Bite Me

Now is a fangtastic time to be a vampire in America!

I know it’s been over a month since my last post, but I’ve been caught up in the biggest blood sucking buzz since the West Nile Virus! Unless you’ve been living like a vampire bat in a cave within the last year, you are surely well aware of the “rise” of the living dead. Vampires have gone POP and there’s no stopping them from sucking your wallet dry!

You know what I’m talking about – True Twilight. The girls go crazy for Edward Compton, the lovable yet mysterious vamp whose heart no longer beats yet belongs to Sookie Swan. They met in Forks, Louisiana and plan to get married. But will their love be accepted by Jacob Black and Jason Stackhouse? And what about the threat posed by the red-headed queen, Victoria? She wants to sell Sookie’s blood! Hopefully Sam and Jacob can turn into wolves and attack the queen when she least expects it.

Only time will tell. We’ll just have to watch the third season movie.

Lost in the Library

I think I was taught how to use the library about a dozen or so times throughout my life. And I think three of those instances happened while in college.

I know it goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. The library sure has changed over the years. Remember the Dewey Decimal System? (Is that system still in use?) Now, everything’s on a server somewhere and I can only imagine how it sent librarians into a tizzy around the late 90s.

Now that I’m no longer in school, I hardly visit the library. But I was given the opportunity to visit a library in Stowe, Ohio a couple of weeks ago with our friends Kristen, Scott and their four kids. It was a double-promo day. Not only was it “Free Comic Book Saturday” it was also “Walk Around the Parking Lot to Look and Touch a Bunch of Different Vehicles Day.” It was cool to see the kids playing around the parked UPS truck, fire truck, police car and book mobile.

After the kids finished playing with the vehicles, we took them into the library and to the children’s section upstairs to see a bunch of books on display featuring cars, trucks and vehicles that had faces, eyes and human challenges. It was well done!

I think we spent a couple hours in that section piecing together puzzles, playing with the kids and discovering a whole other world. It was a lot of fun – at least for me. It reminded me of the days I used to spend downstairs in the Carnegie Library in Beechview. Those were some of the best times of my life. It was Christmas with every visit.

But after that afternoon with the kids in Stowe, I realized the library is more than just a place to borrow books and do research. It’s a community center. It’s a family center.

The trucks and cars were long gone by the time we left, but we left with a new appreciation for the library and its services. I’m going to make it a point to promote the library more often. And I know a few Pittsburgh neighborhood libraries have been struggling lately, but we as individuals must do what we can to support the library and its programs because a town without a library is… well, it’s not really a town at all.

My First Time

I have to admit – I was nervous at first. But I knew it was something I just had to experience. Sure, I felt uncomfortable doing it in front of everyone, but this was a good opportunity… especially since it was free.

I would occasionally see other people doing it. Sometimes it was in a shopping mall or in a storefront. Yes, it was odd to see people doing it in public (especially since I thought it was more of a personal thing), but I was still very curious. “What does it feel like?” I would ask myself.

Well, I never thought my first time would happen while I was at work. But like I said, it was free and, well, the opportunity was a no-brainer.

I always wanted a girl; don’t ask why. Perhaps I would feel better if a woman did it. I think a guy would be too awkward for me. Luckily, a girl was there – and she was well-experience. Sure, my view was obstructed half the time, but it felt really good. It lasted for about 15 minutes and I left feeling very relaxed.

I think the chair massage helped my lower back. Before I left the Health Fair, the chiropractor’s assistants welcomed me to a free screening at the office. They even gave me a pen! (How did they know I like to write?) :-)

A Modest Man

Tonight I visited a funeral home to pay respect to my best friend’s dad who passed away Saturday night following a rollercoaster battle for his health.

Unfortunately I didn’t know the man very well. But he held himself as a modest man with simple tastes. A family man; the kind of man you don’t see much of anymore.

And although Albert Sr. lived simply, he did not simply live. He helped bring three children into the world and raised them as best he could – which is more than I can say for half of the “baby daddies” out there today.

We can learn a lot from Al Sr. Sometimes being “an ordinary man” makes one extraordinary difference.

My Challenge

It's been almost a month since I've posted anything, but it's been very difficult to sit in front of the computer while the weather has been so nice.

But stay tuned because there is more on the way!

Thanks for reading :-)

When It Rains, My Wallet Pours

Before settling into bed on Wednesday night, I used the bathroom in the dark. I flushed the toilet and started to wash my hands. Suddenly, the sound of rushing water grew louder – and it wasn’t coming from the spout. I threw the light switch to find the toilet had become a fountain with water flowing everywhere.

“Help!” I yelled for Laura who was already dozing off. “Water! Everywhere! Coming out!” All I could muster was sentence fragments. There was no time for full or complex sentence sat this point. Every second meant the world.

Laura shot from the bed and ran to the garage for the plunger (a terrible place to keep it, in my opinion). By the time she brought the plunger to me, the water was already a half inch deep on the bathroom floor. I tried to shut the water off at the toilet, but it wasn’t working!

“It’s raining in the basement!” Laura said as she threw the plunger to me. “What?! Raining?!” I stopped trying to turn the water off and ran downstairs to see a steady rain in the basement.
I threw open the door to the closet beneath the stairs and reached for the main water valve. I didn’t know which way to turn it. Righty tighty, lefty loosey? Is that the saying? Huh? What? Where?

“You have to call someone now!” I yell-whine. My eyebrows are floating over my head at this point.
“Who do I call? It’s midnight!”
“They’re 24 hours Laura, you can call whenever!”
“I’m not calling anyone now!”
“You HAVE to!”

This was getting us nowhere, so I tightened the valve to the right and I heard the water shut off. It continued to rain in the basement – but why?

It took a second to realize that the water was leaking from the bathroom floor and into the basement. So I ran into the garage to get the wet/dry vacuum -- forgetting I had left a bunch of dirty water inside for a few months or so. Since Laura’s car was in the garage, I had to lift the vacuum over my head, allowing the rank water to drip onto me (and the car).

I pushed the stupid vacuum up the dumb stairs and into the dim-witted bathroom only to find very little water remaining on the floor. This made sense because all that water was seeping through the floor and into the basement thanks to the worthless grout around the stupid green tile! Stupid, crappy grout job!

In the end, the tiles in the bathroom were looser than ever with more grout coming up, nearly a dozen ceiling tiles in the basement were soaked and needed replaced, and the carpet (along with many of our personal items) were left soaked and slightly stained. Several items had to be thrown away.

And now, I am stuck with the task of replacing the ceiling tile; cutting them into different triangles and lengths. It will be the ultimate test of my “manhood” as I attempt another home improvement project. (Heck, I face a challenge every time I try to apply caulk to the bathtub!)

It’s taken me a long time to admit that I’m not handy simply because I’m embarrassed to admit it. Growing up, my Dad was always useful around the house. He was able to successfully complete anything he attempted – whether it was replacing a bathroom counter, installing a new sink or even mounting a new faucet in the backyard – he was able to do it all. Whenever he started a new project, he would ask me to “help” him. We all knew I was just a flashlight holder, but it was through these projects where Dad taught me how to do things around the house for myself.

Now I have my own home and I know next to nothing about it. Earlier today, I bought a 500 + page book on home improvements and repairs. I browsed through it at the store, admiring its illustrations, diagrams and well designed layout. I just hope I can look beyond the book as a writer and designer and actually apply its lessons.

(This post may evolve into an essay.)

My Sister Lives Online

It seems as though I can no longer contact my sister… unless I sit in front of the computer all day. I try to call just to talk and catch up, but she never answers her phone and rarely returns my messages. I’ve been trying to call for three weeks now with no success. It looks like the only way I’m going to hear from her is if I get one of those all-inclusive mobile devices that cost over a hundred dollars to operate each month.

But this behavior is apparently becoming more the norm. You may experience this yourself when someone on your “friends list” lets you know that there are just way too many blankets filling his or her closet. Or perhaps YOU are the one filling the “walls” with such worthless jabber. Why do we need to know these things?

I’m trying very hard not to simply whine about the lack of communication skills in our society, but I just have to say that if you’re going to write little notes about everything you do and what you’re thinking, then please do so coherently. Please check your spelling. Please check your tenses. Please know the elements of a complete sentence. Without them, you come off as uneducated and, in my opinion, a waste of potential intellect.

Call me old school, but I think friends and nuclear family members should talk on the phone and not wait around for the latest update. Where has the etiquette gone?

And I’m well aware that I’m sharing this information online. Well, it’s just about the only way I have a chance of being “heard” today.