Farewell, Old Friend

He came to me a few years ago in a small box in the mail. It was a promotional offer to try the new Gillette Fusion. I had always been happy with my little blue Gillette plastic throw-aways with their twin blades, but the new Fusion had FIVE blades. I threw it in the cabinet under the sink anyway.

Then this past summer as my supply of little blues was almost gone, I decided to open up the Fusion and give it a try. I wish I could remember the exact day that I did so. It must have been in July because I don't remember taking it to Wellsboro in June. Anyway, two blades had nothing on five.

And everyday, that Fusion did a bang up job on keeping my face smooth as silk. But now four months later, the efficiency of the Fusion had finally run its course. It was time to go back to the plastic blues. Farewell, Old Friend, and Thank You for so many great shaves.

(This is NOT a hint for a Christmas Gift of Fusions!)

The Worst Days of My Life

October 16, 1962

October 13, 1973

April 20, 1975

May 30, 1975

June 15, 1977

October 18, 1977

October 17, 1978

January 4, 1980

January 5, 1988

October 26, 1996

October 21, 1998

October 27, 1999

May 6, 2000

October 26, 2000

September 3, 2002

May 10, 2007

And now....November 4, 2009

3rd Annual Summer Reading List

American Lion by Jon Meacham

Before I Wake * by Robert Wiersema

Bones To Ashes * by Kathy Reichs

Goldengrove * by Francine Prose

Good Grief * by Lolly Winston

Lake News * by Barbara Delinsky

A Little Bit Ruined by Patty Friedmann

Low Country by Anne Rivers Siddons

The Night Watch by Sarah Waters

Self-Defense by Jonathan Kellerman

Stalin's Ghost by Martin Cruz Smith

Can't believe that I've had this blog that long.

* denotes that it was a good read

As always, these books are available to others to borrow, to keep, whatever.

Summer Review

FAMILY

Hi - Got to spend a few days with the Illinois side of the family in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. Also spent some time helping out my niece and her husband painting a lot of rooms in their new extension.

Low - None

HEALTHCARE

Hi - Now that I'm at that age, the summer was spent taking care of some needed procedures as well as a chipped tooth at the dentist's. The "backdoor" procedure was clean as a whistle and the "frontdoor" one revealed only a minor blip that is being monitored.

Low - The total cost of everything was astronomical. Obama and Congress better clean up health care costs and strengthen insurance plans or else I will be looking for a summer job from now on to offset costs. Now I know why mothers always want their daughters to marry doctors.

GARDEN/WEATHER

Hi - The weather this summer was very pleasant albeit a bit rainy. There were very few 90+ and humid days.

Low - The lack of sun and overabundance of rain resulted in a disappointing crop. Tomatoes were late and pepper and eggplant plants took forever to reach full maturity.

CAR

Hi - My Toyota reached its four year anniversary in early August. It had 61,370 miles and it still runs good.

Low - I took it in for a 60,000 miles check-up. The majority of the work was the brakes and the majority of the bill was the labor. If your daughters can't find a doctor or a lawyer, then marry a mechanic.

RUNNING/COACHING

Hi - I finally got my running stamina up to about 3+ miles a day at a good pace. The good groove was an impetus for a better diet and some weight loss. I also ran in my first race in about 14 years.

Low - There will be no coaching Cross Country this fall. And the chronic aches and pains of old age along with sore hammys resulted in many lost days of running. Lost days were followed by runner's depression, weight gain, and more trips to Burger World for fat-boy breakfasts.

SPORTS

Hi - Watching the IAAF World Championships (Track & Field) in Berlin for a whole week. It was like watching nine days of the Olympics without every other lame event or sappy "up-close-and-personal" stories. It was just plain old running and nothing else.

Low - The return of Yankee dominance in the major leagues. They currently have the best record in baseball. Who will stop them? Please, someone!!

It Puts The Lotion On Its Skin

My town is revaluing all of the properties due to an order from the county Board of Taxation. So a person from an appraisal company stopped by today to perform the task. Basically all she did was check off what rooms were in the house and where the unfinished sections were. She was literally in and out in five minutes.

After she left I wondered if she actually was looking at my house. After all I had spent two weeks cleaning it in preparation for this appraisal!!! I could have had "666" written on my bedroom wall in red paint and she wouldn't have noticed. I wonder if she worked in Ohio and had to stop by Jame Gumb's house how that appraisal would have gone.

"Okay. One kitchen. One door to a back room here. Long hallway with attached rooms. One pit. One girl in the pit."

Well, at least I have a clean house now. And I also found out that "Buffalo Bill" has appeared in MONK as Captain Stottlemeyer.

How?? - Part 2

On March 17, I told you about how I found a starling in my kitchen when coming home from school one day. Well, yesterday I was moving a sofa in the finished section of my basement and there on the floor was a dead sparrow. There was no odor nor any decomp. It's hard to say when the TOD was because my town doesn't have a notable coroner nor a crime scene unit. I took the little guy and deposited him in the garbage and like before wondered how he got into the house.

Half and Half

No, this posting is not about the coffee additive. I still take my coffee (and tea) black and sweet.

This posting is about mortgages. In the life of a homeowner there are three important milestones when it comes to the mortgage. The first is the satisfaction that comes when you have been approved for one. There is also euphoria when the last payment has been made. The third one lies somewhere in the middle. It comes when the amounts being applied to the principal and to the interest are the same. After that the majority of the payment will be applied to the principal (and not that bloody interest!) and it's all down hill after that.

Well, for me that middle milestone will be achieved with this month's payment. Yippee!

What the #@*%$ Part 2

It's a quiet Saturday. I got most of my errands done this morning including my running and since noon there has been a steady rain. It's 66 outside now and all of the windows are closed. I'm tempted to turn on the heat but I resist and don a sweatshirt and sweatpants. I make myself a cup of tea and settle down in my easy chair. It's somewhat dark outside due to the thick rain clouds. I turn on the light by my chair and begin to work on the Star Ledger's new 16x16 Soduko. Ah, so relaxing. Life is good. I take a break to rest my eyes and get up to stretch my legs. I walk past the calendar on the wall and see......JUNE 20TH!?!?!?!?!?!??!

DUCK!!!!!!

I had finished my run this morning and was doing my post-run walk thru Verona Park when I passed a couple of trees and heard some birds screeching. I thought nothing of it until I felt something brush against the top of my head. I turned and saw a red-winged blackbird flying away. He landed on a branch and eyed me up for another pass. Either I was near his nest or he liked sweat soaked tops of heads. He came in again but I faced him the whole way and he just fluttered above me for a few seconds and then flew away. I continued my walk without any further encounters. I'll take a detour next time!!

What the #@*%$

I settle down in my tv-watching chair tonight with a six pack and a just-delivered pizza and I flip on my old boob tube to watch my favorite show "Keeping Up With the Kranepools". And nada. Nothing on the screen. What the -----! I guess I'm going up on the roof tomorrow to look at the antenna. Geeez.









(kidding)

How?

When I arrived home tonight and entered my kitchen, the first thing I noticed was the box of toothpicks strewn all over my counter. The box usually sat on the window sill over the sink. The first thought that went thru my mind was that the house had been burglarized. But before any type of fear had time to set in, the mystery quickly resolved itself. From a corner of the kitchen came a flapping sound and a grown starling began to fly about the kitchen and occasionally crashing into the windows. While I watched him fly about I wondered how he had gotten into the house, but my first priority was to get him out. Since he was trying to fly thru the windows, I figured this was going to be easier than getting a squirrel out of the house. So I opened two kitchen windows and fortunately he stayed on the first floor and eventually flew out and into freedom.

After shutting the windows, I looked around the house dreading a broken window somewhere. But all of the windows were intact and all of the doors shut. The door to the attic was shut too. How did he get in? I could only think of two possibilities: the furnace in the basement sometimes has skulls and bones near the vent from birds who try to keep warm in the winter. I went down and there was a skull. But I figured that that entrance should be certain death and since it was a warm day (50+ degrees), highly unlikely that a bird had entered there. The other possibility was a hole in the ceiling in the mudroom (where Woody's ramp once stood). I always thought it was just a hole that was shut down on each end by a joist, but upon closer examination there was what looked like a vent pipe about 8 inches away from the hole. Could he have gotten in thru there? I had no idea but I couldn't find proof of any other entrance.

So I put a temporary patch over the hole and went on with my life.