Ron Crumbaker sent me a message asking where I’ve been and
it got me thinking. I have been out of the loop for a while since my Vegas trip.
I’ll get to the stair dilemma in a second.
Where have I been?
Since MMS in Vegas I’ve been on a few camping trips, 2 weeks
in California (one week working at La Costa and one week vacationing), One week
on Cape Cod, Ma (Day trips to Province town and Martha’s Vineyard) and a week
in Chicago. As an aside, we went to
Buddy Guy’s in Chicago and he was actually there signing autographs. Besides
that work is still nuts since we went public. Lots of work to do. So that’s where
I’ve been. Too busy to post to the list. Just trying to get things done. But I
digress….back to the stairs. Don’t try this at home.
I bought a few frozen pies (pizza’s) at the local club store
and was attempting to go to the basement to put the pies in the extra freezer.
I started walking down the steps in the dark. I never turn the lights on. I’ve
lived in this house for 15 years. I know where I’m going…….right. Half way down
the steps I missed one. And then I missed the rest or that’s how I remember it.
I was in flight by then, spun around and landed at the bottom where the stairs
take a right hand turn. That’s when it happened. I landed on the corner of the
banister with my back side. Left cheek to be precise. I’ve never felt that much pain without
actually breaking something. Playing tons of sports as a child and as a young
adult I’ve broken plenty of things. Not quite like Evel Knievel, but enough to
know what pain is. I screamed out as loud as I could which made my Daughter
come running down the stairs. She asked if I was OK. I said NO! Please put away
the pies baby. Wasn’t her fault:) The first day it looked like Mars from afar.
The second day like Mars up close. Now a week later it is completely purple.
THE ENTIRE CHEEK. STOP LAUGHING! I can finally sit down. Every place we ate on
the Cape I had to sit with one cheek on the chair. It made my vacation really
uncomfortable to say the least. Click on the link at the bottom to see pics of
my vacation. No, not the butt pics. Nice ones. I will say this in closing.
Comedy’s hard but does it have to be so painful?
http://s79.photobucket.com/albums/j121/pgonzalez4/Cape%20Cod%202008
So we board finally. Only to find
out just as we’re about to take off that we’ve been delayed another 2
hours at a minimum. It’s for our own safety I guess. They apologize and tell us
to get comfortable (always a bad sign) and that they’re going to show us a
movie. A chick flick no less. I could almost deal with that because it would
put me out for a nap were it not for the two screaming babies behind me. Now
don’t get me wrong, I love kids. I completely understand. It’s just different
when they’re not yours and we’re stuck for hours on end on the tarmac.
So for now my tally is;
3 trips to Chicago in the last 12 months with a combined
total of 12 hours delayed on the tarmac…..and counting…..it ain’t ova!
So I’m sitting here at Logan waiting for a flight to
Chicago. My flight"s been delayed an hour (so far). Surprise!!!! It seems that
everyone but me loves Chicago. No wonder. I’ve never flown in or out of there
without some sort of delay or problem. One time I was on the tarmac for 3 hours
and another delayed a grand total of 6 hours between the tarmac and the
terminal. I talk to people here and they say….”Oh yeah, that always happens”
What? Are you kidding me? I thought it
was just me.
Oh and now United wants and extra $25 for the second bag.
Screw them. I was going to check my MMS 03 bag and carry my MMS08 back pack on but
now both are with me. The 03 black bag with attached back pack will go in the top compartment and the 08 back pack under
the seat in front of me. Oh yeah and it's like 100 degrees in here!
Am I the only one that has more MS luggage than any other
:)? So far I’ve had my tooth paste and shaving cream taken from me (I forgot
because I was supposed to check that bag). Charged $13 for a cheeseburger and fries,
flights been delayed by 1 hour and I almost paid $25 for the extra bag. I haven’t
even left Boston yet. Must check return flight!
So I use Outlook Express for all of
the lists that I belong to so I don’t bog down my Exchange box with a lot of
clutter. Since I sit across from the Exchange guy, I don’t want my name coming
up on any reports about usage. Hence the use of OE.
I recently noticed that Spell Checker
is weird. Weird suggestions, telling me every word is wrong, etc. So I decide
to check it out only to discover that the language is set to French and there
are no other choices. What? Since when? I use my trusty friend Google and
discover that it’s a known problem after installing Office 2007. Who knew? My
only option was to install a 3rd party spell checker. That worked. I guess you can’t test for everything. I’m
sure no one else has Office 2007 and Outlook Express 6.
The mark of a true friend is not
whether or not they’ll buy you a drink when you’re down or even talk to you
when you need to be talked to. The mark of a true friend is whether or not they’ll
go to the store and buy you underwear when you need them. As the story goes……
We were in Las Vegas last week and
it was hot. Although I live by the motto “the hotter the better” it kicks off a
touch of OCD in me. I shower often when it’s hot. 2 or 3 times a day because I
have a thing about my twigs and berries being clean. I know, I’m nuts! A side effect
of this is that you go through underwear quicker than you thought you might. I
started the week with 14 and was almost out of them by day 5 with 3 more to go.
So by the time “Da Don” showed up on Wednesday I was already complaining about
being out of them. So what’s this all about you ask? Ask yourself this. What
would you do for a friend in this situation?
I was sitting in a session when my
phone vibrated. I look and I have a txt from Da Don (Mike Mott) He asks….wait
for it…….What size? I’m thinking OMG, he isn’t. I tell him and he asks Boxers
or briefs? Now I’m beside myself. It was hard to contain myself. So I answer
(for those of you wondering) boxer\briefs (now you know :) He says “OK, I’ll
see you in a bit” Turns out he walked 3 or 4 miles to buy me underwear. They
were $60 for 6 which was interesting but I now had enough for the week. So now
not only does he watch HBO in his underwear with me but he actually buys me the
underwear that I’m wearing when I’m watching HBO. That’s a true friend. I tip
my cap to you Mott. So I ask you……what would you do for a friend?
Soooooo, there’s a guy that rolls with us on these junkets
that we all know and love. He’s a Shrek like fellow. So, since I didn’t get a “disclaimer”
from him about his name he will hence forth be known as “Shrek”
Well, one morning we were entering a breakout room for a
session. There were a few of us there who will remain nameless to protect the innocent. We stroll into the room totally unaware that
our collective lives were about to change forever. We look around trying to
decide where to sit since we were early and had the run of the place. And then
it happened. The unmistakable sound of a bomb being dropped on an unsuspecting town
in the middle of nowhere. Booooooooooooooooooombs
awaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! It could not be taken for anything other than what it was.
It was audible. In fact people that didn’t know us scattered as well. We looked
like cockroaches in a NY deli scattering after the lights went on. We were all
screaming his name. Shrreeeeeeeeeekkkkkkkkkkk! OMG. We were horrified. And yet
it was like a train wreck. We couldn’t stop looking and laughing a nervous
laugh. Like. “Are we going to make it?” We dusted ourselves off and found
seats completely spread out so he couldn’t take us all out with one mighty
blast.
Fast forward to the evenings activities. We were at the
outdoor bar having a few when John G decides that a new breathing technique was in
order. “Breath out he says” We all nod and learn the new way to survive….I mean
breath. We had a sense for when it was about to happen. He seemed to get this
weird look in his eye so we tried warning people. Ben showed up with his Wife.
She didn’t know us so she thought we were “normal” I tried to warn her otherwise.
At one point I mouthed “run away” but
she didn’t heed my warning. And then it hit her. She had this look in her eye
that even I couldn’t explain but one thing is for sure. She “got it” For the
rest of the evening we were like chess pieces being moved around a magic board
with Geppetto as the chess master. And
so the legend of Shrek is born. If you should find yourself next to him at a
fine Las Vegas establishment or anywhere else in the world, pay attention. Don’t
take anything for granted and for crying out loud, kiss your children……
Many of you have seen a jpg of black socks floating around
the OT list. You may have wondered what that was all about. Well I’m here to
tell you.
One night in Vegas I left the bar early to get to bed. The
last thing I remember was getting a meatball sub at 4AM at a Subway shop. It
was good too. Well around 5:30-6AM Mike Mott turned up because he was staying
with me. No HBO this time. Well when he entered the room all of the lights were
on and I was laying spread eagle on the bed in my white tee, drawers and black
socks. My mouth was wide open and he “claims” I was snoring:) Oh, and red sauce
on my chin. Quite the site I’m sure. He should have taken a pic but I’m glad
that he didn’t.
He yelled out “you’re in trouble young man for leaving all
of the lights on and the door wide open!” Somehow I ended up under the covers with socks removed. I didn’t do it……
So I went to a friend’s house for dinner and we got to
talking. The Wife says to her husband “tell Paul about your sleep test.” So her
husband starts…..I went and they hooked me up to some stuff and watched me
sleep. I slept for a solid five hours which is the most I have in years. I’m
thinking, what’s his problem. He can sleep. What I wouldn’t give for a solid 5
hours of sleep. So we continue talking about all sorts of stuff. And then The
Husband says, Hey, why don’t you tell Paul about your sleeping problems. I seem
to be everyone's shrink:)
So she starts….I have “Restless leg syndrome” I wake up
every 5 minutes when my leg twitches. Then her husband says “tell him about the
spider” So she tells us about the time when she saw a spider in the middle of
the night and jumped on top of her husband which caused him to grab the gun and
flashlight and walk through the house cop style. And then he tells us about the
time when she punched him in the face when he was sleeping without even knowing
it. So I say….um, I would pay to see you do that sleep test with your wife in bed
with you! No wonder he can’t sleep. His wife wakes up every 5 minutes and kicks
him or punches him in the face or see’s things in the room causing him to grab
the gun. I can picture him sleeping with one eye open with his hand hovering
over the gun twitching….
We took our Daughter out to dinner last night for her 9th
Birthday. She chose "Naked Fish." It’s a great place with great food and awesome
Cuban music. We gave our name at the front door and were given a pager because
it was a 25 minute wait. We sat for a few minutes when I see a rather huge guy
walk in with a young Lady. He is also told that he’d need to wait to be seated.
He reluctantly decides to go to the bar.
He returns 5 minutes later angry that he has to wait to be
seated. Mind you there are 3 groups of people that were there before him watching
this happen. One of which happens to be
my family on our Daughters Birthday.
That’s when it happened. He actually said, “Do you know
who I am?” My jaw dropped. I almost laughed out loud but I didn’t know if
he was carrying. You never know. He didn’t look quite right. He starts to go on
about being the one that handles all of the Naked Fish’s properties. He now
wants to see the manager. At this point I’m thinking “remain calm” cause I’m
really going to be pissed if this tub of lard gets a seat before us. The
Manager comes out and I hear him explaining that it’s “first come, first serve.”
Now the guy is beside himself. At his
size, half the place was gone!
Finally one of them points to us. They take us to our seats.
As we walk past him I throw a Cheshire cat smile at him. What a piece of sh%t
this guy was.
I tell the guy that seated us that I had never seen anything
like that before, thinking that he was surprised as well, but he says, “nah, we get that
daily.” What……
Earlier
today (I think….) TT boom said “it made me want to sell all of my guitar stuff”
(or something like that) and it got me thinking…..What would make me feel that
way about my Drums? So the search was on….
I found
some JDS! (Jaw dropping shat!)
There’s a
bunch more but I doubt many of you got this far. It was fun looking for this.
So I went to a Celtics game a few days ago. Yeah, I was one of the 16 people there but I digress. After a few drinks one of my associates tells us a story about the last time his Fiancé left the apartment for a long weekend.He had a few of the guys over and one of them, after a few drinks decides that it would be a great idea to get some strippers over for some “entertainment” They all have some laughs and more drinks but then the night came to an end.Not wanting to get caught, he spends hours cleaning the apartment because his Fiancé was returning in the morning. The Fiancé returns the next morning after a long drive and heads straight to the bathroom for obvious reasons.She quickly leaves the bathroom, comes out and screams “what the @&#^ happened here last night?” It turns out that in his cleaning he missed one key bit of evidence. There was glitter everywhere! How many people do you know that where glitter? My friend made up some story that I can’t remember about what actually happened and his girlfriend bought it. I don’t think she did but she moved on anyway. So kids, the moral of the story is……..IF YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE A STRIPPER AT YOUR HOUSE, DON’T FORGET TO CLEAN UP THE GLITTER!
Some guys have all the luck…..
I tripped over an invite to the Red Sox-Yankee game tonight at Fenway Park. The ticket is for a seat in the EMC luxury box. Those are great seats! They’re not the small wooden seats that are throughout Fenway Park. They deliver the drinks and food right to your seat. Not only that but did I mention that it’s for a Red Sox-Yankee game with Kurt Schilling (2-1, 2.84 era) pitching against Andy Pettitte (1-0, 1.50 era).
With the rain we’ve had since I can remember, it will be awesome to be outside on a nice day. This will truly be a nice day……….I think. Ask me again tomorrow morning :)
So, I got a call last Wednesday that my Mother in law had fallen at Fox Woods and broken her hip. My Wife was at a class. She goes to B.U. at night and I didn’t want to pull her out of class to tell her. I sat her down when she got home to tell her, so the saga begins.
My Wife spent Thursday making arrangements for treatment, rehab, etc. Her Mother’s 85 so services that she has had to be notified as well as the post office, etc.
Friday my Wife gets a call from the surgeon telling her that the Cancer had spread and that there were complications. My Wife lets this go on a while before asking, who are we talking about again? My Mother broke her hip. The doc says OMG this isn't your Mothers chart. My Wife was relieved that it was "just" a broken hip.
Friday I go to work and talk to my Wife on and off about traveling to CT. to see her Mother and make further arrangements. Then at 4PM it hits me. I look at my Boss and co-workers and say I’m not feeling well. I feel like I’m going to yack and I don’t want to do it here. So I drive home all the while thinking, don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it. I think for sure that there will be some clean up involved shortly but I make it home without incident. Some time goes by and at 7PM it starts. I’m not going to go into details but let’s just say that I was not as lucky this time. THERE WAS CLEAN UP INVOLVED. I could not get warm enough. I was fully dressed with four comforters on me and I was still shaking like a leaf. I was sick for two days. I lived on saltines and ginger ale. The funny thing about it is that I lost 15 pounds over the weekend. All water so I’m sure most will come back. I slept sitting up on and off till Monday morning.
But back to my Mother in law. She needed to be moved to a rehab center after they repaired her fractured hip. The ambulance company wanted $1000 to move her to the rehab center. She doesn’t have it. We’re dropping $100 large on our house this summer so I couldn’t swing it either so we decide to transport her ourselves. The doc says that this will work so we go with it. Thing is that we’re in Mass. and she’s in CT. so we wait all of Monday for the call to pick her up. It never comes. Finally Tuesday we get the call and drive two hours to CT.
We get to the hospital and go to get on the elevator when we hear this over the intercom. “Code 4 the hospital is under lock down.” What? Turns out someone had a gun out in lawyer’s office across the street. Go figure, someone was upset at a lawyer. The hospital was on lock down for hours. Finally we were able to get out of the there and get her to the rehab center. And so ends a long and disastrous weekend. So, if you ever ask me how my weekend went, careful. I might just tell you.
So Saturday night I went
out to Henry's to have a few pops and ended up an Irish pub for a night
cap. I was with someone that I'm not going to Rat out because it's
a huge part of the story. If he wants to chime in, he will. Think about it. It
will hit you. For now, we'll call him "Rod"
As we decide to leave we
hear some drunk little bitty say "Hey, remember me? It's ASHLEY." To
some Dude she must have known. Rod tucks this nugget away and saves it for
later.
We see them leave when the
pub closes and we follow. At the moment I didn't know why but I was soon to
find out. Rod yells out "Ashley, remember me?" She looks at him
inquisitively and says "kind of." At this point I'm beside myself. I
can't believe this is working. The other chick she was with says "you
can't let her leave without telling her how you know her." Rod says
"come on, don't you remember me?"
So the one with her arm
around Rod screams out for everyone to hear,
"YOU'RE LIKE HER
FATHER!" Now I have to walk away because I'm laughing hysterically…..
You just can't make this
stuff up…..
Reposting so My Mom can read it all in one spot
<Set the stage>
It's Sunday approximately 11PM Pacific time. We all are smiling non stop because of the alcohol and the fact that "Da Crew" is back in action. Josh is on stage ripping it up. I'm standing by myself just thinking about how much fun I'm having.
<The story>
I turn around and realize that Jr. Seau is standing right behind me. I mouth to myself "Mother******, that's Jr. Seau. His Handler realizes that I know who he is and flies over to me telling me that he's trying to keep it on the DL because they're all a little buzzed. I'm thinking "who the @#$@# isn't." But, I respect their wishes and say "No worries, not a word." his handler looks at me and says "where ya from?" I tell him that I'm from the Boston area and he almost loses his mind. He says "Jr loved playing in N.E. Do you want to meet him. I laugh and say "WTF do you think?" He brings me over to him. I shake his hand while his handler tells him where I'm from. He goes on for 5 minutes about loving N.E. and how he appreciated the knowledgeable fans. I'm happy as a pig in....well you know the rest.
I leave, content in what just made my night (any time there's a good story, my night is made:). Rich, Mott and Josh came over asking, Hey were you just talking to JS? With a big grin I say yup:) Then Rich starts to tell me about his Line Backer son (which at the moment I had forgotten). Then it hits me. I say hey Rich, want me to get his autograph? he says sure!
I walk over and ask his handler if it was cool. He gets him to sign it. I pass it on to Rich and we then proceed to laugh the rest of the night away.
I have to mention that I'm writing this at 1:17 AM Tuesday morning after another night of "adult beverages" so if I've rambled, fumbled or stumbled I apologize.......
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