Spring Flowers

Rachelle and I went to Table Mountain this weekend to look at the Spring flowers. Nobody told us that it was going to be friggin' cold and windy this late in March. If you look closely, I believe Rachelle's smile is frozen on and her hands are still thawing out. That said, the flowers were really pretty and the 40 mph wind gusts kept the crowds to a minimum. And we were still able to have our traditional Easter brunch at the Wendy's. Nothing says "tradition" like a number 6 with no lettuce. I would have let her Biggie-Size it, but it wasn't that special an occasion. At least I let her get her own fries.

Pull the Plug

After watching the exhaustive "news" coverage of the Terry Schiavo story, I want to make it clear to all of my friends and family: I DO NOT WANT TO EXIST IN A PERMANENT VEGATATIVE STATE. Of course, not a lot of my friends and family look at this blog, but I'm covering my bases. I am also completely disgusted by the turd-piles that pass for elected officials in this country. I don't want some bottom-dwelling, scum-sucking, pandering politician deciding whether I'm living a quality life or not. I'd rather leave that to my wife after she finds me after I "accidentally" slip in the tub. I'll start worrying when she starts shopping for a new boat. Or when I start finding my stuff on e-bay. Short story: no tubes, no plugs, no extraordinary measures. And no friggin' politicians.

Moral Dilema

Is it wrong to hate thy neighbor? Especially if he's actually a really nice guy who just happens to make you feel really lame? I was out hauling my crap to the curb for dump day (seriously, hang on for a description of "dump day") and I started talking to my neighbor, Dave. He was doing something to his Chevy Suburban, but it wasn't anything that looked familiar to me, i.e., hosing the bird crap off the hood or emptying the Diet Coke cans out of the bed. Turns out he was removing the gas tank to replace the fuel pump. Crappers. I'm about 85% sure I could find the gas tank on my truck and 100% freakin' sure that I would never be able to remove it/fix it/replace it. Ever. And there's about a 75% chance that I'd blow myself, and the adjacent 5 houses, up in the process.

Back to "dump day". Orangevale is really still a small town with a large population. Once (or twice) a year, the county sends trucks around to all the neighborhoods to pick up any crap that wouldn't normally go in the trash, like appliances, tree stumps, lawn mowers, etc. It's actually a great time. Everybody hauls their crap to the curb and then sits around waiting for the scavengers. You literally can't turn your back before somebody's scoping out your stuff and picking out the "good" things. This year, I had a stack of rotted, mildewed, cracked landscaping timbers piled out front. They were there when I left for work, gone when I came home. I can't even begin to imagine what somebody would want with those, but they went pretty quick. Not as fast as my living room lamps, though. I finished hauling the rest of my crap to the street after work today. I get into the house and look out the window to see my neighbor (William, not Dave) grabbing two table lamps from my crap pile. Sweet. I keep checking the pile to see what's left. At last count, somebody had taken the broken floor fan, broken lawn mower and rusted trash can. I think I'll assign a point value to everything next year and make a game out of it. Maybe Rachelle and I can create brackets like the NCAA's to see who picks the order everything gets scavenged in. Might make it a drinking game. It's a thought.

Mi Casa

I'm seriously re-thinking my decision to move to California. Growing up in Nebraska, I never had to worry about mowing the lawn in March. Or February. Or any time between October and May or June. The 12-month growing season out here can be a real pain in the ass. On the plus side, I did get to buy a new lawn-mower today. And I got to use my Milwaukee Sawz-All to cut up some stuff in the back yard. Not enough fun to balance out all the manual labor, but it helps.

The county has a dump-day once (supposed to be twice, but who's counting) a year where everybody hauls all of their useless crap to the curb and the dump-trucks come to pick it up. That's assuming anything is left after the scavengers come by at night for all the "good" stuff. The notice we get actually says that nobody's supposed to take your stuff but the trash guys, but I couldn't care less who nabs my crap. I had an entire living room set out on the curb one year that lasted just long enough for me to get back in the house. I heard a car pull up and looked out the window to see a guy loading my 7-foot couch on top of his soft-top Jeep. At least it went to a good home. I don't have anything nearly that good this year, but my guess is 90% of whatever I put out there is gone before the trucks get here.