Timmerov's Blog: August 2004

Timmerov's Blog

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

mom

i was sitting on the lawn next to long time family friend julie who happens to have medium long blond hair just like alisa. garrett comes running up from behind us and plops down in her lap. i was thinking, gosh he's being awful friendly. he starts scratching her legs with his little fingernails. julie says, now now you can't do that. at which point garrett realizes this isn't mom. he jumps up and lands in my lap and tries to make like nothing happened. silly boy.

¶ 3:30 PM

Monday, August 30, 2004

head plate

so i was walking on a 1" high bar and some guy i didn't know called out: hey, you wear that goofy hat to cover the metal plate in your head from all the falls you've taken. i always have difficulty responding to comments like this. if that's an insult: hey, you're an idiot for attempting something dangerous you can't possibly have the skills for... then i should reply in kind: come on up here dipshit, i'll kick your ass. if it's a compliment: hey, that's really incredible... then i should reply differently: i'm sure you have skills i'd find incredible, too. pah.

¶ 9:15 AM

Sunday, August 29, 2004

crab walk

crab walk and bear crawl are two exercises one does for conditioning during wrestling practice. even among wrestlers i'm ridiculously fast. our camp friend greg is rather competitive. i almost... almost... suckered him into the crab race with me. i'm old and out of shape. at the end of the race i staggered back to the blanket. greg asked, did you know you were that fast? i wanted to say: nope, first time ever tried it. what i actually said was: HARR! GASP! WHEEZE! it was kinda fun being in a race where the second place guy was so far behind he really thought he won.

¶ 3:04 PM

Saturday, August 28, 2004

races

alisa and i both competed in races on tuesday. she sailed a cup race around the lake. i crabbed walked and bear crawled at the camp michigania olympics. she was born with a golden tiller in her hand. i wrestled for 20 years. her winning time was about 24 minutes. mine was about 60 seconds. she crushed the competition by about a minute. so did i.

¶ 2:55 PM

Friday, August 27, 2004

michigania

when you're allergic to corn syrup you really have to control your diet. camp food makes life a challenge. thank god the cure is as simple as a hyperdose of caffeine. breakfast: bacon, eggs, bagel, milk, orange juice. lunch: cheese burgers with tomato, mayonnaise, mustard, doritos, fritos, milk, orange juice. no catsup. pah. dinner: salad, no dressing, milk, orange juice.

¶ 2:48 PM

Thursday, August 26, 2004

silly names

at camp michigania i encounter some silly names. stu sweet. he's too sweet. gag me. and hugh dingle. which i'm not gonna touch with a ten foot pole.

¶ 2:47 PM

Wednesday, August 25, 2004

giant ladder

the giant ladder won again this year. i blame a series of colds that prevented me from training. the giant ladder is a series of 4x4's suspended by cables separated by 4' to 7'. it's pretty easy for two people to climb. it's rather difficult for one. the free space mantle isn't bad if you have enough explosive jump in your legs to get your center of gravity high enough that tricep power can lift you the rest of the way onto the beam. putting your foot where your hand was works for all but the highest beam and the final cable. for those you have to stand on the beam. i practiced by standing up on 1" bars at kiddie playgrounds. that's a lot easier because the bars are rigid and there's so much rotational play in the beam and it swings out from under you. i wonder if the beatiful and talented alisa will let me build a giant ladder in the back yard.

¶ 2:31 PM

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

lonely luggage

when alisa and the boys arrived in detroit we didn't have to wait long for their luggage. the bags were waiting for us. they were the first bags onto the carousel. in fact they were the ONLY bags on the carousel. apparently everyone that flies from harrisburg to detroit is on their way to somewhere else. except us.

¶ 2:56 PM

Monday, August 23, 2004

cell phone

while killing time in detroit i overheard one side of a cell phone conversation that set me giggling. police siren goes off: wooo wooo. grinning man waves cell phone at me. (probably not the smartest ringer to use in an airport.) "que pasa?" pause. "i'm in detroit airport taking a leak." pause. FWOOSH!! "hang on. i can't hear you."

¶ 3:00 PM

Sunday, August 22, 2004

nwa

we had nice leisurely plans for the day we were travelling from pennsylvania to michigan. they changed. at 10:30 we noticed for the first time that northwest airlines had changed me (and only me) to the earlier flight at 12:05 instead of 4:20. the later flight was overbooked. no way to change it back. the airport is 60 to 90 minutes away. so we jumped in the car and raced. we made it. carryon baggage only. the boys went to see the trains at roadside america without me. i got to see the really cool fountain in the detroit airport. it's not 4 hours cool. that will teach us to not check our itinerary updates carefully enough when travelling with small children and different confirmation numbers. bastards.

¶ 1:52 PM

Saturday, August 21, 2004

fat people

my mother said she thought pennsylvania has the fattest people. i don't mean just overweight people. i mean the kind where you can see a huge blob of fat hanging down from their stomach inside theiry stretchy pants so it bangs on their knees when they walk. and i think that's the grossest thing i've ever seen. but then i think again. it will kill them. and only them. whereas if instead they were thin and smoked... it would kill me.

¶ 1:42 PM

Friday, August 20, 2004

my fink my can

garrett ran a toy train up one side of my head. my fink my can. my fink my can. slowly across the top of my head. and down the other side. my fought my could. my fought my could.

¶ 1:40 PM

Thursday, August 19, 2004

whap whap whap

i'd been fighting a respiratory infection all roller hockey season. we were to leave for pennsylvania early in the morning after the last game. so it was actually kinda convenient that one of my teammates failed to bring his helmet. i skated most of the game and gave him my helmet for the last. figured i'd get healthy and home early and look really noble. on the drive home i hear whap whap whap. i check the tires (twice!) and find a large hunk of metal stuck in the tread. after changing it i get home cold and 30 minutes late instead of 15 minutes early. pah. and we have to switch cars, find keys, and get gas in the morning. double pah.

¶ 12:45 PM

Friday, August 06, 2004

terrorism payoffs

bush claims the war on terrorism is paying off with the arrests of some key figures. maybe it is. but just try imagine how much bigger the payoff could have been if we hadn't spent so much time, so much money, and so many lives in the war on iraq.

¶ 5:48 PM

Thursday, August 05, 2004

cheney

gotta love this guy. yahoo news reports cheney blames the democrats for surging oil prices. paraphrasing bug's life hopper's first rule of management: it's always management's fault.

¶ 5:50 PM

Wednesday, August 04, 2004

riaa

someone has to stop riaa. extorting money from people is criminal. read jesse's story. write to congress.

¶ 5:01 PM

Tuesday, August 03, 2004

xcountry

i love my airplane. not only does it fly upside down but it goes from palo alto to truckee in 95 minutes. and i get to write off the cost as a business expense. the bad part of the trip was i read about the extra 200 currently under development. and i want one. base price is $140,000. that is so close to being affordable. go amd stock go.

¶ 11:07 AM

Monday, August 02, 2004

flutitude

my friend axel recently discovered that it's a lot harder to play a flute at 6250' elevation when you live a lot closer to sea level.

¶ 11:05 AM

Sunday, August 01, 2004

wish list

i really like my powerbook. i take it everywhere. i regularly connect to 6 different wifi networks. i really wish there was an application that updated my settings based on what network it could find. like when i'm at grandpa's house i want it to change to eastern timezone. and when i'm at home i want it to use an assigned ip address. etc etc.

¶ 11:04 AM