UPS: When it absolutely, positively has to be there some day

Last week I ordered a new gadget for Ms. Pool Bar from Amazon, and opted for the standard shipping since there was no big rush for it. Amazon estimated deliver for today, 2/29. So far so good, right? Well, a few hours later I get an e-mail saying the item had shipped, so I figured maybe it would arrive a day or two early. Since I'm one of those who'll keep pushing the elevator call button in the hopes the elevator will get there faster, I checked the UPS tracking link that Amazon provided and saw that the package had left Phoenix, arrived in Tempe and arrived...back in Phoenix. I kept checking the progress over the next few days and was vaguely amused. Today it shows that it's out for delivery, which is on schedule so I'm not really complaining, but check out this shipping history (click for larger image):

I'm particularly amused by the package's stopover in Louisville. What did it do, run out for a pack of cigarettes while it was there? It's almost as if UPS had to go to extra effort NOT to provide 2-day delivery.

Traveler's hell

I was out in the San Francisco Bay Area all last week, and by yesterday morning I was really ready to get home.

My day started yesterday with a 4AM wake-up for a 6AM flight (I was staying at the SFO Marriott so no need to get up ealier). Weather's good, and I get my rental car returned in short order and get through security with no problem. Delta starts boarding the flight about 35 minutes before scheduled departure, so all's good. I've even got first class upgrades for both legs of the trip (SFO-ATL and ATL-RIC). The trouble started about 10 minutes before scheduled departure when the captain came on the PA and announced that we had to wait for a de-icing crew to come and de-ice us. Shouldn't set us back by more than a few minutes, he says, and that he should be able to make it up en route. That's all well and good, BUT...it was 55 fucking degrees outside (that's about 13 sodding degrees to my Brit friends). To top it off, there was no evidence of ice, frost or even a little bit of dew ANYWHERE.

That brief wait for the de-icing crew turned into around 45 minutes because -- wait for it -- there was another aircraft ahead of us for de-icing. When the guys finally show up, there's no de-icing truck, just a scissors jack used for loading cargo and a guy standing on it with what looks like a garden hose. He proceeds to sort of nonchalantly spray both wings of our plane, and we're on our way from the gate an hour behind scheduled departure. But hey, I'm not worried...I've got a 2.5 hour layover in Atlanta which has just gotten shorter.

Fast forward 6 hours or so. I've had my drink and a smoke at the Heineken Bar & Grill (Concourse A, upper level at ATL for those who like to drink AND smoke while awaiting connecting flights) and I'm at the gate for my flight to RIC. Boarding is running slightly late because the aircraft got in 5-10 minutes behind schedule (your attention is invited to Saturday's violent weather along the east coast), but we're still looking good for an on time departure. Brats and wheelchairs board, then first class. Just as the first couple of coach passengers are getting on, the gate agent runs down the jetway and on the plane to tell the flight attendant that she had to halt the boarding process. It seems they had the wrong aircraft type loaded in the computer they'd have to reload it and reboard those pax who'd already been boarded. One rather unhappy camper (not me) loses his first class seat during the reshuffle, and we push back from the gate about 50 minutes late and start taxiing to queue up for the runway.

But wait! The captain gets on the PA and says that due to severe weather in the Richmond area they may have to hold us on the ground for a while. No, wait! On second thought, if we can takeoff RIGHT FREAKING NOW! we might beat the weather! So...high speed taxi to the head of the line, hard turn onto the runway, and off we go. I thought I saw the pilots of about 17 airplanes behind us giving us the finger.

A couple glasses of wine later, we're starting the initial descent into Richmond. Did I mention they were forecasting violent weather in the Richmond area? Yes, I believe I did. Our MD-88 proceeds to get tossed about like a kite in a gale, and because that's so much gosh-darned fun, we enter a holding pattern at around 5000 feet just so we can enjoy it a little while longer while the REALLY violent weather clears the area around the airport. Unfortunately, nobody thought to tell the guys who fueled the plane that we'd be stopping at an amusement park so we started running low on fuel. Evidently, this storm had already passed through Raleigh, so off we go to RDU for refueling before heading back to RIC.

In retrospect, I guess I shouldn't complain that after all that, we only arrived 2.5 hours late in Richmond. Scheduled arrival time was 17:02, and we arrived at around 19:30.

Blowing off the cobwebs

Yeah, I know I've been neglecting this blog lately. Work's been killing me and when I haven't been traveling (Seattle, WA and Portland, OR this week) I've been trying to play catch-up.

The hell of a recession...those of us still working are doing the work of three people. But I'll have some brief, almost Twitter-length posts coming up.

It's always later than you think

When I was stationed at Andrews AFB near Washington, DC in the early to mid '90s, my wife and I became close friends with another USAF couple who'd moved in across the street from us shortly after we did. We remained close long after his retirement from the Air Force and my return to reserve status, but we hadn't seen much of each other over the past couple of years, even though they relocated not long ago a bit closer to where we live. There just always seemed to be too much other crap going on.

Just this evening as I was driving home from the airport, something reminded me of my buddy Ryan, and I thought I'd give him a call tomorrow to try and set something up for the weekend. But when I got home, Mrs. Poolbar told me to grab a beer and sit down. It turns out she'd gotten a call from Ryan's wife earlier today. She'd found him dead yesterday from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Without getting into a lot of philosophical bullshit about friendships and how fleeting life is, suffice it to say that if you've got a friend or family member you've been thinking about getting back in touch with, stop thinking and just do it.

Gear Acquisition Syndrome

I started playing guitar taking guitar lessons (to say I actually play guitar would be a bit of a stretch yet) a little over a year ago, and I'm nowhere near mastering the 6-string guitar. But after putzing around with a 12-string at our local guitar shop (Picker's Supply for you denizens of Fredericksburg), I had to have one. Trouble was, I didn't want to plop down $1400 for the used Taylor they had at Picker's, no matter how beautiful it sounded.

I got on Craig's List and came across an old Alvarez Kazuo Yairi model 5068 for sale at a small luthier's shop in Richmond. The luthier said that it had a couple of cracks which he fixed, and he'd replaced the bridge plate. He did a good enough job that you have to know where the cracks were to find them. One strum and I had to have it. I paid him the asking price (which was so low, I'm embarassed to put it here), and took it home.

From what I can gather at the Alvarez guitar web site, the guitar was produced in 1972...when I was 12 years old. Wow.

My younger son says I've got G.A.S., or "gear acquisition syndrome". Apparently that's a term used in the guitar-playing world for people who get the fever for a new instrument or piece of equipment. Ha! He's a fine one to talk. I've got four guitars now and he still has more crap than I do.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 9

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

So today-- eh, skip it.

When I started this series of stupid posts it was supposed to be a humorous (and obviously fictitious) look at three nominally civilized males turning feral due to the absence of the lady of the house. Today's post was going to be about running out of beer, but that would have really required a suspension of disbelief. Grinding penne pasta down to get rid of the beveled edges? Sure. Running out of beer? Not a chance.

I have a good sense of humor, but that doesn't necessarily translate into being able to fire off good comedy - or even mediocre comedy - off the top of my head. I imagine that even for a comedy writer, that takes some thought and a bit of work.

Between work (my paying job, that is), cleaning, cooking, looking after two boys (who are old enough to look after themselves but probably won't), and making sure a dog and two cats don't actually turn feral, I just don't have the time to come up with truly funny stuff. Suffice it to say that I've developed a new appreciation for single parents.

In case you were wondering, the last few posts were supposed to have been increasingly incoherent ramblings about scavenging for food and making loin cloths from the pelts of neighbors' pets. The last post was to have been a simple "Ook!".

Anyway, Ms. Pool Bar will be back in a few more days, so I guess I'd better start cleaning up the mess from all those sacrifices to the Moon God.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 8

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Had to fight the dog for the last Slim Jim this morning. Mixed up some flour, sugar, water and chopped walnuts left over from Christmas for dinner. Wasn't bad.

Getting dark...gotta go.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 6

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Starting to run low on food here. Still got some stale bread and a bit of beer, and I saw this in the pantry, but, well, it kind of scares me:

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 5

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Yes! Finally solved the dirty dishes problem without buying new ones. Got some odd looks from the neighbors while I hosed them off in the driveway, and I had to break out the pressure washer for those pots and pans, but what the hell.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 4

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Is milk supposed to have chunks?

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 3

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Well. I found out where all the other dirty dishes go. Now they're out of the boys' rooms and on the counter with mine where they belong. At least I think that's where they belong, and I still haven't figured out what I'm supposed to do with them.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 2

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

Grilling I can do. But actual cooking? Not so much. Sure, I can fry bacon and eggs, but beyond that my cooking skills are pretty limited. All that measuring and combining ingredients just kind of baffles me. But last night I thought I'd take on the challenge and make a side dish to go with the meat and settled on macaroni and cheese. What American male doesn't like macaroni and cheese?

I wasn't exactly sure what macaroni and cheese in its raw, uncooked state looks like so I went rummaging through cabinets and the pantry closet looking for some with no luck, then it occurred to me that maybe it has to be kept cold or maybe frozen. So I pawed around in the fridge and the freezer (hey, I'm not a total novice in the ways of the kitchen!), but again came up empty.

There was a bag of something called "Penne" in the pantry, which kinda-sorta looked like macaroni and cheese (without the cheese), but instead of being curved like a capital "C", it was straight, like a sans-serif capital "I". And those weird beveled ends...hmmm. Time to improvise!

I took a few of the penne things out of the bag and when I tried to bend them into a "C" shape, they just broke. I decided I could live with "I"-shaped macaroni, but those beveled ends would never do. Cutting off the beveled ends with a knife ended in the same result as trying to bend them, then it occurred to me that I could just file them flat! I know...I'm a genius.

Armed now with a metal file from the garage, I started filing off the ends and saw that this would take way too long when I remembered the bench grinder in the garage. So I grabbed the whole bag of penne and the bowl of filed-down penne things and returned to the garage. In less than 90 minutes, I had the whole bag of pennes ground down to flat-ended, "I"-shaped macaroni! As macaroni goes, mine were kind of large, but bigger is better, right?

I was sure the rest of it would be a breeze. All I had to do, according to the bag, was boil my penne/macaroni "until tender". So while the stuff was boiling, I went in search of cheese. What's macaroni and cheese without cheese, right?

I was pretty sure cheese has to be kept cold so back to the fridge I went. There was a package of sliced American cheese, but I knew that wasn't the right kind. The cheese on all the macaroni and cheese I've ever eaten was never square and flat. It had to be something closer to a liquid form. A block of cheddar? Nope. Shredded cheddar? Not even close. A-ha! Bleu Cheese Dressing...it was sort of liquidy and even had the "Kraft" logo! It was nearly full, so I dumped the whole bottle into the boiling water along with the penne/macaroni.

FAIL. I don't know if it was the fact that we didn't eat until after 10PM, or that the macaroni and cheese didn't look, feel (isn't all that water supposed to get soaked up?) or taste anything like macaroni and cheese, or maybe it was just the odd metal burr here and there, but the boys weren't happy.

From here on out, it's nothing but meat.

Descent into barbarism watch: Day 1

In which I chronicle the day-to-day tribulations of living with two (more-or-less) adult boys as my wife trots around Europe for two weeks.

OK, so I think I can handle this whole cooking and cleaning thing while the wife's away on vacation. The one thing I haven't figured out is what happens to the dishes after they're used? Sure, I see some of them sitting on the kitchen counter, because I put them there after I was done eating. But where are the rest of them? Weird.

And I'm a bit worried that there only seems to be a few days worth of dishes in the cabinet. Between the three of us, we'll be through those by Sunday, maybe Monday at the latest. I still haven't figured out where the dirty dishes go and where the clean ones come from, but I'm sure I'll figure it out sooner or later. Maybe she just buys more every few days. Yeah, I'll bet that's it.

Update: Well, I figured out where some of the clean dishes come from. I put my plate on the floor so the dog could have the leftover bits, and that bad boy was pretty clean when he got done with it! Might be able to make it to Tuesday.

Boys gone wild

I dropped Mrs. Pool Bar and her friend off at the airport this morning for their flight to Europe. Yup, she's taking a two-week vacation and leaving me and the boys to fend for ourselves for the next two weeks.

I figure by the time she gets back, me and the boys will have turned feral and might be looking something like this:


Apologies in advance if my blog posts start to sound like an unintelligible series of grunts. Well, more so than usual.

Note to Comcast Cable

We've been having intermittent service disruptions with our Comcast Cable high-speed Internet service at home for the past week. No big deal...I've been in the IT business a long time, including time in the ISP business, and I know this stuff happens, and the Comcast support people I've spoken with on the phone and the service techs who've come to the house have always been pleasant, professional and diligent in trying to solve the problem.

Yesterday we had another day of off-and-on outages, so I scheduled yet another service call, which was set for Tuesday. Today, I got a call from Comcast. It was an automated call with a recording saying to please hold for the next available agent...over, and over and over again. After a couple minutes, I hung up and the phone immediately rang again with the same recording. I let it go for a minute or so then hung up again. When the phone rang a third time, I only let it go for about 10 seconds and just as I was about to hang up, a human came on the line to confirm the appointment for tomorrow.

What the hell is up with that? I understand call centers have automated dialers tied to the agents' terminals, but fer cryin' out loud...don't let it start dialing until an agent is ready to talk! Don't call me and put me on hold!

Random encounter weekend

I was out in the San Fran Bay Area again this week and flew back home yesterday. Friday night I was at our usual watering hole waiting to catch up with a friend for dinner and as the place got more and more crowded, I gave up my table to an older couple who were waiting for another couple to show up. I got to talking to the two gentlemen, and when the subject turned to international travel, we started talking about German cities. The new arrival asked if I'd ever been to Wiesbaden, Germany, and I said "Been there? I was born there." I explained I was an Air Force brat and my dad had been stationed there. The guy laughed and explained he was a doctor and had been posted to the military hospital there between 1958 and 1960. Which made me laugh because I was born at that hospital in 1959. He was a general surgeon and not an OB, but he did assist in some deliveries during that time, so who knows.

Then on Saturday while waiting to board my flight in Atlanta for Richmond, there was a crowd of teens from a church choir (I could tell because they were all wearing the same t-shirt) gathered around some short older guy who was talking to them. I turned to the guy next to me and remarked that he must be someone to somebody and the guy told me he was Henry Winkler. I couldn't tell because I only saw him from behind. I took another look and sure enough, it was The Fonz.

The gate agents got him on the plane before boarding the rest of the first class cabin, and when I boarded I found that Winkler was in my seat. He asked if I'd mind swapping seats with him because he knew the lady in the window seat and wanted to chat with her. I said no problem and proceeded to stow my stuff as Winkler and the lady next to him chatted with me (the lady was asking about my Baby Taylor travel guitar that I drag around with me on the road), and I took my seat.

At one point while the plane was boarding Winkler got up so a passenger could have her picture taken with the lady in the window seat so I figured she must be "somebody" too, so I took another look and realized it was Sissy Spacek. I guess I didn't recgonize her at first without the bloody prom dress. Weird, huh?

One thing I have to say about Winkler is that he's unusually kind and gracious with fans. After he got done talking with the kids from the choir, he had one person after another come up asking to have a picture taken with him. He didn't decline once and always exchanged pleasantries with the fan.

Cartoon time

Editorial cartoonist Clay Jones at our local daily, the Fredericksburg Free Lance-Star, runs a caption contest every week, and guess who won this week?

Warm-up

The Washington Capitals and Carolina Hurricanes warm up before tonight's game. Pretty cool...I haven't been to a hockey game in years. I'm in a suite box, and it's free!

Doo, doo, doo, lookin' out my back door

Nothing like an early March snow storm to really bollocks up my day.

March in like a lion...

...Pool Bar vicinity hardest hit.

TOTAL ACCUMULATIONS ARE EXPECTED TO RANGE FROM 6 TO 9 INCHES IN THIS AREA... WITH THE HIGHER END OF THE RANGE MOST LIKELY OCCURRING ACROSS CENTRAL AND SOUTHERN MARYLAND AND INTO VIRGINIA NEAR THE FREDERICKSBURG AREA.

Glad I don't have to fly anywhere today.