I double-dog dare you

Never one to back down from a dare, I've taken up the Thom G. double-dog Three Word Wednesday gauntlet. This week's words are gamble, omitted and temporary.

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Jesse sat back in the chair thinking about the past 24 hours and nervously dreading what the next 24 would bring.
He fucked up and knew it. But that's how he lived, on the edge. He'd done it all his life, ever since that first rush of jumping off the trestle bridge as an 8-year-old. He didn't do it for pride, because his friends would bestow some horrible trestle-linked-chicken nickname on him. No Jesse had the fever -- not for more cowbell -- but for greenbacks. Cold, hard cash. As an 8-year-old the 20 bucks his friends cobbled together would have made Jesse run naked through Wal Mart.
It was his Quixotic mission, chasing the almighty dollar.
He knew it was a gamble to take the Pick 6 long shot at Del Mar. He knew it was even more dangerous to do it with the mob's money.
But that was water under the bridge. Now he'd have to find the six-grand he pissed away at the track. And fast.
There would be no time for excuse, Vinnie wouldn't hear it.
He wouldn't care that the Racing Forum omitted the fact that Friedegg had a stress fracture in its leg and had been in one of those goddamned inflatable temporary casts leading up the final viewing.
The only thing Vinnie cared about was the return on the 4-g's he'd "loaned" Jesse earlier in the week.
There were no "broken legs" promises. It was understood.
Now Jesse, not wanting to end up like Friedegg, in a cast, began scheming.
"Hey, Jack," the phone call began, "Meet me at the Blue Room in an hour. I've got a proposition for you."

God didn't make little green apples

and it may not rain in Indianapolis in the summertime -- but it sure as hell has rained in Kansas City this past week.

Not that it's a bad thing, but it's simply so foreign for this California kid. My hope is to bring back the thunderstorm -- sans lightning -- when we head home on Monday.

That being said, we had an interesting night Saturday at the Royals game vs. Tampa Bay.
In all the baseball games I've ever been to, and that odometer's passed 1,000 a long time ago, I've never had to sit through a rain delay. I've seen a rainout by the wimpy-ass Giants in a "storm" that would make Midwesterners laugh. But I've never actually seen the ground crew roll out the tarp, unfurl the diamond-sized plastic and anchor it down in a matter of minutes.
The closest I get to rain delays is seeing them flash on the AP wire -- "The St. Louis-Chicago game is being delayed by rain." "The St. Louis-Chicago game has resumed after a rain delay of 1 hour, 13 minutes."
But from out COVERED seats last night, we watched, not only the monsoon roll in, but the grounds crew do their rain dance with fascinating precision. (PIX TO COME ONCE WE GET HOME).
And we waited. And waited. And waited. For 1 hour, 13 minutes.
And then the grounds crew undid their magic. And we played on. And somewhere in Redding, Calif., and around the country, the AP flashed that our game had resumed.

Be careful what you ask for

That's the feeling I had Monday morning about 0-dawn-30.

I had come to the Midwest on vacation with the usual wants -- fun, frivolity and a Royals baseball game. Oh, add a honest-to-goodness Midwest thunderstorm. Not the kind in Cali that sparks endless forest fires, but the kind where you get to stand in warm rain and see the cool bolt lightning.

Well, our first night in Muscatine, Iowa, we swam, had dinner and relaxed on the deck until the mosquitoes had dinner on us (there is still a ton of standing water from their recent floods).

An hour or so after heading in, the skies lit up with lightning, boomed with thunder and weeped with rain. Cool. Check that one off the list.

But, oh no. Mother Nature wasn't done. I've always laughed at people in California who actually watch the Weather Channel. It's pointless.

But not in the Midwest. It's essential. The weather changes more than No. 1's moods.

And it has to be tiring to hear daily that a thunderstorm might be on its way -- the same way I'd get tired if the USGS told me an earthquake might be happening tonight.

But we went to bed Sunday with the thunderstorm warning, although my Uncle Mark and I had plans for an 8 a.m. golf outing.

Not so fast.

About 3:30 a.m. the heavens opened. Lightning. Thunder. Rain -- wideways rain. And winds -- gale-force winds.

It woke me up long enough to realize I wasn't going to play golf and turn the cell phone alarm off. Then, about 5:15 a.m. my cousin's son, Jake, came in and said his mom and dad wanted to see me.

Serious faces for so early. Steve said I should be prepared to shepherd everyone to the basement, that the tornado sirens should be wailing shortly. You know shit it serious when people who live there look a little panicked.

We watched the Weather Channel, saw a super cell moving over us in a color I didn't know existed (usually it's red for monsoon rains) and right as the loop showed the cell passing over Muscatine the power shut off.

What the hell?

Well, the worst of it had passed, the storm shuffled east into Illinois. But the damage had been done (pictures coming when I can download them off the camera). We went to Davenport in the morning and saw destruction and misery. It really was a storm they'll be talking about for the next decade (Do you remember that day ...).

The puzzling thing to me, however, was where in the hell were the tornado sirens? With sustained winds of 95 mph, I wanted sirens. According to the news, they were straight-line winds and not a vortex. I assume there wasn't any hot air to mix with cold and form a tornado. Still, it was more than I asked for.

We're not in Kansas anymore

And we're not in heaven, we're in Iowa.
That's right. The Williams boys' roadshow took off Saturday from Lawrence, Kansas, headed up I-35, took a right on I-80 in Des Moines and wound its way across Iowa to Muscatine, home of the Hamptons, Meyers and Snyders (cousins, aunt and uncle).
While Kansas is always fun for the boys and myself (it's become a vacation home base), Iowa was a new experience for all. A vast expanse of flat amazed and bored on the six-hour drive to Muscatine (the only place on the Mississippi River were it travels east-west).
We're hanging with my cuz Stacey and her family, lounging by a pool, going to Quad Cities to a baseball game and doing just what you're supposed to on vacation -- NOTHING.

But the highlight of the trip so far for me is the awesome thunder and lightning storm on Saturday night. I a place that got tattooed by flooding and more flooding in the past two months, many Iowans are sick of rain. But for a California kid, the fury of a storm moving across the plains is a site to behold. Sunny all day Saturday, the clouds kicked up in the south about sunset, followed by flash lightning off in the distance. And then, as Midwest storms do, it rolled through with the subtlety of a right cross. Buckets of rain, booming thunder and lightning so bright I could count my freckles.
Of course, No. 1 got a little freaked about the tornado warnings flashing on the TV, but we assured him he'd have plenty of time to duck into the basement should the tornado siren actually go off.

We've got a day and a half left in Iowa before heading back to the Land of Ahs. A golf outing, a birthday party and perhaps some fireworks are probably in store.
And hopefully more severe weather.

Overwhelmed

I'm on sensory overload after seeing "The Dark Knight."
Too much to digest in one setting, for sure.
Suffice to say everything written about Heath Ledger's Joker character are dead on (no pun intended). He's funny, insane, disturbing and genius. The only negative about his portrayal was that it left you wanting more, in some instances making you stray from what was a genuinely original script and plotline.
You knew you were in for a ride when the Joker's magic trick makes a pencil dissapear in a gangster's eye.

However, there are so many twists, turns and plot subtleties that "Dark Knight" is one of the movies you have to see twice (kinda like "Superbad," where it was necessary to see it again just to get all the penis jokes).
And that's not a bad thing.

Small town, big name?

Ok, so we're on our way to Kansas City for a glorious two-week vacation. The boys and I are sitting in Java City waiting for board the plane.





We're minding our own business when who in the name of the Wide World of Sports plops down next to us but the voice of the Kings, Grant Napier.



Proof positive that Scaramento is still a small town? No one bombarded him for an autograph or told him he's a New York Yankees honk or told him his radio show sucks.

wordless wednesday

Flashback alert

No. 2 spent some of his birthday money today on the new Guitar Hero: Aerosmith. A win-win, as I get to Wii-out with and without the kid.
A convert to Guitar Hero (yes, it seemed silly, difficult and frivolous at first), I have come to embrace the scrolling notes and Mini-Me ax.
While the jury's still out on the new game (wasn't real impressed with most of the first set of songs, though I've never been big on Mott the Hoople and "All the Young Dudes), I did have one of those moments. You know, the moment you're rocketed back to the days of yesteryear, to a fun, carefree (and for me) high time. The first song of the game is Cheap Trick's "Dream Police" (they live inside of my head, in falsetto, of course).
My first alone concert was Cheap Trick on the Dream Police tour in Hawaii at the Blaisdell Arena. Sure, I'd been subjected to the Fifth Dimension at Wolftrap with the 'rents, and dragged kicking and screaming to Up with People by my Uncle Rex, but I'd never spread my wings and soloed. Until Cheap Trick.
I don't remember much. After all, it was 1980. I was 12. And, man, I got wasted. Nosebleed seats, a bunch of Marines next to me and my friends and a bunch of Da Kine (it was Hawaii, after all).
However, I still remember, for whatever reason, that the Dream Police live inside of my head. Not "I Want You To Want Me," "Surrender" or "Ain't that a Shame." But "Dream Police."
I also remember, equally stunning, that my folks had NO CLUE how trashed I was.
"How was the concert, Aaron" was the Parental Inquisition. Thank God.
Fast forward to today, when those same Dream Police re-invaded my head. All I could do was chuckle to myself when No. 2 asked if I knew this song.
Yes, TJ, I do.
Oh, by the way. It was the first time I've made it through a song on the second level without missing a note. It really was "inside of my head."

Sins of the father

The car screeched to a stop. A small boy, frozen in his tracks, began to cry. And wet himself.
The ball he'd once been chasing rolled on down the street.
It's amazing how fate steps in to those life-defining moments. When they work out, it's good fortune; when they don't, the Gods are out to get you.
The youth's mother, still white with the terror she saw in shit-your-pants slow motion, ran to the boy.
"Are you all right?"she asked. "Oh, my God, Jared. How many times do I have to tell you not to play near the street. You wait until your father hears about this."
The driver, equally aghast and whiter than mom, climbed out of his car and asked if everything was OK.
"No thanks to you," the protective hen shot. "You kids scream up and down this street without regards to anything or anyone. One of these days you're going to kill someone."
The kid, a 20-something really, slunk back into his car knowing the woman was lashing out in fear and irrationality. He had not been in the wrong; actually driving the posted 25 miles per hour speed limit.
The boy, Jared the 4-year-old, actually was at fault; as much at fault as a 4-year-old can be.
But now he was wet and knowing his father, prone to fits of rage, was going to "talk to him" when he got home from work.
Even at 4, Jared knew to duck first and wait for the bullets to stop falling.
He had been accustomed to waiting at the top of the steps when his dad, John, came home from the insurance office where he worked.
Good-mood daddy meant sliding down the steps into his arms; bad-mood dad meant slinking back into his blue Thomas the Tank Engine plastered room.
Today, surprisingly, was good-mood dad. John had closed on a deal he'd been working at for months.
But Jared did not slide down the steps, even at the sight of his father's smile. The thought of his mother's threat burned in his brain, a scar he would carry for a long time; that no matter who he surrounded himself with that he was "this close" to anger, disappointment and rage.

Oh, snap! I mean burn!

Is there anything worse than burning yourself? Cooking breakfast for No. 2, the birthday boy, I reached for the pan of fresh-out-of-the-oven cinnamon rolls. Without the hot pad. There really isn't anything comparable to the sound of sizzling flesh.

Or the stream of profanities unleashed after flesh stops sizzling and begins to F'ing hurt.

I've broken a few of these

Got this off a link from gorillamask.net (one of the funniest sites on the Web)


Top Ten WTF? US Sex Laws from collegetimes.com


1. Oral sex is illegal in 18 states, including Arizona. (That's just wrong)

2. In Virginia, it is illegal to have sex with the lights on. (depends on if it's a 2 a.m. pick up or not)

3. It is illegal for husbands in Willowdale, Ore., to talk dirty during intercourse. (Mud, filth, sweat grime).

4. Sexual intercourse between unmarried couples is illegal in Georgia. (whole lot of scofflaws in the ATL).

5. Engaging in any sexual position other than missionary is illegal in Washington, DC. ( what about with Marion Barry and a crack pipe?)

6. In Connorsville, Wisconsin, it is illegal for a man to shoot off a gun when his female partner is having an orgasm. ( No need. If she's orgasming, she's already seeing fireworks).

7. In Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, it is illegal to have sex with a truck driver inside a toll booth. (Huh? Is that even possible?)

8. Having sexual relations with a porcupine is illegal in Florida. ( Do I make you horny, Baby? well don't get all prickly about it)

9. It is illegal in Utah to marry your first cousin before the age of 65. (After that she's not hot enough any more).

10. Sex with animals is perfectly legal for men in Washington state, as long as the animal weighs less than 40 pounds. (Aye, chihuahua!)

Sink or swim

After contemplating for weeks, I finally got off my butt and bought a pedestal sink to replace the leaky, rust-stained thing I had in the hovel's lone bathroom.
A Father's Day gift card from Lowe's covered the majority, the rest came from Mr. Checking Account.

Pop Quiz: How many times did Mr. Bad Example have to go to the hardware store, not including the initial trip to Lowe's?

Answer: If you guessed three, you win . . . nothing. But you are correct.

In all my misadventures in Home Improvement, I've never, I repeat, never gotten it right on the first try. It stands to reason -- if I could get it right, I would be a plumber, carpenter or handyman.
But I soldiered on.
It's funny how removal, usually, is the easy part. I say usually because I've gone to put in a water line for an ice maker only to have the ancient copper tubing crumble at the wall, water spraying everywhere and the shut off valve nowhere to be found on the property.

This time, however, there was no real drama.
1. Turn off water? Check.
2. Unscrew all lines? Check.
3. Remove sink and cabinet? Check.

Cleaning ensued and the process of installing the loomed.

After removing everything from the package, Problem No. 1 surfaced -- the water supply lines weren't the right size at the wall. So instead checking to see if there were any other problems, off we go to Ace for a remedy.
With Problem No. 1 solved, sort of, I was back at it piecing the lavatory sink together.
Only to find out the hot-water supply line with half-inch at the faucet and three-eighths at the wall. Round 2.
Only this time, I decided to make sure I didn't need anything else. Learning, slowly, but learning.
And find something I did. It seems the P-trap, that's the curvy thing at the bottom of the drain for you non-plumbing types, was about a half inch off. If the P-trap lines up with the wall drain, the down-spout drain didn't meet the P-trap at a perpendicular angle. And vise versa.
Back to Ace.
It's funny how you're greeted the second and third time in a hardware store on the same day -- "Didn't work, huh?" the clerk who helped me the first time asked.
I wonder if they have a tally sheet to see how many times dumbasses like me return.
Well, we found the right hot-water line and a flex P-trap line. Then I was off to pick up No. 2 at a birthday party. No more going back to Ace for me today -- they closed at 5 p.m. and it was already 4:15 p.m.
So pick up the kid, make small talk and head home to finally finish my project?
Yeah, right.
The flex trap had gender issues -- both sides wanted to be female. Shit, I can't have a lesbian sink. I need it fixed.
Back to the scene of the crime -- Lowe's.
Return the faucet hardware (the one that came with the sink turned out to be OK after all) and look for a non-transgender P-trap. Gotcha.
Then like magic, things start coming together. Lines connect, putty is put in place. Water is turned on and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . it drains. No leaks (for now, the realist in me knows it will leak eventually).
But for now, I have a sink that works, isn't rust-stained and stops dripping when you turn it off.
And it only took six hours to install. A new record.

Another favorite photo

This will be shown to any and all prospective dates TJ will have.

What's in a name?

Apparently, quite a bit if you're 10 or 8.
The word "Dick" came up in dinner conversation, which turned into a rip-snorting good time for B and T. Actually, it was almost soda-snorting-out-the nose good time for TJ, who almost lost it.

The "offending word" came up when the TV music station began playing Moby's "South Side."

"Cool, Moby," I said to anyone and no one.
"Isn't that a book?" No. 1 asked.
"You mean 'Moby Dick'?" I replied.

Laughs all around.
"You guys are laughing at 'Dick'?" I asked.
More snickers.
"You know," I said in my best "I remember-when-candy-cost-a-nickel-and-gas-was-under-a-buck" voice, "Dick is actually a nickname for Richard."
Crickets.
"You know, just like Jack is a nickname of John," I told them.
"Why wouldn't you just want to be called Rich?" No. 1 asked.
"Because not everything used to be dirty," I said. "You do know that gay really"
"Means happy," No. 2 interjected.
"Yes," I said.
"Still," No. 1 said, "I think I'd stick with Rich."
Indeed.

My favorite photo

As a writer, I'm OK (we're all self-deprecating, you know). As a photographer? Let's just say I shouldn't quit my night job just yet.

Still, every once in a while, I get it. that shot that makes me stand back and say, "Wow."

This is from a hiking trp I took with the boys about four years and 100 pounds ago.

We are on a trek up to the top of Maggie's Peak rising above Lkae Tahoe at Emerald Bay. Brady stood on the rock overlooking the lake, and I snapped.

Even a blind squirrel gets a nut.

The patriotic alternative

No firework on the Fourth of July? Even for an in-the-closet Communist, that's just downright un-American.

So we hopped in the Family Truckster and journeyed up to Mount Shasta's fesitval of blowing shit up.

The boys and I found friends. I chatted, they played, Brady flirted with a girl "he doesn't like' (ah, to be 11 years old again).

Then it got dark. And we saw fireworks.

While I didn't think they were all that good (although I was looking from behind the lens), the kids all thought it was great. And afterall, isn't that what it's about?