Funny about Money

Connie on the Road: Travels with an Escape Artist

June 5, 2016 by funny

By the end of April, Connie the Queen of the Big Rigs is headed back home (Phoenix) for a five-day turnaround. Silver the Ingenious Weimaraner refines her plan to take to the road — not on 18 wheels, but on four feet.

Oklahoma on My Mind…

Buffalo exhibit next to the boot store — Buffalo exhibit near the boot store

Old wagon by the boot store — Old wagon near the boot store

Big puddle next to the exit ramp... by the boot store. Noooooooo!!! — Big puddle next to the exit ramp… by the boot store. Noooooooo!!!

Fine Dining

Going home in a couple of hours. Done here at Sysco Foods.

This is the kind of “food” I’ve been eating for a couple of days. I have run out of my stash of “healthy provisions.” Does this give me “junk food foodie” status?

Connie’s Best-Laid Plans…

←My attempt at keeping the doggie from escaping.

Covered the door handle by hanging a towel over the window.

This is how it looked when I came back from dinner. She sure tried! →

April Turns to May…

Was home for 5 days. Too many projects! (still have not done my taxes – yikes)

In Nogales again picking up watermelon. Woohoo!

↓ Found this in the paid parking lot on the ground under someone else’s trailer at Danny’s Truck Resort when I went to pick up the truck Monday. That enough prepositional phrases for ya?

No, I did not show it to the cashier. I had actually overpaid for the spot but didn’t feel like trying to explain it to anyone at the “resort.”

Mother’s Day

Happy Freakin’ Mothers Day to all you mothers out there!

This day has turned out to be a mother.

I used to make Puke/Emote lists in high school so I could remember what was going well and what I felt I should be worrying about.

You know, like, did I have anything to wear? Were we going to float down the river that weekend and was I too fat to wear a bathing suit? Did I get a good grade in (yuck) German class? Did the cute guy who sat near me in Algebra say hi?

In honor of Mothers Day, I am going to share my Puke/Emote list for the week. Will make it up as I go along…

Please note that this is in no way all-inclusive and is subject to revision at any time.

Will start with Puke, so I don’t have to end this post on a sour note(!)

Puke

1) My iPhone will not hold a charge. The ATT store manager in Phoenix said it could not possibly be the battery because they are “integrated” with the phones now. I am not believing this but go along. I just want my phone to work, dammit. He sells me two chargers and is sure both of mine have to be bad. Because, again, it CAN’T possibly be a bad battery.

2) I swapped trailers with a guy in Phoenix and did not notice the bent bumper until just now. Hope they don’t try and blame it on me.

3) After being gone a day I notice my phone will still not hold a charge.

4) Saw a Facebook post with a horrible picture of Donald Trump’s son holding up a body part from an animal he killed. I fear it is not Photoshopped. I am now traumatized! There are no words that would describe how much I loathe people who kill for fun.

5) I was asked to do the broker of this load a “favor” and deliver it one day early. WTF? Of course I said yes as I am new to this company and, well, if they are really in dire need of my watermelons who am I to judge?

I was already tired from my time “off” at the house, and in order to drive the required miles in the shortened time span I did what has always worked in the past. I ATE my way across Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and 100 miles of Minnesota. Three large cups of coffee, one cheeseburger, three chocolate protein bars (choc caramel, choc coconut and choc pnut butter), 1/3 of a container of peanut butter pretzel nuggets, cheese popcorn, and an entire bag of XXX Red Hot Cheetos got me as far as the IA/MN border. Now I have heartburn and my pants are too tight.

6) I arrived at Russ Davis Warehouse in Eagan, Minnesota at 5 PM on Saturday, May 7 AS REQUESTED only to be told by the Receiving Clerk guy that they did not need the watermelons early. Could I just come back tomorrow?

7) Drove 60 miles out-of-route (unpaid miles) back to the Flying J truck stop to chill out. I tried calling friends to vent but all you mothers were busy!! I did get to vent to new roommate who has major issues with his insane boss at work. This helped.

8) Got up early the next morning to get in a much-needed shower. Was hurrying to make sure I did not miss my original delivery appointment. Dropped a glass bottle of face make up (brand new, of course) onto the tile floor and it EXPLODED when it landed. It was everywhere. In the grout cracks, on the walls and all over the side of my boot and crispy clean jeans.

9) I scurried back out to the truck after cleaning up the mess and did not see Silver’s happy face in the window to greet me. The drivers side door was open. She had decided to escape out of the drivers side door since I cardboarded up the one on her side. NOOOOO!!!

Ran around the parking lot and woods calling frantically. Lots of people in the car and truck parking lots said they had seen a “hound dog” running around. Ten minutes into it a woman pointed into the woods to tell me someone spotted the dog back there and I called out Silver’s name again. She came zipping out of the woods with wet/muddy paws – barking as she ran toward me in a total panic.

10) Now the door panels of both doors are scarred up with scratches from the dog trying to claw her way out of the truck. I got an estimate to repair the damage: $350 per door.

11) I got unloaded at the organic produce place around noon. The forklift driver came out with my signed bills and informed me that nine of the 54 bins of watermelons were rejected and put back in the trailer. I am now parked near an off ramp waiting for the broker to tell me what to do with them. I know what I’d like to tell him to do with them.

Emote

1) I have two great new roommates and they each have a little doggie of the small terrier sort’

2) I still have a job!

3) The weather is 65 degrees here in Minnesota today and all the trees have greened up.

4) My Peterbilt still looks cool and it still has a chrome visor and bumper.

5) I don’t live in a trailer down by the river.

6) Have not had a zit in quite some time.

7) It’s Sunday and I have time to finish all my paperwork before I go to the office tomorrow.

8) My dog is awesome.

9) The world is my oyster.

13 rejected melons — Rejected watermelons

My wild child enjoying the Minnesota flowers – next to the highway ramp!

What is one of the most disgusting things on this planet?

Yes. A tick.

Silver must have picked one up on her romp through the woods this morning. Found it on her stomach while I was giving her loves just now. Total freak out…because I am so mature.

Silver made another friend at the evil watermelon rejection company today.

Arrived at Destination: Need GPS to Find Door

This might not seem that annoying to the average person, but when such a large part of the day is spent following signs at places and on roads you have never been to/on before, an accurate sign really means a lot.

Can you tell by looking at this sign where the Receiving office is?

The Saga of Connie and Silver…

Westward from Albuquerque
Flying Low across the Country
El Paso
Along the Border
Eastward Bound

Oops! Sorry about the weird widget…but check out this site!`

June 3, 2016 by funny

Darn it! I tried to insert a kewl widget linking to a site called Politifact. It is great stuff! You have got to visit that thing. I’m bookmarking it among my horde of news sites.

Anyway, for some reason the widget went up cattywampus. Sorry if you dropped by and saw a weird phenomenon. Apparently either the widget code or this theme’s Sidebar 1 function is acting up. Oh well.

WhatEVER. Check out Politifact: it’s Snopes for the political sideshow.

Both Sides…of the Cloud?

June 2, 2016 by funny

So here’s why I’m mighty glad that by temperament I’ve resisted the Cloud. Apple’s iCloud is having outages hither, thither, and yon, all over the world: L.A., San Francisco, all up and down the East Coast, around the Midwest, in England, Europe… Lovely.

Apple works to funnel users into iCloud, as Google would like to get all its users’ data into functions like the clunky GoogleDocs and Microsoft is forcing people to pay monthly to use Office on a subscription basis, extracting enormous amounts in excess of what its programs should cost. I’ve been clinging to my resident Word 2007 for Mac and will until there’s simply no other choice but to move to something else. When that happens, though, the “something else” may be Pages, at which point I probably will close down my editorial business.

We’re told that Pages will track changes in such a way as to make them visible in Wyrd, although as of 2012 (when the feature came out), it left something to be desired. I happen to prefer Wyrd’s “compare documents” feature, which ultimately produces the same result as “track changes” but without the instability and consistent crashes. With any luck, though, by the time my copy of Wyrd has been disabled by planned superannuation, Pages will be functional for my purposes. If not: retirement!

In any event, I surely do not want my clients’ documents (or my own) stored in the Cloud. Anyone’s Cloud.

As we speak, Apple users complain of presentations locked up in the nonfunctional iCloud that they can’t use for upcoming events, about e-mail locking up in the classic Apple mode (you get a message that your password is invalid; changing your password causes all sorts of chaos for you).

Worse yet, people’s iPhones are affected: one guy “restored” his phone and, because the Cloud was (still is) down, lost everything he’d loaded into the gadget. Ooops!

Imagine what happens if Google’s cloud goes down. All those Google Documents are suddenly out of reach. Presumably Gmail is rendered incommunicado. And you are rendered…out of business.

My paranoia extends even further, to the point where I would just as soon not make it any easier for the Corporate Shadow Government to spy on me. Sooo…between my personal craziness and the fact that there are some practical reasons to want to keep your data on your local disk, I’m compelled to opt out of the Cloud.

The thing that’s weird is the folks complaining about data locked up and programs not working…Apple Fanboys, I mean…who show no indication that their files are backed up in Time Machine, which acts like a sort of local Carbonite. Backs up your stuff pretty much as you type. Backs up all your applications, too. On your own external hard drive, not on someone else’s server.

News of the Day

May 31, 2016 by funny

As a long-time news junkie, I read the news of the day several times a day, thanks to the handy-dandy Internet and a long string of links to favorite suppliers. Lately, though, the daily news makes me feel like I’m watching a spider chewing up its prey. Half the time it’s not informative; it’s not helpful: it’s just stress-inducing.

We have the late gorilla episode, for example: the one where the four-year-old says “MOMMY, I’m gonna go swim in the pool inside the gorilla exhibit.” She says “No, you’re not,” and turns her attention to her cell phone and the four or five other children present. Result: rare lowland gorilla male is executed; child is rescued with minimal injuries (only, as far as anyone can tell, by the grace of God and the skill of a sharp-shooter).

Reading the comments on this story is enough to curdle your stomach. Some armchair pundits think the zoo should be put out of business — matter of fact, all zoos should be put out of business. Other self-righteous members of the peanut gallery think the mother should be prosecuted. Some of the uglier commenters believe the child should have been left to die, given that lowland gorillas are teetering on the verge of extinction and human children are a dime a dozen.

F’r chrissake. That was a CHILD trapped with a wild animal. No matter how magnificent and endangered the animal, we humans owe our first allegiance to humans. And no, it does not matter whether the child’s mother needs an IQ transplant.

Then we have Stephen Hawking on the Trump Horror Show. That a lying, clownish demagogue could achieve nomination by one of country’s two major parties suggests something is wrong with our political system; if he gets into the White House, it will prove our system is broken. While I’m not crazy about Clinton, I fear that an avowed socialist couldn’t win against Pluto the Dog, much less against a guy who riles up all the long-standing resentments against the liberal agenda…some of which are justified: the bureaucratic bullshit, the tangled and patently unfair tax system, the dictatorial political correctness, the death of the middle class…all valid complaints.

If the conservatives run a third-party candidate, they’ll split the Republican vote and lose the election to Clinton. That will be a good thing in that it foils Trump, but it may not be the best thing for America. The best thing for America would be for the Republican party to nominate a qualified candidate and let the best man or woman win.

Almost daily, we’re reminded of the ubiquitous American distrust of and hatred for anyone who is different from oneself. One of the gorilla reports elicited a comment from a guy who openly said the kid should have been sacrificed because he was black and the mother would pop out another half-dozen between now and 2026. No shame, there! Nor is there any in just about any part of the media when it comes to people over the age of about 45. CBS MarketWatch, for example, tells us as a fact that “Older adults have a ‘toxic combination’ of high self-confidence and low financial literacy.”

Then we have this astonishment: A woman answers the door to her apartment, expecting to see a 12-year-old relative. Instead, she finds a rapist who barges in and proceeds to beat and strip her. She manages to reach her husband, who comes running and thrashes the thug to death, a fitting end for that particular sh*thead. And what does he get for his trouble? You got it: prosecution. It’s hard to avoid wondering if he would have been charged were he white…

The homeless population is growing older as the homeless mentally ill age and no concerted nationwide effort is made to get them off the streets.

Consumer spending “enjoys” its largest jump in six years. Dude! Mr. Pollyana, sir! It’s not that we enjoy spending. It’s that everything costs more and more. That would be, presumably, because there’s no inflation, hm? And because junk products made in China don’t last longer than about seven years, max. Most of them, far less, come to think of it.

Home prices are rising faster than expected. This is good news? “The economy is supporting the price increases with improving labor markets, falling unemployment rates and extremely low mortgage rates,” David Blitzer, chairman of the S&P index committee, said in a statement. “Another factor behind rising home prices is the limited supply of homes on the market.”

Yeah, uh huh. Zillow thinks my house is worth almost as much as it supposedly was at the height of the disastrous housing bubble. Interest rates are at rock-bottom and it’s not all that hard to get a loan. How many of those loans are covering collateral with real value? And how many of them are loans against air?

Oh, God. I’ve got work to do.

On the Road with Connie: Westward Bound from Albuquerque

June 5, 2016May 28, 2016 by funny

While I’ve been diddling away my life editing and indexing other people’s golden words, Connie the Queen of the Big Rigs has crossed the continent twice, accompanied by Silver, her faithful (and slightly neurotic) sidekick. Let’s catch up with her in New Mexico.

Heading Home from Albuquerque

There is the flag, apple pie, and US FOODS in Albuquerque. This place is about a mile away from the evil Ben E Keith company.

Look at the size of their lot!!!

When I was assigned to drive this cool truck, I was surprised to find there wasn’t much in the way of shelving in the bunk. Specifically, next to the bed, there is no spot to put an alarm clock, hand lotion, phone, book or whatever. ACK. Was I supposed to put my stuff on the floor???

I hadn’t much time, but quickly found 3 small boxes and a couple of empty food containers to strap-tape together. I McGivered myself a shelf!

Silver is doing her imitation of the Flying Nun. Noticed the angst on her face because I left for 5 minutes to get the paperwork. Poor kid. So emotional.

Found my notes from my first visit to Ben E Keith.

I was passing by the ultra cool Whiting Bros sign on Interstate 40 in New Mexico today. There is no place to park to get a decent picture and I wondered if I might be able to find one online. And I did.

It was on this particular stretch of highway a few weeks ago that I noticed a little lumpy thing on Silvers neck while I was scritching it.

At first I thought it was my imagination. I kept up with the scritching and there it was again. I am not a fan of icky bugs, fungus, boils, rotten anything, etc. But for some reason, ticks creep me out the most.

I took the first exit off the highway, made a u-turn on the side of the road and proceeded to search frantically for the offending parasite. I could not find it!! I kept up the search for another few minutes (what if it got loose in the truck for Gods sake?) until I heard a voice say, “Ma’m, why are you parked here? Do you know you are blocking the frontage road?”

I looked out the drivers side window to see who this person could be and …. surprise! It was a DOT officer.

I could not think of a plausible lie so I just said, “Well, I’m looking for a tick and I can’t find it?”

I guess I was hoping he’d say, “Well, in THAT case, you just take all the time you need little lady. I have dogs myself and I truly understand your plight.”

But he didn’t. He wasn’t impressed in the least and suggested very strongly that I move along and get the ass end of my trailer out of the road. Oops.

Crap. I just went into the Little America truck stop in Flagstaff to wash my hands. Gone less than 5 minutes. Silver was in the back lot looking for me.

Now to bed. Gotta get up at 3AM to drive into Phoenix.

Missed Connie’s earlier adventures?
It’s never too late!
Flying Low across the Country
El Paso
Along the Border
Eastward Bound

Coming Up for Air

May 28, 2016 by funny

Have been almost incommunicado for the past month or so: underwater with clients’ work. Everything happens at once, and then nothing happens. 😀

At last most of it is shoveled off the desk. I’ve only got one task left to do just now, and I may not even do that today. I think I’m going to loaf all day, swim in the pool, watch the plants grow, and after dark, maybe take the dogs for the walk I was too lazy to manage while it was still cool this morning. Or maybe I’ll drive them to the park and let them walk around in the shade.

Choir has gone to sleep for the summer, and so that opportunity for socializing and fun is on hold. Friends are searching out new restaurants — Honored Client introduced me to one last week where I hope to convene some friends in the next week or so. Fave Writing Group meets the first Saturday of the month — last month I was too maxed to drive over there, and the month before that I had to take work with me to keep plugging away during the meeting. So looking forward to June’s meeting, when I’ll actually be able to pay attention to what’s going on! Attended one (1) meeting of Toastmaster’s and have wanted to go back, but breaking free in the middle of the day has been out of the question.

And…in all the paying frenzy, I’ve neglected the Saga of Connie, Queen of the Big-Rigs!

This morning I collected a bunch of her new adventures, and whenever I get out of the swimming pool this afternoon will compile them into posts for you.

Watch this space…