That time again

One fine February morning in 1955 as Doris was doing the morning dishes, her water broke. My old man was working on the road at the time, so she called the doctor, who came and picked her up and so Doris went on Dr. Stannard's rounds with him, making house calls until it was time to head off to Rutland Hospital, where at 3:00 in the afternoon, I made my debut.

Actually, this was the first in a series of disappointments that I caused my mother. I remember a rather cloying expression of the time, where new babies were referred to as "little strangers". I was more like an unwelcome guest. My mother, who was never terribly enthusiastic about raising children, already had 2 and did not particularly want another one. I gather at that particular juncture, my parents were having a rough time financially. On top of that, if I was going to have the bad grace to come into the world, she had wanted me to be a "Valentine's baby". Being a queen, I arrived late.

I have in the subsequent 53 years had plenty of opportunity to reflect on the ways that this shaky start has influenced my life. A good deal of this reflection has taken place in the offices of therapists. I have come to the conclusion that happy childhoods are not all they are cracked up to be. While I would not wish the living hell aspects of my childhood on any poor child, it has shaped me into who I am, for better or worse.

One way it has affected me, is my relative indifference to birthdays. The other thing is my equal indifference to aging. The numbers don't mean that much to me. During the course of my life the only birthday that bothered me was turning 36. Why, I couldn't tell you now, and I don't think I could have expressed it then either. I am not saying that I don't find some of the inroads of the aging process irritating, mostly that I don't still have the energy level of a 20 year old however things like gray hair and wrinkles are just added visual proof that in spite of the vast reservoir of stupid that I have drawn on over the course of my life, against all odds, I am still here to tell the tale.

If I hadn't been plodding along all these years, I would never have met Wahz or C., 2 of the best friends a man could ask for. Or RG or Mike. If I hadn't been willing to change with the times and start blogging and reaching out across the ether, I wouldn't have had a chance to meet the great people who read this wretched blog of mine and against all good sense have reached out and commented and in a number of cases kept up communications outside of blogging. I wouldn't have met the Farmboyz, or Tater or Gavin who made the effort to come to Boston and I wouldn't have met people like Will or Atari who were right here, but were a part of the background noise of urban life. Come May, I will be getting the chance to meet more of you. As far as I am concerned it's worth a few more gray hairs and a loss of skin tone.

I guess what I am saying is that we are suppose to celebrate our birthdays. Another year has passed full of event. Things befall us, good and bad, and if we keep our wits about us we learn new things and grasp new opportunities. While I am not happy about the encroachment of achy joints and other attendant problems, on the whole, I'd rather be where I am now, rather than where I was 20 years ago.

We all deal with the aging process differently. If you want to bemoan the accumulation of years, I'll listen. I just may not be too sympathetic. We are all headed for the same destination by different roads. I for one am going to try and enjoy the trip, take in the sights and enjoy the souvenirs I have picked up on the way.

BTW, Doris sent me a cake.

Cake update, my beloved Quebecer baked me a cake as well. Chocolate of course. And it was really good!

Valetine's Greetings

I fully expect that there will be some people out there today denouncing Valentine's Day and others writing about how sublime they think love and or romance are.

I will be spending my spare time with myself. I won't be eating or drinking myself into a stupor. I will not be railing against the foolishness of love or pining for a relationship. I have been spending the past 18 years in happy bachelorhood.

I am not ruling out relationships. It could happen. But then we may finally get that visit from ET.

You are welcome to spend the day as you will. I will be spending the day remembering the words of Oscar Wilde.

"To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance."

Happy Valentine's Day.

Repair job

Things in Ganomeland have been a little sketchy lately. I tore a muscle in my leg in around Xmas and I am still limping along and trying like mad to avoid physical therapy. At the same time, I caught "the cold that will not go away".

I finally broke down and went to the doctor last week.

Now I know the distaff side of you folks out there are all saying, "Just like a man! Why didn't you go sooner?"

The answer is pretty simple. I knew, in advance, how this was going to shake out. I have a cold. It's a virus. They can't do anything about it. It will go away eventually.

As to the knee related problem. I tore the muscle and it will heal if I take it easy and stop acting like a jackass.

Not acting like a jackass is the real problem. There is a genetic predisposition on the male side of my family to say things like, "I can lift that!" Or "I'll be damned if I'm going to waste a half hour till someone can help me."

This form of jackassitis leads to situations where skinny little men do things like move old Steelcase desks by themselves or move full filing cabinets. By move a Steelcase desk, I mean upend the thing onto a dolly, move it down the hallway, load it onto an elevator, unload it, bring it to the storage unit and offload it from the dolly. (If you are unfamiliar with Steelcase desks, the old ones are about the same size and weight as a Buick.) I think it goes without saying that these behaviors are not conducive to allowing torn muscles to heal and which may have something to do with the fact that I now look like Festus in Gunsmoke when I go down a flight of stairs. To add insult to injury here, I wasn't even doing anything stupid when I initially injured my knee. I slipped on some ice.

However, having been threatened with a physical therapist, I am attempting to behave myself. I have been staying off all the cardio equipment at the gym that bothers my knee. Unfortunately, this means all the cardio equipment. I am also NOT doing squats with the Olympic bar and my own weight loaded onto it. I have actually gone 2 weeks without doing a leg routine, period, and this week will only be trying to do a workout with light weights, which I have promised myself I will stop if I start to feel like I am straining the muscle too much.

All of this goes against the grain. Partly because I am a jackass and partly because I am having to deal with the fact that I am no longer in my 20's. Or my 30's. Or even my 40's and that it just takes longer to heal from injuries, get over colds and in general self repair when I have an insult to my body.

All of this is making me reflect soberly on where I am and where I am headed. I am trying to deal with the idea that some things are just out of the question now and that as time continues to fly by, more things will fall into that category.

I know that eventually my knee will heal and I will be able to get back into my regular routine and try and stave off as much of the inroads that time and age are making in my life and well being.

Then I will go out and do something really stupid. Hey, there are still a lot of heavy pieces of furniture that need to get moved around the department!

Happy Birthday Doris

Today is Doris' birthday. She turned 82 and it goes without saying, is still going strong.

I gave her a call this morning, to wish her many happy returns of the day. I have a feeling that she would love it, if she knew how many fans she has on the internet. However, I also know she would be very hurt if she read some of the more frank descriptions of my childhood.

She would tell me that she had done the best she could and the thing is that I realize now that she really did.

She lived through the Great Depression and WWII. She, someone who I don't think ever really wanted children, managed to rear 5 of us to the best of her ability. Her marriage was not a happy one in many respects and it hasn't been until the past 25 out of 60 years of marriage that she and my father have been able to coexist peacefully. She is a difficult person, but she has had a difficult life.

She certainly made up for a lot of her lack in parenting skills with pure entertainment value. While any example she may have set for us has been of the "What would Mom do?" and then doing the opposite variety, there is a value in that.

Doris does seem sometimes to get crazier every day. The niece and I will occasionally have "How crazy is Doris now?" discussions. We will try and keep tabs on who is in favor and who is in the doghouse. What scheme is she cooking up, in order to get her own way? What has she managed to slip under the radar, and what will she do next?

My mother is the last of her family, having outlived her brothers and her sister. All she has left are her husband and her kids. She doesn't make it easy for us, but I know that she loves us in her way. I think she looks at life as a fight and she is not about to let down her defenses and let life take it's course.

So, if she is going to spin out the remainder of her years as an elderly, female Don Quixote, who am I to stop her. Her windmills keep her going as long as they are out there to be tilted at. She will keep finding some wrong that requires redress, even if it is a wrong only she can perceive.

Maybe as a mother she is teaching me one final lesson, and that it patience.

Happy Birthday Doris and many more.

Famous?

My fame must be spreading. I got this photo from that handsome and multi-talented humanitarian, Nurse Dave. It seems that they've heard of me even in NOLA.

A Night at the Opera

I have never seen a performance of Semele, so I was not quite sure what to expect. I have to say I was looking forward to the performance with a little trepidation. Anyone familiar with early baroque opera knows, they tend to be a bit static and while the music is beautiful, there isn't much scope for action. Singers take their mark and sing.

So you can imagine my delighted surprise when the curtain went up on Semele and on stage was a wedding party, in modern dress in a hotel function room. The chorus, (the wedding party) are all holding presents, in one chair a harried looking Cadmus is holding his head, in another an equally distraught Athamas is in a similar pose and curled up on one of the tables is an extremely sulky Semele!

Opera Boston stages all of it's productions at the Cutler Majestic, the theater owned by Emerson College. It is a lovely hall, beautifully renovated with marvelous acoustics and unimpaired sight lines. It also has a stage the size of a handkerchief! If one were going to be impressed with nothing else by Opera Boston, one would be impressed with the imaginative way that the company utilizes the limited stage. Once again, the stage design was perfect for the production. They managed to construct the tacky pseudo opulence of a hotel function room and by clever use of flats, throughout the production, continuously made subtle alterations to the set so that you were moved through the area.

The singers in modern dress were got up like a real wedding party, complete with ugly bridesmaids dresses and tacky groomsmans outfits. The outfits really looked like something one would see at a wedding, and yet did not go so completely over the top as to be distracting.

The orchestra and chorus were lovely. The Semele, Juno, Ino, Jupiter, Apollo, Athamas, and High Priest were all making their debut in this production and the only singer who seemed less than competent was the Athamas. Considering the quality of Opera Boston's productions in general and the rest of this cast in particular, I am willing to speculate that he was having a bad night. Counter Tenor is a difficult vocal range, but he did not seem up to the task. Fortunately, it is a small role and we spent most of our evening listening to some wonderful performances.

Semele was shallow, vain and silly, yet slightly dowdy. Her character was perfect for someone overreaching. Her interactions with Athamas were played with a perfect awkwardness and with Jupiter, just with the right amount of overenthusiasm.

Jupiter, portrayed as a high powered business type, was all you could want for a fatuous swain, both as seducer and neglectful lover proclaiming his undying love, while checking his cell phone for messages.

Ino as the unrequited lover was a wonderful, quivering mass of thwarted romantic intentions in an ugly bridesmaid dress.

Juno, in a power suit, with Iris as her personal assistant was indeed Junoesque. Her anger, as much injured pride as jealousy. All severe tailoring and privileged impatience.

Iris was played as Juno's personal assistant in an even more severe blue suit and RPD glasses. This made her aria where she describes Jupiter's precautions to safeguard his beloved Semele all the more sensual when she metaphorically lets her hair down as she delivers this song.

All in all, for me, it was a surprising performance and with the exception of Athamas, beautifully sung. The staging had just the right proportions of humor and downright camp without ever sinking into burlesque. The modern setting was used to great advantage, Somnus in Dr. Denton's, the use at one point when Jupiter carries off Semele, of a video camera, the growing dishabille of the chorus as the wedding party proceeds, Semele's overweening vanity, the little blue box that makes it's appearance as Jupiter tries to distract Semele from her quest for immortality, all wonderful metaphors for misplaced human ambition.

The denumount, with Juno tricking Semele, and her reunion with Jupiter leaves the audience with a tableau of Athamas, with the slightly stunned, grinning and gormless expression of the average groom and an equally stunned though not at all happy looking Semele, being united.

All in all, it was an enjoyable evening and I was surprised that 3 hours of music went by so quickly. I still have Ernani to look forward to, so I'll get a little grand guignol in as well before the season is over.

I heart Sharon Jones

When Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings play a song, it stays played! Keep your pop divas kids, this woman has a set of pipes. If you don't run out and buy this album after listening to this, there is no hope for you.



I have been playing the hell out of this album since I bought it.

Just checking in

My brain still seems to be on vacation. However, I have been meaning to post a picture of my new t-shirt that Monkey gave me. I love my new t-shirt. It kinda says it all.


I am going to go to "Semele" tonight, so I should have something to blog about tomorrow. I know how anxious RG is to hear about my opera going experience. Don't worry Cowbell, I'll give you a detailed description too.

Aside from that, like everyone else in the country it seems, I am nursing the never ending cold that won't go away. (Just shoot me)

On the other hand, even in my fog of cold driven misery, I couldn't help but notice last night on my trek home that it is no longer dark at 5 o'clock.




Maybe there is hope after all.

Signal to noise

I remember when I was a lad, I used to go camping with friends. By the time we were in high school this had become an excuse to go off on underaged drinking sprees. Among the necessities we brought along, with a case of cheap beer, was a radio.

This was back in the very early 70's so those old radios were monaural. With telescoping antennae and running on 4 D batteries and a built in AC adapter they fairly hefty. While the thing probably weighed as much as the tent it was none the less one of those items that were indispensable to the teenage camper.

One thing I remember most about those camping trips was the variability of reception on the radio. I didn't know then, that those cloudy nights were the nights that we could pick up the RPI Fieldhouse, and listen to the lastest hit from Aretha Franklin, and that on those clear nights when the sky was alive with stars we would have trouble picking up the commercial station broadcasting out of Rutland.

Currently, my brain is acting a bit like the old Emerson, on a clear summer night. I cannot seem to get my brain to register anything but noise. What ever poor signal of inspiration for blogging and story telling I usually experience is not coming through at the moment. There have been a few flashes of a clear signal, perhaps stories that will appear later. For the moment I only seem to be experiencing hissing and popping.

Instead of fighting it, I am just going to let it happen and do a little mental star gazing until whatever mental clouds that are necessary for me to string together a few coherent thoughts have formed.

It's, like, a fish

I was out shopping with C. today. We went to Ocean State Job Lot to look for a shower curtain and view the wonderful horrors on sale there.

Having got my shower curtain (2.49) and a yoga mat (6.99) we went to the check out line. A rather awful mother and her daughter came up behind me. The mother was of a rather vinegary disposition and the daughter most kindly put, was a ditz.

Mother: Is this a checkout line? (petulantly) Where's your grandmother?

Daughter: She's around.

Mother: Well, go find her.

Daughter: Can't she, like meet us at the car?

Mother: I don't think so! She doesn't know where it's parked.

Daughter: Okay, take this.

Mother: What is it?

Daughter: You put, like, your iPod in it. It, like, lights up. And then it dances. It's, like, a fish.

Overhearing conversations like this, make shopping in only the finest stores worth every penny.

Voices carry

Sunday just isn't Sunday unless RG and I go out looking for trouble. I have a vision of the 2 of us, with blue rinses and walkers out marauding the streets of our metropolis, scaring the tourists.

Yesterday was no exception. In addition, we had Atari Age in tow, the poor child.

We had met up at the Charbuck's in the Pru Barnes and Noble. After a certain amount of coffee consumption we decided to head out and take a look at things and began walking. Eventually, we found ourselves at Downtown Crossing, which was at one point the retail destination for the city. The area is closed to motor traffic with the exception of delivery and emergency vehicles and has been for many years now a pedestrian mall. Consequently, it is in the great scheme of things fairly quiet, for a busy urban area.

For those of you have been denied the joy that is RG in person, one thing you should understand is that, like small children and the hard of hearing, RG has no indoor voice. If RG says anything, it is heard by anyone and everyone in a 20 block radius.

With that in mind we had got to the corner of Washington and Franklin when RG announced, and I do not use the word announce lightly, "Can we turn here? I want to go get some poppers."

It was quite the conversation stopper. I looked at him and said, "RG, we're using our indoor voices."

In his usual form, he just gave me one of his "I'm such a stinker" smiles and raising his voice, declared, "I think the hookers are over this way."

It's always an adventure.

Natures skin care

I am sitting in my office while a snowstorm rages outside. While most of the other schools in the area were able to display some common sense and close, we on the other hand stayed open.

In spite of the fact that there are no classes and probably 80% of the staff commutes in from the outer burbs, we are open. The fact that there will be an enormous absenteeism rate today and consequently it will be next to impossible to get anything done leaves the forces that be undeterred. We are open.

I also predict that we will close early. Which will tick me off even further, since it means that I will get to traipse back home in this crap, when I could have been sensibly ensconced in my nice, warm, dry apartment.

On the upside, as RG has pointed out, walking in a blizzard does a great job at exfoliating your face. I'm positively radiant!

Dinner time

Doris had any number of drawbacks as a parent, but I will give her credit for entertainment value. If she had been a bit more responsible in her parenting duties, she would in some ways have been an ideal mother for growing boys.

One of the ways she managed to get along with us was that she had and still has a rather bawdy sense of humor.

By the time I was 14 or 15, I had discovered dirty jokes and also found an appreciative audience in my mother. By that time, things had degenerated around the house to the point where my father and I could not eat at the same table, so Dad would take his dinner on a tray in front of the TV and my mother, my younger brother Mike and I would eat at the kitchen table.

I can't be sure of when exactly it started, but dinner time became the set hour where we would review for Doris all of the jokes we heard at school. Looking back, Mike must have had quite the group of friends, since he is 4 years younger than I am and he was able to provide quite the staggering array of smutty humor.

There we would sit, biding our time. Timing was everything after all. What was the point in telling the joke, unless you could hit Mom with the punchline when her mouth was full. We got extra points if she passed food through her nose.

Every evening Mom would make the same dire statement.

"Goddamnit, I'm never going to eat with you 2 again!"

Every evening she would be back for more. Occasionally, she would make her own contribution, having heard something particularly good from one of my aunts or one of her crony's.

We must have made an odd grouping. 2 adolescent boys, telling dirty jokes to our mother and our mother telling us dirty jokes in return.

Some of Mom's more straight laced friends thought that this was just awful and wondered what type of horrible monsters we would grow into under this disgraceful arrangement.

My father couldn't understand it either and grumbled away, but he might as well have been on the other side of the country. Having excluded himself, he never found his way into this small and exclusive club, dining in his solitary splendor, above such vulgar displays.

Looking back on that sad, odd childhood I am strangely pleased that I can find these little islands of happiness. Strange as they were, they were vignettes of something like family and I suppose must have informed my outlook on the world.

Getting a good laugh at the dinner table is still one of the tools I use to measure an enjoyable time at table. Dirty jokes don't figure quite as large, though I will also say that some of the more interesting experiences my friends and I have had that usually revolve around sex make up a goodly portion of dinner conversation and we have had a lot of good laughs at each others or our own expense.

On the whole, I would say that those dinners with Doris, regardless of the dire predictions of our turning into hooligans, in fact prepared us for civilized life. After all, they say man is the only animal that can laugh.

Though, whoever said that never owned a dog. Cats don't laugh, they only snicker.

Gym update

I am over a week into my new gym. So far, so good. The niece emailed me to ask how the new gym is working out. Since I know you all couldn't care less are dying to know, here's the scoop.

The gym really is much cleaner and more well maintained than my old facility. The level of fitness also seems to be much higher, which is pretty motivating. Not that everyone is an Adonis, but watching my fellow gym goers, everyone seems to be pretty intent on paying attention to what they are doing.

For those of you who do not foolishly get out every day and beat yourself up, you will have no idea of how distracting it is to catch, out of the corner of your eye, someone literally swinging weights instead of lifting. I am a bit of a nosy parker about these things and want to go over and tell people to go down on their weights and do it right. It is nice to not have to watch sports injuries just waiting to happen.

I am also being motivated to set myself some new goals. Like getting rid of at least some part of my spare tire. To that end, I have actually been doing the much hated cardio workout. There are few things in this life that are more obnoxious, in my opinion, than getting on a cardio machine and wasting precious minutes of your life that you will never get back. However if it gives me less belly jelly for RG to make fun of, it will be worth it.

I am also going to start yoga classes tomorrow. Every tendon in my body is screaming just in anticipation. Since I don't want to suffer alone, I have picked up a week guest pass which I am going to give my pal La Simpatica. Why suffer alone when you can spread the joy?

There is also the improved customer service which is a relief. Not that this whole thing was entirely satisfying.

A week after I joined up AARP deigned to let me know I was eligible for a discount. They were only about a week late in relating this to me. When I called up the gym, no surprise, my contract was already locked in. It would have been nice to get the discount, but it isn't as though I am loosing out on that much money.

What made it less painful was that the manager was very polite while explaining that if you snooze you loose. He actually did try and make the news as acceptable as possible and offered me a bunch of guest passes and told me that if anyone signs up with the gym and mentions me as the person to recommend the gym that I get a free month. Quite a change from my old gym. I didn't get the discount and I can accept why, what made the big difference was the attitude. He seemed to be pretty interested in keeping my business and I wound up assuring him that I was very pleased with the change.

On the whole, I am really happy with the change. Not least of all, that I can get out of the gym and go home and make myself some coffee instead of grabbing a cup on the fly as I race off to the T. Though I am going to miss the coffee place I used to frequent.

10 boring facts

Our beloved Willym has tagged me with this meme. (You'll get yours pal) I cannot believe what a dull life I've led.

1)Three Exes I would pretend not to know today:

I only have 3. If my dear Jon were still alive, I am sure we would still be bickering in the good natured manner, which was our ground state. As for the other 2. I haven't seen either of them in years and hope to maintain this happy state of affairs.

2)The most scandalous rumor to pass through my high school.

Other than my drug habit? One of the girls (who shall remain nameless) went into the hospital with an apparent attack of appendicitis and gave birth to a full term baby. No one knew she was pregnant and she really wasn't "showing". Swayuh to Gwad!

3)The time I Knew Santa didn't exist.

I don't remember exactly. Born cynic that I am I think I had caught on by the time I was about 4.

4)The funniest thing I did in a house of worship.

They used to have to keep my cousin Steve and I separated because of the unsanctioned hilarity, but it was Doris who was my downfall. One Sunday, one of the wealthy lady parishioners came in swathed in furs, wearing a fur hat. As she passed by us, my mother and I noticed a tiny, truncated tail on the back of the hat. We looked at each other and started shaking but not laughing and then Doris began to croon very softly, "Daveeeeey, Daveeeeey Crocket, King of the wild frontier." I got in so much trouble with the old man.

5)Best excuse I came up with for being out past curfew.

After a long night of being led astray by my peers, I staggered into the house to be confronted with a rather pissed off Doris. I simply announced. "Mother. I'm drunk" and lost the contents of my stomach on the spot. She still laughs about that one.

6) Saturday cartoon character I had a crush on.

Race Bannon on Johnny Quest. C'mon, he was hot! And you know he and Professor Quest were doing each other.

7) Cartoon character I wanted to be.

Wolverine. (This was long before Hugh Jackman. We're talking the old Marvel Comics here.)

8)Foods I can no longer stomach.

MacDonalds.

9)Tacky pick up line you used that worked.

"So. Wanna?" It's worked more than once.

10)Secret Hangover recipe.

Extra strength Ibuprofen washed down with an extra spicy Virgin Mary with a raw egg beaten into it.

As you can see, other than my rather unfortunate lack of judgment concerning men and a bit of heavy drug abuse in my early youth, my life has been pretty lackluster.

The question is who to tag now? I'd tag Belle, but she isn't blogging any more. So.... I guess we will have to turn to RG. I can only imagine. (Note to self, have sex in house of worship, preferably Catholic, for old times sake.)

Opportunity

I just got this in my email at work. This may be the big opportunity I've been looking for to transition into a new job.

Try to think of a better coreer option for you!
Why wait?!WE now happy to introduce to you a tatally different option to acquire your qualification online!Any field your master in you will defenitely go better with a diploma record in your CV.
Millions of people all over the world took advantage of getting bachelor’s, PH’s, and Master’s through the net.
And plus you now able to reach your aim almoust instantly.Ladder you carrer! Call us 1 206 888-2083 for 24/7. You can proudly grasp your diploma within days!

I was especially excited about the ph. Maybe the shower gel I got at L'Occatane with my fab gift card will make all the difference. If not, I will at least enjoy the scent of Vetyver in the shower. I particularly liked the use of the word grasp, in reference to the diploma. I wonder if I act now, if they will throw in a set of steak knives.

Update:

Hot on the heels of the last email came this one. This must be my lucky day!

Now there's a time to check out what's in store for you!
Start right ahead!We now thrilled to bring you this special offer to get your degree on-line!Whatever your specialization is now obtaining your diploma degree becomes a reality.
Millions of people all over the world took advantage of getting bachelor�s, PH�s, and Master�s through the net.
And what�s more you now don�t have to wait years to advance your career.Ladder you carrer! Call us 1 206 888-2083 around the clolck. You can proudly grasp your diploma within days!

Though with all the question marks, they seem less sure of themselves. I think I will be sticking with the original offer.

Field trip

When Tater was in Boston last November, we talked about the idea of bloggers getting together in New York come the spring.

Suddenly, it is January and it seemed like a good idea to start rallying the troops. So far, we have on the list, Bigass Belle, More Cowbell, What Would Jackie Wear, Roger Dodger, Tater, Dulce y Peligroso, Secrets of the Red Seven, Why Oh Why and everyone's favorite Ganome.

I also made sure to alert my Monkey Boy in person.

We trust that the weather will by then be warm enough to have lured Father Tony back up from his southern retreat.

So. Who else is in?

RG is all for hitting the Guggenheim, WWJW has suggested the Cooper-Hewitt and I would like to go to the Museum of Natural History, which I have not seen since the renovations took place (What's it been 10 years?). Plus, there will be food and drink to seek out.

The next question is, who else is in? So far, survey results as they come in are for Mid May. I am going to float the dates 5/16-5/18 as a possibility.

Talk amongst yourselves. I know that RG and I are already ripping each others hair out planning our trip and looking forward to stalking seeing Tater again.

And Doralong. We'll talk about shoe shopping.

New Year, New Gym

I started at my new gym, which is, so far pretty nice. Once again, nothing fancy, but the equipment is newer and the facility is much cleaner and much more well maintained. The clientele seem to be much more respectful of the facility as well. Of course there are more grown ups and fewer muscle head frat boys at this gym, so that helps. For one thing, I couldn't help but notice that the members actually strip the weights off the bars and machines when they are through using them. It doesn't hurt any that this morning I meet one of my fellow gym goers, a very hot and handsome young Latino guy, who is also built like a brick shithouse. Too make matters worse, he's very nice and offered to help me out if I needed a spot or some help with my workout. There should be a law, that when you look like that, that you have to be an asshole, so I can quietly hate you and all your hotness. I guess I'll get used to it.

Other pluses are that it is a 5 minute walk from my house and they offer classes that I can actually attend, since they are scheduled for hours either in the early hours of the morning or after work. Not at 2:00 in the afternoon.

It is still early days, however after my experience with canceling the membership with my old facility, I am happy I made the move.

When I showed up at the old gym yesterday, I cleaned out my locker and told the new manager that I would be canceling my membership. His sole concern seemed to be letting me know that the gym policy is 30 day notice, so I would be charged for February. Having worked in retail long enough, I know that as unfair as this seems, it is pretty standard. What irked me was that I was not asked why I was leaving. I have had to sell goods and services to a gullible public long enough to know that if a client announces that they are going to dispense with your product, you ask questions. You find out why they are unhappy and if you cannot persuade them to continue using your goods/services you at least try to create some good will so that the door is open. People have changes of heart and will come back to use stores or services that they swore they would never use again if they feel as though their custom was valued.

This new manager, who as far as I can ascertain, has been on the job for a couple of months now, but whose existence I was unaware of until a couple of weeks ago is an ass clown and has no business managing any kind of a business.

I think that is what really pissed me off. Not the 40 bucks that I'll never see again, just the crappy business practice. I've done this type of crap for a long time and have been pretty good at it. I had to work pretty hard to get to management level before I threw it all over for the glamour of office work, so I appreciate it when I see someone who knows their stuff.

Like I said, this guy is an ass clown, and if I find I don't like my new gym as much as it seems I will, I will go elsewhere. The old club is not getting a second chance. If they don't want my money, some other club will find that my money is green and spends just fine.

Oh, the other thing. It opens at 5 a.m., so I can go work out and then come home and enjoy my coffee in a relaxed manner before I walk to work instead of rushing out of the door to the gym to get grab a cup of coffee from a shop and then try and make the train to work.

This could all be good.

Decent cup of joe

New Years Day, Starbucks in the Prudential Center B&N.

RG and I are having coffee on our usual mission of checking out the male pulchritude wandering around loose in Boston and ogling the 20 year old barrista, when a friend of RG walks in. RG waves him over to the table.

RG: How are you? We don't see each other for ages and then twice in one week.

Friend: It's because I work over here. Both times I've seen you it's been over here.

RG: So, what are you up to today, you're not working?

Friend: At the moment, I'm looking for a good cup of coffee.

Pause for a beat.

RG: So.... why are you in Starbuck's?

Happy 2008

Just a quick post to wish everyone a happy new year. I would also like to thank all my bloggy buddies old and new for keeping tabs on me and I have a whole new year to look forward to meeting more of you guys in person. (Lynette, this means you)

I hope you had the new years eve celebration of your dreams and that the new year includes fairy princesses or princes, depending on preference, and singing and well choreographed woodland animals. I personally get to go back to the office tomorrow, which only features a wicked witch.

Happy New Year, everyone!