A proud day in history.

I'm not a builder. I like to think I can build things and fix things, an have a pretty good record in doing those things, but I need guidance since I've never been formally taught. Like I said, I've had pretty good luck in my attempts, but there is one thing that I have attempted, on several occasions, and have failed miserably. The task I speak of, is installing doors. I've mounted two doors in my basement, and both work like crap. Oh they are functional, but they aren't flush and they sure aren't pretty. Both attempts ended with the phrase, "That's good enough, I give up." Spring ahead from those attempts, to yesterday, when I once again, prepared to tackle my nemesis, a door. I will say, that do to an incredibly stupid math error on my part, I bought the wrong sized doors and brought them home and got them in the basement, before I realized my mistake. A small fit and several curse words later, I'm on my way back to the store to get the correct sized doors. I nervously bought the doors, loaded them in the truck, brought them home and carried them into the basement. I stuck the first one in, and it fit, minus a few shims. I worked on getting it all square, shimmed it where I needed and it all seemed good. I drove a few nails in and all still seemed fine. I put the rest of my nails in, added the door knob and shut the door. Holy crap, it works. It doesn't drag, it lays flush in the frame, and it closes without having to do any lifting, tugging or kicking, unlike my other attempts. I can't believe it, I have successfully installed my first door that works.

There is no trim around the door, but it functions, and that was my goal. We have a friend staying with us for awhile, and I figured she might want to be able to close her door. I have one more door to install, and if all goes well, maybe I will attempt to fix the others. Who am I kidding, that sounds like frustration just waiting to happen, I'll pass.

I was going through my phone and found this picture I took awhile back.

It's hard to read, but that says "Pecker's Trucking." Struck me as funny.

OH NOOOOOOOO!!!! Wait, nevermind.

So you know we have a pet anole, a lizard for those of you with a public education like me who didn't know what the heck it was when I was told we were getting one. His name is Kirby, and he is actually a she, but that isn't important. Kirby is an odd pet. He doesn't like to be held, so he lives in this tank that we throw crickets and meal worms into for him to eat, but unless we are cleaning his tank, he stays solo. Anole's don't drink water out of a bowl or out of one of those hamster things, so you have to spray the sides of the tank and the leaves we have in there for him and he drinks off of those. When you spray his tank, this thing flips out like it is acid rain. Running all over the tank until he finally calms down enough to hide under stuff. He does this without fail, every time, like it had never happened before. I feel sorry for him because, for an anole, he seems puzzled and terrified. Yesterday, I was walking by the tank and Kirby was laying at the top of his cage, asleep. I knew it was time to water him and since he has no job, wife or kids, I don't feel too bad about waking him up from his nap. I squirt the water into the tank, and he doesn't move. Oh crap, here we go with the "You see kids, things die" speech that I was hoping I wouldn't have to give again until Mason turned 21 years old. Since the anole's only live a few years in captivity, probably not gonna be able to hold off that long, but I can dream. I kept squirting and he kept on being dead. Crap. I sneak over to Marcy to fill her in and tell her to get her speech ready. We decide to wait until the boys go to bed and then check everything out. An hour or so later, I walk by the tank and that little shit is sitting at the bottom of the tank, unlike his dead position at the top. His eyes are open and he is far less dead than when I saw him last. Not sure why the water didn't freak him out, so I squirted it in the cage to see if he was just use to it, and he flipped out. Maybe he is an actor and is trying out for the Geico commercial, I don't know, but I got to put my speech away until later. Maybe I should figure out how to deliver the speech without saying, "Life sucks kid, get used to it."

Pins and needles?

I know, you are so excited with the anticipation of hearing a detailed description of "Mark's dancing, the early years." If you read my earlier post, you know I called for the divorce of Marcy for even thinking of signing me up for an activity that I would rather, well, do anything else other than dance. You've heard the old saying, "He has 2 left feet." That would be a compliment to me, I have one left foot and some sort of a hoof. I've never had much success with dancing. I always feel as though the paramedics will rush in, assuming I'm having some sort of seizure, and I will wonder why they are breaking up my best dance ever. So Marcy signs us up to take Ballroom dancing lessons, which right away sounds better than freestyle dancing, or whatever that is called that people do at clubs. I haven't been in a club for years, don't miss it. We were supposed to start last Monday, but my prayers were answered, and weather blew in that closed the dance place. I thought God would answer my prayers again last night, it rained during the day and then started to freeze, but it was not to be, class was on as scheduled. Seeing as how we had the huge temperature switch, my sinus's decided to give me the "going to puke" feeling, but I knew I had to fight it back. Marcy would NEVER believe that I was sick, she would assume I was faking so I didn't have to boogie. When I was a kid, I would have gone that route 100% of the time, but as an adult, I don't play that game anymore. I went to my room after I got home, closed my eyes and prayed I would either throw up and get it over with, or the nausea would subside enough that I could go without fear of having to mop up anything on the dance floor. My trick worked, some, so my head wasn't pounding as much and I was only slightly concerned about adding a new dance on my first night of class, the slip and dodge. We arrived at the dance studio and I was pleased that after everyone arrived, there were a total of 4 couples, us, our friends Michelle and Andy and two other couples. This doesn't include the instructor couple, who were busy putting on their dancing shoes, literally. Ever gone somewhere to do something, and someone else walks in with a really cool something that would make what you are doing better? Shoes would have been it, since you weren't supposed to dance with "street" shoes on. Looks like the sock hop is happening here tonight, so we ditched the shoes and the four couples nervously waited as our instructors introduced themselves. The one wall is all mirrors, which is what dancers want so they can watch themselves and others, without turning their head. For me, very distracting. I mean, there is a 6 foot 4 inch bald dude that won't take his eyes of me, kind of creepy. I still found myself turning my head to look at the instructor, when I just had to look straight ahead and I could see him in the mirror. Our first dance? The Foxtrot. I'm not sure how it got its name, I'm guessing a fox doesn't walk like this, but it is a fairly simple thing to teach a beginner. Before I had even come close to figuring the basic step out, they added a turn and then a promenade. I didn't do too bad, only stepped on Marcy a few times, but dance like what you might think if Frankenstein were to foxtrot. I feel stiff, that's what she said, and jerky. I have to be conscious of my stride, since one step of mine is two of Marcy's. There is a turn that we do that I go backwards and if I take my normal stride, I will drag Marcy across the floor, and that isn't exactly Dancing With The Stars worthy. There is a lot to remember, form, steps, direction, count, beat and I'm sure week two, they will add a lot more. What did I learn? I learned that when told exactly what to do when I dance, I'm not horrible. I learned that since I lead, paying attention to where I'm driving is important so I don't slam my wife into a wall, because I failed to "turn." I learned that there are worse things I could be doing, but I get to spend an hour looking into my wife's beautiful eyes. I don't want to end on a sappy note, so I will add the best part of the night. As our instructors were teaching us a step, I heard the woman slip a fart out. It was loud and she did the nervous, put your hand up by your mouth as if to say excuse me. Nobody reacted, maybe they didn't hear it, but I have an eye/ear for those sort of things. I asked Marcy after class if she heard it, which she had but didn't know where it came from. I know. I didn't react, but on the inside, laughing my ass off. Yes, I'm 8 years old, still funny. I told Marcy last night, and I feel it is my duty to report, I had fun. We'll see what next week brings.

Push #4, to be totally pissed off.

I discussed this with one of my sisters the other day, and she has the same gripe, so I don't feel alone in this gripe. Why can't we have people answer business phones anymore? I know, it's a way to cut costs, and those that propose it will tell you that it is more efficient, because you can direct the caller to the correct department to get the help they need. That sounds good on paper, but I freaking hate these things. Here is my latest run in with "efficiency." I am a member of AAA. That is AAA, not AA. It was time for me to renew my membership, so I wanted to call them so I could also add Marcy to the coverage. I usually don't have her on the account, because it costs more money and usually, we are together, so if there is an issue, I can cover it with my card. With Marcy traveling to MN alot, I wanted her to have an account so there wouldn't be any issues if she needed help. I called the main number and oh how happy I was to hear, "For English, press one." Crap, here we go. I start down the press this press that road and get to the services menu. This is where they list all of the services they offer, which I don't remember what they all were, but the first was for information regarding their insurance and once we got down to number five, that option sounded the closest to what I wanted. That is part of the problem, sometimes the choices are vague, so I'm not sure if I want number 4 or number five, but I'm positive I don't want 1, 2 or 3. I have to push a few more buttons, but I feel I'm heading to talking to someone to give this business my money, which is what they want. After I push what I hope is my last button, the recorded message comes on and says "Our insurance office is currently closed, goodbye." HOLY SHIT,I have no idea how I got to the insurance office, but I can say with 100% certainty, I NEVER pushed a button that the recording said was insurance related. Now they just hung up on me after I worked my way through their verbal maze like a rat, only to find out that the cheese isn't there, it was closed. Now I'm not an expert on efficiency, but I'm pretty sure that this would not fall into that category. If a customer calls you, and wants to not only give you the money they owe you, but more money, hanging up on them should be waaaaaay down on the list of possible outcomes to a phone call to that company.

Another issue with these things, are they can't always understand what you are saying. I had called a place and they said to say the option I wanted, which I did. I apparently was asking for either something they didn't do, or were trying to frustrate me enough that I would hang up. It was working, I was about to hang up, when I decided, instead, to just yell a curse word in frustration, and see what happened. It said it didn't understand. My 10 year old would have understood that word, it meant I was pissed, so they obviously decided to not recognize those words because I'm guessing I'm not the first to utter it at the recording lady. I decided to try a new trick and I said "operator." It understood, but tried to get me to just speak my way through by asking me if I wanted one of "the following categories." I just kept saying operator until some lady actually answered the phone, and I think the first thing I said to her was "operator."

I know that I've had some of these things actually work, but I just think it would be so much easier to tell one person who answers the phone, who I want to talk to, and they connect me to them. Done, game over and I don't have callouses on my pointer finger for pushing 100 buttons to get to a place that a halfway intelligent person could have gotten me to in 2 seconds. I'm just saying.

Shocking news

In the winter in Iowa, it gets cold, not news to those of you who live here, have lived here, or anyone who watches the Today show. It isn't a secret, and we don't want it to be. This is how we keep the thin blooded trouble makers out of our state. There is a reason our crime rate is lower than all those warm states, the criminals don't have the cojones to stick out an entire winter where it is common for the snot in your nose to freeze your nostrils shut. For days. I bring this up because, the consequences of the cold is, you have to run your furnace quite a bit so your ass doesn't freeze to the toilet seat when you try to relieve some of the hot coffee or hot chocolate that you have been consuming to keep your organs from seizing up. The byproduct of the constant furnace running, is the air in the house is now dry, which in turn electrifies all fabrics and hair in the house. Taking off a hat or moving fleece pants will cause any nearby hair to stand at attention. I wear fleece pants and my leg hair tries to escape from my leg, or at least that is what it feels like. To combat that, I run humidifiers in the basement and one upstairs by the bedrooms. It helps, but doesn't eliminate all of the electricity. I was changing the tank on one of these one day, when I noticed something floating in the base unit. I stuck my finger in the water to touch it, and got one hell of a shock through the water in the tank. It may have been the total surprise of it that made it appear worse than it actually was, not sure. This thing is plugged into the wall, so that carpet static shock was a bit unsettling. Today, I was again working to get the humidifier working and went into the bathroom to fill the tank. I knew the static buildup was high, so I didn't want to touch the light switch, get shocked and piss my pants, so as I usually do, I figured I would use something in my hand to actually turn on the light. Today's choice, a half full can of Coke. To my surprise, the current from me walking into the bathroom had built up enough that the spark traveled through the can, shocked me and I wasted part of my can of Coke, which you know, is a sin. It is like the 5th Beatle, that is the 11th Commandment, you don't always see it, but you know it's true. Now I'm afraid to touch anything for fear that either it, or I, will burst into flames. If there were hidden cameras in my house, pointed at the light switches, you would be very entertained to see the lengths I will go to so that I don't get shocked. Don't think that these are little shocks, these are visible electric current, arching out of my light switch and into my body. That can't be good.

Back, Mexico and divorce

Sorry about the lack of posts, both of you must be pissed:) Life is crazy with work and the kids and trying to keep the house in order. I had a back spasm the other night that was the worst pain I have ever had. My back is still bothering me, but it helps to have a friend that is a physical therapist, who is willing to work on me for no charge. She worked on my back on Saturday and when she was done, it felt great. The attack happened at 2am, so I'm always a little nervous when I go to bed that I will be woken up with the pain. Since Marcy isn't home 2 nights a week, it's just me and the boys, and they can't help. Last time, I was home alone, which wasn't fun.

I was having some flash backs to my Juarez days today. I can still see the area we worked in so vividly. The time I spent there was some of the best times of my life. I can still see out the little window that is above the urinal. I can see the dirt streets and hear the people talking outside the barred windows. I couldn't understand them, but I could hear them. The dirt always built up in your nose and we joked about blowing out adobe huts when we got back to El Paso. I can still see the garbage coming up from the ground, the glass that covered every step you took. I can still see the garbage that self combusted and was smoking just a few feet from the house we were building. And the dogs, man there are a lot of dogs. I can still see my smashed thumb from the time I hit it with a hammer, then hit it again. I'm not sure if that mission will ever be able to cross the border again, which is a shame, because the work we were able to do helped those families, and it changed my life. Even though I will probably never go back, the people, the sights and the sounds will always be with me. They're burned into my soul.

And finally, I have some bad news. I think Marcy has done something that I think you will agree, is grounds for divorce. I know what you are thinking, not Marcy. Yes, Marcy. I just don't think I can take this, it's just so mean. What has she done? She signed us up for dance lessons. I know, I know, you can't believe it, but it's true. Apparently I need to learn the foxtrot, but I've actually gotten through 43 years without having a clue as to what that is, so I don't think I need to know it to finish off whatever God has in store for me. Do me a favor. If you see me out, walking around, hit me with your car. I don't want to die, but give me a good clip that might knock me out of this hell that is approaching. Can you do that for me?