Category: random

It was a nice day, neither to hot nor too cold, so I decided to go out and sit at our picnic table and read from my bible. Three of the five dogs followed me outside.

They were excitedly racing around me much like Indian’s would circle a group of wagons in an old black and white movie. One of them caught the heel of my right foot and it hooked the back of my left foot.

As I fell forward, I let go of my bible. I hit the ground and rolled trying not to screw up my back any more than it already is.

The bible landed in one of the five-gallon water buckets we have set up for the doors when they’re locked outside and sank to the bottom of the bucket. When I retrieved it, the entire book was soaked.

This isn’t the first bible I’ve had that’s been destroyed by one of the dogs. In the last couple of years three of my bibles have been chewed up by one of the dogs and it’s doubtful it will be the last.

I’m still shaking my head.

All this week, I’m playing bachelor — sort of.  My bride is in the San Diego area visiting family so I’m kind of on my own.

Kind of? Sort of?

Our housemate Kay is here and she’s making sure I don’t starve to death or forget to finish up the few chores I’ve been given to complete by next Friday. That means she’s bossing me around too, an act I’ve grown accustom to as a married man.

I’m also working overnight and sleeping during the day.

It’s getting enough sleep while Kay is home that has become the real struggle for me. I’m certain that you have either heard a bunch of horses racing from one place to the other, either in a movie or TV show or in real life to know what that sounds like.

However, in the case of Kay — it’s more like a herd of turtles. Not a whole lot of noise, but jus’ enough to keep you aware she’s around.

Yesterday, as I tried to sleep, I’d hear her drop something on the floor, or close the cupboard harder than she meant too or go out in the backyard to yell at a dog. These noises draw me out of my deep sleep, but they don’t fully wake me up either.

Thus, Kay is like a herd of turtles, bless her heart.

I was out with my son’s high school cross country team as they practiced in the hills in and around Pyramid Highway. It was a pleasant day to be out in the high desert.

One of the members was in an area where the terrain was extremely rugged and sloped, having a hard time getting down the hill side. Add to it that the area is full of loose rocks and sand. Seeing this, I decided I’d go up and cheer him on.

After getting up next to this runner, I slipped and started to go down the slope at a quick step. I ended up running, which I am not supposed to do because of my busted back.

Somewhere in the last 20 or 30 feet I found a large rock to trip over. Next thing I know I was flying through the air.

I hit another rock, tearing up my right arm and my right knee. As I bounced for the third and final time, I sucked in a huge mouthful of dirt, rocks and sand. I suddenly found myself unable to take a breath as I also knocked the wind out of myself.

It took me half an hour to recover from this incident. Unfortunately I have yet to recover from wounding my pride.

The runner I went up the hill to help made it down without a scratch.

A few days ago my son noticed I don’t carry a note pad with me everywhere I go like I used too. He wanted to know why?

I didn’t have an answer for him at the time.

However it has occurred to me that I do know the answer and I’ve known it all along. It’s rather simple and has been staring me in the face for the last 11 or 12 years.

I have the Internet and blogging, so who needs a note pad all the time?

The last couple of days I’ve been thinking about what to do regarding all my writings. I have three basic catagories of writings: personal journals, news articles and stories and poems.

My bride asked: Are you planning to leave all this stuff for Kyle to have to throw away? That set my mind in motion as it’s really the only legacy I have to offer my son.

About 8 years ago I made the mistake of telling someone that I thought it would be great if my private journals and news articles could be sent to the Library of Congress for future research. She told me I was conceited for thinking so grandiose.

I hadn’t thought about the subject till my bride brought it up a couple nights ago.

She wasn’t saying anything mean; she’s simply looking out for Kyle’s interest. Her statement comes from the personal experience of having to clean out her parents home after they passed away.

While none of my writing holds any true literary quality, it does hold some historical information. And 100-years from now, I’d think some researcher studying the 1980’s, 90’s and Y2K may find some useful information among the pages I’ve scribbled.

But then again—maybe I am being egotistical. However I can’t help but look at it all and think it would be a shame to consign it to the trash heap.

Snow had been falling since the day before and I had to be to work at KBUL at midnight. As it would turn out, the power would fail throughout the region and the station would be off-air for about 12-hours.

Throughout the city, there were accidents from people sliding into each other with their vehicles, cars and trucks high-centered on snow drifts or where the snow plow had left a high furrow. Even 4×4 trucks with their enormously high wheel base ended up stuck in snow.

I had no problem with my little front-wheel Hyundai sedan getting from my home on Sutro to the studio on Grove. Only two other people made it in to the station like I had; Dan, the Program Director and the General Manager, Debby.

All we could do was wait the storm out, which I did by laying down on on the floor in the front lobby and falling asleep. My sleep was interrupted when the electricity returned.

Outside the building door was a generator, brought in by the engineers to provide electricity to make coffee and run auxiliary lights in the engineering office. It had been running most night and into the early morning, offering a gentle chugging noise that had helped me fall asleep.

Once the electricity returned, it became a scramble for Dan and Debby to make-good on all the commercials missed in the hours the signal had been dark. As each hour began I was handed a handwritten log with five to six minutes of commercials to play four times an hour.

After nearly 10-hour of being on the air, trying to play a couple songs followed by 10-to-12 half minute commercials, I was exhausted and ready to go home. Never have I ever been so happy to sign off the air.

As I left the building I noticed the generator was no longer on the steps. I figured it had been brought inside and was not in the engineering office, however I was wrong.

But by the time I got home, I had received a call wanting to know what happened to the generator. At first I got the blame for it’s disappearance, until I pointed out the generator was too big to fit in my tiny vehicle.

To this day I still don’t know how a person could get away with a 300-pound generator without being noticed.

Living out in the county can be trying at times. Especially when it comes to an early spring invasion of field mice.

That means it’s time for the annual setting of the mouse traps. One, under the sink near the HVAC register. A second tucked in behind the refrigerator along the wall.

As I laid down for my nap in preparation for another graveyard shift, I heard the distinctive snap of one of the traps. This was followed by the painful wailing and crying of a dog.

Our two-year-old pit-bull, Roxy, evidently found the smell of the peanut butter to be too irresistable. The vet says her tongue is going too be fine.

Exactly 30-years to the day, I was fired from the U.S. Air Force. It took me years to come to terms with what happened, but now I accept full responsibility for everything that occurred.

It’s what happens when a person goes outside the chain-of-command like I did. It doesn’t matter if it was to the Inspector General’s office or not, I broke a trust.

I have concluded that given the situation I found myself in, I’d do the same thing all over again, without hesitation.

The best thing that came out of the entire situation is that I renewed my relationship with Christ. It came about in the early morning hours, when I felt all hope was lost.

A wave of peace washed over me as I lay in my bunk feeling sorry for myself. It was at that moment I knew God was with me, that He had never left me and that He’d always be there for me.

Once the sun came up, I felt refreshed and ready to face whatever lay ahead. It hasn’t been easy, but through the grace of God, I’ve continued on with life.

Have I always done right? No. Do I try to do the right thing? Sometimes.

Will I screw up in the future? Yes. Is it difficult to admit this? You bet.

But thankfully, I’m not in charge.

The people gathered, all very excited to see the U.S. Air Forces’ Thunderbird flying team. Half the crowds were civilians, the remainder in uniform.

The aircrafts,  Northrop T-38A Talons, streaked and roared over head to shouts and cheers, as they flew in groups, bursting like a smoky flower high in the sky. Then they flew headlong at one another, a game of chicken at near the speed of sound.

On perhaps the fourth pass, disaster occurred as two of the crafts touched wing to tail. While the pilot who sustained the rudder damage managed to make it to an airport safely, the other pilot lost part of his damaged wing.

Witnesses could see the pilot was fighting his aircraft as hard as he could to bring it upright and to pull it away from the crowds and the close-by base housing. The craft screamed sideways, passing overhead, spewing smoke and debris.

The pilot, Capt. Charlie Carter blew his canopy and punched out as the dying aircraft drew tight to the earth. However his plane rolled over on its back and Carter ejected head first into a parking lot of the rodeo grounds.  

The charred and torn tail-section of Carter’s aircraft used to sit in a storage area on the backside of the air force base, well hidden from the publics view.

So, I’ve been made aware that I post and blog way too much. Is this true?

A bit of the back-story: A friend that I’ve known since 1977 told me that I blog and post too much. They say my writing overwhelms their FaceBook pages, therefore they deleted me from their “friends” list.

While it doesn’t really bother me, I jus’ want to know what others have to say about this. If I am overwhelming you too, I’d like to know.