7/31/19 Javalina Has A Full Plate?

    Yesterday, I finally got around to getting off and talking to one of the band directors about what he thought about us buying our boy a tenor saxophone.  I don't really want to do it if it will only be used during marching season.  I got some unexpected information prior to talking to the music director though.  I was waiting outside and there were a couple of other parents, I said hi tot he crowd and one of the moms asked how is it going.  I instantly went into my little "first world problem" of should I buy my son a new saxophone or put up with the ugly one they had assigned him.  She said "wow, just this morning my husband and I were talking about selling one of our tenor saxophones, maybe you would be interested."  I said "sure, but I need to see it and maybe try it out to make sure it works and sounds good."  She said "no problem".  Javalina came out about this point and he got all nervous because he saw me talking to the parents of the lead saxophone guy.  He thought I was making trouble for him, I don't know why.
    We then talked to the band director and he said that Javalina is getting both a tenor and a bari sax assigned to him.  He will play the bari in concert/symphonic band and maybe jazz band if he is interested.  I got all excited because as much as I liked band, jazz band was way better.  I still want to look at this used saxophone, maybe it could still work as a home saxophone, so he wouldn't have to carry the school horn home to practice.
    When we got in the Excursion (it has been behaving itself), he told me about talking to the coach and he wants him in there in cleats on Thursday to start working out.  The football players start working out at 7:00am until like 11:00am, the band kids go from 8:00am to 4:00pm.  He is going to have to split his time between both while he figures out what to do.  A funny note coming from Mr. I want to be on the varsity team as a freshman, while talking to the coach, one of the upperclassmen walked by him and told him "coming through, Little Man."  He says he could not focus on the coach anymore or talk.  He wanted a helmet and pads so he could go after this clown.  I asked him if he was a big guy, Javalina said "my eyes were probably at his chest, but he wasn't like massive, just really tall.  I had a good long laugh because I have been upset that he basically "wasted" the summer and barely worked out.  It is all on him.
    So school still hasn't started and he has to juggle these two things and he is still only on book 1 and he is supposed to read at least two books from a list over the summer.  He needs to kick it into gear and start getting shit done.

7/30/19 Should I Buy Javalina A Tenor Sax Now?

    Javalina started band practice last week and instead of getting a bari sax assigned to him, he got a tenor saxophone.  I have always been kind of interested in playing one as I never did back in my playing days, but I opened the case and like Boy said "that is a box of tetanus waiting to get you."  I am sure this was a pretty saxophone back in the 1970s, when it was new.  This horn has no brass coloring left.  I am surprised it even plays.  My old saxophone my parents bought me when I was in 7th grade looks better than this instrument.
    I don't know how serious Javalina is about band.  If I knew he was serious about it, I would go buy him a new one just out of principle.  How can he take any pride in the music he produces when the instrument looks like a crude representation of a working sax?  Maybe it is just my ego, but I know I played a lot better when in my sophomore year I got a brand new Baritone Saxophone, well the Crystal City Band did, but I was the only one assigned to play it, even though there were 3-4 other people in the other bands playing bari as well.  I loved that instrument with its thick golden shine and exotic looking box that nobody else was allowed to mess with.
    It is fairly easy to do here.  When we went to get him the alto sax for 6th grade, we just went to the music center and walked out with a new one and a monthly $70 payment.  I wanted to do that with the bari but those things go for about $8000.  I believe tenor saxophones can be bought for around $2500, which is a pretty penny but I would like a sax around the house, whenever he is done goofing around with it.
    Speaking of band, he said it was kind of kicking his ass.  They have been going out and marching and doing exercises, probably to knock the cobwebs out of all these little dorks (I say it because I am a band dork at heart).  He was complaining because they were doing stuff like holding their arms above their heads repetitively which left him a little sore.  Monday morning either he was really sick with a little diarrhea and nausea or he used it to get out of "working out" with the band, and he thinks he is going to dominate with the football players, hmm?
    This is not about football yet, right now I am wondering if I should help him out with a new instrument?  I don't want him to be the spoiled freshman with parents who buy him whatever but I also don't want him to be the freshman that gets no respect and has to play the "shit" instrument to "learn."

7/29/19 Resting Weekend?

    I guess the best way to describe this past weekend was to say it was lazy.  I spent a great deal of it sleeping and dreaming.  Wife was back on Thursday night, which was great, but with her current school load, she is distracted beyond belief.  It seems to be one paper after another.  As soon as she is done with one paper, she mentions she has a day or two before the next paper is due.  We are fixing to go into August and the classes are down to their last two weeks, so as every other test we overcome, it is only for a finite time.
    Still, this weekend she had to be in class on both Friday and Saturday, so we could do nothing but wait around Friday until like 8:00pm and Saturday until around 4:00pm.  My idea was to go have dinner Friday night after she got out, but for some reason, she said the professor had ordered a bunch of food and then she ended up bringing aluminum pans full of lasagna and fettuccini pasta and salads and breadsticks.  We had no choice but to eat this food since there was so much of it.
    I had thought it would have been a good weekend to take Javalina out to 6th Street so he could see some of the crazy Austin night life.  It has been really like 20 years since I've been out there, I am not sure if the idea is still the same or not, but it should have some sort of nighttime activity.  He was commenting just a week or two ago that he liked Austin but it was a little boring as there never seemed to be anything to do.  I told him there's stuff to do all the time, we just don't generally get involved.  That is when I got the idea of going downtown one of these weekends.  Wife beat me with the movie idea, and it was a good one.  Even Boy joined us.  His GF has been working a nightshift recently on the weekends, so he has nothing better to do.  It's nice to have him with us to argue with him a bit.
    We got home after the movie and I fell asleep quickly while Wife was watching some show.  She came to bed, we did the hokey pokey and I slept until a good 6:30am without getting up to go to the bathroom or anything, Big Girl wore me out, I guess.  I then got up Sunday morning to write yesterday's blog and mess around on the computer.  After struggling with the Excursion all week, I am still having serious thoughts about getting a new truck. Wife insists it needs to be an SUV so I can fit my family and everyone those 2-3 times a year people come to visit.  I get what she says, which is why I have held unto the Excursion for so long, but I really want a big truck.
    Sunday night was more laziness, she worked on a paper all afternoon, until we went to eat a burger at Culver's.  Shoot, but the time we were headed back, it was already coming up on 9:30pm.  Wife pretty much showered and went to bed by 10:00pm.  It is about 6:40am and I have been up since 4:30am when she woke to get ready and leave to La Pryor.  This is another long week for me, so it just feels like another long week coming up.  Next week should feel nicer, as it will finally be a short week.  I haven't had one in over a month since I trade them with long weeks when I request a week off.  It's just easier that way, pay wise.

7/28/19 Once Upon A Time In Hollywood?

    I have to say, this one was almost a dud, considering it was a Tarantino movie.  I went in knowing almost nothing about the reason or premise of the movie.  Afterwards, Boy was saying it was supposed to be about the Manson murders.  I have a hard time believing that was the idea of the movie since there was no imagery of a Charles Manson character or his followers other than the hippies who kind of hang out on the street corners waiting to get in stranger's cars but all live out in some old compound.
    I did enjoy the cool way the Brad Pitt character lived and just went through life, good or bad.  Leo Dicaprio's character was having a sort of melt down realizing he wasn't the hot shot he used to be just a few years earlier.  These two have good chemistry together and the dialogue between them kept the movie going along, even when I wasn't sure what the point of the movie was about.  There is a point in the movie where Brad Pitt is sitting around on a movie set and Bruce Lee is talking about how he could go in the ring with Cassius Clay (Muhammed Ali) and kick his ass, to which Pitt's character chuckles.  This starts a fight between Lee and Pitt and it was actually funny to see Bruce Lee get thrown and how his eyes open up right before the fight when they tell him this guy killed his wife and got away with it.
    Once presented with the idea of his acting life having a mortality rate, I think DiCaprio accepts it and figures he might as well make as much money as possible, going to Europe to make spaghetti westerns and then using the money to fund his retirement.  He has a conversation with Pitt about having to let him go from his employ, but Pitt never leaves his side, up to the night they are partying when the Manson idiots show up.
    I have to say the whole last ten minutes was the best part of the movie, Pitt has just decided to get "high" with his little acid cigarette which he bought from one of the Manson flower children, and then the other Manson people show up for no particular reason at their house.  Just like in Inglorious Basterds, Tarantino changes history from the truth, for entertainment's sake, but the result is just so awesome and kind of hysterically funny.  I don't want to give anything away from it as it is the best part.
    Margot Robbie as Shannon Tate was just about perfect as she kind of looked like her.  I am not sure why she wasn't utilized more specially since Tarantino changed reality so much, why not make her interact more with Pitt/DiCaprio more to include her more in the movie?  She is just a vision of beauty plus she worked with DiCaprio in Wolf of Wall Street, they already had movie history together.  Even as a "bad" Tarantino movie, it is still much better than the crap being put out in today's environment.  Who needs to see Lion King Live or whatever new cartoon number 5 or 8 or whatever.  Does the world need a Toy Story 7 or whatever number it is on?

7/27/19 Now I've Been Bit By The New Car Bug?

    I was doing so well, I had told Wife that I was willing to wait and just keep driving my Excursion a couple more years since it is like a tank and never gives me any problems.  It's not that I don't want a new truck, nobody loves new shit more than me, I just don't want the $700-$800 a month bill.  This all changed this week after being without my Excursion for most of the week.  Being without a vehicle makes one do things he wouldn't normally do, like look at other vehicles online.
    My problems started Sunday, I got a new battery, then a new alternator with new connecting wires, just when I thought everything was cool, that failed to solve my problems and the battery light kept shining for all its worth.  It took a second alternator to finally fix the problem, I think.  At this point, can I say the problem is solved, or am I just waiting for the batteries juice to run low enough that it is going to start all over again?  One gets gun shy after experiencing a problem over and over.  I feel like when I was having gallbladder pains, never sure what would initiate it, but sure that it would happen soon and continue until I had dry heaved into a toilet and left there almost in tears.
    So maybe it is time to move it on up.  I have been driving the Excursion since 2004, that is almost 15 years, and some of you a-holes call me spoiled and say I need to constantly be spending money on the latest toy.  As much as Wife likes the sound of the word no, she can be swayed with a pretty picture and the right price.  I've been staring, bordering on making certain F-250s blush because I think they are just the perfect sexiest machines on the road.  My only problem is that 95% of them are either black or white.  Sure, there is also a dark grey that looks kind of black and about 3-4 silvers and off whites that are all basically white.  I won't deny that the black ones are very good looking, but I already had one and they are hard to keep looking clean, even with the fact that I had a contract at the local car wash and I washed it about once a week.  What I really liked this week is their Ruby Red, they have two tones of red and this is the darker richer looking one.  With the chrome wheels and the rest of it looking black, it is a beautiful looking thing.
    There is one in San Antonio for $42,795, but it has cloth seats and is not particularly loaded.  With about $4000 down, the monthly payments would fall near $600 for 72 months.  There was another one for $49,500 in San Marcos I think, and it did have the fancy console with the giant screen but again, no leather.  I could always have the leather installed like I did on the Excursion with some OEM seat leathers after awhile, but I don't know.
    Right now, I want to see what the Excursion is going to do.  If it settles down with the light show on the dashboard, I will settle down too.  If it keeps fucking up, well, I guess it might be time to head in different paths.  I love you, but only as far as you can be counted on.  I gots no time for fuck-ups.

7/26/19 Third Time's The Charm?

    Almost, I almost was done with my problems with my Excursion.  After not listening to me that it was the alternator, I got a new battery installed Monday, Tuesday I barely got to work before it died on me.  I got a tow from Harper's Towing.  The dispatcher was nice enough to put it in Wife's head that the tow should be free because it hadn't been 72 hours.  Well, that sounded official, so now my wife and everyone who overheard in the house was expecting me to go and fight for the cost of a tow.  I really hate doing shit like that, but I mentioned it to the service manager.  He said "no, we don't do that, never heard of it."  I said ok and let it go.  He was telling me the alternator was still covered under warranty, so replacing it would not fall on me, it would be free.
    Today I went in to pick it up with a new alternator, they installed new wires and add the new battery on Monday, I should be jamming for at least two years, worry free.  Before I left, the lady who was helping me mentioned that I would get an online evaluation to give them 5 stars.  I told her "are you high?"  I then explained how I had gone in there saying I was pretty sure it was the alternator but Mr. Man (who took the afternoon off) corrected me and funny enough the main service area manager had just walked in maybe because I got loud, and he chuckled (maybe it just seems condescending, I'm not used to people suggesting I am wrong).  He said taking off the negative terminal doesn't necessarily prove that it is the alternator.  This got me to pull him in to the conversation to which I said "fine, I can respect that answer, but when we do it your way and two days later I am on the side of the road and I specifically told you I didn't want this problem and you just chuckled, can we now agree that it might be the alternator?  I spent hours Sunday night charging the battery to save the towing fee.  I drove it in without A/C to make sure I made it in only to still have to tow it Tuesday afternoon and pay $150."  At this point, Mr. Service Manager mouthed "it probably is the alternator."  I then had him and simply said "Don't you stand behind your work anymore?"  "Of course we do, what would you like to happen here?"  I told him I am not an unreasonable man, pay at least half the tow or give me a credit for my next oil change, maybe the battery was also bad."  He said fine, we'll make a note on your record that we owe you $75.00 credit.
    I walked out pretty proud of myself with a free alternator and my $75 credit.  I was even going to get to work a little early, but as soon as I stepped on the gas on the frontage, the battery light came on AGAIN!!  I drove all around to Stassney and back to Ben White to go back to Ford.  I dropped it off with the lady who thinks I am giving them 5 stars but it was after 6:30pm and they were closed.  I had to leave it there.  I called Boy who was still in the area at Lowe's and he came and picked me up, with attitude, to boot.  That brown Turd, after driving him around most of his life, up to the age of 20 because he didn't want to drive tells me "what is up with tomorrow?" as he is dropping me off at work.  I said "I don't know, get with your mom, maybe I can use her car, but don't disappear until we are sure.  Your brother has band camp all day from 8:00am to 4:00pm.  You might need to pick him up."  He had the balls to tell me "this is getting old."  I sarcastically said I am sorry I am affecting your love life, but you are driving around in my fucking car.  Idiot child.

7/25/19 The Problem With Tiny SUVs?

Last week I spent most of the week in Wife's Kia Soul which she loves.  This week, I have been driving Boy's Ford Edge for two days now while my Excursion is in the shop.  Not that I want to replace it, but at some point, it might be cheaper to get a new vehicle than keep going days waiting on my vehicle.  I keep telling Wife that my vehicle of choice is an F-250, big and wide and useful to pull and carry heavy loads.  She insists we won't be buying any more toys or things needing to be towed.  This just breaks my heart a bit every time, but that is how we got into our debt problems in the first place, so there is no point in arguing.  My 2nd choice if I don't get a big truck is a big Ford Expedition which replaced the Excursion as the big SUV in their lineup.  Again, Wife insists that 95% of the time, I am driving around alone or with Javalina.  This is true, but I cannot downgrade quietly to one of the smaller SUVs just because she is comfortable in one.
    First of all, she is 5ft 3in, so she fits in almost anything.  I am sure gravity is already making me shorter than my tallest I ever was, but I am still a massive 400 pounder, I just don't fit anywhere.  Most SUVs have a tunnel connecting the dashboard to the middle console so that A/C ducts can be fed to the back.  This is great for the kids in the back, but it makes the space up front much tighter than it has to be.  What I end up doing is sitting kind of sideways on one ass more than the other, otherwise my normal sitting would press both my knees into either side of the plastic material and that is just going to lead to cracks in the plastic if we keep it up.  To add insult to a fat fucker, the seatbelt on Boy's driver position is shorter than any other vehicle I have ever driven.  I have to lean the back further more than I like and lower the choice on the wall down as far as it will go.  This barely lets me click the belt on.  This is a shame because I like the drive of the Edge, it seems more than capable and "peppy" but I am not comfortable with the belt suffocating me.  I don't drive it enough to go buying an extension which I am sure exists either.
    I don't know if Wife is trying to emasculate me by putting me in a "bitch" car.  I don't think she will be happy until I am driving a Ford Festiva for the sake of saving a fucking dollar.  There are rumors we might actually get a raise at work, couple that with I've been listening to Ludacris and other "pimp boss" types and I am feeling like Daddy will ultimately need a proper new truck and that does not mean a Ranger, maybe something that requires a ladder to board.  'Merica, Fuck Yeah!!!

7/24/19 I Get Tired Of Being Right?

    Well, the Excursion did exactly what I told the Ford service guy it was going to do.  I told that fucking condescending shit that I thought it was the alternator, he just smiled back and said "nah, they rarely go bad.  It's the battery."  I said "yeah, but I did a test I found online where you remove the negative terminal and if the engine dies, it is the alternator, if it stays on, the problem is the battery and when I did it, the engine died."  The last part of the sentence fell on deaf ears, he was already nodding an ignorant yes, yes, I know.  The part that pissed me off was when I said I don't feel great leaving and getting stranded on the highway because it is the alternator.  He just gave me a "well, let's hope it doesn't happen."  The only good thing that sounded intelligent was him saying they ran the battery against a load and it was holding charge.  A load is probably with the A/C and lights on as those are a few things that run off electricity, that I know of.
    Last night while driving in to work, the ABS light came on which I thought was weird, then a few seconds later the radio shut off.  This scared me a bit, thinking I've got electrical problems.  Luckily, I was close enough to work that I made it to my parking lot.  I turned it off and attempted to turn it on, figuring I didn't want the surprise of it not starting after midnight when I head off to lunch and then being really alone to deal with this.  I called Wife and she called a tow truck since she has dealt with a few in her days, she keeps a number on her phone.  A lady tow truck driver showed up which seemed odd (I had never seen one, other than on TV), but she was quick and competent, so no problems for me.  She had a small charger and quickly turned the engine on.  She agreed that it had to be the alternator if the battery was new.
    Everybody I talked to says Ford should compensate me the tow which I agree with ($150.00), specially since this is the second time I go back in two days and I told them it was the alternator on Sunday night.  My son thinks I should somehow be given the battery since apparently mine was good since the new one didn't solve the problem, I am not sure I follow that logic.  Nonetheless, I am pissed at being dismissed and then I was right.  If you are going to act like an expert, you goddam better be one, white and old doesn't mean you know your ass from a hole in the ground.

7/23/19 Stepped Into A New Year?

    Wife is gone after being with us for a nice three week break, sort of.  She was technically back at work last week, but we tagged along, Javalina and I, to Houston, so it seemed like we were on a break from work for three weeks.  It could have been four or five weeks.  It really is time for her to get her butt back and give us some semblance of flow and normalcy.  Right now, it just feels like I live with roommates who mooch off me like a lot, the little one completely.
    I thought it was kind of weird tonight when I went home for lunch around midnight, Javalina came and had a "heart to heart" with me.  He wanted to thank me for everything I do, he knows with mom far away I do a lot for him and he wanted to say he recognizes it and appreciates it.  I told him that is what I am here for, but don't worry about thanking me, just don't be a douchebag when I am asking to do stuff FOR YOU.  He has a bad habit of denying our wanting to buy him nice clothes.  He says we already bought him enough shirts for school, he has maybe 6 new shirts.  Boy would have at least twenty new shirts when a school year started.  It was so frustrating at the Galleria Mall last week, Boy would have left my credit cards smoking.  I couldn't get Javalina to try on a pair of pants or even tennis shoes.  He likes the cheap shit from Academy, I do too, but he should be cooler than me.
    The first major hurdle we had to get over as Team Gallegos Men was the battery on the Excursion.  I was sure it was the alternator, but the service technician at Maxwell Ford assured me it was just the battery.  I say great, as it costs half as much as replacing the alternator.  It sucks being without a vehicle and as soon as I can work it in, I am going to try and buy a cheap back-up car.  Since we are on our own, each of us, we can't rely on one another.  A cheap dependable back-up car might even be useful if Wife starts having car trouble or even Boy going to San Marcos for classes, they could take the back-up.  I love the Mini brand, but I am such a big cow for them.  Wife jokes that we should get another Kia Soul, she loves hers that much.
    I say she is gone but she will be back tonight, she was at a conference in San Antonio, Sunday through Tuesday.  She will come up, sleep at the house, then drive to La Pryor Wednesday morning, sleep in Crystal Wednesday night and come back Thursday night, this is the last or 2nd to last week where they work 4 ten hour days.

7/22/19 Excursion Acting Up Again?

    It seems like less than a year ago when we had the twice in one day dying Excursion leaving us for dead on the side of the road.   I just spent a half hour looking, but I must have given it a weird name as none of the blogs seemed to be about getting stranded around a year ago.  It almost doesn't surprise me that it would develop problems.  It has sat for two weeks where it didn't get used at all with one week where I used it for four days to go to work.  It was only driven 4 days in July.  I'm supposed to get to normal this week, Wife had even left to San Antonio for a conference and I was simply starting the week by going to fill up the gas tank and get him a burger for dinner.  When we got to the end of the street, the battery light came on and I decided to turn right back home and take a look at what was going on.  Boy had already left for the night, he was off to spend the night at his GF house but I called him to come and help me.
    I popped the hood and saw the terminals were dirty and corroded like Boy's last week.  I hoped that cleaning the terminals would solve my problems but no.  I used a voltmeter and got a reading of 12.3volts before I cleaned them.  After I turned on the engine, I got a reading of 12.1volts which was lower.  At this point I started sensing it was the alternator and not the battery.  I looked online and found a "negative terminal test" which is simply while the engine is on, disconnect the negative terminal.  If the car turns off, it has a bad alternator, if it stays on, it is a bad battery.  I disconnected the battery and the engine promptly died.  Now I was sure of the problem.
    Since we have had problems like this is the past, we have a pretty good battery charger, so I connected the battery posts to it and waited for it to get 100% charged.  After doing this, I had Boy follow me to Ford so I could drop it off and hopefully get it serviced tomorrow.  I am hoping the alternator still has some sort of warranty, but with my luck, it will just have expired.  It does suck that the first one lasted over 14 years and the second one can't make it past a year.
    Before driving it like we did without an alternator, I read online a bunch of suggestions and most seemed to say that with a fully charged battery I could expect the car to run between 30 minutes and a couple hours, just don't run the A/C, or radio.  I would have run without lights too, but it was around midnight that we were dropping off the vehicle.  The drive was non eventful, thankfully.
    After dropping off the Excursion and filling out the paperwork, I told Boy to swing by Whataburger as Javalina was still hungry.  I offered Boy and his GF a burger and handed them my credit card but GF gave Boy her card and handed mine back to me.  She said I was always buying them food, so it was her turn.  I thanked her and we were taken home.  If all goes well, my Excursion will be ready before I head to work tomorrow, and if not, Boy and I will be sharing his vehicle for a couple days.  We'll see.

7/21/19 Home Is Where I Keep My Favorite Mistress?

    No sooner did we arrive from Houston than I was on top of her apologizing for cheating on her with a professional.  It is bad enough when we go to my mom's and I use a younger, smaller and more supple version, but when we go and stay in hotels I have no choice than to hire the professionals that come with the room. I know, you think Wife should be my one and only, but a big man like myself not only requires Wife, but also the support and bounciness she gives.
    Wife overheard me and thought I was being funny saying I was sorry and it would be along time before I thought of another.  I was already paying for it by having a sore back and stiff neck.  Let's face it, a different one always gives you a wild ride the first time.  You might even swear this one is the best you have ever tried as I did the first night we got to Houston.  Hell, I called my mom to proclaim I was having the time of my life and had just found her and was laying on her and she had the perfect give and firmness where it counted.
    What can you say to your number one after a whole week of you being gone and enjoying your vacation spending more than 1/3 of your time on a different one.  I swear at home I only give her 6-7 hours a day, but with this new one, I was going ball's out and enjoying her for up to 10-11 hours at a time.  Wife could only get me off of her by enticing me with food or another mall.
I am talking about our bed.  I thought the hotel had a really good bed, but I was so glad to get back to our house and enjoy our foam mattress.  The hotel bed was just a firm mattress with coils/springs, probably a good mattress but not the high quality honestly that we have at home.  Add to that, we also have the type of base that elevates the head and/or feet and I don't think any ole bed will compare.
    Just having a little fun with this one.

7/20/19 Back Home?

    At the end of any trip, it is good to be home.  Check-out time yesterday was at 11:00am and we pretty much walked out at 10:58am.  Wife took care of signing out at the front desk and I went and talked to the valet guys to bring the car up front.  Don't think for a minute that we're fancy, that is how the hotel works.  It felt weird having random guys bring the car to us, I know and even see in movies that tips are paid for this interaction, after a week of enjoying this, I gave the guy $20.  I told him I wasn't trying to be rude and wasn't sure if this was enough, but we hadn't tipped all week, so here.  He said thanks and that they do pool all the tips and split them, which made me feel a little better about it.
    After this, Wife wanted to stop and eat, but she wanted to be outside of Houston before doing so.  I was alright for going on as I had gotten up at 8:00am and eaten breakfast by myself.  Wife said she would wake us at 7:30am but that did not happen.  She also said if you wake me, you will drive home, so I was as quiet as a mouse and went downstairs to eat eggs and real bacon, which was nice.
    Anyways, we hit Katy Mall around 11:50am and walked around the boats and fishing gear for about an hour before I got bored and we decided to get going.  We stopped a few miles down the road at the Buc-ee's and filled up with gas.  That little car is great, she gassed up on our way up there in Bastrop and didn't need more gas until we left for the long road trip back and it is usually only like $25-$28 to fill up.  we then stopped in Sealy at the McDonald's and got some burgers to go.  Wife wanted to get home before rush hour in Austin started, whatever that means.  Regardless, we were home by around 3:00pm and the heat upon opening the car door at the house kicked us in the face.  We walked in and stripped down to our undies.
    We saw Boy hanging out, he said he had come home early and was working from home.  We talked about our trip for an hour or so and then we went upstairs to relax in our bedroom.  Wife saw a show, I played with my phone until I fell asleep.  Wife then said she was taking a nap and we ended up sleeping until 9:00pm.  We got up and we both had Taco Cabana in mind.  We ate there on Sunday before we went on our trip and either this branch is making better food or TC has improved their menu that much, but the food was delicious.  I had a couple of brisket tacos and a fajita taco along with a bean and cheese and all were very good.  Wife had chicken tacos and she was equally pleased.  Javalina sticks to the quesadilla with chicken which he likes.
    We came back home talking about doing a marathon watching the first season of Grown-ish but Wife got caught up in a shitty movie, Here On Earth.  The premise is simple and I don't think they got it.  An A-hole from the big city with money races through town and smashes a small restaurant.  The judge being over the top and non realistic sets the guys punishment at him helping to rebuild the restaurant which is supposed to teach him manners, but I don't think he really learned his lesson.  He was still a dick even towards the end of the movie.  The local girl falls in love with him as they always do in shitty movies (because she gets him), and they are off to play grab-ass and probably pregnant if not for her life changing ordeal.  The movie was chicken shit, but it's the kind of crap Wife likes.

7/19/19 Houston Museum of Natural Science?

    Wife mentioned going to this museum early in the week, but it sounded kind of like a pain the ass and we would have to walk a few miles, but looking at Google, we also saw that it would be free Thursday evenings, all summer.  One thing we all love is free, even if "not really".
    We started the day again, at like 8:00am, eating the free breakfast offered by the hotel.  I really like the eggs and cheese and even the red potato wedges they seem to use at every meal, but Monday they gave us sausage patties that were Turkey based, they were ok.  Today, however, they gave us turkey mini links and they were just too sweet to be natural.  I had gotten about 4 and was having a hard time finishing the last two but Javalina gave me his and suddenly it felt like a punishment to have to swallow that much lame meat.  I managed, but I did not want to eat anymore after this.  I did tell Wife to get me a plate of pastries for the room for after my sleep while I got a cup of coffee.  We got back to the room and I think I wrote a blog and went to sleep while Wife got dressed and left for her sessions.
    Wife started calling around 3:00pm that she was almost done and we could go pick her up.  I said slow down and turned over on the bed.  I was still dead asleep and was not going to get up and rush to go find her in some random building.  I got up maybe five minutes later and jumped in the shower.  She managed to get here by the time I was out and then Javalina reminded us we needed to go eat at Genghis Grill because he likes it so much.  We went and it was ok, at best.  I was worried all that mixed up food would mess me up, but after going to the bathroom at the museum, I only farted a little bit.
    So, the permanent exhibits are free on Thursdays, but that did not include the show about gravity and space.  I was really hoping it would be about the Apollo space missions and the Saturn rockets that got us going to the moon.  It was not, it was kind of a generic overview of we are going to some day vacation on the space station and then eventually the moon.  This part of the show cost us a whole $11.00 for the three of us.  The permanent parts were hit and miss.  There were a lot of rocks and minerals, that it was hard to get excited about them.  We went through a vault that at the time I didn't know was a different exhibit because it was more rocks, but these were polished like diamonds.  We went around and even downstairs to an exhibit about chemistry, best place to go to the bathroom, common people are scared of chemistry, so it was barren down there.  We missed the prehistoric chamber on the main floor the first time as you have to walk down a quiet hallway that looks like it goes to offices, but eventually you get to a new wing and it is really the best part.  They have what look like a couple of T. rex skeletons, a triceratops, and others in those majestic sizes that make us appear small.  On one platform, they have like three full skeletons and another two nearby, it makes for a very awesome scene if it was millions of years ago.
    I had to buy the boys some souvenir shirts, which was another $50 for two plus the parking fee of $20 made this free museum visit feel not so free.  We ended our last night by going to the room and jumping in the pool one last night.  It actually felt like a cool evening and it was windy too, so we only lasted about 15 minutes.  We went back to the room and ate some leftover pizza and everything else we had been accumulating, such as some pastries we bought at the mall and the ones from the morning.  We should be home by tomorrow afternoon, Wife said she wanted to stop at Katy mall to eat lunch on our way out, I said sure if I can just spend a little time looking at the boats there, but who knows.

7/18/19 Galleria Mall Is King Of The Malls?

    We got off to a slow start Wednesday.  Wife's late night dinner/snack did not agree with her and she paid for it around 4:00am, waking up to vomit and stuff for the next couple hours.  I stayed up late, so when she was throwing up I had only been asleep about an hour, I asked her f she needed anything a couple times, she said no, so I stayed in bed.
    I didn't really wake up until 2:00pm or so and we then decided to go to the Galleria Mall after the disappointing trip to the first mall.  Malls may be slowly dying, but the Galleria looks even more lively than last time we were here about 6-7 years ago.  That last time we stayed at whatever hotel is attached to the mall, so it was real easy to walk to it.  This time, we drove about 7 miles to get to it.  I was surprised at driving through a lot of wooded area specially since we are supposed to be downtown.  A lot of it is still undeveloped.
    We parked in a parking garage and it felt like we might be in the wrong building because initially it just looked like offices, but after a couple of rights and long hallways, we finally saw the ice rink.  I remember the bottom floor being sparse with shopping stores years ago.  It was packed with fast food places and shoe stores and girls stores like Claire's.  We ate because Javalina is pretty much always hungry and like most members of my family, he gets ugly when he is not fed.  After eating, I was ready to venture out and find something new and fun.
    The second floor is pretty much what I dreamed a high end mall should be.  One fancy watch shop after another.  The first one we walked in, Omega, is celebrating with NASA, they were the first certified watch to go to space.  They had the Speedmaster, which is a modern version of the watch to go to space and they also had a very nice watch with the dial made of a space meteorite.  I really liked that watch.  I was really looking forward to the Rolex store, but it was kind of lacking.  They have had a shortage of watches coming from their factories and it was evident.  About half the store seemed empty.  We also saw Breitling, Hublot, Montblanc, Ben Bridge, and some of the other fancy stores are trying to sell watches, but I didn't really believe them, such as Louis Vuitton, which is crazy expensive, for purses.  I guess the watches were crazy expensive too, most that I liked were at least $6000 and as much as $43,000.
    I know I can't afford them right this minute, but perhaps in a couple years, I can get serious about another nice watch.  Montblanc, the pen makers, had a couple lines of watches and one that I liked was $2200 which is not too bad, but I don't want to buy it because of the name.  I want to buy quality or a sense of craftsmanship not found on other products.  I may come to my senses and realize that all these watches are selling on their names, but some of them are really beautiful.  I enjoyed the day just looking at watches I normally only see in pictures.

7/17/19 Staying In?

    Wife spent most of Tuesday at her conference, so Javalina and I did what we do best, sleep.  I was in and out of sleep until around 2:00pm.  I used the day to rest my knee that was about killing me Monday night.  We did get up at 7:00am for the free breakfast.  It was pretty good, for free.  There were eggs, and potato wedges, and toast, pastries, fruits, orange juice, cranberry, coffee, cereals, and even the famous waffle maker.  I ate almost everything and fell asleep almost the instant we walked in the room.  Wife likes it super cold and the room was set at 67 degrees.  I kept waking up with sore joints, not sure if it was from the temperature or sleeping in a strange bed.
    I finally woke up at 2:00pm or so and asked Javalina "what do I do to stay awake, I got no reason to stay up..."  He was busy on his phone watching videos, I eventually took a shower to wake me.  It was funny that by the time I told Javalina to come with me and get some fresh coffee from the lobby, Wife came home and came up one of the other elevators.  We came back up and of course, Wife was trying to clean up the room, busily throwing away the pizza boxes we ordered the night before.
    Around this time, my brother called.  He said my dad had taken a fall and his blood sugar was in the high 500s.  After going back and forth, they called an ambulance and they took him to the area hospital in Carrizo Springs.  I felt a tad guilty that I couldn't do anything to get down there.  We are in the middle of a conference.  To make matters worse, we were getting dressed to go for a swim in the pool.  I sat for awhile in the room, called my mom and she said the same thing my brother had just told me.  While we swam, my brother said they had gotten him to the doctor and his blood sugar had risen a bit more, but at least now he was under doctor supervision.  The main storyline is that a few weeks ago they changed his medications and his sugar has not been responding well to it.  It took a few hours but by nighttime mom texted to say his sugar had come down to 265 at 11:00pm.  He was going to spend the night for evaluation and hopefully he goes home tomorrow.
    We enjoyed the breakfast at 7:00am and even the "dinner" at 5:30pm, but we were hungry at 9:30pm.  We went down to the bar and we were able to order some burgers and fries at a steep price of $14 a plate, but at least we didn't have to leave anywhere all day.  We finished the night by going back to the room and watching a couple more episodes of Big Bang Theory.  Wife worked on her newest homework assignment for class, Javalina ate some ice cream, and I laid on the bed and napped in and out until Wife got ready for bed.  I then switched places with her and here I sit on the desk, writing and listening to YouTube videos until at least 2:45 right now.  Wife and Javalina both fell asleep by around 1:00am.

7/16/19 Houston Escape?

   I had different thoughts to the reality of Houston.  We are downtown amongst the big buildings but it is nothing like say even Austin's downtown.  The downtown area here seems to shut down at 5:00pm.  When we got here yesterday, we even saw signs advertising a tunnel system which we asked the valet guys about and they said it's ok, but they shut down around 4:00-5:00pm.  We asked them for a recommendation and they suggested a mall about 8 miles away.  Again, it was ok, but not like the high end mall I would have wanted to see.
    My knee has been bothering me since Sunday and I was having a hard time just walking with Wife.  It hurt so bad that the mall had a Target and I tried the different bands for support but none would fit.  Wife suggested I stay at Target and she would walk to the other end of the mall where we parked.  Watching them leaving me behind made me a little panicky and I said forget that.  I yelled at them to wait for me and I hobbled along with them.  We made it to the car, eventually.  From the mall, I noticed an Academy on the other side of the highway and we stopped there so I could get a wrap of some kind for my leg.  None of the pricey ones worked, my leg is too fat.  I finally found a thin wrap that is focused on the patella.  It seemed to help and we got out of there.  A sales guy was helping me, even throwing in that his wife was a doctor and he suggested Tiger Balm, that it would definitely get hot.  I've tried Ben Gay and I was expecting something like that but more intense.  I rubbed a bunch around the knee and felt nothing.  This was in the morning, and after I washed my hands, I washed my face to go eat breakfast downstairs and that stuff got in my eyes, man that was a little rough, but my leg never felt anything.
    We got to the hotel around 9:00pm, couldn't figure anything better, so we ordered a couple pizzas, and swam in the pool until 10:00pm.  The pizza must have gotten there at 10:15pm and we went up to the room to eat and call it a night.  It is freaking nice to have the pool up high, ours was on the fourth floor, so no one from the street could bother us.
    I imagined the downtown area to be kind of dirty, it being bigger than Austin, I kind of expected it to be more smelly of urine and all those fun things 20-somethings find appealing of a lively party district.  Honestly, it is quite dead at night.  A lady at the mall in one of the stores was telling us that everything including the tunnel area all shuts down around 6:00pm.  It only exists for business and there is no live music like in Austin.  I even had the conversation with Wife that we pulled into Houston around 4:00pm and didn't see a black man until around 7:00pm and he was driving a city bus.  All the people walking around the downtown area seemed to be white.  All the valet people and people working in the hotel seemed to be middle eastern or Hispanic.

7/15/19 Always Something?

    Why can't life be simple?  I had told Javalina and Boy that all I wanted to do Sunday was cut the grass, since we are leaving on Monday to spend most of the week in Houston.  First off, I had to deal with Boy's Edge.  While we were coming back from Crystal City, Boy called us and said his car had suddenly died, like completely.  There appeared to be no power at all, even the auxiliary lights were not on.  When the tow truck guy showed up, he tried jump starting him and it turned on but wouldn't turn back on.  We all determined either a bad battery or alternator.  Sunday morning started with me looking under the hood and the first thing I noticed was the negative terminal was rusted a lot and it was loose.  Luckily, we have a voltmeter and checking the battery, it read 12.6, which is enough voltage to turn on the car and certainly not a dead battery.  I cleaned the terminals with a wire brush and some coke which is supposed to attack the oxidation and then I put it back together.  The first time it did not do anything, it still did not fire up or show any life at the lights.  I put the voltmeter on the wires and they were reading 12.6, so the connections were good.  When we tried it a second time, noticing the lights were on, it fired up easily.  We did it a couple times and it seems to be ok.  I worry there may be an intermittent short due to the other end of the negative cable also needing a cleaning, but I can't get to it as it disappears to the lower part of the engine bay.  Boy drove around and it seems to be ok.  If he has problems, I told him to just wiggle the wires until he sees the lights on and drive it to Ford so they can clean the other end of those terminals.

    The other problem was hearing Javalina "dad, I need a new phone."  "Dad, do you think I can get a new phone?" "Dad can we leave now, so I can get a new phone?"  He can be laser focused when he wants something.  We went to Best Buy, the deal seemed expensive and there wasn't much selection in phones, then we went to Sprint, which the lady was a tad rude and we had to wait in line like 40-50 minutes total.  Again, it seemed expensive, specially with Boy telling me how Verizon will bend over backwards for you because that is what he has.  He is paying almost $90 for his plan, we are paying $138.19 for all three of us.  Verizon told us Boy's new payment would be $210 if we added Javalina to his plan.  I said that is too much.  We walked back to Best Buy in Southpark Meadows and then they didn't have any of the phones in stock.  He said the store in Bee Caves did, so we headed that way and got there around 7:00pm.  They ended up having the Samsung S10e, which is what he wanted and if we bought it, it would be only $550, instead of the $900 normal.  We put the phone on our Best Buy account which I should be able to pay off in two payments by the end of the year and our Sprint bill should remain the same.  I need to double check this with Sprint today, but that made me happy.

    We then got home around 8:00pm and I thought we could still cut most of the yard.  He just wanted to play with his new phone and Boy was busy doing meal preps with Sweetie (as he likes to call her).  I told him Wife cooks by herself all the time, Sweetie can do the same, she is a strong fierce feminist.  Now, get your ass outside and cut the yard either front or back and Javalina you do the opposite yard and I always trim.  We then all meet in the back yard which is much bigger.  It took us finishing in the dark, but we cut 98% of the yard pretty good, I think.  A couple of bad spots in the back yard aren't going to hurt anyone.

    We eventually ate dinner at like 11:00pm at Taco Cabana and those brisket tacos were so good.  I am not sure if they have upped their game or we were just really hungry.  We got back home at midnight and then packed while we re-watched Revenge of the Nerds.  We were up until 1:00am and I got up at 6:00am to write this, which I caught Javalina still up, saying he would sleep on the road.  It'll be interesting today, as once we leave, we won't be checking in to our room until 3:00pm.

7/14/19 Visiting An Uncle?

    Before we came back on Sunday, I wanted to visit with an uncle.  My dad had 4 brothers (2 are now deceased) and we can safely say this was the most likable and probably most like my dad.  He is still married to the same lady that bore him his four children, but instead of 3 boys and 1 girl, he had 3 girls and 1 boy.  He had a history of being a first class runner in high school, breaking long distance records in the 60's.  This transferred to his kids who all managed to go to state and win at both the 1 mile and 2 mile distances, and even in cross country they dominated, although I'm unsure if there were state meets for that.  We were all more like my mother's side of the family, born big and beefy, otherwise I am sure he would have recruited us to run and win.
    My dad has always been the type to stay out of the limelight, just going to events to see us required him to prepare.  His brother, a total opposite, never hid from his popularity.  He was always around his kids and everyone knows him as who he is when they were in school.  After graduation, he gave me my first job.  We spent that first summer (1989) building a house in the nice part of Crystal City and it was a trip.  We had always been kind of coddled, never had to work just focus on our schoolwork and suddenly I was allowed to hang out with other men all day long.  I was in fairly good hands as these were dad's brothers and friends, this being a small town and everyone knows everybody.
    I have always loved the honesty of this man.  My mom sometimes cringed hearing him talk, he might say a granddaughter was kind of fat if she was heavy, or like my lawyer brother when he was working with us building the house, "este guy is no bueno at work."  Kind of like a coach to my mom "Letty, make sure he stays in school, he is no good at working outside."  He always praised me.  He took us in the first week not knowing what to expect and said the first week he would pay me and my brother $3 an hour.  After the first week, he told my brother to go home, and he would pay me $5 an hour to continue because even though I knew nothing, I was always willing to work hard and do as I was told.  I worked with him for the three summers I kept coming home, mostly putting up roofs the following two summers.  Roofing in south Texas in the summer is no joke, 100+ degrees and humid.
    After college, he has always praised me as a good guy and I love that, but being who he is, I might visit and he would not hesitate looking at me and doing the hand gesture of at the same time looking scared at how big/fat I was getting and doing the hands like my waist was expanding but laughing about it in a joking way.  He is funny that way, not really trying to hurt your feelings, just a very matter of fact type of man.  As the kids say, he keeps it 100.
    I know this is a long way to get there, but as men who get to their 70s+, he got cancer in his prostate a year or so ago, beat it, was looking good at my niece's quinceanera, but my mom was concerned that the last time she saw him, he had been bleeding from his kidneys and had a catheter and things weren't looking good.  We stopped because my mom said "just in case you don't want to have regrets of not seeing him one last time."  Wife, Javalina and I visited with him, he answered the door himself, which I took as a good sign.  He sat there in the living room and told us the doctors had checked him and there was no cancer, it was just the kidneys got an infection and the doctors thought they could salvage them, he had a catheter going straight from the kidneys to a bag on his leg.  He said he had been given 3 bags of IV but they screwed up not including the right amount of calcium which was making his fingers lock up like tetanus.  Once the doctors figured out their mistake, they doubled his calcium intake and fixed his hands.  He seemed weak but ok to my eyes.
    In an effort to make him smile, I told him about Javalina running the 100 and 200 meter dash (we all know Javalina is a big lineman type and has no business running those races) and showed him the videos on my phone.  From those few seconds, he looked at his gait and got up to show him things to fix.  He had already asked to see him run when I had told him he ran funny at the quinceanera.  He went through a five minute show and tell of what to do with my boy, which I thought was amazing.  Here he is all sick, but he loves talking and explaining running stuff.
    He then went and told us a great story of when he introduced his son to running.  He offered him a dollar at age 9 to run in some meet with a bunch of high schoolers and he ended up beating most if not all the 9th and 10th graders, kids 14-16 years old.  He said once he saw that his son was doing the fundamentals he showed Javalina correctly, he never really got in his way.  He just let him train to build stamina.  His son was a beautiful specimen when you think of a runner.  He was just muscle and bone back in the day.  Now he is as barrel shaped as me and my brothers, which is somehow humorous, but he is a chef.  We left his house after an hour maybe and the funny part was he might be sick and my mom was worried enough to prompt me to go and visit but he walked us out into the hot weather to sit outside and smoke a cigarette.  Wife told him that wasn't a good idea and he said he would just smoke one a little bit, not a whole one.  He actually put his new cigarette down and picked one up that was stabbed in the ashes and halfway done and lit that one up instead.

7/13/19 Did You Pee In The Public Pool Too?

    Yesterday was an almost perfect summertime afternoon, finally.  Too often, we are caught up in our lives and work and frankly, BS.  I called my mom earlier in the week to see how things were going and out of nowhere she mentioned that my brother was going to have a pool party on Friday for his little boy from around 6:00-9:00pm.  The minute she said it I cringed and kind of like a caged animal I thought how do I get out of this one, but on the other hand, I love swimming and chilling in the water.  She then started up with the usual "people here aren't really expecting you to come..." to which I countered "no, I like the idea of a pool party, we'll try to be there."
    I love my family, but I honestly hate coming down, small town family life feels constricting to me.  Even if we don't go anywhere exciting at night in Austin, small town life tells you "stay home, everything is closed."  This is a little different because the pool party gives the night direction and we have slowly learned we don't have to stay the whole weekend.  We have a big trip to Houston all week, not to do anything, but we will be down there most of the week, so we need to go home Saturday and at least cut the grass before we leave Monday.  The HOA finally grew a pair of balls and started fining us for not being obedient little hamsters.  We had to pay a $25 fee for not keeping up with our yard.  My neighbor said he got a fine for having his RV out all week in his driveway before one of their trips (he does this every time they go camping).
    I digress, we arrived at 6:20pm or so and mom had called to check on where we were on the road, to which I said La Pryor.  Mom said they were all already at the pool, to go directly over there.  We said ok and did.  When we arrived, we did not recognize anyone's car, we almost thought we might be at the wrong place, other than my younger brother's SUV.  We got off anyway because this is the only pool in town.  Once we approached, we could see my sister was sitting there and my dad was in the water amongst a lot of people we later realized were my sister in law's family.  My brother then popped out of the water to greet us by the time I came out of the changing area where I put on my swim shorts and I went in the water right behind Javalina.
    You couldn't paint a prettier afternoon.  It was hot but not oppressively, maybe 95 when we got there and cooling.  There were some pretty clouds in the sky, the pool is located in the city's biggest park basically out of town, so to one side where the sun was setting there is nothing but trees, which are still green from the recent rains, and the water was a perfect degree or two below body temperature that it was cool but not chilling or soupy feeling.  I only got out to eat some pizza and then to sing Happy Birthday and eat some cake.  Even when it was about 30 min to closing, I jumped back in, at which point it was basically just me and the birthday boy in the water.
    I got out with probably 5 min before 9:00pm (closing time) and slowly walked out with my mom and aunt.  Afterwards, Wife, Javalina and I drove to Carrizo Springs, 10 miles away, to go get tacos and stuff, for a late night dinner.  I know it wasn't the healthiest but it put a nice cap to an otherwise perfect afternoon.  It could have been perfect if not for realizing everyone is basically peeing in the pool because I never really saw anyone going to the bathrooms.  I have to admit that even I, before getting out for a cupcake peed before getting out.  My brother started making the joke about everyone peeing in there and making it warm, to which I agreed "yup, you have to."  Besides, I tried using the bathroom but of course, it was plugged up with too much toilet paper and flies and grossness.  I was not going back in that direction.

7/12/19 Just About An Hour And I'm Off For Another Week?

    I almost felt guilty pulling this one off, but they changed the game on us and I think I am just responding to what they are offering.  At the end of last year, they mentioned that we would be going to unlimited PTO (Personal Time Off), which doesn't make sense until someone said to me that this is some sort of cop out.  Normally, we are supposed to have the number of hours we each have for PTO in the bank or we (the company) can get in trouble with the government somehow.  By offering unlimited PTO, there doesn't have to be the same accountability, but....
    It opens the door to shenanigans.  At the start of the year, yes I had the thought that like anyone else, I could take a ton of time off and who would say anything?  Other people are kind of doing variations of this and taking longer vacations or more frequent vacations.  Up until now, I can say there was one day a couple months ago that if I was younger I would have toughed it out and come in.  I think I tweaked my lower back and felt like a cold coming on or something, so I stayed home on a random Wednesday.  Other than that, I have been strict and trying to do what I normally do every year.  I started taking the two weeks of Christmas and New Year's off.  I then followed that in March with a week for Spring Break, and normally I take one week in July, but since it is unlimited, I added another week, mostly because Wife only gets two weeks off in the summer and this will allow us to hang out together for an extra week since she goes back to work next week, but she is scheduled to be in a conference in Houston.  Work is paying for her suite in downtown Houston and my plan is to just go and chill, sleep with the A/C uncomfortably cold as most people do in hotels and maybe see some sites.  For the sake of completion, I also have been taking the week of Thanksgiving off the last few years when they stopped paying OT like they used to when they wanted to keep things operating.
    There is a little precaution with the incoming hurricane which is being aimed at Louisiana currently, but Houston might be close enough to get a real drenching and maybe some flooding.  Either way, we will be in a high rise, so I think we can stay safe.  Before that trip, my mom mentioned that my brother is having a pool party at the local public swimming pool, which can be rented in the evenings for private parties and this time they even decided to do it on a Friday.  Usually, the Knuckleheads do these parties on Sunday afternoons and then get mad at us for not trying to attend.  We also have kids that go to school on Mondays and we work too, but anyways, this is a nice change of pace plus I love the idea of a big pool, so I will definitely take my swim shorts.

7/11/19 Maybe God Was In The Shitter?

    I argue with my Mom who hates the fact that I say I am an atheist, but the thought of a god out there looking over us is as likely as Santa Claus is to deliver presents on Christmas Eve.  The only way I could ever agree with a god up above us if he is like the late great Carlin said who described having a god as "if we have a god, he's at least incompetent or most likely doesn't give a shit."
    My reason for this rant today is my Mom texted this morning that my cousin who drives big trucks out there in the oil fields in South Texas was involved in an accident this morning.  I know some of you simpletons are going to say "well, god protected him and he survived."  Fuck you, the seatbelts and the brakes and the construction of the cabin by ENGINEERS and people that think kept him alive.  Sorry, but I get tired of the same old song.  Here is the story that my cousin recounted to my aunt.  He was driving towards Asherton, Tx in the morning (he works a night shift and Asherton is about 30 minutes from Crystal City) and he came up on another big truck going the other way when all of a sudden a pick up truck popped up from behind the other truck and attempted to pass the big truck.  My cousin said he envisioned killing the man in the truck, the road was narrow and nowhere to go.  He tried making room for him but once he stepped off the gravel, nature took its course and the truck lost control and he flipped into the ditch side.  Ok, maybe God was taking a shit or making coffee, but the other trucker tried to do the same of making room for the greatest human turd in the world driving a pickup truck.  He also managed to flip his truck into the ditch on the other side of the road.  Guess what?  The Turd in the pickup truck was not late to his appointment or his Sancha or wherever the fuck he was going because the mother F-er didn't even stop.  He caused two semi trucks to roll over so they wouldn't hurt him and I guess mission accomplished, he didn't even get a scratch on his pickup.
    My cousin's boss was glad he is going to be alright and glad that someone wasn't killed.  My aunt said he came around to the hospital to check on him.  He was nice enough to give him the rest of the week off.  Back to God, maybe he hates my cousin?  He has never hurt anybody, is as quiet as a mouse, and an all around nice guy.  I would say my siblings and I are bigger dicks than him and we are still good people and this is who the Almighty decides needs to be tumble dried in a big rig?  Why don't we hear stories of the heroin addicts and people who commit crimes getting into shit like this?  I can almost bet that Dick in the pickup truck was a ne'er-do-well.  A decent human would have stopped.  I hope he at least called 911 when he got to wherever he was rushing to.

7/10/19 When Do We Stop Treating Boy Like A Kid?

    Boy, our oldest is 25 and I believe one year or 5 classes away from graduating.  He claims he was going to graduate in the fall, but one of his classes did not form, so he has to wait until the spring.  He has this semester loaded with the 4 classes and then next semester will just be the one class.  I was most looking forward to getting his car payment off our books and giving it to him to worry about.  Even though he is in school, he has this internship that has pretty much turned into his first real job.  He is making like $23/hr, so my question is "when can we expect he can take care of himself?"  We would never turn our back on him, but recently, for example, we have been spending a good amount of money on clothes for Javalina, buying him slacks and shoes and plenty of jeans.  This makes me feel a little bit bad about the feeling like we are ignoring our other son now that he is older.
    I couldn't help myself, we were at Buckle which is his go to store and I saw a couple of shirts he tends to wear.  I threw them into our basket since we were getting Javalina a bunch of stuff already.  I felt better knowing Boy has some new clothing, but then a thought occurred to me.  He could be rude and say "naw, I don't like that shit."  When the thought ran through my head, it was followed by the obvious "how many kids your age do you think parents are still helping out?"  I know Girlie hasn't had any help from her folks since she graduated high school, same with his best friend, his GF, DD, DDs GF.  They all talk about their folks like "yeah, we see them once in a while."
    Do we just have a better relationship with Boy, or is it simply because we offer free room and some meals?  I say some meals because he spends a lot of time with his GF and they usually eat out by themselves.  Boy joins us for maybe 1 or 2 meals a week, factoring in that Wife is out of town during the week and I work nights.
    Since he is going to have a full class load this fall, we already discussed that he can keep paying me only for the Shell card and what he owes until the end of the year on one of our credit cards he overused on Amazon.  I am really hoping he is mostly working in the spring and just cutting out for the one class so that he could really take over the payment permanently.  Once he graduates, I want to add the utilities to what he pays for around the house.  Either that or a flat fee equivalent to about $400 or so.  I love having the Boy around and I don't want to punish him, but there is a possibility he is making more money than me, why shouldn't he be helpful?

7/9/19 Lil Dicky Is Back?

    I am currently obsessed with Lil Dicky's new "freestyle" he performed on Sway In The Morning on channel 45 on XM Radio.  From what I heard on several YouTube reviews, it is the most popular channel on satellite radio and covers rap and hip hop music, artists and stuff.  I found the song on YouTube where Wife would say I spend too much time as it is, but I get more out of the short format viewings than committing to whole movies or even half hour shows with scripted dialogue.
    Anyway, the first hurdle people are having on the new video is whether he is freestyling or if it is something put together before coming into the studio.  I have gone through at least 20 different reaction videos and everyone kind of brings this up as a point.  I don't really care, the word play is so good, every time you listen to it, you catch a new line, or as the cool people say a new bar.  Lil Dicky is just a master of the double entendre, not even dirty all the time, such as in one line he says "when I go shopping, I browse long line AD (many of his rhymes involve sports and there is a basketball player with a unibrow, Anthony Daniels, making the line funny)."  Another awesome double entendre is when he declares "only perkies I fuck with is breasts (saying he doesn't take drugs, like Percussets)."  He just bombards you with "bars" that you will miss some the first time.  Some are so clever and in your face, all you can say is "wow", like "I'm switching it up like I'm Trans (transsexual, transvestite)," or "they waiting for my buzz like they at the Outback (buzz is his next music/project and also the buzzer you wait on when you go eat at Outback Restaurants)"
    He is just too clever and fast that I just assume he puts these together beforehand.  Maybe he is a genius and can do it on the fly, which is even more powerful.  I really hate that he is not taken seriously by most people because he comes across as a comedian rapper, much like Weird Al Yankovich, which I am also a big fan of.  Why does music have to be all serious?  There was a time when we had CDs, that I carried 5-6 comedy CDs and we would always play them on long trips.  I miss those times.  Nowadays, we just put on a station and listen to what the man wants us listening to.  You can always change the channel, but every channel plays their best 30-40 songs over and over with an occasional different one, now and then.  Lil Dicky is that rare different one that needs to be played a lot more.

7/8/19 End Of My Vacation Week 1?

    I don't know that this past week was less than restful but I think it was good overall.  The first few days were stressful with the discovery Boy was sick with mono.  This caused us to cancel our plans to Corpus Christi with my folks because Wife wanted to ensure Boy would listen and stay home.  We managed a couple of day trips to San Antonio to visit with my in-laws as my father in law had a surgical procedure on his bladder because of his prostate.
    The best part of the whole week was that Wife was not on me about my sleeping pattern.  She let me do whatever.  Most days I was up at 5:00-7:00am and lasted until 10:30am or so before going for a nap.  While I napped, she worked on her homework, so there was no lost time.  I would then get up at 2:00-4:00pm and enjoy the rest of the day.
    As I said on other blogs, we went to look at the boats at Bass Pro Shops and I have been having a tough time deciding whether I will or won't buy a second boat.  I spent a lot of time looking at boats and other possible distractions since we really didn't have an agenda.
    Probably the best thing to come out of this week is that I decided to get back on Atkins.  I was just feeling heavier and heavier and Wife put pressure on me to buy new clothes, I usually refuse to even try on.  Her yammering got me to try a few shorts at JCPenney and non of them really fit, even though I was looking at the biggest they sell in both dressy and casual.  I have to admit that I need to do something, so Atkins has repeatedly been the easiest thing to get me going and that is what I decided to start on.  It is more than likely water loss but I have already seen my weight go from 430 back down to 419.  The biggest difference is in what I munch on.  Normally, I love pastries and any type of bread with something sweet on it, such as: Cookies, all the Little Debbie treats, ice cream, sodas.... Changing to a low carb menu means I have to munch on cheeses, nuts, sugar free Jellos, for starters.  I can still enjoy my cup of coffee every morning but I only use artificial sweetener and a little milk.
    Friday was Javalina's sleepover night and we grilled and ordered pizzas for them.  We grilled again on Sunday night, this time making actual fat steaks for each of us and some sausage.  Because Wife is also almost trying Atkins, she made some asparagus spears wrapped in bacon and a vegetable medley with a bunch of cheese melted and heated over the grill.
    Things are pretty cool right now, Boy was here in time to eat dinner with us, so it felt like we were all together when we ate.  After dinner I set up Javalina's shoe rack which we went and got at Lowe's forhim and Boy.  I like the way the original ones look by the entrance door, so I got a couple more for each of their rooms.  Going back to work tomorrow sounds like a pain in the butt, but I work for one week and then I am off for another week with a scheduled trip to Houston, unless Boy manages to get sick again.

7/7/19 Almost A Party?

    Wife and I keep talking about missing those few years ago when we seemed to have a gathering or party every couple of weekends.  The last few years have just been quiet and a bit boring.  I guess the beat goes on, even if nobody is really dancing to it.  Today (Friday after 4th of July) was pretty much another relaxing day with no agenda.  We had bought ribs to grill, they were on sale on Tuesday, and we thought maybe we'll jump in the pool.
    Javalina has been having sleepovers every other weekend and that is fine, so we knew he had at least a couple boys coming.  Only two of the three showed up and that is a good amount, but Wife thought the ribs would be overwhelming for the boys, so she got them pizzas.  We had three racks of ribs and honestly Wife cooked them directly over the fire and fast, so they were very char flavored, yet delicious with a just right amount of BBQ sauce.  While we were doing this, Girlie was studying for her summer class, her BF was in their room playing video games, Boy had a group of people as they had planned on helping a friend move some furniture.  Wife did not like this much because the boy is just getting over mono and there is no win in him going to do this, but how do you stop him?  At least they called reinforcements and DD showed up with his GF and out of nowhere another friend from Del Valle showed up.  This one moved to Houston and recently graduated with a degree in hotel management.
    Javalina wanted to and did walk to Target with his two buddies, which is about a mile from the house while the meat was grilling.  I told them to call me when they got done buying whatever snacks and I would go pick them up as it was getting late.  They probably left at 8:00pm when it was still lit and I picked them up probably at 9:00pm.  We got home just as their pizza was delivered, they ate pizza in their room, Girlie and the BF joined us eating ribs and sausage.  We were having a pretty good discussion about different Netflix shows we should all watch when Boy got back and the house got loud.
    Javalina saw Boy's friend and we had just been telling him how much of a big mouth he is becoming and the first thing he says is "Hey, didn't I kick your ass last time you were here?" as he gave him a hug followed by them clearing the island so they could arm wrestle.  The little boy is a shit talker.  They had picked up hoagies or subs or something and it became a big party with everybody eating and telling tales.  I honestly love that and miss it.  All through the days Boy was in high school, we usually had one version or another of these kids here at the house, it is nice that as they have become adults, they still feel comfortable enough to stop and visit.

7/6/19 I Am An AMD'er?

    I know our company has had a few name changes over the years, but at the heart, most of us are still AMD people.  Recently, one of my coworkers told me I should visit a page on Facebook dedicated to connecting old AMD people to each other.  I hadn't paid much attention to it until tonight when Wife saw it on her computer while looking at a family thing.  She pointed it out to me and I was captured audience for the next two hours or so as I went all the way back looking for familiar names.  At first it seemed like the page was for other people but soon enough it started feeling like me.
    People are talking about how they put twenty years there and I think that is a long time, but I am going on 23 years there, so I am definitely more than a new hire.  Yes, there were some people talking about Fab5, which I am unaware of any of its history, but I knew Fab10, the second fab built in Austin in the 80s.  I worked in Fab14, which was built in a huge building along with Fab15, for more than three years as a sustaining engineer, four if you count my first year as a technician.  I have thought of this many times as the best part of my career.  I was young and learning pretty much every day.  I had a cool boss teaching me how to appreciate being a man, such as ordering your steak medium rare to really taste the meat, not the burned char of the grill.  I was new on night shift and able to get by on a few hours sleep.
    I went down a long way before I actually saw familiar names, but eventually I saw one of the maintenance technicians calling out our lead operator and she responded a few weeks ago.  Not knowing what else to do, I added a hello to both of them on that chat, just to throw my name in there.  I really thought these people were great.  They took the time to show me stuff so that I could in time help them and we worked together for what seemed like a long time until the Fab rumors started that they were shutting down.  I bolted to find a more secure position and ended up in the department I am in now that has become its own company.
    I may be the last one of our Fab14 D shift group still employed onsite and that gives me mixed emotions.  On the one hand, I'm proud of myself for avoiding so many lay-offs, but on the other, maybe I would have expanded my palette and tried a different career path instead of doing what I am doing now.  The reality being that prior to this week off, I was feeling for the first time "burnt out", like maybe I should look for a new career already.  Maybe I am just antsy because I am such a whore about my pay and I feel I need more.  Most everybody on the FB page is still doing semiconductors, some are just doing it at Samsung across town or in what was Motorola, some have even gone to the dark side and gone to Phoenix and wherever evil Intel is located.
    I know Intel is largely responsible for spreading computers to everything and everyone, but I believe it was AMD biting on its heels keeping prices in the realm of the common man and we helped push innovation because Intel was not going to let our tiny company get more than a fragment of the market.  As AMD'ers, I believe we all have a little of that "little train that could" inside of us because we were always fighting something bigger than us and we didn't give up.

7/5/19 Independence Day- Where is Your Credit Card Application For Fireworks, Mr W?

  Today was 4th of July, a celebration of all things American.  I used to love the idea of BBQ and swimming followed by fireworks at night since this is about the middle of summer.  Then we moved into this "faggoty" HOA controlled house which meant we would have to celebrate generically.  I don't think fireworks hurt anything when done right (I know they cause hundreds of lost fingers and small fires when unsupervised), sorry but we've been popping fireworks since I was a kid so 40 plus years times 2 (4th of July and New Year's) and I can't recall any injuries, maybe a burned finger on a younger kid from an out of control sparkler.  I know, too many stupid people pulling their guns out and shooting straight up is plain ignorant and irresponsible, but we never did any of that.

    So now it has become a holiday we are rarely at home for.  We have been going to my in-laws over the last ten years or so because they technically live outside SA city limits (outside loop 1604), so the kids can run around lit fireworks and play with matches and lighters until their little fingers grow raw from trying to strike a lighter lit in the wind outside.  This year we were pretty excited at the thought of going to the coast to meet my parents for a few days but then Boy got sick.  Instead of thinking about having fun, I started thinking about getting through the summer and saving money and then I got hesitant because I didn't want to spend $150 a night for a hotel plus eating out every meal times even 2 or 3 days seemed like an excessive way to go.  Wife then mentioned her dad going in for surgery on Monday, so I thought maybe we should spend some time over there, since she rarely sees them.  As of last night, they had changed the plans saying he wasn't feeling up for company, so we were just going to stay home and grill some ribs and maybe sit in the hot tub.  This seemed like the way to go, so as not to spend money and still celebrate and maybe even still see some fireworks if we sat outside.  Wife got up to an early call from her sister to go ahead and come, they would be making some food and even if it was not a big party, we could still have dinner together.

    My boys wanted fireworks (Boy did not bring GF, so he didn't have to be cool), so we stopped and man, have things changed.  We walked in the fireworks metal building and were greeted by a display as tall as me for $700.  This thing would not have fit in Wife's Kia, it was bigger than her roof.  There were smaller displays for $550, $400, $350, $199, $120 and then down to the kiddie bags in the $20-$40 range.  Javalina got a kid's bag when I joked that he was still a tank popper, as that was the only way to buy the little tanks we have always enjoyed.  I wanted a big "boom" package so I settled on the $69 box of cannons.  This kind sound like a shotgun and then blow up with bright colors and sound.  Wife chose a few and Boy got a few.  We walked out spending $180 which I did not really want to do, but it is part of the fun, isn't it?

    Nowadays, I try to carry about $100 in my wallet at all times and I knew we were going to get some fireworks, so I had grabbed an extra $100 from my stash (my stash being Javalina's Disney money I try to keep in the closet).  What amounted to about 15 minutes of fun left me with a lame $20 and a couple 1 dollar bills in my wallet until next payday, but I guess it was fun while it lasted.  In the past, my brother in law who has four boys also gets a bunch of fireworks, but he wasn't around, same for Wife's other cousins and family members, which makes the fun last for hours.  I think the boys enjoyed the few minutes we lasted outside tonight.  Usually, we are there until midnight or later, but we made it home before midnight this year.  I guess all's well that end's well.

7/4/19 BlacKkKlansman? (Movie Netflix)

    Without getting into the movie, I was watching and a thought occurred to me, which is more powerful, infiltrating a group and forcing change from the inside or demanding justice and screaming at the wind?  I thought the main character, Ron Stallworth, was doing a great job in being a perfect example of what a fine black police officer could do and look like.  The general police force had a very negative opinion of black people and now they were forced to accept one in their ranks and see that a lot of their stereotypes were just that.  He was slowly challenging the status quo and making the other officers think of the black inmates as people and not "toads" as they liked to call them before Ron started saying no.
    The contrast was then seen when a popular personality came into town to talk for the area college and he was an inspirational guy.  He said all the right things and he put things in perspective making the black man think about things maybe he hadn't, such as his example where he grew up cheering for Tarzan to beat those "savages" when he then realized that those "savages" are the face of me.  TV had trained him, a black person, to hate his black heritage.  He was calling for all black people to arm themselves, that war was coming.
    I don't think this is the best way to handle tense race negotiations.  The "white" man has the advantage of better access to better weapons and the law is on their side, because they wrote it.  In any fight, it is going to be black vs. white and white will just win most of the time.  This goes along with standing on a street corner and yelling for equality, all it does is invite people with an opposing view to come in and yell the opposite opinion in your face.  This is what happened in North Carolina two years ago when the KKK came out from under its rock and were quickly met by forces larger than themselves.  People ended up dead over there in their attempts to scream "I am more right than you."
    The movie is set in the 70s, in Colorado Springs, Co.  Ron Stallworth is trying to do more than just be a cop.  He wants to make change happen, and does he.  On a whim, sitting at his desk, he calls the offices of the KKK which I guess used to advertise.  He poses as a white man tired of all the blacks, jews, Mexicans, and everyone else who might be stealing his job.  He gets his partner to pretend to be him and go and join them.  Pretty soon, his partner is in and seems to be doing fine except for the one ahole obsessed with the idea that he is jewish.  He denies over and over, and the story culminates with the idiot klansmen set up a bomb trying to kill the leader of the black movement on campus, which has slowly become the love interest for Ron.

7/3/19 Half A Year Has Flown By?

    I hate thinking like this, but it is reality.  We are past the halfway point in 2019, basically we have 2 months of heat, football starts, 10-12 weekends of Longhorns games, and suddenly we are back in the holiday season.  This year will go extra fast with keeping up with Javalina's football games and band commitments.  We want him to keep doing both at least for now, mostly because he can, but we are curious about band life in the big city.
    I started out great in January with Javalina doing about 6 weeks of Atkins, we both lost around 40 pounds.  Then it was one party after another and we went through February like sampling different cakes every weekend for someone else's birthday and before we knew it, I am back to 430 as of last night.  I swear I need to do better.  I can take the weight off, I am just not disciplined to keep it up.  My excuse was that it is expensive to maintain that high protein diet, but honestly, we are right on the cusp of being done with some commitments and freeing up some of our money, so eating well shouldn't be a problem, specially with renters in the house.
    I told Wife after a very lackluster romp in the sack that my fat ass needs to be in better shape to perform.  These last 40 pounds are like a switch and I honestly don't even want to go at it.  She keeps asking and I'm like "I'm playing Sudoku, or I need to shit, or didn't you just fart, gross."  I was even thinking I was doing better with my sleepiness, but I guess I am weak.
    Javalina has become a rock, he lost the 40 pounds and now actively avoids junk food.  I keep buying cheap ass Little Debbie snacks and then end up eating most of them myself.  I should have just kept up with him lifting and dieting.  It is easy to say right now that I am not working.  I hate waking up and breaking a sweat but maybe that would be best.  It would not kill me to walk a mile or two on the treadmill and do some squats to strengthen my knees.  I surely don't want to be like my dad who hurts everywhere all the time.  I need to stay ahead of the pain.
    Wife has started some classes and so far so good, she is sporting a couple of A's on her first papers, she is just good at that stuff, I can't muster the energy to even think of going back to classes and be bossed around by some know it all dink.  I'll support her as much as I have to, she can be my security blanket for my old age.  She'll keep me in the lifestyle I have become accustomed to.
    Boy will eventually graduate.  He snuck in an extra semester, but even then, the place where he started his internship still has him and they are in the process of creating a package to keep him with a real salary.  He is at the $50K range right now, I am hoping he is offered something around low $70k for starters plus he says they offer full medical and dental and there might also be stock options.  Mijo is pretty set for his future if he can only wait until GF finishes school to move to the next step.

7/2/19 Is A Rose Just? (poem)

I swear I must always compete

whether to make a point or just because I find it soothing and sweet.

A friend was giving his woman a rose a day, and I thought "Gay!"

but he is trying to be romantic so I let it go and just said "okay."

It seems he went and bought himself a pile of the yellow variety

to which an unromantic like me just sits back and thinks "well, aren't we a little High Society?"

Yellow petals are pretty but he might have missed the point of this scam

the color signifies platonic love and appreciation, not a good way to get in that clam.

Lately, everyone has been giving flowers,

Wife got some from Boy's GF and there were some from her mother's.

am I the only one left remembering that all flowers are good for is dying?

I do have one little twist to this simple tale

there is apparently one way I would get Wife flowers and not look fraile.

That is of course, growing them on my own land

once in a while I find the most perfect specimen grown by this and that hand.

While slaving away cutting the grass in the front

I found the most perfect flower, Wife will surely swoon and give me her c**t.

It was clipped in its prime, big and looking pinker

Wife then whispered "Big Boy, tonight you can have it all from the baby maker to the stinker."

Maybe I've been wrong as my inner child with these words found itself crying.

I guess even an old dog can learn a new trick from a kid being romantic

I gave Wife a simple rose trying to be sarcastic and I found my junk engorged and a bit gigantic.

I'm not sure what to do with myself as we are not in bed

but trust me tonight her farting will not keep me from getting my needs met.

She may not like me disclosing this fact

but it's hard to get in there when it sounds like you're under attack.

I kid, I joke, it is me that farts like it is in my genes

but what can I do, it's 9:30pm and she's refrying some beans?

Fart jokes and butt holes, the simple things that make life gratifying.

7/1/19 Bass Pro Shops And My Boat Dreams?

    I am certainly getting closer to the time that we decided I might get a new boat, but I am having a hard time deciding whether I will even bother.  Since we didn't stop at the one by my in-law's Saturday night on our way back, Wife declared we could go on Sunday to the one in Round Rock.  I was glad to be going specially since we had been planning on going to Corpus Christi for a few days and I did go to Cabela's a couple days ago before we were cut short by Boy's E/R visit when I was looking for fishing rod solutions since Wife wants to go everywhere in her buttplug of a car.
    The problem of buying collapsible fishing rods for Corpus was solved when they told us in the E/R that Boy would need to be home bound and Wife thinks it's a good idea to stay home and keep an eye on him.  Even going to Bass Pro Shops was suspicious for Wife when we got back home and she noticed a Jason's Deli noodle cup so she immediately yelled at Boy "Did you go to the store to get this soup?", which Boy gave a half-ass answer that the GF had gone alone.  I didn't believe she went alone and neither did Wife.  It is now Monday morning and he says his side was still hurting last night quite a bit.  While driving up to Pflugerville, I had a pretty good conversation with mom, for once she didn't have the 100s of grandkids around so she could focus on the call, it was almost weird, having her undivided attention.  I told her we were having doubts about Corpus and she said she had already figured out we were probably not going to go.
    But back to my boat dilemma... Wife says I suck at maintaining my toys, whether it is RVs or boats.  I say it sucks when I have to have them in storage 20 miles away for me to keep batteries charged or keep an eye on things that go bad.  With this in mind, I have been thinking a couple of PWC would be better, as they would fit in the garage and thus would be here where I could get to them easily.  They would not be perfect for the family, although Boy says he has zero interest in water sports.  I am not sure my dad could even balance himself alone to drive one either, leaving this idea for Wife and myself along with Javalina who is still 2 years too young to drive them by himself, legally.  I saw a small 16 foot boat with payments of $200, this would be easy to purchase and pay, but man, there isn't much to the boat, but it would fit in the garage, at 16 feet.  Wife insists she would prefer a pontoon boat and I like the idea of carrying a bigger party, of up to 12 people, but then I am back to the problem of where to park it.
    I know it would be easier to just say no to all this stuff, but then I am afraid I will spend all my downtime asleep or in the house and that just sounds sad.  We did all sorts of camping and fishing with Boy growing up, I don't know why he hates the idea of being outside, but I feel like Javalina has not had any of this kind of exposure and he is basically high school age.  If we don't do it now, we will miss our window of opportunity with him before he becomes a "Man" like Boy has.