Hobbies....

Wine and Cheese.
I love wine and cheese. Once upon a time I thought I would read up on these subjects and become an aficionado. Negative. Didn't happen. I just don't have the patience to do it or maybe the interest really isn't that great. Also, why. Why do it when there are all these experts around at the specialty shops to guide me in the right direction. I guess if I really loved it then it could become a hobby. The hobby I'm hoping and striving to get back into is photography. I just have to remember to bring that little camera with me wherever I go. I set a goal for myself at the beginning of this year to take "serious" pictures at least once per week (hasn't been achieved yet). If I did this and showed that I was serious then I could justify upgrading to a "real" 35mm digital camera. The little one I have is a lot of fun but it just doesn't give me the control that a more professional camera would, like my old Canon AE1. But there is no going back to film digital is just to great.

The Kid and I are going to work on building a toy box for her school. There's another great hobby for me: woodworking. I love it. It's all about time and commitment with these hobbies. I've got to commit damn it (I'm starting to feel like the boy who cried wolf when it comes to this stuff, all talk no action)

NCAA

I love the NCAA hoops tournament but it's not so big out here. I tried to get a pool going a work and got little interest. I'm going to check out if any games are on right now.

The Kid and I are hitting the slopes on Sunday. Should be fun.

44-22-38 (HS)
7-21-36 (JR HS)
15-35-15 (JR HS)

Those numbers are the combinations to my HS locker, JR HS locker and JR HS gym locker. I was so paranoid of not remembering those numbers I devised a scheme to help me memorize them. Every Sunday while I waited in line for communion at church I would run the combination over and over in my head right up until the point I said amen. It's been a while since I've received holy communion but I do recall that I went on auto pilot and started repeating my HS combination at Christmas mass with M & D sometime in the recent past.

Smelly little golf ball.

Probably around the same year as the ear wax incident I coughed up what looked like a tiny little golf ball but a bit more off white in color. Maybe about two and a half peas in size. I smooshed it between my fingers. What ever it was smooshed with a consistency somewhere between peanut butter cookie dough and mashed potatoes. I can't remember if this happened around the same time as some illness or not. It smelled really bad too.

The first thing I can ever remember stealing was a match box car from my friend Jon Whitney. We were lying on his floor playing with cars and somehow I was able to grab the car I wanted with my toes, transfer it to my hand and into my pants pocket. I had exactly the same car at home. Why did I need to steal his. For years to come I'd see that car and think "I stole that from Jon Whitney, why?" I seem to recall seeing that car around well into my high school years, probably every time I had to clean my room I'd come across it.

More Bologna...

The CEO noticed that the Blog about Bologna solicited some nice inputs but the one about the president and our schools...nothing. Conclusion: The people want Bologna.

OK!

I was a sophomore in HS and sitting in geometry class when I stuck my finger in my right ear and my fingernail scraped something deep inside. Something it had never scraped before. I was obsessed. I couldn't figure out what is was even with my finger probing the area an unnatural amount of time. When I got home I took a pair of tweezers reached inside my ear and pulled out a wondrously big piece of hard wax, probably the size of a pea. Then sensation was fantastic.

Next Blog: I cough up what looks like a pea sized golf ball.

It seems that Bush just has way too much time left in office. I mean this guy has got to go. The problem I have is that he is leaving such a mess that who ever takes over is going to be in a world of hurt trying to straighten things out. And another thing if we can spend so much on the war in Iraq can we spend more on education. Why should our schools be hurting like they are, this is ridiculous.

"-Question:
How much money does the U.S. spend on public elementary and secondary schools?
-Response:
Total expenditures for public education, including school construction, debt financing, community services, and adult education programs, came to $455 billion."
-The National Center for Education Statistics

"The War In Iraq Costs

$245,856,530,66

Instead, we could have provided
11,918,583 students four-year scholarships at public universities."
-National Priorities Project

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http://big.gouda.googlepages.com/home