Doozers

First of all, if you recognize the name from this post as a name you've heard in the past.... 5 cool points for you.  If you recognize the name and can actually PLACE it.... you win.  

Unfortunately for me, I had a job the other day to do here at the house that was less than fun.  We moved into an 80-some year old house, and with it came little obstacles that I must fix.  Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the work it takes to get this house just like we want it, but this is a job I could have lived without.  There is a gargantuan hole beneath my house, that apparently some early 1900's heating engine used to sit.  Obviously, I don't know the specifics, but our current heat pump sits within the crawl space, above the huge hole.  Over time this hole has accumulated at least 100 gallons of water, probably from below rather than from above.  With the mosquito and overall bug problem, I knew I had to get rid of this water soon.  I hate mosquitos and they love me.  It's my biggest problem with the fall of man, because you KNOW ol' Adam and Eve didn't have to deal with little flying vampires in the garden till they bit that apple, then all hell broke loose. 

After pumping this water into my neighbors yard, (and I can't begin to explain what kind of mutated fungal bacterialized critters were in there)  I crawled in and started digging.  The objective was to dig, with two different sized shovels, and fill in the hole.  Well, this hole is very large, so my objective changed after working extremely hard for 30 minutes and hardly making a dent.  I just wanted enough of this dry dirt that had been pushed aside (and took up crawl space) to cover the remaining water in the hole, which was approximately 5 to 10 gallons.  I worked from my stomach for about 30 minutes, breaking up hard dirt and pushing it in the hole with shovels.  I worked another 30 minutes standing in the hole and raking the dirt into the hole with me.  As you can imagine, I was a site to see after I was finished.  My shoulders were SUPER sore from the work.  I woke up the next morning and I swear that even my FAT was sore.  I remember thinking, I wish I could hire some Doozers.  For those of you that don't know what a Doozer is, here is a couple pictures:

Call me crazy, but do you know what kind of money these guys could have made with me that day?  If I had Jim Henson's phone number, he would have had 7 voicemails.  That little dozer and those little dudes could have gotten that entire hole filled in in one day.  Don't you remember seeing them on Fraggle Rock?  They were ALWAYS working.  They were the equivalent of hard working Hispanics in the Fraggle Rock world.  You know they were underpaid too....    You never saw them talking and sitting around, or eating lunch or taking a snack time... everytime we saw them, they didn't even take time to wave at the camera.  They just kept digging and doozing.  Anyhow...  Don't be surprised if you come to the house and see a few of them grilling out with us or something, cause if I find them, I'll do whatever I can to make sure they finish that job...

War Drawing

OK.... I actually plan on posting more now that we're all moved in and life has slowed a bit. I definitely wanted to share something my mother brought to me the other day. As a young lad, I would retreat to my room and draw sometimes. I also used to beat myself in the head with large sticks, so I'm quite surprised that I took this kind of alone time to entertain myself quietly.... but it's the truth, and I remember it. Enclosed in this brief blog, is a picture I drew once. I'd like to say I was like 3 when I drew it, but the reality of it is: I was probably like 13. There are two drawings, in the case you can't see one as well as the other.

As you can see, I placed high value on verbal interpretations of noises and large explosions. I was also into civil wars, random volcanos, planes flying into those random volcanos, and Americans speaking German. I'd also like to point out that it is quite possible that my understanding of drawing "to scale" could have been a bit tainted. Last but not least, I think it actually is more likely that this helicopter was peeing on the guy below than for the guy below to be shooting darts straight up in the air with his walkie talkie.

If you'd like some ideas for your own imagination, please call 1 800 SHUUT UP before making fun.

Championship Smoke....

Choose a good cigar, especially if you're a UNC fan. Tonight might be huge! Come join us from 6:30pm until the end of the NCAA Championship game as we meet at Monkeez Brew and set fire to some premium tobacco...

Don't forget that we've usually have some card games going on and free WIFI if you actually manage to get bored. We hope to see you at Monkeez Brew TONIGHT!! Bring your friends, we're gonna have a great time...

Walmart Produce

Ever heard any of your friends tell you not to get produce at Walmart?

They say it's just not as good, wrinkled, not ripe..... or in this case, has cocaine inside.

I don't think this site reveals the identity of the store, but I've heard it was a Walmart in Queens.
So far I've never seen anyone jumping on a pogo-stick down Times Square because of some stir fry they ate... but hey, there's a first time for everything!

Don't mind Travis...

OK... I'm sure there are many of you that have read about or seen this story on the news.

I was just listening to a morning show in which they were throwing out their own opinions about this crazy event. I am trying hard to have compassion on the owner of this chimpanzee named Travis, but I have been unable to thus far. I actually DO have compassion for her friend because she got roped into this, and is now missing some very important stuff.

Here's my problem with this. When you take an animal created by the good Lord to be a wild animal, and work 14 years on turning him into a human, one day it will come back and bite you (no pun intended... but that was kinda funny, in a very wrong way). I don't care if your chimp has been in 123,543 commercials, is potty trained, drinks beer the glass, does your homework, and shoots sporting clays with your buddies.... he was created to be wild, so don't act surprised when one day HE ACTS WILD. Not to mention, when you give him tea laced with Xanex and glasses of wine... why are you surprised when he loses his mind?

The owner's response (to the opinion that wild animals can never be completely tamed, and that she shouldn't have owned him) was that chimpanzee's are the closest animal to humans, and that sometimes humans go crazy too. She said it was a "freak accident". WOMAN IT'S NOT FREAK! Go live in the jungle and swing around on vines with chimps for a while. Invade the territories of other chimps while you're playing Tarzan and see if they don't ride the jungle of you. They do the same thing to other chimps, that's how God made them. They are wild animals, therefore they will act wild. I just can't understand who threw out the idea that ANY animals would have a conscience.

Anyhow, I have the strong opinion that says if you want to have apes for best friends... you should be made to go to their habitat and should be restricted from bringing them to ours. Use Jane Goodall as your example. This way, you don't run the risk of your little chimp budding ripping your best friends apart.

Entertainment through Stupidity

Wow.... I didn't realize it'd been so long since I "blogged". I never really have anything important to say anyways, so I won't use that excuse.

Again, I don't have anything important to say now. I just thought I'd comment on people that do stupid stuff for attention. I've now watched two shows in a row, in which people do stupid stuff repeatedly. Why? I guess to have their own show.... I'm not really sure. Bear Grylls is now eating big berries out of bear poo... and I just got done watching some bald British guy tie himself up and sink himself to the bottom of a huge tank filled with ice.

I guess my biggest question is... where do these guys get their start? Did "Bear" Grylls crawl around his backyard when he was 13 looking for fruity dog droppings so he could make a name for himself? Did he know he would have his own show by the time he started eating raw snails and scorpions? It kills me how he always says, "This should give me a bitta energy...." Yes that's what we should do. Eat poo for energy. I'm sure we all feel very energized after eating poo and vomiting like we've got a parasite (because we probably do by this point). Geez, what a moron. He's got that backpack on... always. He has water in it, why can't he stuff the rest of the space with Cliff Bars or something? I mean, I would actually think he was smarter if he did that.

My point is this: If you're in the middle of the Ozarks and you're lost, chances are you weren't planning on it. So if you want actual reality, let me go smack Bear Grylls out of bed and drag him to the Ozarks in his Austin Powers undie-roos with nothing but a toothbrush and his teddy bear. NOW it's survival time. Go survive... go on mate.

Right this very minute... Bear is showing us how to widdle the end of a stick to make a spear, just in case a real bear comes at night (ha!). In case you didn't know, it takes a thirty-something year old military survivor man to show us men how to do something we already had perfected when we were SEVEN. Here's your sign "Bear". We all know you stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night....

I bet your real name is Gaylord....

The Greatest Terrible Year Ever...

That's right, I said it.  2008 was, for me, the greatest terrible year ever.  

2008 has been a difficult year for me with many challenging events.  I've hugged the neck of my best friend who lost both his grandfathers and another friend who lost his Aunt.  I recently lost my Uncle, the one I've always lived near and been closest to. 

This past year also provided me with the loss of my dog Decker to a sudden tumor, he was my best dog to date and didn't even make it to 4 years old.  My mom's poodle, Molly, was also put down this year.  She made it to somewhere around 15 years old, and for some reason preferred me and mom over dad and Lindy.  Naturally, I've rested on many furniture pieces with that little one growing up.  As some of you know, Beth and I have now set a NC record for trying to finalize house building plans for the longest period of time.  Yeah that's right, another setback this year... and most likely we will now be looking into completely new plans because of affordability.  

Although entirely more rewarding than disappointing, Chris and Lindy's relocation to Kenya has been difficult for us for many reasons.  We are very close to them (Lindy is like a sister to me) and spent tons of time together. 

There's tons of small stupid things I could list from traffic tickets and appeals cases to vehicle malfunctions and graduating students leaving the youth.  Basically, all this paired with the job change (which has been somewhat of a tough transition for me... I'm not a natural salesman), the economic crisis, and the election... 2008 would have completely went down in my top 3 worst years had it not been for one little boy (and the Patriots getting beat in the Super Bowl... but to mention that would be shallow, right?)

I had been told A LOT of things about parenthood before I became I entered it.  It has all been true too, for the most part.  There is one thing that stands out that I was never told though.  One thing that, if asked, I would tell someone immediately about parenting.  Chris and Lindy, consider this my addition of factual parenthood and what is to come.

Levi makes everything better.  He knows no stress, no worldly influence, he knows nothing of competition, technology, the economy, or the war.  In his mind, there is no conceptual reality that differs life from death, rich from poor, or good from evil.  He is happy when he is rested, clothed, and fed.  Half the time, he entertains himself with whatever he can find on the floor or a button to push 3,343 times... stopping to clap after every 3 pushes.  What an amazing blessing.  At my lowest points and saddest moment, I have looked at his face to see him smile and everything was a least a lot better than it was.  For reasons that wander well beyond the obvious, I had a brief breakdown upon hearing of Jeff's death.  Levi thought I was laughing I guess, so he just sat there and laughed at me.  What did I do without that before?  He has made life so much more wonderful that I can't even remember what life was without him.  If someone told me that parenthood was no indication of God's presence, I would pray that God would break through that skeptical barrier because it would be too thick for anyone else to. 

As my pastor once said, there is no one person or mass of people that he would sacrifice his own child for...  I agree completely.  I can not comprehend a love any stronger could exist.  It did, and it still does.  The Creator of the Universe had a Son much more special than mine.   He also made everything better, but beyond that he made all things new.  His Son was also perfect and changed all norms.  Never before or after has a King been born among animals, raised in poverty, lived to serve others, and died an unimaginable death to save us from our own death.  This tells me how wrong I am to become so bonded to this World and how society works around me.  All that has been wrong with my year means nothing.  

We have been awarded the promise of a day with no goodbyes, no tears, no loss, and no pain.  Levi has been the face of peace for me this year, but I can not comprehend the true peace that awaits me.  As a personal challenge for myself, I look forward to allowing God to show me my purpose by erasing the norms placed in my heart and mind by the World and replacing them with His own Word.  I encourage you to do the same.  To all the challenges of 2009, may they strengthen us in ways we are unable to understand.