All out of Pledge and my dust rag is clean

It has been awhile. Things are busy in the world of David lately. With work, the stimulus bill has kept me extremely busy. Busy is a good thing in employment work. It has been a great opportunity to get out and meet new people and get acquainted with different companies. The shear size of the stimulus bill is crazy. If you want an insiders view on it, I would be happy to share it with you but not here or not on here today anyway. There is always tomorrow for you.

So travel, again. About a week ago, I was able to head back to MS for a couple days. It was more of a purpose trip as oppose to just simple pleasure. Yet, I managed to find a little fun in the mix. We visited Natasha's family, a hospital visit to see her cousin and then headed to Oxford. We caught then end of game 2 of Ole Miss/Alabama, which we won to claim the series. We, including Ben, Natasha, her dad, and I went out to the Sports bar to get into March Madness. It was a great success and the crowd was not to crazy. We then ate sushie, yessssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss, what I miss living in Pikeville, and called it a night.

Sunday brought more of the same, except a loss at the hands of Alabama, ahh you can't sweep them all. We then headed out to Taylor Grocery. It was good food and even better friends. We were able to have a good crowd of Natasha, Ben, I, Jenny, Byrd and Rachael (this was a good friend of Natasha back at Community College and they have sense rekindled their relationship)(this is good). The more long term friends you can have, the better. I was sadden to the fact that we really were planning on going to Yocona this weekend. With it burning down, this brings much grief. For those of you who don't know, Natasha and I had our first date there and were engaged there as well. We also had dates there in between. They are saying they will rebuild, which is good, they needed some construction anyway. Hopefully it will look closely to the same!

It brings up a good point. Why do we attach ourselves to possessions? Not so much places of memory as much as material things. We have a family member die and we want to keep every thing they had in their place. We will take that old stuff and store it up somewhere forever. Some things we look at but some we never even get out of the attic. Then when someone comes along and mentions getting rid of it, oh no, that is important. Really, really, is it that important setting up here with 12 lbs of dust. I don't know, maybe that is what comes with moving and traveling a lot. You begin to limit your material things, so you don't have to load that shit up 2 flights of stairs in the middle of July, (right Ben)! I can handle the occasional picture or antique but not every little piece of $25 Wal-mart furniture. I mean really, I don't want everything in my closet to be something I pull out and look at once in a blue moon just to remind me I miss someone. I'll miss them anyway, they were apart of my life, I'll show it with a picture on the wall or antique in the dining room but not every sock they wore back in 82.

That always leads to the discussion Natasha, I and a friend of ours had last night. What is the goal in life? What we attempting to accomplish overall? This will be the next discussion, I'll leave this on topic today.

So why are we here? Is it to collect things of people past? Is this what we truly what to keep when people are gone? Is it their memory or their material possessions that we should keep? If it is the latter, I better get more stuff so I can fill up your attic too! Oh who am I kidding, I am going to live to be 119. I'll explain this theory later. Hope you guys don't mind if your stuff ends up in a yard sale. I don't want to seem shallow or that I don't care about others, I do. I just not a believer in building items to leave being is a sign of success nor is collecting people left over possessions a way to show you care more than others. I guess it relates back to when I acted in a scene of "Death of a Salesman." A complex play dealing with just this fact. A guy realizes, as he is being released from his job, that he truly has nothing material to leave behind. He become fearful that people will forget him and he begins to do crazy thing to leave things behind. It is good, you can read it yourself. Well long story longer, It is simply that we have our time and our family and friends have there time here is this world. There is the chance to make this world the best possible without leaving that VHS copy of Christmas Vacation for me to keep for 25 more years. "But It was his favorite movie........."

We can't all be Martin Luther King Jr but our impacts to a community, a state or a nation can be long felt with the ripple effect long after our departure. Even more so than those 3 dining room tables in storage. Maybe I just don't like to dust so much furniture.

People in places...

Maybe that could be a Wheel of Fortune category, maybe it already is. I got told the other day at work that the Thank you email I sent out was too wordy. To wordy you say, I thought about that. I wrote it down, I thought about it some more. I felt it was constructive criticism, as was so carefully stated in the email, along with a great compliment at the end. Someone has been reading their manager manual. Yet, there is something larger about that concept that has bothered me. It's not because I don't use the phrase myself. I have previously used it here to describe mine and other people’s writings. The fact that it is a business letter, it maybe does make sense. They are attempting to keep the document more professional. Don’t let your guard down; don’t open up too directly with your clients. Don’t write like you talk, keep it professional. I’ve heard it all before. There is feeling that causes restraint of the mind in this context. This is the great thing about blogs. There is no restraint. You can write what you want and how you want to write it. You can say what you feel. You might pay the price of putting out on the line, but it’s your chance too. No criticisms, just free roam. People will then take the time to click on your page, read your thoughts and then they can do as they please. Therein lays the question of why are we here. What causes people to come to his or her blogs to write and to also go to others blogs to read? It is the pull to express ones potential of freedom and the principal of opening up your thoughts, mind and feelings.
So let us get on to this wordy discussion. I always ponder what makes people stay where they do. What makes people commit to a certain area? What makes them center their self in that location? These are questions I have no answer, yet that is. I will give us examples of people intertwined into their atmosphere. I'll give you case 1: Big One staying in Oxford.
Big One and Little One had been enjoying the evening events of the college town. It had involved quite a few cocktails at one of the many waterholes so carefully placed throughout the square of Oxford. After making sure the bartenders weren't serving any more these two determined individuals continued their dream of total intoxication to a common event known as a late night. These so cleverly named events award you the opportunity of continuing to wet your whistle at late event beyond the hours of operation of the pub. After a few more hours, pushing their watches into times only used for hunters and night shift workers, the Ones are perplexed to their need for nicotine. As they begin the roll up to the late am service station, the vehicle of choice would sputter using their last fumes of gas. This occurring at roughly a 75% incline of a hill. They were able to get the mass of metal to remain braked at close to the center of this hill. Now getting the hollowed out jeep to the side of the road would be another adventure all in itself. They request the assistance of a 350 lb fellow friend, which was called out from his deep slumber. He helps push the vehicle up the incline to the side, not with Big One, nope, with Little One, all 75 lbs of him. Good thing the friend didn't let go, the story would end here. Yet the story continues with Little One sent after the gas. Big One gives Little One 5 dollars with specific instructions as follows:
"Get 1.88 in gas, a Mountain Dew and a pack cigarettes" Yes you guess it, this was exactly 5 dollars. Taking that he knew this exact total meant that this wasn't his first adventure with only getting 1.88 in gas, maybe why he was running so low. Anywho, the story then goes with Little One's question "What do I put the gas in" Big One quick on his feet replies "Just borrow a can from the gas station" Heaven forbid you skip on the MD or cigs.
We move forward with the return of Little One. Big One and friend still remain in car. Little One lights a cig, good investment and begins to put gas into truck. Little One tells Big One that he is done. Big One turns the key over, no start, tries again, still no start. Big One gets out in a whisk to see what the hell the problem is. He then notices that Little One had not poured the gas in the truck, OH NO, yet down the side of the truck and all onto the ground. Now sitting broke, out of gas and nothing but a half MD and pack of cigs minus 2. All in all, the truck is stranded there, friend is now disgusted and proceeds to let them know that they now have only the option of returning with him and that is it. You can't make this up.
I don't recall how long the truck set there. I do recall this was either not the first time or the last these two adventures ran out of gas on this same hill. I guess it hard to keep 1.88 in gas flowing through the pipes. Luckily, some years later, these late nights don't happen, well not at the bottom of that hill anyway. Good thing, guess it tough to pour gas on an incline.

A one part series...

I always begin my post by reading my previous post. This not to duplicate. In the last one I noticed I had become some lengthy. There also was discussions in the last travel that eluded to the fact that it is negative when blogs become to wordy and tell to much. I begin to lose focus. Speaking of focus, ten hours down and ten hours back of traveling alone gives you all type of time to think. Thinking can be good and can be bad. We'll see later. I know many of you have been patiently sitting and waiting for the next entry from our great lives.



I have been given a request to talk on the some great friends of ours. In order to hide their identity, we will refer to them simply as the Coopers. Say I stole hiding identity in blogging from my mother, it won't be the first thing I plagiarise throughout these entries. To further examine them, we will label them as Big One and Little One. Oh but don't get to excited, they are to come later.



This entry will be on this weekend's adventures. The Toyota was loaded down with two empty coolers and a suitcase stuffed with clean clothes as I pulled out of Pikeville, KY at four pm on Thursday afternoon. I laid the hammer down headed for the interstate. This is not always an easy thing to do when leaving extreme eastern KY. Regardless I made it. While cruising through Knoxville, TN, I called into a radio sports program to discuss SEC sports with some TN fans. It was fun, put me on live and they were cordial. It wasn't the first time I had been on the radio, not even that day. I had put on a Career Fair, partnering with all the area schools, and hit heavy on the marketing events.



Back to the road, I hit Carthage about 1:30 am, gaining an hour to central time. It was good to smell the fresh uncoil air, have a good pressure hot shower, and eat an omelet and biscuits. I loaded up the smoker that I had stored at the in-laws. Now, this isn't your every day run of the mill, I remember when I had first grill, smoker. This is a man's man smoker. One that you sit around with your other guy friends and say yeah, it's a hell of thing. We did. It's an over compensation thing. Like the guy on the lake with the boat that is to large and to loud and looks like it belongs on the ocean. Yeah, it for sure that he is not packing. We also tauted other people in right field with there small gas and electric compact grills and such. I imagine they were laughing as we load in the pouring sleet and snow. As long as well get to laugh, it's all fun.



So long story longer, I was able to get to Oxford, MS by Friday afternoon. Big Al (if you don't know him, I will introduce him through out post, we take some of the same travels with us) and I began the prep work on 4 10 lb Boston Butts, 16 slab of ribs, 10 lbs of sausage and 4 whole chickens. I think we had a couple can of beans and some chips to go with it. Staying focused on the key food groups. All we needed was a Diet Coke and we want looked like a McDonald's order. "I'll have a big Mac, Fish sandwich, and Super Size fries.......and a diet coke"



The Friday game was cancelled for rain and it was close to freezing cold. We opted out for the Japaneese place Kabuka (sp). Nine guys and an open flame was an entertaining time to say the least. Across from us sat 7 women and 1 guy. Now this brings up an interesting topic. Was he the being that guy, you know the one who just can't let the girls go out and have a good time. Surely he isn't that boyfriend or guy that thinks, hey "7 women and me, wow, that sounds hot" because it's not as "cool" as you think it is. OOOOOOOORRRRRRR was he just gay. If so, then I understand more. yet, it does bring up another question and conversation? How much and far are you allowed as a gay man to take that. I mean would you include yourself in "ladies night' functions. If so, this it becomes a purely sexual based night out. Saying, "If you are more likely to have sex with men..night out" Doesn't have quite the same ring to it. I'll leave this one for you guys to discuss. It just needs to be addressed that even though you would rather be with men, it doesn't include you. Women have other matters/problems/fun things to discuss on ladies night. Don't be that guy! Hell, maybe I am way off base and it was simply that he has cancer and it was his Make a Wish gift. He did down that 15 second gasoline shot like a champ. I was impressed he took all our pranks we pulled out. Big Al not to be out down with the young lady called him out.



Moving on, We did make it to the baseball field the next day. At 8:00 am for a 12:00 game. It was roughly some where between Montana and Alaska Cold. Yet to decide what kind of cold that is, I don't consider Canada at all. Nothing is really Canadian, they combined everyone elses things. The meat cooked slow, but we ate very well. This brings me to the main discussion. I know I know, said I would shorten this one up.



Why do people insist on telling you how freezing cold it is when it is cold. This is such a simple topic of negative behavior. I know people that will constantly deliver bad news. Hey David, it's going to rain, it's going to be cold, it is raining, it is snowing, it is cold, the event is going to suck, yah yah yah yah yah yah, shut it. Doesn't matter, really. It is not perfect weather conditions for baseball, but it was perfect weather for B^3 Baseball, Beer & BBQ. This event occurs on opening weekend of baseball. Guess what, that is always and is always going to be in February. Most likely going to be ugly weather. Not bad but ugly. Let's move on. I could go on and on with a rant about this relates to life and the negative behavior have towards their situation and how that leads into a projected bad time, but I have done that and you have heard that way before me. Does it matter, if you don't like the event, the experience, then "WHY ARE YOU HERE" Just enjoy the situation, live the moment and I promise you that it will leave you with hell of stories later. Ones that will leave you saying things like Natasha's favorite words "You can't make this shit up!" I'll give you this from the late Paul Harvey: a great loss this past week.

"People like bad news because it makes them feel better about themselves. We like to hear of others struggles because it will let us say to ourselves at least I am not like that person."




There are a lot of stories from this weekend of travel. It is always fun to head to Oxford and to MS in general. They were only able to get one game in with the freezing rain coming in side ways. The next was canceled for snow and then the next day was concealed as well. It happens. I will return. I also went and played a little poker as well. It was fun and entertaining. Then I headed down to Jackson, MS to see New Site (my high school) Girls Basketball team play in the state tournament for the first time ever. They lost by four, great to see old friends.

Speaking of Friends, I will begin to introduce friends in different writings. I think it is important to not only know why are we here as far as locations but why we associate and interact with certain people. People are the back bone of a happy life. It is what makes us rich in life, not the travel to destinations but the people we see and the experience we create.

" But it's not how big's the house, it's how happy's the home, How poor is a rich man who lives all alone" Aaron Watson, Shut Up and Dance