work

So I went back to work this week. I haven't worked my real job since Aug 24th, 2008, due to being TDY, needless to say I had lots to catch up on.

I was overwhelmed at the beginning of the week, they want this, they want that, civilians, joint base, blah blah, need it now. Of course they want all this while one of the dudes is in Texas and the other guy is doing training for a competition. It's going to take me a few weeks to get everything caught up. Plus we have a new commander coming Monday, so he might say I want this and that. Oh and on Friday I get the keys to my new house and the following week the movers come.

The weekend has been nice though. My super BFF wife went and sold a bunch of stuff at the Columbus Flea Market so it's stuff we don't have to move with us. The kids have been normal, so that means not too good and annoying, haha. I love those guys.

Hopefully this week at work will go a little smoother!

Other things I've been up to, is playing 1 vs. 100 on xbox live, picked up Bioshock again - great game. Downloaded Fable for the xbox. I'm reading Violets are Blue by James Patterson. I have a couple of ideas for craft type stuff for the new house when we move. I'm a nerd.

Plain White T's and Puppies

On July 3rd they put together a concert on Ft. Dix with Plain White T's being the main act. Well we like the Plain White T's, so we loaded up the car, bungeed the double stroller to the roof and went to the show. We got there at 6pm, the start of the concert.

All flyers for the event showed two bands playing, some Army band and the Plain White T's. Well, as soon as we arrive some rap group was on. I don't mind rap, but man these guys were not good.

The next band they brought on was some group with four dudes who did cheesy covers of songs and some really terrible dancing. The funny thing is one of the guys microphone wasn't working, so they replaced it. The second one didn't work right away but when it did, they had it turned up louder than the other singers so all you could hear was the one singer and man he was bad, ugh.

The third band was actually good, called the delphonics or delphonic sound - the host said both so I'm not sure - no I'm not talking about the old R&B band. They had a couple of guitarist, a drummer, a trumpeter, two singers -a rapper and a singer- and a DJ. They were pretty good, I tried searching for more info on them but have been unable to locate anything.

Fourth was the Army band. They did covers of popular songs, but they weren't very good.

Finally Plain White T's came on, we've been there for about three hours now, the kids were pretty nuts because they were bored.

The first pwt song starts and Cam said he had to pee. So I walk him over to the port-a-johns. I open the door and he refuses to go in, he said he was scared and wanted to pee at home. I said ok and we went back to sit down. At that time my 9 year old said he had to pee and then Cam said he had to pee too. Back to the port-a-johns we went. Now the area they had the port-a-johns was unlit and it was dark out so even the oldest one was a little leery to enter, but eventually he went. We both tried convincing Cam to use one, we even both stood in a port-a-john, I held the door opened and used the flashlight app on my iPhone to light the way, but Cam still refused. We went and sat down again and Cam started crying about having to pee. So, I spent three hours waiting for Plain White T's and I barely was able to watch them because I was at the port-a-johns located behind the stage. What I did see though was good. They put on a good show and sound good live.

Puppies
My wife has been wanting a puppy and I kept putting it off. We had a dog before but found out later that my 2 year old was allergic, so we got rid of the dog. After research my wife found some hypo-allergenic dogs, usually mixes with poodles are good. She wanted either a goldendoodle or a labradoodle. She found a great deal on a labradoodle, so off on a two hour drive I went to look at the puppies. I looked at all the dogs and immediately saw my favorite, a cute female labradoodle. I paid my fees and off we went on a two hour drive back home. The dog (now named Lola) was rather drooly so I tried wiping her face with a napkin. That was a mistake, she stood up on my passenger seat and threw up all over. I stopped at the nearest rest stop and cleaned it up with tissues - that's all I had. I put her on the floor and started driving again, about 30 minutes later she threw up again. I just drove home in a puke smelling car, I wasn't stopping again. On turns I would bunch up the floor mat so the puke would stay on the passenger side car and not run under my feet. We get home and the kids flipped out, they didn't know about the puppy. My one year old just ran around screaming "puppy" and pointing at her and saying "look!" He's funny.

So now, I have a household of a wife, five boys and a dog.

The Commissary

I'm in the Air Force and do my grocery shopping at the Commissary. Yesterday my wife said we needed to go grocery shopping. I offered my services so it wouldn't be all of us (me, the wife and five boys). It's pretty much an adventure whenever we all go out. My wife said sure I can do the shopping but I had to take our four year old with me. I agreed, got the list and headed out to the commissary with Cam.

Being a wednesday I figured it wouldn't be too busy during the day. Yeah, I was wrong. Where do all these people come from? It's not like McGuire is a big base. They must live around here, but why would you retire in NJ?!? NJ sucks and is expensive!!

For some reason the layout of the store is not logical to me. I had to hunt for items because I couldn't find them. Why wouldn't fruit snacks be with in the aisle marked snacks? Why wouldn't pizza sauce be near the spaghetti sauce? It makes sense to me that they would be near each other. Why wouldn't you put all the varieties of bubba burgers in the same area? Why are french bread pizza and pizza rolls kept in a different aisle than frozen pizzas? Who designs these stores?

So, I'm dealing with a bunch of retirees, a four year old who wants to touch everything and I can't find stuff. Needless to say I wasn't pleased! I hate grocery shopping. I was there for more than an hour. UGH!!

Me vs. the proform elliptical machine.

Back in August 2008, before I went to Iraq, I bought a proform elliptical machine so my wife could exercise while I was gone (it was her idea, so don't think I was forcing her to exercise.). So, the machine arrived and I assembled it in our bedroom. There wasn't much room for it, but we got it to fit.

Well it's now June, I've since returned and now they are moving us to a new house. On saturday, 27 June, they had an open house on one of the new houses. Upon checking the house we realized the only place there'd be room for the elliptical was the garage. We didnt feel like working out in the garage so Bekki put up a post on Craigslist. We received a response and that's when the fun started.

So there I was, standing in my bedroom, looking at the furniture I would have to move in order to get the elliptical out. Needless to say it looked like every single thing in my room was in the way of removing the elliptical (nickname: Satan Machine). I clear the room and pull on the Satan machine. I had forgotten the thing weighed 300lbs, I also forgot that I put it together in the room and it is much bigger assembled than when it's apart. We tried pulling and pushing and twisting and turning but the Satan machine would not make the turn from the bedroom into the hallway. I took off the handles, thinking "hey I'm smart, this should help." Well yeah, apparently I'm not as smart as I think I am and it really made no difference. I lift the thing up on one end and try moving it out that way. Once again, I was outsmarted by a piece of exercise equipment. Eventually I realized if I remove one of the bottom thingamabobs (I'm very technical) it might clear the doorway. Yay! it worked and it's now in my living room. Well having five boys and three of them under five years of age, they like to touch everything. We tried keeping them away but it was an exercise in futility (this happens a lot around here.). Into the car we loaded and went on a road trip in a giant circle until it was time to meet the guy.

The guy shows up and I see that he's driving a Subaru Baja. The Satan machine is six feet long and I told the guy it was huge and might not fit. He said it would fit, so we drag the 300lb machine out the house, down the walkway and up the sidewalk to his car. With the help of a neighbor, we lifted it into the Subaru. It sat precariously on the end of his truck. I watched as he used about 10,000 cargo straps to make the thing stay in his vehicle. I hope he made it home ok. I was just glad that the Satan machine is gone and that will be the last BAEE (Big Ass Exercise Equipment) I put into my house.

Lessons I learned, exercise equipment is heavy. Exercise equipment is smarter than me. I will never have a career as a mover. Also I now have a lot more space in my bedroom, so that's a plus. Oh and I used some of the money I received for the Satan machine to have Chick-Fil-A for dinner, so that was super plus plus.

what this is

This is just an exercise in writing and reflecting on events in my busy life. I am married to my super best friend Bekki and we have five boys. Needless to say things get interesting from time to time. I'll also just post random links and things like that from time to time.