam Refresher Course. It is 2 hours from 7:30 - 9:30. And I am certain I am going to walk out of class tonight feeling extremely stupid. Since I really haven't had to use my brain since I graduated. Wish me luck.

Picture of the Day

This picture was taken April 22, 2000 in E-Bor City, which is near Tampa, FLA. This is "The Pose". You will soon see that I have a number of poses. I have the thumbs up, the finger point and the peace sign. But the hands in the pocket, hip to the side that truely is my favorite pose. I was down in Florida for Spring Break with Nate, Andy, Brown and Russ. A good time was had by all.

PICTURE OF THE DAY

I recently posted a story from my European travels. And for the story I posted a couple of pictures. I realized that I have a quite a few pictures in my archives. Since most of you have never seen them, I thought I would use this arena to display them all. This past week I spent approximately an hour or so a day, scanning and then editing the pictures. I have scanned in 158 pictures. As long as I don't have modem problems, I will have pictures for you until June 30th. This should take us well into the summer. In an effort to increase me viewership, I have decided to post a picture a day. Here is picture number one.

This was taken February 16th, 2002 just outside of Phoenix, Arizona at the church before Matt Kaker's wedding. Back row, that is me, Justus "Melon" Klink and Paul "Krum" Krumrich. Bottom row is Matt Kaker, and Dave "Spider" Pawlyshyn. We were going for the soccer team photo and the serious look. Justus did not get the memo.

WEEKEND UPDATE

Friday night I did all of nothing. I stopped by Nate and played some ping pong and that really was about it. Saturday morning, I went to my niece, Lindsay's basketball game. Saturday night I was planning on going to see my friend, Brian and his band "Whiskey Jars and Scandals", but things got off track and I didn't make it. Brian, I deeply appologize for not making it. A group of my friends, headed by Nate, were headed down to Potowatomi to have dinner and then play bingo. Brian's band was playing on the East side at 10:00. My plan was to go and have dinner and leave and catch the band. I have to admit this was one of the first times I had been to the casino, one sober, and two that early in the evening. Normally I am fueled with alcohol and it is 2 in the morning. During dinner I sort of lost time. And I left the casino at 9:50 p.m. This should still get me to the Eastside almost in time, but probably a little late. I was parked in the parking structure on the 5th level. As I was walking the catwalk from the casino to the parking structure. I noticed that the line to get into the parking structure ran from the entrance, down the block and out to Canal Street. Nonetheless I tried to leave. What a joke. I had moved one car space in 20 minutes. Once it was 10:25p.m. I knew I was not going to make it to see Brian's band play so I let one person out of their parking spot and pulled into it. And I ended up going back into the casino and playing bingo. But that parking structure. What an absolute joke. 20 minutes and I had moved 5 feet. So I am sorry Brian for not making it. I will be there next time. Sunday, I managed to get myself out of bed nice and early at 10:30 a.m. After going to church I went to the health club to work out. Alright I didn't go to church, but I did somehow make it to work out. Sunday afternoon, I had my uncle Eddie's Retirement party in Germantown. I guess the highlight of the afternoon came with the entertainment. My aunt had hired a clown to entertain all of the grandkids. And he wasn't too bad. Although I think I could have been given him a bit of a run for his money in the juggling department. Anyhow throughout his act he was pulling the kids up to join him and help him with magic acts. I must have been a little too close while I was taking pictures, because somehow "Zappo the Clown" summoned me to help him with the tied scarf trick. I tried to ham it up with him as best as I could. Before the clown left, he tied balloon animals for the kids. However, after he left, some of the animals came undone. But to the rescue came my brother, Jon. We now call him Johnny Balloon Animal. I thought I would share some of the pictures of the weekend.

Lindsey in here game. She made one basket, got hit in the head with the ball once, and nearly got hit in the head with the ball twice. She must get her court awareness from her Uncle Dan.
Me and Zappo the Clown

Me and Zappo the Clown, hugging it out.
Johnny Balloon Animal

I really don’t know who everyone is in my readership. I have done some checking via my site meter, which is found at the very bottom of this page. You may click on it to check it out. So have had my blog up since August and I have had 365 visitors to the site to check out what I have been up to. If you go to the site meter you can also do a search by location. I am happy to say that I am international with hits coming from Canada, Ireland and Great Britain. Although I am guessing those hits might have been on accident. Anyhow I appreciate everyone who checks in. I think the rumor mill has but turning in the area, so I thought I would make the big announcement. One week from today is my final day of work here at the DOT. And starting on Feb 13th I will begin a new job with a company by the name of URS Corporation. Check out the link. I scheduled to be in the Milwaukee office until late summer / early fall. At which time I slotted to be moving up to Prescott, Wisconsin. I will be the Project Engineer on a rehabilitation of a movable / rolling bridge which crosses the St. Croix River. It is a temporary move up to Prescott, only for 6 to 9 months. So that is the latest. Oh and Wednesday night my soccer team broke out of our 5 game losing streak with a 5-1 win. In the process of the win, I once again dislocated my shoulder. It was pretty pathetic after the game. I came home and I grabbed a shower. I was lying in bed with an ice pack on my shoulder and a heating pad on my back. And if I had another ice pack I would have put that on my ankle. I felt like I was much older than I actually am.

Resale Value

In my continuing effort to lower the resale value of my house, I have yet again made a home improvement. Admittedly this is a minor home improvement. But I had some left over paint. And some time on my hands so I figured why not. Last week I called in sick and I started laying out and painting the floor in my utility room / work shop in the basement. I put in chevrons on the floor leading a path to the washer and dryer. Why I don’t know? Maybe so that in the event that if I ever get married and the Mrs. starts to get on my nerves, I can tell here to go downstairs, follow the arrows and get to work. Please reference the below before and after photos and let me know what you think. Was it a good idea or a bad idea? I have a feeling that I will get the normal reaction I get from people when I do something like this. “It is pretty cool, but I wouldn’t do it in my house.”

Law Application

When I got home this afternoon from work, I checked my mail. In my mail, I found a letter from the Wisconsin Board of Bar Examiners. Apparently my friend, Dave “The General” Stegall has listed me as a reference in his application. I would like to share with all of you some of the questions and my answers to those questions. I would like to make it known, that I do not like lawyers. However, I do take our Judicial System very seriously. With my disclaimer out of the way allow me to begin.

Are you related to the applicant? No, and I thank God everyday for that.

How many years have you know that applicant? 15 of the longest years anyone has ever known.

In what context have you known that applicant? We met in Alcoholics Anonymous and just recently we both registered as Sex Offenders.

From you personal knowledge, do you believe the applicant’s reputation for honest, trustworthiness, diligence, and reliability to be good? If you mean by reliability, you mean never answering his cell phone, or calling you back when he says he will, then yes. But I have a feeling that you don’t. So I would call that a big no. Maybe I should use capital letters. NO.

Do you believe that the applicant possesses good character? Good character? Anthony Hopkins played Hannibal Lector and that was a good character. Sure, Dave has good character.

Do you sincerely and unequivocally recommend the applicant for admission to practice law? Unequivocally? Wow, that is a big word; this is definitely a law application, either that or an insurance policy. I tell you what, I give you my most noninsincere and my least antiunequivocal advisement for the applicant to chase as many ambulances as he wishes.

Has the applicant ever been discharged from employment or asked to resign from employment? I know that he worked for all of one day as a security guard at Menard’s, the reasoning for his dismissal have yet to be released to me. He was also a bouncer at a bar in Oshkosh called the Bubbler. He was able to hold down that job for nearly a week. And three people got beat up in the bar while he was on duty, not to mention the mass number of underage patrons that he allowed to enter the premise.

Has the applicant ever engaged in fraudulent or deceitful conduct? I would consider magic and the art of illusion to be both fraudulent and deceitful conduct. So that being the case, and knowing that Dave dabbles in magic and probably some witchcraft, he does have two cats, I would have to answer with a “Yes”.

Has the applicant ever misused or abused drugs or alcohol? I have never known the applicant to be around drugs and/or alcohol without misusing them and/or abusing them.

Has the applicant ever used illegal drugs? Can I use the back of the page to name them all?

Has the applicant ever displayed and indications that he or she may lack the mental fitness to hold a professional license? He is morbidly obese with respect to mental, physical, emotional and social fitness.

Are there any issues other than those listed above that you believe may be relevant to our investigation. Yeah, how about the time in the army, when he was posted in the Middle East and he decided to address his entire platoon wearing nothing more than his helmet, his boots and a smile.

Dave, I am sure that you will be reading this sooner or later. I suggest you give me a call and we can work on our lies together and maybe revise some of my answers.

Europe Pictures

I was going through my Europe pictures after having told my Germany story. And I ran across some good photos. So I thought I would post them so you could check them out. These are all from late summer 1999. It is pretty amazing, that was 7 years ago. I can't believe how thin I look in these pictures. As I recall, I went over there right after I finished a triathlon, so I was in pretty good shape. I also didn't like much of the food over there and lost a lot of weight. I was right around 185 pounds when I came back. Maybe I need to go back over there.

This is a picture I got with a band that was playing in a bar. The town was called Hellevoetsluis.

Here is a picture I got the following morning in Hellevoetsluis, I am not sure if you can tell or not but I am way hung over.

Here I am in front of the main strip in Eindhoven. There were probably 30 some bars on the street behind me.

Here I am with some of the local ladies in Eindhoven.

This one is from Brussels. The thing behind me is from the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels. I believe it is called the Atomium, and it suppose to be the model of an iron crystal. At least according to the research I have done.

Here is a picture of me and a Castle in Luxembourg.

Here is me in Paris with a Tour Bus that I would love to get on some day.

Here is me with the Eiffel Tower.

And me in the middle of the Champs Elysees.

I will try to dig up some other old photos from my travels, since lately the best picture that I can find are of dead mice.

International Diplomacy

Towards the end of summer in the year 1999, while working for Merge Technologies, I was sent to Europe for a month and a half. One of the project managers from Merge, Jeff, came over there for a week while I was already there and he and I had to do a presentation at Philips world headquarters (Headquarters, good move) in Hamburg, Germany. The computers that we were doing the presentation on had to have the latest and greatest software installed on them before the presentation. Unknown to me, there was a small bug in the software. The night before the presentation I loaded the new software on the computers and then rebooted them as is the normal procedure. But when the computers came back up, the screens were blank and nothing worked, they were locked up tighter than a chastity belt on prom night. I stayed up all night trying to figure out a way to bypass the bug with no such luck. In the morning at breakfast Jeff asked me how things were going and I told him it wasn’t good. I told him he might want to start working on his excuses. I remember having the computers all set up two and a half hours before the presentation without a single one of them working. Jeff came into the room and asked me how it is going. I said “No problem, I will have this fixed in plenty of time.” We also had one of our German salespersons, Peter, with us on that presentation as well. He would check in on me every five minutes as well, which didn’t help and only got on my nerves. In the end, I made a number of feverous phone calls back to the U.S. just as people were getting into the office and with their help and with really no time to spare I got all of the computers up and running for the presentation. I would call this a mild miracle. The presentation was a success. Because of the success of the presentation, I know that Peter got a huge sale, as memory serves me it was in the neighborhood of a couple hundred thousand dollars. I never had a full understanding of our sales persons pay structure, but I know that he made a big chunk of change on this little trip to Siemens, and most of it was due to my hard work especially since I was given software with a major bug in it that I found and fixed. Let’s see how much Peter would have made if those screens were all blank during that presentation. Leaving Siemens I was the one driving the three of us back to our hotel. And I was in a good mood because I got everything to work. I have always considered myself rather savvy when it comes to directions and navigating myself around a city. Granted I have had a lot of experience. As I was driving, Peter kept telling me where to go. And I knew where I was going, so I finally said to him “Relax! I know where I am going.” To which Peter replied, “You Americans are all alike. You think you know everything.” Excuse me. Over the next couple of minutes Peter, who just made a butt load of cash because of me, and I got into a semi heated political debate. Most of what he had to say was slamming the United States. I distinctly recall Peter making the statement “America sticks its nose into everyone else’s business.” Well I had just about had it with Peter going off on my country so I replied back. “You shouldn’t be mad at the United States. Do you know who you should be mad at?” Peter replied, “No. Who?” I said, “The Japanese.” Peter confusingly asked, “Why?” I said, “Because if the Japanese wouldn’t have bombed Pearl Harbor, we wouldn’t have had to come over here and kick the crap out of you guys.” That shut Peter up pretty quick. Shortly after that statement, I glanced in the review mirror and noticed that Jeff was in that back seat and he had a look on his face that was half way between under shock and laughter. That night we all went out for a drink. We ended up heading down to the Red Light District in Hamburg. I was still a little ticked off at Peter, so as were going around town, Peter would give us a bit of a history lesson. At one point he explained how one particular area was absolutely leveled in World War II. To which I replied “Boy we really bombed the shit out of you guys.” Peter also was a little irritated with me because I was taking pictures of some of the prostitutes. Apparently that is frowned upon but I told Peter “Hey, if they want to come down to where I work and take pictures, that is fine with me.” The next morning we dropped Peter off at the train station and Jeff and I headed back to our European office in Holland. On the drive Jeff told me how much he enjoyed watching me frustrate Peter but that Peter couldn’t say anything since we just scored him a major sale.

Fake I.D.

February 19th, 1994

When I was in college I used to make quite a few trips up to Oshkosh. In fact, years later when I was at a wedding I ran into a girl who I had run into up in Oshkosh. She swore that I went to the school because she saw me up there so often. This story stems from my Oshkosh Days and also has to deal with my fake ID. Unfortunately there needs to be a little more set up with this story. When I was 19, I finally convinced my older brother, Dan, to give me his ID. I can still recall the day that I got it from him. I had been hounding him for weeks for him to give it to me. He had stopped by my old place in Milwaukee, 2864 N. Cramer Street. By there are some memories there. I recall that Dan was a little short on money at the time and I actually had to pay him for the I.D. I think I paid him $20, but I also recall that at that time he owed me $40. But I wanted the I.D. so bad that I gave him the money. I wasn’t really all that sure how well the I.D. would work for me since Dan was 24 years old. But I had used it all over Milwaukee and never had a problem. I would buy half barrels at the liquor store down the street with out a problem. So after a couple weeks I was very confident with the I.D. On this particular weekend I was once again up in Oshkosh visiting Matt Kaker. Krum had also come into town on this weekend down from Minnesota. Krum had just paid for a fake I.D. himself. Although he had taken his I.D. to a person who cut the numbers in the license number and the date and rearranged them so that it appeared that he was 21. Some of your friends who lived at the “Soccer House” (because it was all soccer players to lived there) were throwing a party that night. We were at that party for a while and then we hit the Oshkosh bars. First we went to The Bubbler and then we headed to Molly’s. Some how we got a little split up on the way to Molly’s and Paul and I walked in together. The bouncers stopped us both as they claimed that our I.D.s were fake. All of my friends were already inside and I had my beer muscles going, so I put up a pretty big stink about them not letting us in. The bouncer said to me, “There is no way that this is you. You have two choices, you can leave or we can call the cops.” I said “That is me so you better call the cops.” Krum and I are sitting on a bench just inside the doorway waiting for the cops to come. In the meantime, Kaker comes up to us and asks us what is going on. I tell him the situation and not to worry. As we are waiting Krum starts to crack under the pressure. Krum goes up to the bouncer and admits that his I.D. is fake and just asks for it back and wants to leave or he if can’t have his I.D. back if he can just leave. The bouncer doesn’t give in to either request. I of course with my liquid courage am sticking tight to my story. Finally the cops show up. The bouncer give him the situation that they are fake I.D.s and that Paul has already said that his was fake. The cop looks at my I.D. asks me my name and address, I told him. He gave the I.D. back to me and said, “Have a good time.” I shoot the bouncer an “I told you so” look and Kaker was standing right there with a drink in his hand just waiting for me. Unfortunately for Krum he wasn’t quite as lucky. Since he had confessed that it was cut he ended up getting a ticket. It is too bad, because if Paul had kept his mouth shut he would have got in. After knowing that it was cut, they still had to look at it really close to see that it was cut. The cops hauled Paul out of Molly’s and into the cop car waiting outside. I felt kind of bad, so I left the bar and walked outside because I wanted to see what was going to happen to Krum. I walked right down the sidewalk and past the car with Paul sitting in the back seat. I headed down the street a half a block and waited for Paul to get his ticket. Krum was pretty mad, but he had just kept his mouth shut everything would have been fine. A good gangster, Krum would not make.

Weekend Update

Well I would like to tell you that I had an entertaining weekend. But all I really did was work on my garage. I don't know why I do these things. I get an idea in my head and I run with it. I don't actually spend that much time in my garage, my long term plan is to eventually put a ping pong table in there and maybe a couch. But I will still make it so that their is room to park a car. I know I am probably dreaming but I do have it all planned out in my head. And if I ever get around to building a shed, I will put all of the things that normally in a garage in the shed and the garage will turn into a little rec room. Being that I am always about the music, I needed to upgrade the sound system in my garage, up until now I had been getting by with an old boom box, that actually was thrown out by my old roommate, Andy at least 4 or 5 years ago. I literally pulled it out of the garbage. Saturday afternoon I made a trip to Wal-Mart and picked up some car stereo speakers. I thought that they would look kind of cool mounted into the walls of the garage. I also did a little rewiring of the garage so that I don't have to turn on the black lights and strobe lights manually. They are now both wired to two separate switches on the wall. As I have been told in the past I might just have a little too much time on my hands. But as I have also been told in the past "Idle hands are the Devil's workshop". I believe that I have posted pictures of my garage in that past. But here is another one. Let me see what else. Saturday night I went to the Bucks game with my brother, Dan. That was a good time even though the Bucks lost. They really put on a poor showing. But afterwards we went to a couple bars and I was home by midnight. When I got home I went to the kitchen to get something to drink and I heard something moving around behind my breakfast bar. I walked around to look and there was a mouse cruising across the floor. I think mice are pretty disgusting. I set up a mouse trap right away and when I woke up this morning and checked out the trap. Sure enough that little stinker couldn't keep away from that peanut butter. So here is a picture of that little guy. I made a shocking discovery Saturday night. After setting up the mouse trap I settled in to watch a little TV before retiring for the evening, and I was tuned into Comedy Central. They were playing Dave Chappelle's stand up act. And to my dismay, they didn't edit it at all. They left in every "F", "S", "GD", "MF", "C" and "B" Bomb that they could. I couldn't believe leave it. So it is noon on Sunday and I am going to settle in for some football, and tomorrow I will be paying my respects to Martin Luther King Jr. therefore I will not be reporting to work. I appreciate you reading this far, because this entire posting is pure drivel. I will try to come up with some better material in the future.

Don't Judge A Book By It's Cover

Today’s new word is humility. Humility it is a noun who’s meaning is: the quality or state of being humble in spirit: freedom from pride or arrogance. Last night my soccer team had its first game for this session. We moved leagues from the Over 30 Rec League to the Over 30 Competitive League. This seemed to make sense since we have pretty much dominated the Rec League over the last 3 years. I would guess that our record in that time is somewhere in the area of 70 wins and 5 losses. We would routinely hang 10 or more goals on our opponents. Before our game I was kicking the ball around with The General, and I noticed this older gentleman, I will venture a guess he was in his mid 40’s, in the corner by himself jumping rope. I found this a little odd as I had never seen this before and I even made mention of this to The General. “Hey Dave, Did you see that guy jumping rope? What is the deal with him? Do you think he is in Ice Cream? (See Previous Blog Entry)” In the minutes before our game we were out on the field warming up, and taking a couple shots on goal. As I had all of my life, before any soccer game, I would always take a look at the opponent warming up across the field to size them up and gauge how tough of an opponent they would be. As a kid, I would always look for he kid who was wearing jeans, or one that had his shin guards on the outside of his socks, or worse yet wearing jeans with the shin guard on the outside of the jeans. These were normally easy tells that you could dominate the player and team with out a problem. Of course at this age and level of play you probably will not be seeing any of these conditions. But in looking at the other team, they didn’t look like all that much to me. There were a handful of guys who appeared to be a good 15 to 20 pounds over their ideal playing weight. More than half of the team was sporting not just a little gray hair, but most of their hair was gray. And probably the grayest of the heads belonged to my buddy who was jumping rope prior to the game. I would guess their average age was around 37 or higher. My team overall appears to be in pretty good physical condition, and our average age is around 33 including 2 illegal players who are under 30. By the end of the game we had been thoroughly dominated in every phase of the game. We lost 8-5. Absolute humility. My friend, Mr. Jump Rope, he only managed to net a hat trick and a couple of assists. He had one goal that was a one touch to the far upper corner, all of this was done while I was guarding him. And I didn’t think I was doing all that poor of a job guarding him as I had a fist full of his jersey when he scored. It wasn’t a soccer game, it was a lesson. I laid in bed last night, telling myself that I need to change my ways. I need to do things better, I need to get myself in better shape, I need to turn my life in a new direction. Well not surprising to any of you, I over slept and was 15 minutes late to work this morning. So much for my new ways. Don’t worry about me, I am not suicidal or anything. I am just a little depressed. Maybe it is the fact that I haven’t seen the sun in 3 weeks that has gotten me down a little bit. Still lamenting the evening before and the path I have chosen in life this morning, I climbed into my truck and I thought to myself, life could be worse. What if I didn’t have a garage door opener? Having to manually open my garage door would have really bothered me on this bone chilling Wisconsin winter morning. Or what if I didn’t have a garage at all. At least I am not one of those poor humps that had to run around their cars this morning scraping windows. I apologize to any of you who are one of those humps who had to scrape their windows this morning. But it is you who I used to cheer myself up this morning.

"I Am In Ice Cream"

I have this story occurring in the summer of 1995. But I could be wrong.

I was out on a Friday or Saturday night with The General and Preston. My older brother, Dan was also out that night and I told him that we would meet up with him. We all ended up at Sharkey's, a bar in Waukesha. This bar is well known for all of its pool tables. Dan is playing pool, and as it is par for the course, I am not good enough to be his partner, so The General, Preston and I are just drinking and watching from the bar. As is normally the case, Minnesota Fats (That being Dan) and his partner beat these two clowns that they were playing against. For the record, Dan is actually a very good pool player. Although in the past I have beaten him before. Anyhow one of the clowns that Dan beat in this game, I will call him, Bill, for the story’s sake. Bill is either rather impressed by Dan’s play, or is a bit on the fruity side and just impressed with Dan. Dan is standing and talking to us at the bar when Bill comes in and introduces himself and starts talking to Dan. Bill from what I remember didn’t seem all together when I saw him, actually I thought that he looked like he just come from watching a Whitesnake concert, and I would know because I have been to a Whitesnake concert. And as I recall the conversation which happened right in front of us went something like this:
Bill: “Hi. I am Bill. That was some nice shooting.”
Dan: “Thanks. I am Dan.”
Bill: “So what is your story?”
Dan: Taken back a bit by the question “What are you talking about?”
Bill: “I mean what do you do?”
Dan: “I am a tree trimmer, I work for Wright Tree Service.”
Bill: “That is cool.”
At this point there is a bit of an uncomfortable silence in the conversation. Me, I am as comfortable as can be watching this guy apparently hit on my brother. I am finding all of this very amusing. Finally Dan takes the bait in this lull in the conversation and replies.
Dan: “So what is your story?”
Bill: “Oh I am kicking ass.”
Oh he is kicking ass, I am thinking he is a mechanic with his own shop or maybe a banker who is just taking it easy on a weekend.
Dan: “Kicking Ass? Really? How is that?”
Bill: “I am in Ice Cream.”
Dan: “Ice Cream? Good for you.”
Dan goes back to the next game of pool. At this point is where The General, Preston and I begin the interrogation of Bill. Does he make ice cream, or deliver it? Which is a better seller, “Push-Ups” or “Ice Cream Sandwiches”? Eventually The General and Bill got into quite the little discussion as Bill was once part of our armed forces. But I will never forget the guy who was in ice cream and kicking ass.

Word For The Day

Today's word is "Pathetic". It is an adjective who's meaning is that which evokes tenderness, pity and/or sorrow. Yesterday afternoon I was feeling a bit hungry so I took a look in the old refrigerator and this is what I found.

If you look closely, all you will see are condiments, a carton of eggs, 8 water bottles and two bagels. The pitcher of water and the leftovers on the top right shelf, they all belong to my roommate, Jim, who moved out at the beginning of last month. I defy anyone who isn't cleaning their refrigerator to come up with a more pathetic array of food. However, I would like to state that my collection of condiments is rather impressive. Also I do not have any food that is rotten or moldy in there. Although I am guessing some of Jim's stuff is getting close.

If you want to see something even more pathetic, let's take a look at my refrigerator in the basement. You guessed it all beer.

And lastly you can see exactly how pathetic my life has become as this is the topic of my blog today. I am talking about the state of my refrigerators. I have to dig up some old stories and fast.

From the Archives

With this wonderful winter weather we are having, I thought I would replay one of my favorite winter stories.

January 1st, 2005

Friday night after finishing up a rough day slaving away protecting the interests of the public as they drive on our state highways, I was just lounging around the house playing video games. I know real mature. Nate called me around 4:30 asking me if I want to go out for a happy hour. I asked him, “Well, how happy do you want to get?” Nate said just a couple drinks. Shortly after that call, Jay called me and told me that his wife had to work that night and he was looking to get into some trouble. I asked him, “Well, how much trouble do you want to get into?” Nate and Jay both stopped over and we had a beer or two. Then we went to Shepards in Wauwatosa and thought it would be a good idea to have a couple pitchers, some pizza, and play some Golden Tee. Around 8 or 9 that night the snow really started coming down. I had the brainstorm to go sledding that night. In fact I had been thinking about getting some sledding in that night since I had heard earlier in the day that we were supposed to get dumped on. It was around midnight when the three of us decided to get out of the bar and get ready to go sledding. Nate drove home, Jay and I went to Jay’s place where he changed and then we picked up Nate. Once we got back to my house, I got ready and then I grabbed some rope and looped it around one of the tie downs in the bed of my truck and then tied the two ends each to a sled. For the next half hour to 45 minutes I developed quite the racetrack around 2 or three blocks in my subdivision, at times hitting 40 m.p.h, all of this with Nate and Jay in tow behind in sleds. When we stopped, Nate and Jay were just coved with snow from head to toe. Then looked like Luke Skywalker when he got stuck out in the snow on a ton-ton in the Empire Strikes Back. Nate took over the driving, I told him, just be careful and don’t hit any curbs. Nate was a little more adventurous in his driving than I was. We started by my house, then Nate found the Honeycreek Parkway. He took that until we crossed Bluemound, then down Wisconsin Avenue to 76th street. And we went to cross 76th street again, Nate noticed it was too late to stop so we ran a red light. We circled around my house a little more, then hit the parkway again, which we took all the way down in to Tosa. Upon turning around and heading back up the park way, we passed a Volkswagon wagon just struggling to get up the hill, and the passengers decided it would be fun to yell expletives at us. On the way back to my house, not only did Nate nail a curb, but then I nailed it with the sled as I followed. Good driving buddy. But the Toyota held up and the steering is still in alignment. We decided to call it quits on the sledding around 3:30 a.m. And I was ready to call it a night, but then Nate said, why don’t you guys stop by and jump in the hot tub. After about an hour in the hot tub I was starting to fall asleep, I told them that was it and I got home and was finally in bed by 5 in the morning. A good time was had by all, however both Nate and Jay’s significant others wouldn’t quite agree. I believe Michel started talking to Nate again couple days later.

We Have a Winner

The Survivor League is over and the winner is my brother in law's friend, Todd. After 12 weeks of battling, he won out. Todd's Bucaneers won and my uncle's Cowboys lost. Todd, I will get the $85 to my brother in law and it will be up to you to get it from him. I do still have three people on the dead beat list, Ray and Fish from this league and Spider from the last one. But I fear not. We are three short months away from the next gambling endeavor and I keep track. So make sure you tune back in to get updates for the NCAA tournament pool. And lastly, we will have to say good bye to those lovely cheerleaders for 8 months. But they will be back next year.

New Years Resolution

I don't know that I have ever really made a serious New Years Resolution. I always tell myself that I want to get in better shape but who doesn't. Last year, I sort of made one in February. After a trip to BW3's on MLK Day and a rough go around with the toilet for a day or two, I swore off Buffalo Wings. It has been almost a year and I have stuck with it. Other than once again trying to get myself into better shape, I have come up with two New Years Resolutions.

This year, one of my resolutions is to stay away from fast food. As of right now, I am off Taco Bell, Burger King and McDonalds (that is going to be tough around breakfast time).

My second resolution stems from one of my biggest pet peaves. Cell phones. I don't have one. I don't want one. I really don't think that I am that important of a person. Plus, do I really want people to be able to get a hold of me whenever and wherever. Sure cell phones are handy especially if you are trying to meet up with people, but I was able to meet up with people before their were cell phones. A little prior planning and things should work out. At work, I was required to have a cell phone on the job, and I literally had it in my hand all day. I always answered it when it rang. I feel that if I call someone on their cell phone and they don't answer, that they are just looking at their phone and seeing my name pop up and thinking to themselves, I don't want to talk to this loser. That is a hit to my self esteem. This brings me to my resolution. I am boycotting the biggest offender I know of not answering their cell phone. Dave Stegall you are out. It will be a long time before you recieve a phone call from me.

I ask you as my friends and readers to help me with my resolutions and to call me on them. So when you see or talk to me just ask me, "When was the last time you were at Taco Bell?" or "How is Stegall doing?" Thanks for you help.

Where Were You At Midnight?

For whatever reason I decided that this should be my first New Years in 11, I mean 17 years with out alcohol. And I was successful. I went skiing at Cascade Mountain, they had a special with the hill open from 11:00 p.m. until 4:00 a.m. I invited a bunch of people, and to her credit, Liz, is the only one who actually made the trip. Liz has always been a trooper. And skiing was fun. A bigger group would have made it a little bit better. But my goal with New Years was just to get some skiing in. Where was I at midnight? I was at Cascade Mountain, I had just finished a mogul run. And I was at the bottom waiting for Liz as she slid down the run. Please note from the picture that Liz does not have her skis on, as she is sliding down the hill. I would also like to mention that I told her that I would follow her, and she insisted that I lead. I didn't know it was a mogul run. And once we realized it, I told her to cut across to one of the adjacent runs, but she didn't. So that is the question I ask you my loyal blog readers. Where were you at midnight? That means actually reply and write something.