Horse Manure Park

It started with a few flakes, but by nightfall it was the heaviest snowfall I've ever seen in my life. And it was 20 years ago today. Yes, 20 years ago today Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play I experienced the biggest blizzard of my life (so far).  The Halloween blizzard of '91.  It was one for the ages. I was 22 years old then.  And I had work ethic back then, I'll tell you.  I was living in St. Francis, MN, in an apartment complex.  It was my senior year at the University of Minnesota.  I worked for the U of M Food Services, and my main job was running a little coffee shop Monday through Friday.  I had to open the shop early morning on November 1st. Yes, I actually attempted to drive the 40 miles to Minneapolis to do my job. I didn't make it out of the apartment parking lot, though. I remember waking up in the middle of the night and looking out the living room window and I couldn't believe how hard it was snowing.  I set my alar...

We made a big move yesterday.  Neil's bedroom was officially moved to the upper level and his old room on the lower level (formerly known as the baby room or nursery) was transitioned into the toy room.  It was a lot of moving, a lot of stair climbing (and a lot of complaining about the moving and stair climbing) but it was well worth the effort. We also moved our big screen t.v. (an old rear projection set) into the toy room so the kids have their own little movie theater when they want to watch a movie. Best of all, the adults now have the upper level to themselves and the lower level of our house is now being used for something other than laundry and sleeping! The new toy room.... at long last! Playing a fishing game.  Bean bag chairs will be coming this Christmas. In other news, my iPod Classic had a massive stroke yesterday.  I've no idea what happened to it.  I plugged it into my computer Friday night, but iTunes would not acknowledge it - di...

Neil woke me up again at 3:40 AM (the kid has an internal alarm clock).  He quietly pads into our room and flops on top of me every night/morning at the same time.  He is freezing cold, so I am thinking he wakes up because of that reason. I put him back to bed right away, tuck him in and he falls asleep very quickly. But I am not blessed with the ability to easily fall back asleep once I wake up.  In fact, once I'm up, I'm usually up for the day. So I started writing this entry this morning complaining about my lack of sleep.  But I found myself hitting the delete key.  Some times you've got to look at things differently. So here I sit on my couch on this chilly late-October morning trying to change my crappy attitude.  I've brewed a pot of strong really strong so-strong-it-is-illegal-in-the-State-of-California coffee (which will do wonders in changing said attitude).  The house is quietly sleeping.  And I'm finding some time to write. ...

 "I'm having just a horrible day. I just realized that my square-shaped Fiji Mineral Water bottle simply won't fit into the cupholder of my new Audi R8. It's just ridiculous."

Can you mag ne what l fe would be l ke w thout the letter " "?  t would be k nd of we rd, wouldn't  t?

:-, :-o :-O :-( ) >-* :-)

I've been watching a little news today.  The demise of Colonel Moammar Gaddafi Gadhaffi Qaddafi  ...or however you spell his name... has finally come to fruition.  Yet another dictator has bit the dust.  It interests me because it will certainly be recorded in the history books - Colonel Gaddafi Gadhaffi Qaddafi ruled Lybia for 42 years.  A total megalomaniac. But why did he remain a Colonel?  You would've thought he would have promoted himself to General of the Army or Ruler of All Mankind or something.  I've always wondered about that. But anyway, I haven't been "tuned in" to the news as much as I normally would be simply because I find these news channels - namely the personalities of these news channels - very hard to watch.  I can't stand their faux concern, their calculated facial gestures.  The whole damn thing is nothing more than an orchestrated stage show under the guise of "news." However, good ol' Wolf Blitzer of CNN gav...