firemanjay988's Xanga

Sunday, October 05, 2008

Sun, 05 Oct 2008 03:57:55 GMT

While watching the Cubs implode, I come back to you, my faithful readers. Tonight I also have an announcement.

Today has been one of those long, crazy days that come almost never. First off, if you notice up there and over there, the dates match. I am 28 today. Another year closer to 30 and that will signal the end! To celebrate, Brett and Colin had me over last night and there was a cake at the game today. Brett also said he was going to ask his long time girlfriend, Linda, who he calls Lynn, to marry him tonight. Colin said "we're getting married." He cracks me up. Other Colinisms from the night "I'm so happy I might throw up" and "It only took me 13 years to get 2 normal parents."

So after that excitement, I came to work. Tay had a cross country meet this morning but I didn't go because I was working. He called to tell me he finished first out of 19 runners. It was a small meet but it is the first time he has ever finished first overall.

Tay got home from his meet and came to the rink where we had our first game of the season. Dave gave his pep talk and all that. We have a lot of tall kids this year, 3 or 4 who are 6 foot or taller. Anyway, the guys went out and scored four in the first period then coasted in to a 5-2 win. A fine way to start the season. Our next game is tomorrow because it is opening weekend.

Now for the jerk. This has got to be the youngest jerk I have ever had. A seven year old in Alice Springs, Australia broke into a cage at the zoo and went on a tear. He bashed a few lizards with rocks then threw other animals into the crocodile cage where they were gobbled up by 440 pound Terry the crocodile. The boy's parents will be sued since a 7 year old cannot be charged. He also receives a tiara and sash.

Now for the major announcement. In light of last night's O.J. Simpson kidnapping trial guilty verdict, I have decided to open up the Jerk Hall of Fame. Criteria for election is as follows, a) ten (10) or more years of continued jerky behavior or b) selection as Jerk of the Year.

The charter inductees are as follows...

2006 Jerk of the Year Cory Petero, who was arrested for tackling a kid during a youth football game even though he was 36 years old at the time.

2007 Jerk of the Year Jonathan Lee Riches, a South Carolina inmate who is known for filing frivolous lawsuits. Some of the suits can be seen here

Albert Belle, baseball star, who committed many jerky acts including throwing baseballs at reporters in the stands and chasing children who came to his house on Halloween.

O.J. Simpson, who was believed to be a generally nice guy, until 1994 when he was accused of killing his ex-wife and her boyfriend then consecutively acquitted in a criminal and found guilty in a civil trial, and is now facing life for kidnapping and armed robbery. He pisses me off. He had everything, he won the Heisman Trophy and set the NFL record for rushing in a season, then he became a tv pitchman and sportscaster then pissed it all away. So for that he is in this Hall of Fame as well as in Canton.

There you have it. A fifth inductee will be announced in December when we crown the Jerk of the Year and award the sash, tiara, and a 1985 Yugo GV!

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Thu, 02 Oct 2008 03:33:04 GMT

No more hockey practice! Real games start on Saturday. I am very excited about this. I just thought about it, this will be my 16th season doing hockey either as a player or coach.

Last night was our last practice before ice hockey. On Friday night, we're having the team over for pizza and a showing of Miracle. The indoor pool in our building will also be open for them to use. We go into the season with 23 healthy players out of the 24 on the roster. They are solid with everyone returning from roller hockey. It's all good. I figure they will be about 30-10-5 or so. We're also doing a Christmas tournament to somewhere.

October baseball is here. The must win games on Monday and Tuesday were good stuff even though I wanted the Twins to win. This week is a baseball feast with all kinds of games between pretty good teams. I hope the Cubs do well but it looks like they are doing the choking thing again by losing to the Dodgers.

Tay admitted today that he is missing hockey. This is my 16th year doing hockey and it's his first without hockey out of the last 11 years. There isn't a place for him in hockey. He aged out of youth hockey and senior leagues don't start until you are 18. He's 17 (and a half) so he's stuck. I can't even let him coach because we have plenty of people helping coach.

I brought John to work today. He's bored out of his mind with his knee surgery. The doctor said 3 weeks of no nothing. Since it's his right knee that includes driving so he just sits at home and waits for 3 weeks to go by. Today was day #9 out of 21. Maybe he should come to the team party on Friday, at least there would be free food.

It seems that our 13 year old neighbor Colin has a new friend. He comes in last night and said, "There's a new kid in my class, his name is Kris with a K." He has another friend, Christian, who goes by Chris (with a C). I thought it was pretty funny that he talks about him as "Kris with a K".

That's all I got. I had a rough day so I am going to drink some (root) beer because I'm at work.

Monday, September 29, 2008

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 02:50:14 GMT

The weekend is over and I am at work, which happens most weekends (2 out of 3). Actually, part of my weekend is cut out every weekend because of the 6 AM-6 AM shift so even a Friday shift goes until Saturday at 6 AM.

Yesterday was sports day. I went to my brother's cross country meet. I am glad I never ran cross country because they all look so miserable when they run. He finished 4th out of 71 runners, his best finish in the 4 years he's been running.

From cross country, I went to our hockey scrimmage. We played intersquad, meaning half our team against the other half. It was a good fake game. Both teams did what we expected them to do. Our neighbor Ryan was the guest referee since he was home from college this weekend. Jordan was the only injury with a shot off the shin. (I just typed a shit off the shin, oops!) Jordo might sit out Tuesday but he'll be ready for the first game.

It was a pretty good day all around. Dave's brother, Shawn the goalie, and his friend Eric stayed over and made rude noises last night then I came to work. All is well with my world even though I am going to be old very soon.

Now on to the jerk. The administration of Tioga Middle School in Fresno, California thought it would be a grand idea to teach the boys and girls about cursing. The way they did this was to list all the words they shouldn't say on the blackboard. This upset a few parents who are now discussing legal action with the school.

I kind of like the way schools did it when I was a kid, and still do it, according to our middle school aged neighbor, Colin. See, Colin got a discipline slip for calling his friend a dumbass in school a couple weeks ago. He used a bad word then got in trouble. He knows what the bad words are and can spell most of them. No grand lesson on what the bad words are. So to the administrators at Tioga Middle School a tiara and sash for you.

Lights out, bitches.

Friday, September 26, 2008

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 03:12:23 GMT

I am tired. I don't know how you people who work normal weeks do it. I think hockey has something to do with it. Dave called a practice for after school today. Since he's a teacher, he can get away with having a 3:30 practice when coaches with not school jobs are still at work. The guys were crisp and ready to play their first game next Saturday, my birthday!

I have no notes written because nothing has really happened in the last few days. Colin called me at work on Monday asking me if I wanted pizza. It's his scam to get me to buy a pizza so he can have some. He forgot I was working so we had pizza on Tuesday. His team had practice last night.

I worked with Dylan on his college essays. I still don't know how he got this far without being able to string a paragraph together. He can handle sentences but knowing when the begin and end a paragraph is not his strong suit.

I will close with Tay's essay. It is one double spaced page:

I’ve had ADD since I was 6 but I probably had it since I was born but it was only in the last year that I hated the label. I hate that last D, disorder. To me, it means something is out of line in my head.
I went through a lot of stages with my ADD. First I didn’t know what it was or why I heard things a little different. Then I leaned on that diagnosis for a while. Since I have this disorder, I deserve special treatment. Believe it or not, it worked for a long time. It’s ok, give Taylor a break for acting out, he probably didn’t take his meds was the line I’d hear when they didn’t think I was listening. Soon after getting that message I did what I wanted and just said my meds weren’t working or I forgot them until the excuse wasn’t accepted anymore.
In high school, I found out that nobody cared what medicine I took or what it did for me. Once I accepted responsibility for my actions, I was able to get off the medication and I embraced the differences that are now a blessing to me.
As a result of my disorder, I can now read and keep track of a few books at once. In sports, my coaches say I see things before they happen. It isn’t that I see them first but it is that I am too overwhelmed by the obvious so I look for the second or third option.
My disorder has made me naturally curious. When I am reading, I often stop to investigate a topic more depth. In an odd way, the disorder has allowed me to reorder the things that are important to me. I think I am a more interesting person because of my disorder.
Overall, it has been a pretty good run even with the challenge of ADD and I hope to continue it at (name of school here).

That's all I got. John is visiting work and I have to take him home soon.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 03:18:38 GMT

The interesting weekend is over.

It started with the scrimmage. Dave had a touch of a cold this weekend so he spent the third period in the locker room and let me play head coach. I did all kinds of crazy stuff. Sometimes I'd send out 4 players to pretend it was penalty kill. I pulled my goalie since there was no score just to see if Shawn would come over. He did but didn't know why. Poor kid was all confused. Anyway, we mostly all had fun. Luke got tripped up and banged his shoulder into the glass and is out 4 weeks. Beside him, we had a good time.

In other Saturday news, Tay did not run.

Yesterday, I stayed around and watched football then the closing ceremony for Yankee Stadium. Shawn and Eric came over to hang out with Dave and they watched the entire Orioles/Yankees nearly meaningless game. I worked with Dylan on his scholarship essay. He's a bright kid but he can't put words together on paper. We spent over an hour trying to work out grammar mistakes and awkward sentences. I could tell he was getting frustrated. Tay's essay that he is going to use was amazing. If it wouldn't have been totally weird, I would have hugged him. It was a really well written essay about how his education with ADD hasn't really been a disorder but has allowed him to explore other aspects of problems he wouldn't see without his disorder.

Today was an interesting day. I had to go to a fire drill at one of the schools. There were no problems and they evacuated within the guidelines. No fines were issued and one of their official fire drills is done. After spending the afternoon enjoying Maury, Jerry Springer, and the myriad of television judges and doing homework, I went to see John, my co-worker, who had his knee scoped today. He kept wanting to look at the marks where they stuck the scope in. I had to show off my scars to show him they really aren't that big. He wasn't moving well but he'll get better at that since he has 2 weeks to practice. On Thursday, I might bring him to work for a while.

That's about all I got.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

Sat, 20 Sep 2008 01:47:01 GMT

So here begins my weekend. We have a scrimmage tomorrow morning at 8:30 so I can't go home and sleep because I will have to be up not long after that.

I don't get the economic crisis. So if you get in enough trouble, the government will just bail you out? If the Dow goes into the toilet in 2 days it will go way up? Is this confusing to anyone else?

We had hockey practice yesterday. I have no hockey practice news. It just happened and the guys did well considering they were playing against each other. They all did well in the mile skate even the goalies who had to do it in pads. I think we did the worst because we had to count the laps.

A soldier who died was denied the Medal of Honor by the Department of Defense this week. Now the family is upset because it was denied. It is called the medal of HONOR. You don't receive it on a whim. If the DoD says no then the answer is no. It is a tragedy that he died but not a tragedy that he did not get the Medal of Honor.

This is the last weekend for Yankee Stadium. The world has stopped to say goodbye. People, it is just a building. Any stadium that hosted those Yankees teams would have seen a ton of World Series teams. Even if it was in Hoboken.

Finally for the jerk. I like old people who pose as high school students. Wendy Brown of Green Bay posed as her 15 year old daughter to be a cheerleader because she missed out on that when she was a teenager. School authorities thought she looked older but she acted like a teenager so they let her slide. Just plain crazy.

Over and out. Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Wed, 17 Sep 2008 02:51:41 GMT

I really wish I had more to say but I am getting kind of upset that my readers seem to have evaporated a bit. Yet I soldier on.

Work has nothing going on. I am working my first shift in a while because of the New York trip. I worked last Sunday, September 7, then I went to New York and that took up two shifts. It is always weird coming back after time away. It is almost like I expect something to be different, but nothing has changed. I am still here and so are my co-workers. John is having his knee scope on Monday so I'm sort of preparing him for that since I am a veteran in that department.

Hockey season started yesterday with the introductory meeting. All of our team played roller hockey so there wasn't much introductoring. We skated for a bit. Dave said he wants to do a Christmas tournament that involves a plane trip. The guys seemed excited even when Dave said how much we'd have to fundraise to make it happen. He figures $600 a kid would cover a 5 day, 4 night trip.

I am having problems with Matt already. He's been mentioned here a lot. He has a knee problem that keeps him from playing games on consecutive days. He really shouldn't play hockey but this is his last season. He failed his physical but got another doctor to pass him with rules. Anyway, he was sore after skating last night. It could be a no skating for 6 weeks sore or it could be my knee can't handle it sore. If it's the latter, we might have to find him a job to keep him around because he really likes being on the team.

Finally, when I see pictures like this, I wonder what life would be like if I was extra small or something like that. He did have a nice view!

Birthday shoutout to Chase who is 15 on Thursday. Over and out.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Sun, 14 Sep 2008 05:21:07 GMT

I am back at home after five days of mostly fun. We went to museums, saw everything we wanted, and participated in the tribute on Thursday. Yesterday it rained all day so we saw a few more museums instead of doing the Statue of Liberty in the pouring rain. We still went to Ellis Island so it wasn't a complete loss.

Now I am home and tired because it is 1:00 on my adjusted time. My car battery is better but Dave is not here. Nobody is around really because Brett and Colin were going to Portland today to do hockey gear shopping then spending the night up there. Tay came in 14th out of 71 runners in his meet today. He couldn't understand why I didn't answer his texts while I was on the plane.

It is back to real work on Tuesday. The same day that Dan becomes Big Brother champion.

For the jerk, I can never understand why people take advantage of people in trouble. People are afraid of Hurricane Ike yet some gas stations have decided to raise prices to $4.99 or even $5.20 a gallon because of perceived shortages from the storm. Is it fair to raise prices $1 a gallon overnight? No, especially when it's multiple stations in a cartel. I just can't figure it out but then again, I have a heart.

Over and out.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 02:29:08 GMT

So I'm here in the big city and they are treating us like kings. My dad moved out and moved in with another dad and I am in a room with a 24 year old firefighter from Salem. There were 5 selected for our delegation along with 5 guests.

We left Monday morning and the flights were fine, no delays all the way through. When we got to the airport, they had buses to take us to the hotel. The hotel is pretty nice but the rooms are small. I think they are expensive because it is New York City and all hotels are expensive. We had a meet and greet buffet on Monday night.

Yesterday we had free touring then we had to be at the Mets and Nationals game at night. They gave us coupons for the concessions. They are closing Shea Stadium so iut was nice to visit in one of the last games. Today we also got to do free touring then we had dinner. Now I am resting up for tomorrow morning's ceremony.

In home news, I talked to Dave. He has called our first practice for Monday night at 9:30 because getting ice on the first night is really hard. There is a team practicing on the other rink late than us. We hardly even skate first practice so the guys will be sent home by 11. They better be, Dave has to work on Tuesday. He also reported that all physicals are in and everyone has a pass.

Taylor competed in his first cross country on Saturday and finished 9th out of 48 runners. He races again this Saturday and hopes to improve on his standing.

I have no other news. I will write after I get home on Saturday.

Monday, September 08, 2008

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 02:48:18 GMT

The day is nearly upon us. The boy from the high desert who has never been to a town larger than Seattle or Denver is going to the big city. The bright lights of New York are about to greet these country bumpkins. As I have mentioned, I am on the Oregon delegation for the 9/11 commemoration. I am taking my dad as my guest since any other possible guest was busy. We leave tomorrow afternoon.

Does this mean that life is just going along perfect? Hell no! On Friday after school, Tay skipped practice and got his wrist x-rayed. There was no fracture so he was told to keep it wrapped and iced until he felt better. Yesterday, I worked with Dave and some of the guys on laying down the new ice and making the logos. It was pretty neat to see how they did it. Plus I made some decent money for supervising the whole thing.

So we come to this morning and I go out to the truck and it doesn't work. It starts then turns off, starts, turns off, I finally got it to start but I didn't trust it so I woke Dave up and he drove me to work. He is getting my truck fixed while I am away. He is also coming to get me from work in the morning before he goes to teach all day. I am lucky to have him around because if somebody woke me at 5:30 on a Sunday, I'd be upset.

I was all ready to announce my Super Bowl locks then Brady went out and tore his ACL. So I will pick the Chargers against the Eagles for the Super Bowl.

Finally, from our Jerks of Africa series, I present a friend of Robert Mugabe, who is destroying his country, King Mswati III of Swaziland. Mswati threw himself a week long celebration for the combined occasion of his 40th birthday and the 40th anniversary of independence for his nation. For those who have never heard of Swaziland, it is the country with both the highest incidence of HIV+ population (26%) and lowest life expectancy (32 to 39 years depending on the source). This doesn't bother Mswati, whose party included several new BMWs, a shopping trip for 9 of his 13 wives, and an official budget of $2.5 million. To mark the occasion, several topless women were to parade in front of him as he was preparing to choose wife 14. A tiara and sash for your birthday King.

That's all I got.