Back in '97 I upgraded to what I thought was a huge TV. For years I had a 13 inch color TV, which Clone has now. When I finally graduated from college and was out of my parents house for a year, I bought myself a 27 inch TV. That is the largest TV I've ever owned. That TV died about four years ago and I ended up buying another 27 inch TV because it fit in the entertainment center that was had. I was fine with that TV all these years because it's all I needed.

That was until last year. I started hanging out with some friends from work to watch football on Sundays. It would rotate at who's house it was held. No matter how much I offered to host the "Football Sunday", they would always pass because I had a small TV and it wasn't in HD. Which in all honesty was fine by me. That way I didn't have to clean up before and after.

What changed was when the Packers started doing really well this year. I started saying, "If the Packers make it to the Super Bowl, I'm hosting the party." They are my team and unless another Packer fan wants to host it, I'm going to watch the game in the house of a Packer fan. I even talked Ktreva into letting me buy big screen TV if the Packers made it all the way.

So I've been watching and planning on how I'm going to do this when the opportunity fell into my lap. One of my peers at work bought a 50 inch HD TV a couple of years ago. It's too big for her room and her and her husband both decided to get a smaller TV. So they decided to sell the one they have. They wanted it out so they put a price on it of $600.00, which includes the entertainment center for it. Yea, I jumped on that. I didn't really ask Ktreva's permission, but the TV they have is a $1,600.00 TV normally. There is no way in hell I'm going to find a deal like that in the stores. All I have to do is go pick it up.

I called in a couple of favors from people I've helped move stuff in the past year and we are going to go pick it up on Saturday. The only problem is that now I have to get rid of the entertainment center we currently have. Fortunately it's falling apart and old, so I'm not worried about preserving it. I'm thinking firewood for over the summer.

Posted by: Contagion at 07:05 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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1 Haven't you heard tv ruins your vision. Wil already wears glasses and I'm not to far behind him. So you should save your vision & sell the TV to us for $300. The Packers are going to lose anyway

Posted by: red at January 18, 2008 08:11 AM (r6Tdl)

2 Enjoy the game - now don't forget to upgrade your cable to the HD box - and make sure they give you the one with the DVR and not the basic box!!!

Posted by: Teresa at January 18, 2008 01:05 PM (rVIv9)

3 Well it was Big and it was COLD but we got it there! Sorry that you had to see the Pack game on it for the 1st time. At least Archie has one son that he loves tonight!

Posted by: Bruce at January 20, 2008 10:05 PM (59+ds)

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Okay it's been a couple of days and I'm sure some of you... okay maybe one of you... is wondering what happened. Well it was fun, I think. Honestly I really don't remember. Hell, I don't remember who all was there.

I have a traditional of being a little socially lubricated, it helps me overcome my shyness. This year was no exception. The first guests showed up a little after 5:00. I remembered guests showing up regularly after that up until someone noticed a wooden box I had in my office. I explained it was Shut the Box, an old pub game. After a very quick explanation of the rules, as it is a simple game to play, they decided they wanted to play. After the first couple of rounds others joined in. The next thing I know some arsehole decided that just taking a drink of beer for the loser wasn't good enough, it had to be shots. After that everything went down hill.

I have no recollection of the rest of the night. Well except playing drunken Wii at 2:00 in the morning. Apparently I was calling people on the phone, texting people, talking to people that called me on the phone and much more. I don't recall any of it. Allegedly I was rather amusing.

So if you received a phone call from me, a Text message from me or I spoke to you on the phone that night. I apologize for anything I may have said or done that could be construed as offensive. If you just found me amusing, than I'm glad I could be of assistance!

Posted by: Contagion at 07:36 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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...it's been replaced with Wii shoulder. So I bought the family a Wii. We spent a lot of time yesterday playing it. It was a lot of fun, but after bowling as much as I did and playing some of the other games, I noticed my shoulder was starting to ache. At first I thought it was just me, but no KTreva stated that her shoulder and wrists were starting to get sore as well.

When I was younger I remember playing the Nintendo for hours and getting what my friends and I called "Nintendo thumb" That dull ache and stiffness in the thumbs from holding the controller for hours and the pushing of the buttons. As I sat there yesterday I realized that my thumbs weren't sore at all. Nope, not one bit. Mainly because most of the action of the games revolves around the motion of the controller, not the pushing of buttons. After doing all the bowling, tennis, golf, shooting games, extra, my arms felt like I'd given them a steady workout.

On the upside, I did work off the Christmas dinner I made for the family.

Posted by: Contagion at 09:58 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The annual Lutefisk dinner was tonight. For the first time Ktreva joined the boys and I there. In years past it was always men only, but they opened it up to women a couple of years ago and my Dad figured that if they are going to let other women be there, might as well let one he likes come along as well. Of course she tried the wonderful lutefisk. It was delicious! They did a wonderful job cooking it. The rest of the meal was wonderful too. Pickled herring, Korv (Swedish cooking sausage), Swedish meatballs, rice pudding, pickled beats, lingonberries, beans, red potatoes, ham, etc. It was just full of all kinds of Scandinavian cooking delights. There wasn't any lefse, but I can wait a couple of more days for that.

Overall it was a great time. It did make me miss my grandparents. When I was younger my grandfather would go with Dad and I to this every year. It was an annual tradition. When Ktreva and I got together I started bringing Boopie with and Clone came every year since he was one. It's because I remember attending this function since I was younger than Boopie, most of those years with my grandfather, and my grandmother just dying that made me think about him even more and how much I miss Grandpa and how much I'm going to miss Grandma.

Posted by: Contagion at 09:04 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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The first batch of Glögg is done. Just a tip for future Glögg makers; you can use the fruit to make other things, I just don't recommend eating it straight. It tastes fine, but my nasal passage feels singed. Right now I'm sitting on about 2 gallons of glögg, and I have another 2 to two gallons making. It should be done in about 30 minutes. Then I figure an hour after that I won't be sober enough to update you anymore. Oh, and according to the hydrometer, I'm at about 75% alcohol.

Posted by: Contagion at 04:21 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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My grandmother's funeral is visitation is tomorrow and I have nothing going on today, so I'm going to start marking my second annual Glögg for the holidays. Hey I figure what goes better with mourning than alcohol? Glögg will help numb... well everything. So if you don't hear from me in a while, it's because I'm in the kitchen with alcohol.

Posted by: Contagion at 12:20 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I spent the whole day yesterday down at Fritz's in Stillman Valley. Over the last week I told everyone I bumped into that I was going to be down there all day and that if they wanted they could come down for a drink or two and some conversation. Through out the day various friends stopped in, some ate, some just drank, but all had a good time. The staff was nice enough to fill me in on all the local gossip and inquired on missing individuals. They were even nice enough to turn the TVs the the Tennessee Vols' game for me. Which turned out to be a great game. A real nail biter, they won in 4th overtime!

Now today I'm heading over to my friend J-man's house to watch the afternoon games with some friends there. I was going to host it at my house, but J-man doesn't like my TV. Since it's only a 27 inch TV, he doesn't think it's big enough. Thus he begged, pleaded and groveled to his wife to let him have it at there house, and she said yes. It doesn't matter to me any. I wouldn't mind having the guys here, but on the same side I don't have to worry about Clone climbing all over everyone and I don't have to pick up after them.

The best part about today is that since the Packer's already played and won, I can enjoy all the other games with out wondering what's going on.

Posted by: Contagion at 10:50 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Yesterday, Thanksgiving, went really well. There was no drama at all. Then again most of the day was spent with my father and I in the basement watching football. The Packer's won, after trying to give it up on Thanksgiving again, putting them at 10-1. Since both my father and I are Packer fans, we were damn delighted.

Of course today is Black Friday, that shopping day in which people become rude animals mugging each other to get some deal at what ever big box store. Seriously I've seen people get into fights at Wallyworld over TVs. Traffic is insane as people ignore the rules of the road to rush to the next store to buy items. It's just stupid. Until last year I avoided going out on Black Friday. That was when I found the good deal on ammo. Well they had the same deal this year. So off I went to try and get me a buy.

Dick's Sporting Goods had the sale of buy one box get a second 50% off. Unfortunately this year they had better trained staff and I didn't get 50% off all of my ammo. Also this year they jacked up the price of ammo right before the holiday, so I really didn't save that much. Even so I still ended up getting six boxes of .45 automatic. I went to Gander Mountain to try to get the deal there as well. My friend that worked there left a couple of months back to take a job elsewhere and they wouldn't honor the coupon from the competitor this year. I did end up picking up 10 boxes of 7.62X39mm and a Christmas present for Boopie. I didn't mean to do any Christmas shopping, but one of the few items he actually really wanted they had a Gander Mountain and it was a good price on it.

The nice thing is that neither store was busy at all. Heck I didn't get out of bed until 7:45 AM and when I arrived at both stores, they weren't overly busy at all. In fact I've seen them busier on normal weekends. Now of course the staff at both stores say they get busier in the afternoon after all the big electronic items are sold out at other stores. The only problem I had was the traffic. I really wish I had push bars on my truck. I also wish I had the right to pull people over and ticket them still. At one point traffic was grid locked because people were turning on red and the roads were backed up so they couldn't get out of the intersection. Cross traffic and on coming traffic had to stop because cars were blocking the intersection. I really just wanted to push the idiots off of the road so that traffic could get going again.

I didn't do it, but I really wanted to.

Posted by: Contagion at 09:21 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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It's almost time for Christmas, which means kids will be making lists about what they want. Now a days we have all these electronic and online wish lists, but when I was a kids it was the catalogs and wish books from various stores, I remember those fondly. I remember spending hours sitting in front of those books circling the items that I want. Over at X-Entertainment (I don't know why they named it that because there is nothing x-rated about it nor is that how I found it! It's all about toys and stuff.) they have an article regarding the 1985 JC Penny Wish Book.

I agree completely with the author regarding the USS Flagg. That was the only GI Joe toy that I wanted really bad that I never got. Sometimes, late at night when I can't sleep, I still think about it.

Posted by: Contagion at 09:39 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I had to buy a new addition to the house yesterday. With a little toy I brought back from Georgia, my firearm collection leaped to the count of 18. That includes black powder in case you are wondering. Well Ktreva was starting to get nervous about it. I normally kept them secured in cases under the bed. The ammo was locked away in boxes with me having the only key.

So I went out and bought a gun safe. It's not a huge one, but big enough to hold all the ammo and firearms in it. The problem is that it's still pretty big and takes up a lot of room. I ended up having to put it in the hall way, which is the only place it would fit. I don't think Ktreva is too pleased with the location, but she's just happier now that we have a proper safe instead of series of locked cases.

What's the new toy I brought back from Georgia? I'm not telling. It's a surprise. Plus I just don't want documentation that I have it.

Posted by: Contagion at 07:23 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Tonight on my ride home I was listening to a local talk radio show. Admittedly it was a liberal radio show, but I like to listen to both sides of an argument before I form an opinion. The host, who usually states he doesn't want to own a gun, was talking about getting a gun and was asking for input from listeners. So of course I called, I had too.

The previous callers to me covered most of the points I was going to say, but I had some other points. He was looking for a firearm for home defense, I recommended a .38 revolver. It's big enough to stop someone, less maintenance, and it is compact enough for both him and his wife to use. He had also stated that he was going to buy it and would never use it. Thus I told him not to buy it. If he doesn't take it shooting at least once ever 3 months and clean it, he may end up having more problems. He agreed with that and said that he could do. He asked me how *I* would store a loaded firearm in my house. I told him I'd buy a good gun safe to keep next to the bed. One that him and his wife were the only ones that knew the combination too.

Then he inquired if I had kids and how do they react to firearms. I told him that I do have kids and that it's been my rule that every time that I bring a firearm home, I show it to the boys. That way they know it's in the house and I desensitize them to it. I told him that I teach them gun safety at a young age and that way they aren't inclined to play with them. It's how I grew up and I never touched the firearms with out my parents.

Overall I was on the radio for about 15 minutes talking the bonuses to owning a firearm, but I also told him that if he buys one and is going to be afraid of it, it's not worth buying.

Posted by: Contagion at 05:42 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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This morning when I went out to the truck I discovered that someone had ransacked it. The center consol was opened and everything on it was spread all over the seat, different compartments were open stuff was strewn about. Whoever did it didnÂ’t take anything, at least nothing I noticed. They left money, CDs, sunglasses, etc. I donÂ’t generally leave a lot of items of value in my vehicles. They did however search the ashtray.

To be honest it is almost like they where looking for something specific. They tossed the compartments, but didnÂ’t take anything and looked into compartments that normally you donÂ’t store stuff inÂ… like the ashtray next to the coin compartment. Places that are just big enough to say hold a cell phone.

Not that I have any proof. And I may be over thinking this, but allegedly the Ex told Boopie that if I don't return the phone by this Friday he's going to take me to court. Which would be a bad idea for him. At least I know it wasnÂ’t Boopie, he couldnÂ’t get out of the house in the middle of the night with out setting off the alarm.

Posted by: Contagion at 12:46 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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1 My guess would be that it was somebody looking specifically for cash.

Posted by: Shadoglare at November 15, 2007 11:18 AM (Volhe)

2 Seriously, does he know how many firearms you own?

Posted by: oddybobo at November 15, 2007 11:48 AM (mZfwW)

3 Get a 12 volt batter and connect it to the frame of your truck with the positive cable. Get a nice sheet of sheet metal and connect the negative cable to it, and set the sheet metal so it lays the width of the truck and protrudes via the Drivers and passenger doors. That will seriously deter anyone who wants to open your truck doors

Posted by: BloodSpite at November 15, 2007 12:00 PM (xUF9P)

4 Shadoglare: Then why did they leave the cash? Oddy: Nope, no idea. Bloodspite: Yes, it would deter, but it also might end up in jail for manslaughter.

Posted by: Contagion at November 15, 2007 12:11 PM (Q5WxB)

5 Lift some fingerprints so if it does end up in court you can mention that someone with his fingerprints ransacked your truck. Or call the cops, I would.

Posted by: Quality Weenie at November 15, 2007 12:24 PM (ZM3Qb)

6 I'm with QW. Get some evidence. Call the cops. At least get a report on the record. He really does NOT want to take you to court. Heh. His loss. I hope you hid that cell phone GOOD.

Posted by: caltechgirl at November 15, 2007 01:00 PM (/vgMZ)

7 You want I can come camp out in the bed of your truck and wait for the idiots to come back. Like a little surprise. From what I've heard, I can take him and that way YOU won't get in trouble. It ain't "art" but it'd be entertaining none the less.....

Posted by: Tammi at November 15, 2007 01:54 PM (ZRV91)

8 He won't take you to court... but I wish there was some way to hook up a "flash" for if he tries to do it again. You know, set it up so if someone opens the door to the truck - a camera flash goes off and scares the bejesus out of him...

Posted by: Teresa at November 15, 2007 08:15 PM (rVIv9)

9 ... this guy is beginning to sound more than just a wee bit psycho....

Posted by: Eric at November 16, 2007 04:03 PM (g02Hg)

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IÂ’m sorry I didnÂ’t post about SaturdayÂ’s game, but we were celebrating pretty hard. Bloodspite and I got up early on Saturday so we could find a decent parking space at the game. Since all the close by parking is reserved for alumni or season ticket holders, we had about a quarter mile walk to the stadium. Bloodspite dropped the bomb on me Friday that the stadium was dryÂ… meaning no alcohol. So I figured the pre-game partying there would be beer available. Wrong! It was on campus so no beer. Oh well, we can live with out beer. Beer to football is like steak sauce to steak. The steak is great on itÂ’s own, but the sauce just adds a little extra something to it. We did go to the Volunteer Village to hang out with all the co-eds, fans, co-eds, alumni, co-eds and cheerleaders. We also picked up some free swag they were giving out. Including pictures and autographs.

Two hours prior to the game the was the Vol-walk, a tradition where the players walk from the athletic center to the stadium so all the fans can shake their hands and cheer on the team. Now IÂ’m not a Tennessee fan, but I was rooting for them. Bloodspite, on the other hand, is a different story. Folks let me say he feels about Tennessee the same way I feel about the Packers. When the walk started and he realized we picked out front row seats he was ecstatic. When the team started coming down he was down right giddy. After shaking Eric AingeÂ’s hand I thought he was going to start jumping up and down, giggling like a little girl. Hell, he damn near bragged about it to his mother the whole day. Then again if it had been Brett Favre, I probably would have been the exact same way.

After the walk we went to the stadium to watch the game. This is a huge stadium. Officially Neyland Stadium seats 102,037 but I kid you not there were like 105,600 some people there. They actually sell standing room tickets I guess. Our seats were three rows from the top of the southwest end zone. The only complaints I had wasnÂ’t the location of the seats, we could see just fine and it was nice to see plays open up. My issues were that there is no legroom in this section; we were packed in tight. The reason there is no legroom is that this is a steep stadium. The people in front of me could use my knees as a headrest. If you have a fear of heights, do not get seats this high up. Hell it about caused vertigo in me.

The game was good, well good for us. Tennessee won 34-13 over the Arkansas Razorbacks. We were sitting in a sea of razorback fans. Fortunately their smack talk started dying shortly after the game started. After the game we headed back to the hotel and met up with Bloodspite’s cousin. We drank some beer, went to Wild Wings Café for some hot wings, nachos and more beer. Someone stole a bucket that was used to deliver beer. I’m not saying who it was… but I had two accomplices. After dinner we went back to the hotel were we had beer left over from the previous night’s beer search. About a case into the night T1G calls and proceeds to get upset with me over drunkenly questioning him about “a new roommate”. I just had to point out that it was his fault that he called me when I was drunk! Some people!

Sunday morning I headed out early. I wanted to get home in a decent hour and I had a ten-hour drive ahead of me. Everything started out great, there was almost no traffic and I was making good time. About an hour and fifteen minutes into the trip my phone rings. ItÂ’s Bloodspite wanting to know if I had his car keys. I hadnÂ’t seen them when I was loading, but I told him I needed to top of the tank so I would stop and look. I checked the door, the floor, the glove compartment, under the seat, the center counsel, between the seats and there werenÂ’t in there. So he went back to checking the room. I get gas, hit the bathroom, buy something to drink and get back on the road. He asks me if IÂ’m sure they arenÂ’t in my car. I assure him they arenÂ’t. He asks me to check again so I tell him at the next off ramp IÂ’ll pull over and research the vehicle. Now of course IÂ’m curious so while IÂ’m drinking up and down this curvy mountain highway IÂ’m reaching around. I look up just in time to see me careening toward a guardrail. I slam on the breaks and swerve. Then something hits the back of my footÂ… There were his keys. In the wild driving the night before they must have slid under my seat. I didnÂ’t even think to look under my seat. Now I have to turn around and bring him his keys.

To make up for all the lost time IÂ’m driving a bit faster then before. I made the return trip in just under an hour. I did the same thing on the way home. I found a vehicle going faster then I was and pulled in behind them and kept this up all the way home. In fact on the stretch between Indianapolis and Chicago on I-65, I was doing in excess of 100 mph keeping up with the pack. What should have only taken me 10 hours took me 10.5 (with a 2.5 hour detour to return the keys). See I think this was BloodspiteÂ’s way of balancing out the trip. He had a 14-hour drive and was trying to make me share his pain.

Overall I had a great time and to be honest I may have to look into heading back next year. It was just that much fun.

Posted by: Contagion at 06:33 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Last night was fun. Every time I laid down I would get nauseated. I had to try to sleep on my back with my head propped up to stop it. Unfortunately I can't sleep that way. It's very uncomfortable. I'm more of a sleep on their side/stomach kind of person. Thus I'm staying home again today. I really need to get over this. On Thursday I'm driving to Tennessee to hook up with Bloodspite for the Tennessee Vols vs Arkansas Razorback game. I've been planning this since September and if I have to drive there while horking, I will.

On the flip side, it's kind of nice to be able to spend the day home alone with Clone. We are going to watch some movies and play a couple of games together. I guess if I'm going to be sick, it's not a bad way to spend the day.

Posted by: Contagion at 09:00 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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I'm staying home from work today. I've felt off for the last couple of days. It started Friday night after an evening at Fritz's. I thought maybe the beer wasn't mixing with me too well. The middle of the night fun and all day nausea I attributed to a hang over... The first I've had in 2 years. Then Sunday evening while at the ball I still felt off, but thinking it was just a persistent hangover I kept trying to drink it out of my system. In hind sight, that might not have been a good idea.

Sunday morning I still felt off, was having more bodily function "fun", and just had a general icky-bad feeling. I went to football Sunday over at Bruce's. I forgot all my stats, my flags, my chair, my clip board and was just kind of out of it. I'm still thinking hangover, but I'm starting to question it. I was also gassier than any man has a right to be.

Last night when my stomach was dumping it's contents in the middle of the night I realized... hey, it's not a hang over, I'm sick! Thus I'm staying home today because at 8:35 CST this morning I've been in and out of the bathroom 5 times since midnight. I really didn't want to be at work like this.

Posted by: Contagion at 08:24 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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IÂ’m a little disappointed in last night. First off I didnÂ’t get the amount of trick or treaters that I thought I was going to get. Usually I get 200-300 kids, last night I got maybe 100-150. Trick or treating started at 5:30, but I didnÂ’t get my first kid until almost 5:45. At first I thought it was because it was still light out and that a lot of people were waiting until it got dark, but no that wasnÂ’t it. It did start picking up but it wasnÂ’t until Ktreva returned with Clone that I realized why it was down by so much. Remember the flooding we had back in August, well a lot of the houses that were hit really bad are still condemned and abandoned. There were a lot of kids in that area.

Getting back to the daylight, how annoying. Half of my display doesnÂ’t look scary in the daylight. In fact some of the scarier things you canÂ’t see until it gets dark, like the free-floating ghost that is in the upstairs front window. Yet I still had a lot of people taking pictures of the house and me in the daylight. I lost count of how many kids I had my picture taken with or the kids had their picture taken with my display. You have to remember I dress up in a costume to hand out candy. Here I am:

I will admit that I do intentionally try to scare kids, but I have a rule. If they look like they are under the age of 10, I play nice. If there are kids under the age of 10 around, I play nice. If a kid under the age of ten gets scared, I will take my mask off just so they can see I’m not a real demon. I really do go out of my way not scare the younger kids, but sometimes bad things happen. There was on little boy, about two years old, that must have been in a panic before he got to my house. I could here him getting worked up as they approached. There were other kids there so I was handing out candy. My fog machine had been on and the wind had died down so there was thick fog bank on my obscuring my front porch from the sidewalk. As this kid in the stroller is pushed up to my steps a gust of wind clears the fog and he is looking directly at me. A shriek that only can be produced by a young child in fear for their life AND in pain was made. It was ear shattering! I ripped my mask off so fast I almost tore out my earrings. I said to the little boy, “See, it’s just a costume. Just like you are Spiderman, I’m a dark lord of the dead!” Sadly that actually seemed to calm him down a lot. Yet I still think he’s going to be in therapy until in his 50’s before he gets over this one.

I did get one legit scare last night. Two girls, about twelve, came walking up to the porch. At first they were hesitant and a little scared, but after they got their candy and were walking away I heard one say, “He’s not so scary.” So I jumped down the porch, ran up behind them and made a guttural scream. Both girls screamed and took off… in different directions. I don’t know if they ever found each other because I didn’t see either one of them the rest of the night. Maybe they went around the block to avoid my house.

What I don’t get was the extremes in reaction I received for the first time last night. Remember I said I had people wanting their kids to have their picture taken with me. Well I kid you not, one kid turns to me and says something like, “I want a pony, and a rocket ship, and a gun that shoots darts.” WTF?!?!?! What am I? Some kind of Satan Clause? Kids asking me for toys and stuff. That’s just not right!

Then on the other hand I had a lady who chastised me for scaring little kids. She arrived at a busy time when I had a lot of kids on my porch. The kids with here were probably 8-10 years old. A family with a young kid came up and the kid, of course, got scared. Thus as I stated I do, I took my mask off and gave the girl a piece of candy. After they left the Lady says to me, “You really should be ashamed of yourself for scaring little kids.” I replied, “It’s Halloween, I decorate and dress spooky. I don’t go out of my way to scare small children, but it does happen. That is why I took my mask off. This is for fun, if the parents want cute they’ll take the kids to see Santa or the Easter Bunny.” I mean c’mon. My house has a life-like skeleton hanging from a pole axe, zombies rising out of graves, a coffin with death hanging in it, ghosts, a giant spider eating severed limbs, rats, shrunken heads, severed heads, multiple skulls and me walking around. I think my decorations themselves speak as a warning that my house is PG-13 on the Scare-o-meter.

Eh, maybe sheÂ’s right and I shouldnÂ’t do all of thisÂ…. Wait a second, I had one person complain and I had just about EVERY OTHER ADULT COMPLIMENT AND APPRECIATE WHAT I DID. I donÂ’t know why, but her comment really got under my skin. IÂ’m actually pretty annoyed by it. I donÂ’t know why, but I am. Usually I let stuff like that roll of my back, but this time itÂ’s still stinging a little.

Posted by: Contagion at 05:25 PM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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1 You should have given her a bitch slap. In character only, though.

Posted by: That 1 Guy at November 01, 2007 06:21 PM (8lJah)

2 I thought you looked GREAT and she's just a party pooper. Every party has one.....

Posted by: Tammi at November 01, 2007 07:11 PM (dnmhS)

3 The subdivision I take Critter too, has a real cool guy who converts his entire house, on his own dime, in to a haunted house. And he lets the kids in the neighborhood go through it for free. I always thought that totally rocked, and it sounds like your doing pretty much the same, and I still think it rocks. lets face it, you can't make EVERYONE happy. And if you can..you should run for office

Posted by: BloodSpite at November 02, 2007 07:18 AM (xUF9P)

4 People who don't want their kids to be scared should either not participate in Halloween, or not approach a house clearly as decked out as yours must have been. Forget it, she's a tard.

Posted by: Carmen at November 02, 2007 07:56 AM (9VWj+)

5 Dude - I think it's great! And you look scary as hell! I caught a few comments about the fact that I dress for Halloween around here - sucks that people can't see the fun in it...

Posted by: Richmond at November 02, 2007 09:03 AM (xc+kE)

6 The proper response to the moron woman... "I'm sorry I scared you, perhaps if you let your child stand in front of you, she can protect you from me. Or you could skip going out on Halloween." hehehehe.

Posted by: Teresa at November 02, 2007 09:10 AM (rVIv9)

7 I think you look awesome. I always avoided those houses when the boy was smaller - now he is all for them!

Posted by: oddybobo at November 02, 2007 10:05 AM (mZfwW)

8 Heheh... now you're one of "those" houses...

Posted by: That 1 Guy at November 03, 2007 06:57 AM (8lJah)

9 Good thing you and Titan's Liar's homes aren't located side by side. What scary panic that would produce. :-)

Posted by: h~ at November 03, 2007 01:46 PM (DWOkQ)

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Ktreva found the perfect Halloween decoration for me. It combines two of my most favorite things in the world together. According to her she was just walking through the store when she found it. As soon as she laid eyes on it she said she thought of me, it was something "I had to have".

Want to know what it is?

See the extended entry!
more...

Posted by: Contagion at 01:11 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 96 words, total size 1 kb.

It's almost here! Tomorrow is Halloween! Which for those of you that don't remember is one of my favorite holidays. It and the Fourth of July are are so close that I really can't decide between the two of them. Tonight we are preparing for the fright fest that is my front yard!

Every year I decorate the house with all kinds of ghouls, zombies, skeletons, ghosts and other scary things. Then I hand out a ton of good candy. No, we don't use the cheap stuff, I'm talking Kit Kats, Baby Ruth, Reese's, Snickers etc. I even dress up like a demon to hand it out to all the boils and ghouls that come to my door. Of corpse I always get a scare or two into some of the older ones. I have a rule that I don't scare the kids that appear to be under the age of 10.

This year the weather is supposed to be warm and nice and it would be an almost perfect Halloween... if the Government hadn't gone and screwed things up. Remember last spring when they changed daylight savings time? Well the clocks don't turn back until next weekend, so tomorrow night it'll still be light out when the kids come trick or treating. That is really going to screw up a lot of the decorations. Hell some of my effects only work in the dark. Since the official start time of 5:30 PM and ending at 7:30. That will give the kids about an hour of darkness to trick or treat in.

Owell, I'll just have to make the best of the situation.

Posted by: Contagion at 05:42 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Most people have one. Either it is one of their own or one that involves a friend. Some people have a lot of drinking stories, me personally I have a 39 volume encyclopedia of drinking stories. And there are two different types of drinking stories. You have the “drank too much” variety, which seems to be the most common.

For example: The summer before my junior year of college I worked as a welderÂ’s assistant. The company I worked for let me keep some of the equipment including a really good pair of welding gloves. When I returned to college I brought them with me, I donÂ’t know why, but I did. Some friends of mine and I went to a big party bonfire party and for reasons beyond reasonable explanation I brought with the welders gloves. Hey, there was fire and the gloves may come in handy. Well they did, but not for reasons expected. There were about a hundred or so people at this party, we were all drinking very heavily. There were multiple kegs and bottles of hard liquor going around.

At some pint one of the other party goers brought out some bottle rockets and started setting them off. Now I was pretty drunk at that time and remembered I had my welder’s gloves with me. Putting them on I said “You want to see fireworks, watch this” and I grabbed a burning log out of the fire and started swinging it around. Of course the drunks all thought this was cool and funny. And then I did something that normally I wouldn’t do, but I was young and drunk. I threw the burning log up in the air as hard as I could. Sparks flew everywhere. Then the log came back down to earth… in the middle of a corn field. A very dry corn field in October at the end of a draught. The next thing I know flames started leaping up out of the corn field.

Party goers are running in every direction, in the end about a quarter acre of corn was destroyed by fire, I think about a half acre was destroyed in trying to contain and put out the fire. It made the local news and I lived in fear for months that someone was going to turn me in. Needless to say IÂ’ve never brought wielding gloves to a bonfire party again.

On the other hand you have the “You didn’t get drunk, but alcohol was involved” variety. These tend to be more just on the quantity or quality of alcohol. A good example of that is many years ago we attended a re-enactment and I had brought two cases of beer, Bucktooth Billy brought a couple of cases of beer and Maelduin brought a couple of cases of beer. We arrived at the event on Thursday. Late Friday night we ran out of beer. Bucktooth Billy and Maelduin made a beer run on Saturday, while wearing kilts. Ktreva had asked them to pick her up a bottle of wine while they were there. Just after picking the wine from the shelf a female patron made a comment to Maelduin. He turns and filled with anger howls, “IT’S NOT A DRESS!” The lady gets scarred and runs off. Bucktooth Billy comes over to Maelduin and says, “She didn’t say anything about your kilt, but commented on the choice of wine.”

Now these aren’t my best drinking stories, but to hear those you need to buy me a drink or two. So why am I talking about drinking stories? It’s because CNN did an article on “Drinking Stories That Put Yours To Shame.” Now I’ve heard many of them before, and there are some really good ones in there. I don’t know if they are the greatest, but damn! They really do have some that make you laugh or cringe.

So tell me, what one of your favorite drinking stories is. Let me know either in the comments or post on it and let me know.

Posted by: Contagion at 07:19 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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IÂ’ve been in a funk for the last couple of days and I couldnÂ’t figure out why. Last weekend was great. I spent four days hanging out with a lot of good people, having a lot of fun and just having a good time overall. There was no reason for me to be in a funk over anything.

Then it dawned on me about ten minutes ago what a big part of my problem is, my job.

I donÂ’t fit in at my company. In my office I am one of two supervising management positions that are male. IÂ’m one of four overall male management. The office itself is 87% female. Not that being one of the few guys in the building is difficult, itÂ’s that I think differently than my female counterparts. Thus in this office my opinion doesnÂ’t matter. Management in my office is a good olÂ’ girls club and I just donÂ’t belong.

I get the crap assignments and when things go wrong in my department, I catch the blame for it, even if it was another Supervisor and teamÂ’s responsibility. IÂ’ve been singled out in meetings, IÂ’ve been harassed and when I try to voice my issues they sweep them under the rug. IÂ’ve even been retaliated against.

The only reason I havenÂ’t left is because of the stability. Yet if certain politicians get their wishes, that stability will be gone. Eh, maybe things will get better.

Posted by: Contagion at 10:56 AM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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1 It's really hard to give up that stability when you have kids at home. Especially when one is nearing college age. There are tons of bills and everything else to worry about. Much as many people make changing jobs seem easy - it's a HUGE undertaking. And (if you're at all like my husband) it divides your mind between the job you're supposed to be doing and the "looking" for something else mindset... something that is VERY difficult to do if you want to do your current job to the best of your ability. Of course there are 2 options and I know you know what they are. *grin* I'm sure you'll figure out what's best for you and what you can tolerate. Luckily you have all this wonderful bloggy goodness to make the day not so bad. ;-)

Posted by: Teresa at October 03, 2007 12:09 PM (rVIv9)

2 Being unhappy at a job, or in the funk of feeling you don't fit in sucks. I spent almost 8 months working in a place that I dreaded going to every day. When I started with the company, I loved what I did, then they moved me to Cedar Rapids. At that point, life began to suck. I couldn't wait to hit the road Friday afternoon and go HOME. Finally, it took a less than favorable performance review to push me over the edge. I started looking for another job. 3 weeks later, the company and I parted ways, I spent another 3 months looking for work, and finally something found me (thru monster) that is making me happy. The lessons of my story, it doesn't hurt to look, (monster and careerbuilder are good), sometimes it takes that extra push to get us off the cliff. I am lucky, I was 24 and single when it happened (along with it being planting season on the farm to help me get by). If you feel you need to, take a look around. It may even be possible to use this as an opportunity to move up or manufacture a raise for yourself. Just remember, you have family and friends who support you.

Posted by: Petey at October 03, 2007 12:52 PM (tmnSV)

3 Ever listen to Hank Williams Jr? "C'mon over to the country...." Missouri is always lookin for a few good people

Posted by: BloodSpite at October 03, 2007 08:19 PM (xUF9P)

4 Preach on brother... (not that I know anything about what happens there)

Posted by: Bruce at October 03, 2007 09:57 PM (PA6oE)

5 I would start documenting everything and get stuff in writing about what they are doing then when they fire you (which it sounds like they are trying to do, they are building a case against you so they can fire you or harrass you into quiting, been there, done that) and then you can sue their ass.

Posted by: Quality Weenie at October 05, 2007 08:19 AM (BksWB)

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