Here is a woman who really understands!

Posted on 02/27/2010 by RLW3

My wife loves watching movies. Me…not so much.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I like watching GOOD movies. But so many of them aren’t very good…

In my opinion…

And while I am watching one of those “it’s oh-kay” movies, my preoccupation with time starts rearing its ugly head and I get restless. I try, but it is hard work!

Fairly early in our marriage, my wife and I watched the movie adaptation of Shakespeare’s play, “The Taming of the Shrew”. For my younger readers, it was made in 1967, long before you were even thought of! You can read all about the play here.

Elizabeth Taylor, one of the beauties of her era, plays Katerina, “an ill tempered, scolding woman.” Richard Burton plays Petruchio, the young man who agrees to take her off of her father’s hands (for a tidy sum, of course) by marrying her. He then sets out to tame her!

I honestly can’t remember how we learned of this movie but I know that I probably suggested that we watch it together. Why?

Well, there was a time in our marriage (certainly not now!) when my wife…

umm…

how can I put this…

shared some of Katerina’s emotional traits!

And since she likes to watch movies…

and she likes it even more when I watch with her…

and it was, after all, written by Lord William Shakespeare…

But that was a long time ago.

Now, I think she must be getting desperate. Why do I say that?

Guess what DVD showed up in our house recently?

That’s right…and I didn’t buy it!

We watched it last night. It was interesting that both of us forgot most of the first half of the movie. It seems that all we could remember was the taming part. Great minds think alike.

Things were going great but, alas, my Kate fell asleep just before the former shrew Kate gave the greatest speech that any female has ever delivered in the history of movies!

Aahh, yes…Here is a woman who really “gets it”!

Posted in Marriage | 1 Comment

The world is getting smaller

Posted on 02/23/2010 by RLW3

It may sound strange, coming from a blogger, but I have not been a huge fan of technology.

We went several years without a television in our home. When we did get one, TV time was strictly limited. Basically, for most of my children’s lives, we used the television to watch videos.

During his childhood, most of my son’s friends had Nintendos, game boys, o whatever they were called. He didn’t. Why? Because I thought that there were more important things for him to learn than how to get to the 32nd level of whatever game was hot at the moment.

I never had anything but the simplest games on our computers for the same reason.

Our children were some of the last to get cell phones and when they did, their minutes were strictly limited.

I do not regret any of those decisions. In fact, if faced with the same situation, I would make them all again.

But today, I really appreciated the technology that I have available to me.

My son had an important meeting in Philadephia this morning. Shortly after it was over, I not only learned that he was cleared and but quite a few of the details of the meeting via text message.

I then wrote him a e-mail at lunch.

While I wrote that e-mail, I pictured how isolated parents were from their children when they sent them off to college in previous generations. I am thankful that technology has made it so much easier to stay connected.

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You got written up for what?

Posted on 02/22/2010 by RLW3

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I have been having a long distance relationship for more than two years.

Actually, I am in several simultaneously.

It so much more difficult to communicate. I tell you that it is SO much better when you are face to face…

But, what other choice do I have? End the relationship? After all of this time?

I just can’t do it…

So, I continue being a long distance father to my three oldest children!

This weekend, I learned through the family grapevine that my son had been written up for violating the school’s behavior policy!

Whoaa!

I called him…

“For what?”

“Drinking…”

What do I say to that?…

I had no idea so I said nothing…

“But I wasn’t drinking. Everyone knows that I don’t drink or mess around or anything. So, when the other guys involved vouch for me, my record will be cleared.”

I have written about the moral climate in the dorms where he resides. It turns out that his roommate and a friend were drinking in is dorm room while he was present.

I then introduced a possibility that he had not  thought much about…

“What if they don’t?”

I then tried to open his eyes to how exposed he was in his present situation. He is completely dependent on other people to clear his name, people who clearly have little regard for rules and what is right.

I also showed him how easy it would be for the “judge” to find him guilty. After all, he knew the drinking was against the rules and yet he gave tacit consent to people who broke them.

His meeting is tomorrow.

Posted in Children, Parenting | Tagged , | Comments Off on You got written up for what?

What else am I going to do?

Posted on 02/20/2010 by RLW3

This stage of being a parent is…how shall I put this…challenging.

When my children were younger, they had to listen to me…or else!

Now that they are launching out on their own, I have to watch them make mistakes. Let me tell you, it is highly overrated! I get no pleasure out of it, no sense of “S-e-e-e-e-e-e-e, I told you so!”

I generally just bite my tongue, all the while hoping that they will ask me for my thoughts on the situation.

Take my son and his wrestling, for instance.

He has developed a counterproductive habit…

He eats like there is no tomorrow and then cuts a bunch the day before a tournament. He started his senior season in high school that way, continued through the season all the way through freestyle season.

He tried it again this weekend.

Since he has been “watching his weight”, he ONLY had to lose 8-9 pounds AFTER Friday morning’s practice for today’s tournament! He ended up going 2-2 for the tournament with his elimination loss coming to a fellow Drexel teammate!

I wonder what might have happened if he didn’t have to run 4 miles last night to make weight?

Oh well…I will have to wonder. He finished his redshirt freshman season with a record of 4-6.

Posted in Children, Parenting | Tagged | 2 Comments

“Pastoral”

Posted on 02/19/2010 by RLW3

I don’t know if you noticed, but I have changed the look of this blog. I have moved things around, changed font sizes, increased the writing area while decreasing the sidebars.

It is not as easy as it sounds because it is all written in HTML code.

I do not know HTML.

However, I am pretty good at trial and error.

On 133rd Street, just past the “no longer a mystery” condos, there is a large bronze (?) sculpture of a barefooted, open shirted young man, laying on ground with his arms behind his head, looking up at the sky nestled amongst a grove of trees.

I stopped the car the very first time that I saw it and have stopped to look at it on more than one occasion since, both while driving and walking.

A few weeks ago, I took a picture of it covered with snow.

I had forgotten that until about a week ago when I got tired of the background on my computer at work. While looking at the picture today, it occurred to me that it would make a great image for this blog.

For the past year, I have wanted to make the images on this blog more personal but that has seemed like too big of a hill to climb. However, ever since Bean took me to the woodshed…

Back to the HTML lab to figure out how to do it…

I still have a few minor tweaks to make but I like the end result.

In the process of figuring out how to change the image, I realized why I like this sculpture so much. After all, I am not an “artsy” guy.

I like this sculpture so much because it is me!

As a young boy in the country, I would go out in the yard, lay in the grass under a tree, look up at the sky and talk to God.

This is the new image for this blog.

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What are the odds?

Posted on 02/18/2010 by RLW3

I saw it and I still can’t believe it!

I mean I was there…

It happened to me…

and I am still having a hard time believing that it actually happened.

This is a picture of the overflow hole in our bathroom sink. (click on the pictures to see them better)

This is a picture of my contact lens.

I realize that the picture is blurry but the contact lens is easily as big as the opening of the overflow hole.

This morning, I put my left contact lens on my finger and moved it toward my eye. Here is a view from the tip of my finger.

As I moved the lens toward my eye, the contact fell off of my finger. No big deal…just find it, clean it up and try again.

As the contact fell, I watched it flip over and over and…

completely disappear into the overflow hole! It was gone!

“No way…that CAN’T be true…It HAS TO BE somewhere in the sink.”

I visually checked the sink carefully…no contact lens.

“I’ve GOT TO BE missing it somewhere.”

I wiped the entire sink out, checking my hand after each wipe…no contact lens!

My eyes were not fooling me! That lens had fallen into a hole that is smaller than the lens itself! I bet you if I stuck the lens on the end of my finger and TRIED to put it in that whole, I couldn’t do it on the first try!

If that were the extent of it, that would be amazing enough. However, when you consider that the overflow hole is nearly vertical, since it is on the side of the sink, and not lying flat, as it is in the first picture, it becomes even more unbelievable! Click on the picture of the sink again to get an idea of how small the target area was!

The rotation as it flipped in the air had to be perfect!…and it WAS!

It didn’t hit the lip of the hole…

It didn’t hit the back of the hole…

It didn’t hit anything! Nothin’ but net!

Do you realize the statistical likelihood of that happening? infinitesimal! Especially when you consider that the contact is wet and likely to stick to whatever it touches (except the end of my finger).

Folks, I saw this happen and I am still dumbfounded!

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Missing Tile Syndrome cured!

Posted on 02/15/2010 by RLW3

Although I am getting better, I frequently suffer from missing tile syndrome. I first read about this psychological defect in “Happiness is a Serious Problem” by Dennis Prager.

Imagine looking at a beautifully tiled ceiling. Now picture realizing that one tile is missing. My instinctive response is to find it and fix it! However, if I am not careful, that missing tile can become all that I can see.

It describes the all too frequent tendency to focus on the one small thing that is wrong in our life rather than all that right. That was starting to happen with my purchase of the Toyota’s engine and transmission. I think I have gotten a great deal but…

“I saved $50 on the transmission shipping costs. I wonder if I could have saved on the engine’s shipping costs from California? Why didn’t I think of that?”…

“I wonder if I really did get a good deal?”

I decided to put an end to this conversation.

I called the local repair shop down the street and told them that I needed to replace the engine and transmission in my ’92 Paseo.

He called me back late this evening…

“I haven’t got a call back from the junkyard yet but you are looking at around $1,600.”

I thought, “Well, shoot, that is what it is costing me now.”

“…for the engine. Then, probably another $1,000 for the transmission. If you add in all of the labor, you could be looking at $5-6,000.”

You know, that missing tile doesn’t look so bad. No, I think that I like my ceiling just the way it is.

Posted in Cars, Money | Tagged | Comments Off on Missing Tile Syndrome cured!

Tilt!

Posted on 02/14/2010 by RLW3

As soon as we  leave our apartment complex and turn right to head east on the lightly traveled 133rd Street, we cross a main North-South street. On the north corner, a development of houses that sell for $500-750,000 begins and extends for the next 1/2 mile. Over that same 1/2 mile stretch on the south side of the street, there is another nice apartment complex on the corner, a 5 story office building at the 1/4 mile mark and finally two 3-story condominium buildings.

The condominiums have been somewhat of a mystery. We drive by these buildings every week. I pass them frequently on one of my prayer walks. I hardly ever see cars parked outside or people in them. The lack of observed activity over the last year had made me curious about them.

They sign at the foot of the driveway says that they have an “Open House” every Sunday. Yesterday, on the way home from church, we decided to take a peek.

We were greeted by a realtor who informed us that the 2nd story unit we were in was 2,800 square feet! It had a very spacious, creative layout. The kitchen had Viking appliances, granite counter-tops. The bathrooms had jacuzzi tubs, separate showers, spacious, well appointed walk in closets. Really nice!

The price…

One point one million dollars!

…plus homeowner fees (I didn’t ask) 

The realtor informed us that we were standing in “the last unit of this size so the market price has been firmly established”. Maybe in New York or Boston…but in Kansas?

“You have such a great view. Look at it!”

 The condos back up to a small shopping center!

On our way out, the realtor encouraged us to also look at the 1,900 square foot unit on the bottom floor. It was a “bargain” at $550,000.

As we walked out the front door, we couldn’t help but notice the beautiful houses across the street that cost the same as the “bargain” condo. As we drove that last 1/2 mile to our apartment, that “exclusive, luxury condo” began to look like a glorified version of our apartment!

$1.1 MILLION???

You can buy a whole bunch of house and then pay people to maintain it for a lot less than that.

I can’t quite get my brain wrapped around that. Then again, I have also not been smart enought to earn that amount of money either.

Posted in Money, Real Estate | Comments Off on Tilt!

I finally took delivery

Posted on 02/12/2010 by RLW3

I called the North Hollywood company to get the tracking number for my Toyota engine. It will be delivered to my work address next Monday.

My mechanic is going to charge me $800 to replace the engine. However, he will charge the same amount to put in both and engine AND a transmission.

With each passing day, the thought of installing an engine with 50-60,000 miles and not replacing the 175,000 mile transmission just wasn’t sitting well with me.

When I ordered the engine, I asked if they had any 5-speed transmissions. They didn’t. Yesterday, it was bothering me enough that I went on car-parts.com and did a search of all the participating “auto recycling” companies in the Midwest.

I first sorted the list by miles away from my home. That didn’t really help.

Then I sorted by condition…but one junkyard’s “A” condition is another one’s “C”.

Then I sorted by mileage. I saw a transmission in Toledo, Ohio with 25,000 miles on it. I was skeptical but I decided to call on it anyway.

“Westwood Auto Parts. How can I help you”

“I’m calling about the 1992 Toyota Paseo transmission.”

“I have one with 25,000 miles and one with 172,000 miles.”

“I’m calling about the one with 25,000 miles. I have a few questions.”

“What do you want to know?”

“How can a transmission for a car that is 18 years old only have 25,o00 miles on it?”

“Well, we bought the on 6/7/94, pulled the transmission, put it on the shelf and it has been sitting there ever since.”

This transmission is effectively 2 years old! They have been holding it for me for 16 years! You talk about service…

I bought if for $175. Add in $100 for shipping and my total costs to buy the engine AND transmission are $800. That is not too bad.

Posted in Cars, Money | Comments Off on I finally took delivery

Bean takes me to the woodshed

Posted on 02/11/2010 by RLW3

I realize that I haven’t written in a few days…

It’s my oldest daughter’s fault!

She started a blog! And it’s good.

Great picture (of course she has much better material to work with than I do!)…contemporary look…creative, fun writing…(I wonder where she gets that from? They say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree…).

I enjoyed her blog so much that I immediately went to write a post about it. And then I saw it…

My blog looked so cluttered! Monthly Archives…Categories…Search Box…

What am I thinking? This isn’t the National Archives. People aren’t coming to this site to do research for a project!

And the fonts! Could they be any larger? I mean, I need bi-focals to read but, come on! Mr. Magoo could read them without his glasses!

In 15 minutes, my daughter made me hate the layout of my blog!

So, for the past few days, I have been learning how to to alter HTML code!

By the way, I deleted the links to my other two blogs since I am not currently writing anything on them and I have added a link to Bean’s blog. Take a look. It is a fun read.

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