A Trip To The Doctor

  Last week Pearl was really sick, so sick she didn’t trust driving her self to the doctor. So I stayed home from work to take her. I had already been trying to avoid catching what she had for about five days. I didn’t kiss her on the lips, washed my hands a lot, and generally avoided sickness related tissues like they had the plague on them. When we got to Kaiser they sent us up to a clinic upstairs. I grabbed the handrail on the climb up. Then we sat in the waiting room, fortunately there wasn’t a bunch of people in there, but there was a few sick  people coughing.

  By the time they called Pearls name to go into the little room I felt like I was covered in germs from head to toe. I probably wasn’t, but I swear I could feel them crawling on me. Pearl and I are sitting  waiting for the doctor to come in and she decides to get up and use the aerosol hand sanitizer hanging on the wall.

  A quick PFFT and she had a nickle sized dab of foam in her palm. I, still feeling the germs crawling on me, decide I need some too. Pearl asks me why and I say I touched a door handle. I was trying to hind my germ phobia. I reach up to the dispenser of life saving foam, cup my hand under the nozzle and as gently as I can press the nozzle to dispense it into my palm. a quick PFFT and I would be germ free. PFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!!! The foam comes out at an alarming rate. It squirts into my palm and then out of my palm. Up my arm and onto my shoulder. Still spraying, the foam hits me in the face. I react like I was shot, not on purpose but just a natural reaction to getting sprayed in the face with foam. The runaway foam actually sprayed off the top of my head.

 I muttered a few expletives and trying to keep my cool I start rubbing in the foam while quietly  giggling to myself. I hear laughing behind me, surely Pearl hadn’t seen what I had done. I turn around and laughing with tears in her eyes is Pearl. She starts laughing even more because I still have foam hanging on my glasses. I start laughing. Because I know that this is going into the ” Stupid Things Bryan Has Done ” file in her head. Right next to the time I caught my own arm in the power window of our car.

  I sit down and by this time we are both crying from laughter. Pearl is now helping me rub in the foam. Right at this moment we hear a gentle knock on the door. Sure now that I’m covered in foam the doctor shows up. He couldn’t make us wait another two minutes when the foam would be all rubbed in.  He comes in and says,” Whats going on in here? ” I explain what happened and he tells me how to control the spray of the foam. Not how to keep it in my hand, but how to spray other people. So be forewarned I know how to use it as a weapon now.

  Well the I guess I got what my heart really wanted when I was reaching for the foam. When we left the office I couldn’t feel the germs crawling on me anymore. I’m pretty sure I got them all!

Ford, Fuel Pump and My Wife

  The fuel pump went out on the Taurus ( yes I own a Taurus) And I had to spend a day of vacation replacing it. I began by jacking the car up and disconnecting the  miriad of hoses attached to the tank. After that I started to remove the bolts that hold the straps that hold the tank to the bottom of the car. One of those was difficult to get out, it squeaked and groaned until it was out. the tank was lowered  and before I knew it with Pearl’s help the pump was in.

  That is when the fun began. I began lifting the tank back into place. One strap goes in easily the other … not so much. I can’t get the bolt to start threading. I started to get a little frustrated so I move on to other things. I decide to put a new fuel filter in  that I had ordered and waited for two days to come in. I’m trying to put the filter in but the fittings are too large. The parts store ordered the wrong filter. I’m frustrated again, so I decide to finish connecting the hoses I can and go back to the tank strap. problems still with getting the bolt to thread. I pull the bolt out and it’s retainer and examine them. They are stripped. I didn’t do it I think Ford did when they assembled the car. Remember the bolt that groaned taking it out, this was it. I finish what I can and decide to go to the parts store and junk yard to replace the wrong filter and stripped parts.

  First the parts store. I’m greeted by a nice old man who tries to help me but says he can’t approve my return. He needs to get the manager. I tell him that’s fine and that the manager WILL do my return. I’ve decided that he has no choice he will give me back my money. The manager comes out and SHE ( I guess it was a little sexist of me to assume the manager was male) looks at my part and tells me” That’s not our part”. I show her my receipt and tell her ” That’s the part your guys sold me “. She approves my return all I’m asking for is the correct part but they don’t have it. They give me my money back ( about $50) and I’m off to another store. This store has the part I need  and it’s only $13. I made a little money back, something is finally starting to work out.

  Next I went to the junk yard to replace the stripped part. I decide to try a new one in my area because it is close. When I arrive I noticed that the cars are all sitting on the ground with no tires on them . This is a problem because the part I need is under the car. I found two piles of  junk that will suit my needs. In order to get the part out I have to lay flat on the ground with my arm stretched out  almost as far as it will go and blindly find and  turn the bolt that I need. After wrenching for a while the bolt finally comes out. Now I’m thinking the hard part comes. the retainer I need snaps into the body and I struggled to get the one out of my car when I could see it. I reach in blindly once again  saying a little prayer that it comes out easily. Fumbling around I can feel the part and to my amazement it almost falls out into my hand. I have the parts I need to finish. Yeah!! And Thanks God.

  I rush home with my treasure of parts  excited to finish up the car. The fuel filter first It goes in easily, very easily. Then the tank strap …..  not so much. I put the new parts in but I just can’t quite seem to get the bolt to thread. I keep trying and  trying but it just won’t go. I keep trying for what  seems like an hour .  But nothing the strap is just not quite reaching the hole. I try everything I can think of, I even use a drill at one point thinking if I make the hole in the strap larger it will reach, it is that close.

  I’m about to walk away for a while when Pearl comes out. She starts giving me her ideas on what to do. All of which I’ve already tried. Then she say’s ” Why don’t you jack the tank up higher?” I say back ” It’s up as high as it will go.”  And defiantly grab the jack handle to prove my point. After all I’m not stupid. I pump the jack handle and the tank goes up another couple of inches. I try the bolt and it goes in easily. OK maybe I am stupid. I ask her ” Where were you an hour ago.” From now on whenever I’m working on a car I will have her standing by just to keep my stupidity in check.

I’m On ” Vacation”

I’m on vacation from my job this week. Notice that I didn’t say from work. I’ll give  you a rundown of what is on my schedule this week.

  1) Do something with the foam in my garage. I have about ten sheets of foam that I must do something with. I’ve already tried a pulley system to pull them up to the rafters but that didn’t work. I’ll probably just make a shelf of sorts to set them on.

  2) Finish my Ma-in-Laws bathroom. This has been an ongoing project for a while now. We’re having to repair repairs that have already been made by someone with not very good craftsmanship skills. I have to install a toilet, sink base and sink, and do some plumbing in the crawl space that the ” expert” left unfinished.

  3) Put a fuel pump in the car. I’ve already bought the pump and I have to say, it looks like something I would be installing in a swimming pool not a car. It’s all plastic with plastic hoses. That project should take me a few hours. ( hopefully)

  4) Help Audrey and Ben paint their new home. Wednesday will be spent painting  the rooms they will be living in. They are renting a house from Ben’s grandparents and are fixing it up for them as sweat equity. We’ll also be taking her desk to her. ( shhhhhh!!! don’t tell her she doesn’t know that yet)

  5) Clean out the garage. There’s a giant armoire hiding in there somewhere. I can’t see it but I know it’s there.

  6) Start sanding the giant armoire and get it ready for paint.

  7) Hide from Jeanie because if she finds out I’m on vacation she’ll find more work for me.

  8 ) What ever else is on my honey do list. I’m sure Pearl has other stuff for me to do.

  9) This is provisional. If I have time, take time to rest after all I’m on “vacation”.

Just For Fun

I think I’ve found my new hobby!

What a Week I’m Having!

The week started out OK. Got up went to church and it was Fathers day  so there was lots of BBQ to eat. Then Monday came around. The starter in my truck decided to die about a week ago so Monday after work I decided to change it. I’m thinking” two bolts two connectors and it’s out”. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I struggled to get the connectors off they were hard to see. I fought to get the top bolt on the starter out it was difficult to reach. I crawl under the truck to get the bottom bolt out. I start to wrench the bolt out for what seems forever and it comes out . I go back topside to start pulling the dead part out and it doesn’t move. I REMOVED THE WRONG BOLT!!! It was a transmission bolt. I put that bolt back in and find the correct bolt. Back to wrenching again. I get the bolt out and the part still doesn’t move!! @#$@##%%$#%^& I PULLED OUT ANOTHER TRANNY BOLT!! Back in that bolt goes. I feel around and find the hidden starter bolt. It is Impossible to get to. I try for two hours to get a socket on it and finally give up around seven O’clock. I’ve had enough!! I decided to take Tuesday off and get the truck fixed if it kills me. I got up early and bought some socket extensions that I think will help me get the bolt out. They didn’t. I spent about another two hours trying and trying to get a socket on but it just won’t quite fit. I, in desperation, try a box end wrench. I can just get it on but I can’t move it because of clearance problems. I came up with a solution. I cut my wrench in half to get the clearance I need. In times of desperation sacrifices must be made. It works …sort of. I can move the bolt about an eighth of a turn at a time. Still progress is progress. I finally get it out after a half an hour or so of wrenching. The part is now loose. It’s time to celebrate with lunch. After throwing some groceries down my neck it’s time to get the part out of the truck. It won’t come out , everything is in the way. By now I have the front tire is off and the inner fender ripped out( I was getting a LITTLE frustrated.) I had to loosen transmission lines and brake lines to even attempt to get the old part out. I even took part of the steering loose. I finally pry, pull the part out. I almost cried! The new part goes back in fairly easily and I put all the loose parts back into place. The truck starts and I thank God for allowing me to keep my sanity… just barely.

Today I drive my freshly fixed truck to work and all goes well. During my workday there is a point in which I start receiving product into the building. During this period I also have to receive the mail ( we get some product in this way). I have to cut some stuff out of the shipping boxes and down to the packaging that we sell the product in. I slice the top off of a box and my razor knife gets hung up for just a second . It lets go and all of a sudden I feel a sharp pain in my left thumb. I’m now bleeding. I can’t work on anything without bleeding on it. I have a half inch gash on my thumb that goes very deep. So now I need to go to the emergency room, expecting stitches. I didn’t get any, instead they tape my thumb back together. It’s amazing the uses of duct tape. I also get a tetanus shot.

So let’s take  a tally of my injuries . My ribs are sore from leaning over the truck, I have broken finger nails that are sore,scratches and abraisions on my chest, stomach, head( yes head from laying on my back wrenching I irritated the skin on the back of my head.), hands and arms. My thumb is bandaged and taped together, and my shoulder hurts from the shot. All that’s left is… I dunno maybe a broken toe to top off the week!

New Adventures In The Same Old Job

A couple of weeks ago my job at work changed. I’m no longer a frozen forklift. I took a two week vacation and when I got back there was a job posting up for a dry goods utility( Warm department). Having not had my fingers and toes go numb for a couple of weeks was really nice so I signed the bid. Much to my surprise I got it! I’m out of the freezer!  To quote Martin Luther King ” Free at last! Free at last! Thank God almighty, Free at last!!”

The utility jobs are replacements workers if someone goes on vacation or calls in sick. It’s a job I’ve been avoiding for several years. The reason is I knew I would have to learn how to  receive. A job I’ve done at my last employer but didn’t really enjoy. The past couple of weeks I’ve been training to receive.

It turns out I’m pretty good at it, and I kind of like it. It gives me a chance to use my brain. They say that every time you learn something new you get a new wrinkle on your brain. Mine must look like a bowling ball( naw that’s to big… a pool ball… nope still to big, OK a BB, that’s about right).  I haven’t learned anything new in quite a while. The forklift job is pretty mindless. I turn on the computer on the lift, I scan a label on the pallet , take the pallet where the computer tells me to, put the pallet away scan the rack, repeat a couple hundred times a day! Pretty boring. It is a job however, that allows my mind to wander. It’s where I’ve thought up my best blogs.

I’ve picked up receiving pretty quickly. But it is very information intensive. I’m used to checking to make sure six or seven digit numbers are correct, but now I’m dealing with alpha-numeric numbers that can be as long as fifteen digits, sometimes they all look the same. I’m also dealing with drivers that come in so I need to be a people person, which I am not!

The computer system we use is a home grown system and sometimes it seems overly complicated. For example to print out the lables, purchase order, and the sheets for the  guys who actually stack the product I have to do this. Enter the  p.o. number tap F9, tab over enter door number tap F7, now tap F10 type ” O” for open hit enter, tap F10 twice, type ” P ” for print then “A” for all then press enter then tap F3 and then F8 the paperwork is now printing. Seems very complicated in this day of point and click. Especially when the program is based off of Windows. It gets more complicated if there is a problem.

My main concern in learning all this is that my brain is going to get full. I’m currently on an information overload. My brain is looking for places to store it all but seems to be having space problems. I’m afraid if it doesn’t get saved soon my brain is going to have to start overwriting files and I’ll start forgetting important stuff,  like my name, or how to use the big boy potty! Or worse yet it won’t overwrite and my head will just keep getting bigger until it pops, spewing marshmallow fluff all over the place. That’s pretty much what my brain is made of.

Ally is One Today!!

Happy birthday Ally!! We are so glad you came into our lives. I had forgotten how much fun it is to have a little person crawling around with you.G’ma and G’pa love you very much!

Chicken Gnocchi Soup For The Soul

A few weeks ago Pearl and I went to The Olive Garden for lunch. Pearl had the chicken gnocchi soup for lunch. I tried it and it was very good. We decided then and there that we would have lunch when I was on vacation. I’m on vacation this week. We decided to go today, the first day of it. We wanted the all you could eat soup, salad, and bread stick lunch we had been waiting for. We sit down hardly even look at the menu because we already KNOW what we want. Our waiter, his name happens to be Bryan, ( a great name) greets us and asks us what we would like to drink. We tell him and I feel so sure of what we want that I go ahead and order for the both of us, that is something I never do.

Bryan brings us our salad and informs us that they are out of the chicken gnocchi soup. We had been dying for that soup for weeks now. We dejectedly decide to try another soup. Some Tuscan soup, I forget the name, it didn’t matter because it wasn’t what I really wanted anyway. As we are eating our salad, Bryan comes back and tell us that they have the gnocchi soup and asks if we would still like it. Duh! it is what we ordered to begin with. He brings us two bowls of our treasure and I quickly hurry through the rest of my salad to get to it. I put one spoonful of it in my mouth and Bryan comes back and asks if it is lacking flavor because they tasted it in the kitchen and they thought something was missing. I tell Pearl to taste hers, she is the real expert on the soup. I noticed right away that the soup seemed thin. Pearl tells Bryan that and takes a bite. She says that the soup is definately missing something and has NO flavor. He tells us that they are fixing the problem. We take that to mean that they are making more soup and would be bringing us a new bowl, so we both stop eating it. A while later Bryan comes back and asks us if we would like more tea, but brings us no soup. He asks if we liked the soup we tell him no and ask for the Tuscan stuff again. He returns with the new soup which we didn’t really want in the first place. I take one bite and reach for the salt and pepper. If possible, it had even less flavor the the other soup. Absolutely no flavor at all. We finished our salt and pepper gruel and Bryan asks if we wanted more. Politely we said no but inside I was thinking “ I wouldn’t eat more of that if you were paying me to”. All we wanted by now was to be set free. He brought us our check and tells me he’s going to talk to the manager because he knows this wasn’t  a wonderful dining experience for us. They took one of the meals off our check,which was great, but honestly I would have payed the whole thing  just to be able to leave.

Pearl and I think that both soups sucked because they watered them down to extend them through the lunch rush. How else could they have magically come up with soup that they didn’t have? We also decided to try again later in my vacation to have our soup. We still want it. We need it!! We’ll try a different Olive Garden to get it!!!!

The menu describes the soup as “A creamy soup made with roasted chicken, traditional Italian dumplings and spinach” Ours was like water,and mine had absolutely no chicken in the bowl! One more thing, they ran out of breadsticks! How is that possible at Olive Garden?

Adventures With Hotel Furniture

Pearl and I went shopping for furniture at a used hotel furniture store the other day. Actually Pearl went shopping there earlier  in the day and found some nightstands that she liked so we went back to get them. There were a few of the same kind so we were deciding which of the three we were going to buy. One had a scratch on the top another one  had water marks on it. None of that matters because we’re going to paint them.We noticed that the  drawer in one of them wouldn’t slide all the way back in. I pulled the drawer out and looked into the opening. I could see something black in the way, so I reached in and pulled it out. As it came out it unclumped so I could see what it was. I could see it was black and lacy. By now Pearl had noticed what it was and told me, in a panic not to touch it. It was already in my hand, she thought it was a thong and that it probably had cooties. It was a small lacy bra, no cooties.

After we had chosen which nightstands we wanted we decided to look around the store for other treasures. We found an armoire that we liked. We had seen it before but they wanted too much money for it. This time the price had come down. We decided to get it also. After we had paid for the stuff the workers at the store were helping us load the truck. The head guy ,who claimed to have many years of experience, was ordering the other two guys around. Now the armoire is over six foot tall and about four feet wide and is very heavy. It looked like it could be taken apart into two pieces and I pointed it out a couple of times. But I was just the customer and I don’t have many years of experience. The three guys load the armoire into the back of my truck standing straight up, telling me that if they lay it on a side it will break some moulding on it. OK so we move it standing up. While they are loading the nightstands on the end of the truck, I’m putting every strap I own on the armoire. The head guy tells me the he hopes I have a lot of good neighbors at home to move the armoire, I do so that’s not a problem.

The problem is getting home. I own a mid sized truck and this load is very top heavy. We start home and the load feels like it’s going to tip the truck the way it’s loaded so we pull over in a parking lot to adjust it. I take all the straps off and start to move the load around. While the straps are loose the wind starts to pick up and it sprinkles a little bit. Then the wind turns into what can only be described as a micro burst, a very strong straight line wind. I’m still trying to tie down the armoire and hang on for dear life, Pearl is trying to help, but we are getting pummeled with rain and rocks from a nearby field. The wind lasts a couple of minutes, it stops just after I get the straps back on the load. I moved the nightstands up next to the armoire and the load feels more evenly distributed on the truck now. The trip home is a long nervous drive. I drive about ten miles an hour under the speed limit… during rush hour . I’m sure I was very popular with the other drivers. I take every corner VERY slowly, almost at a crawl so I don’t tip my load. It still feels like a catamaran tipped up on one pontoon every time I turn. I tell Pearl I’m not having trouble just being careful. I’m a nervous wreck by the time we get home. I start to back into my driveway and Pearl is afraid I’m going to dump the load when I drive over the curb.That was probably the slowest I have ever driven over it. The load is fine and I can pry my fingers off the steering wheel now and wipe the sweat off my palms.

Before I can get the straps off, my neighbor is over asking if I need help. I tell him yes but I’m going to try to take the thing apart first. Like I said it looks like it will break into two pieces. I start looking for screws and I find them. I take out about eight screws and the armoire is in two pieces and much easier to handle. Two people can handle the weight of each piece. I know I’m not a professional mover but it seems like it would have been a much easier trip for everyone if it was broken down like that in the first place. Like I had suggested.

So next time I go to the hotel furniture store I’m taking tools, just in case.  A little advice for the expert furniture mover, work smarter not harder. And if you are  the girl who lost her bra in the hotel, and you know who you are. It’s in the bottom drawer of the remaining nightstand. I left it there for you.

The Oriental Theatre and Trace Bundy

Last night Pearl, Steven, his girlfriend Aisling and I went to the Oriental Theatre to see Trace Bundy in concert. We stood outside of the building for about a half an hour to get in. You could see some of the features of the landmark that showed it’s past glory. Unfortunately the building is run down and in need of restoration. We got inside after the wait in the cold only to see that the few seats that they had on the lower level were filled. So we went up to the balcony. There were still seats that look like they were original to the theatre. We tried to sit in the front row of the balcony only to find that the bottoms of some of the seats were missing, so we sat in the second row. I was looking around trying to imagine what the place looked like when it was in it’s prime. I bet it was beautiful, curved ceilings and murals on the walls. But , the place is falling apart. The plaster was falling off the walls and I’m glad it was dimly lit because I didn’t want to see what the floors looked like, they were sticky and people sat on them. I don’t know maybe this is just my perspective because someone came in behind us and exclaimed” What a neat theatre”. I was looking for the fire exits. I know I saw stuff that shouldn’t have passed a fire inspection.

Once Trace Bundy began to play all fears were forgotten. His mastery of the acoustic guitar is amazing. The sounds he can get out of one are astounding. He was funny and genuinely seemed to be glad he was performing. He played a medley of the theme from 8Mile/Kashmir that was great. It was a nice evening but we were out of there as soon as he was done. We didn’t want to be there when the building collapsed.

p.s I hope the owner decides to restore the theatre, it deserves it.