I’m taking yet another vacation day today, my friends. The older boy is “graduating” from middle school, and I feel like I should be there. However, I am doing so under protest.
All this “graduating” irritates me, if you wanna know the truth. The kid’s fourteen years old, and I think I’ve seen him graduate three or four times already. His brother has graduated almost as often, and it’s just too much.
There are only two real graduations: high school and college. Am I wrong? All these feel-good in-between graduations are boolshit.
But what are you gonna do? Not go? I don’t think so. It’s not the kids’ fault; they didn’t come up with all this stupidity. So, I’ll go and support the boy.
But I want it to be noted that I’m not buying into it. Jeff Kay does not endorse serial in-between graduating. I mean, seriously. I’ll be good, though. I’ll be on my best behavior, and will smile and shake hands and act like I’m wiping away an occasional tear.
Oh brother.
Steve called me a few minutes ago, and said he was in a Barnes & Noble store last night. He bought two paperback books. The total was $20.80, and he gave the cashier $21.00.
He was waiting for his twenty cents, but the woman closed the register drawer, and said (in a very polite tone), “There will be no change for you today, sir.” Then she turned and walked away.
Steve said he just stood there blinking real fast, and finally shrugged and left the store. WTF? Any idea what that might’ve been about? Hilarious. And kinda bizarre.
Toney was fuming earlier in the week, about some pushy, “ball-busting” woman who came stampeding into her office at work, demanding to know the date for some event.
“I will need that date now,” she commanded, in a hyper-assertive boardroom manner. And the woman’s bombastic attitude irritated my wife.
I told her she should’ve said, “OK, do you have a pen handy? Alright… the date is July shove it up your ass, 2010.”
Yeah, it’s easy to come up with those kinds of answers, after the fact. Not so much when it’s all going down. Oh well.
Speaking of Steve, we got our tickets to see the Eels, on the first day they were available. Is that too soon? I feel like we probably should’ve waited until Day Two, at least. The first day is a little too fanboy, in my opinion. A more casual approach is recommended…
It’s gonna be fun, though. The Eels are great, when it’s a full band and everything. Last time it was just Mark Everett, and a drummer. It was a very strange show… inside a church for unknown reasons. And they showed a feature length documentary as an opening act. The crap?
But the whole band will rip your head clean off. It’ll be a good time. Steve and I will undoubtedly be hollering at each other on the drive home, shouting above the amplified refrigerator hum in our ears. I’m looking forward to it.
Friday is the last day I’m going to take orders for the limited edition summer shirts — designed by the Evil Twin, and featuring the good ol’ Smoking Fish.
When I drag my ass out of bed on Saturday morning I’m going to remove the PayPal link, and place my one and only order with the T-Shirt Lady. If you’d like to have one, please order soon. They’re gonna be extra-cool. Here’s your link.
And thanks for the support!
I’ll leave you now with the Question of the Day…
We’re not going to do much this summer, on account of money and lack thereof. We’ll probably go to Knoebels a couple of times, and that’ll be it. But I’d like to live vicariously through you guys.
In the comments section please tell us about your summer vacation plans. What do you have cooking? Bring us up to date, won’t you?
And I’ll see ya again tomorrow.
Have a great day!
Now playing in the bunker
Pre-order your summer WVSR shirt here!
1st! Must be my birthday!
No summer plans, really. Except for today because it is in fact my b-day.
The Missus and Spawn will be headed to Florida at the end of June. Let’s hope there’s a beach to go to by then. I will not be going because of . . . obligations, but I’ll have a vacation of sorts myself. Pizza, beer, breakfast for dinner, war movies. Oh yes, my friends, the Dog lives right there on the pointy edge.
This will be “The Summer of Much Suckage.” Nowhere doin’ nuthin’.
Knoebels last summer did not disappoint. I stood on the bridge at the log flume and was soaked from the ride. I looked down to see a wet cigarette butt stuck to my shirt.
No summer plans. Too frakkin’ hot. I feel a road trip coming up in late September though.
Words I wasn’t sure I’d be able to put together and use in my lifetime:
Happy Birthday, Whistle Dick!!!
Cross that one off the ol’ bucket list.
Same as every year. Go to the lake and drink.
Lake Huron, Oscoda Michigan
Last week was my vacation. I spent it partially in Ithaca, where much people-watching was to be had, and partially in the Philadelphia area visiting the fam. The best day was in Atlantic City, where I swam in the surf (it was 62 degrees, what of it?) and stuffed my face with mountains of seafood. Then I woke up to a rash the next day. The Atlantic giveth, and the Atlantic taketh away.
This made my week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miK-j-IhZG0&feature=channel
Top 10 and …
Happy Birthday, Whistle Dick!!!
Happy Birfday, Zoe.
No summer plans…I agree with Good2Go…I don’t do hot very well anymore. The humidity has reached wet blanket levels here and I’m about to pass out. Can’t wait to see how miserable July will be.
However, I will perform my usual July fourf ritual and stand in the middle of the street, drop my pants and fire a rocket. The neighbors seem to enjoy it.
Whoops, forgot. Happy birthday Whistle Dick!
A few days at the Women’s US Open Golf tournament at Oakmont(near Pittsburgh) and a week at Rehobeth Beach in Delaware with the grandkids. Other than that, I can be found on the golf course….when I’m not chained to this freakin’ desk that is!
I will be playing hockey and drinking beer. Just like I did all winter. Except now, I will be playing inside and drinking outside, instead of the other way around.
Don’t knock the in-between graduations; for some people its the last one they will participate in.
Hey! Thanks guys! Obviously I came back to check but still a lovely surprise to see some bday messages. Gretchen- i lived in Atlantic City for 10 years. When we needed a beach fix we drove several miles south to Ocean City. Much safer and cleaner, and now with less infectious medical waste.
Zoe: I’m from the Philly area. Every summer growing up I went to Ocean City, so I know that’s the better beach. It’s just that the person I go with likes A.C. better for whatever reason and since he’s driving, that’s that. Otherwise I’d rather go to O.C. Or Stone Harbor. Or Spring Lake.
Summer plans– not many… Probably a couple weekends drinking beer on a pontoon boat, and lots of shooting guns. Dogberry– breakfast for dinner, or brenner, as it’s known around this neck of the woods, is Gods gift to man. Absolutely delicious.
sweat, drink, repeat.
I was planning to go canoeing on the Buffalo river for a few days but my work will not allow me to be gone when i was supposed to be so that got cancelled and now it is just beach time on the weekends when it doesn’t rain.
my children are gone for the summer though so every day kind of feels like a vacation. i can drink when i want sleep when i want coook dinner when i want. its kind of wonderful.
I plan to annex the Sudetenland.
Zoe Appreciation Day! Have a happy one!! I, however, claim the entire month of July! Bikerchick Appreciation Month. So…start planning now… ha
Well…every year we “say” we’re going on a full week’s vacation but never happens because we never have enough money to pay for our vacation imagination.
This year, so far, is the same as last……Next week we’re off to Thunder in the Valley in Johnstown…a biker rally. Quite fun actually. Four days of drinking and whathaveyou…. We are staying with friends who have an enormous camper with batroom facilities, a hot shower and A/C. Not exactly roughing it. We went for the first time last year. They have this wet t-shirt contest every year. What a HOOT! Most of these chicks have flapjacks for jugs. A rock in a gym sock in would have less hang time. But it’s a good laugh.
Mid July is Jamboree in the Hills. A four day country music and drunken stupidness.
I would love to go to the beach somewhere but the sheckle shortage is running rampant.
My vacation $$ is being spent NOT going ot the beach. Which does not make me a happy camper.
I have to buy a plane ticket to WV, rent a car, cook for 2 days, decorate my church activity building and throw a baby shower for my neice. So there goes my vaca $$. I wish I was heading to Myrtle Beach instead.
I do have plans to hit the dog track with my sorority sisters. Having a few drinks with Bill and high school classmates, Jeff, want to come?
No real summer vacation plans. Normally I would have a trip to Cali planned to see friends but I don’t feel like spending the dough.
I am planning to go to the Patriots/Bengals game in Foxboro in September. Not exactly summer though.
Happy Birthday Whistle Dick.
I’ve been known to wait for one cent change at a drive-through, so that 20 cents would have been mine, one way or another! I wouldn’t have left the store until I had an answer and the money!
We are having kind of a low key summer. Lots of BBQing, lots of video gaming, and the highlight of our summer is our trip to Delevan, WI to see Phish for two nights at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. We’re staying in a hotel right off Lake Delevan called the Lake Lawn Resort…last year we noticed that the hotel staff put all the hippies on side of the hotel (the older, shittier side of course), and the golfers on the nice ritzy side. So later in the night after the show we were boozin’ and seeing colors and some such on our back patio, heh, and there were random hippies wandering lost in the grass, the smell of pachouli and incense filled the air…omg it was great. That is the highlight of my summer!
“A rock in a gym sock in would have less hang time” — ROFL I almost fell out of my chair, Bikerchick..
As for my summer plans.. St. Louis via Amtrak with the kiddos. Going to con my husband into going up in the arch (he who’s both afraid of heights and claustrophobic) by telling him we can do the Busch Brewery tour afterwards. Free beer should lure him in… even if it is Budweiser.
Oh, and 4th of July in Las Vegas for god only knows why.. Hubby has a conference there so I get to sweat my fatass off in the desert for 4 days in July. On the upside, there’s much freak-o people watching to be had in sin city. I plan to spend much of the trip drunk so I got that goin’ for me..
As of this weekend, I just won an all expense paid trip to Las Vegas (!) to play pool for a week in the APA National 8 Ball Team Championships! It couldn’t have been better timing because not three weeks after playing for that title, I’ll be playing in my first ever US Amateur Championships, an individual title. It might be an understatement to say that I plan on practicing pool through most of the summer…but at least my hobby takes me places.
I currently hold several collegiate titles, but this is my first adventure into tournaments open to the general public – into real “shark infested waters.” I can’t wait to see how far I get!
Hi there, Surf Reporters!
Been there done that already this year, or, as Jimmy Buffett would say, “The weather is here, wish you were beautiful”.
Wife Barb & I went to South Beach and Key West the latter part of March. Unfortunately, we had failed to take into consideration Spring Break, *ARRGGGH* but we enjoyed the trip anyway. Key West was especially interesting. Plus, some great air & hotel bargains.
I will say this about air travel today: it has sunk from the merely inconvenient to the truly uncivilized. If you fly nowadays, bring a truckload of patience & restraint.
Today’s quotes from one of my main gurus…
1. “Travel is fatal to ignorance, prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness.” – Mark Twain
2. “I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.” – Mark Twain
I’m with kenju on the twenty cents thing. I would not have left without an explanation. And my two dimes.
We had a kindergarten graduation and high school, nothing in between. I’m still wondering when I’ll graduate from the school of hard knocks.
@Brittney – You live right in my neck of the woods. Fun to hear you talk about stuff I recognize. Have been to LLL for some work related overnights. I read you ant issue on your blog. We have had so many ants and flies this year, I think it’s a sign of the apocalypse (plague).
@ Bikerchick – so, did you win last year?
No big summer plans. Went do Disney in March. I don’t know if there will be any beach left in the near future. I keep thinking I need to go out and eat copious amounts of shrimp while it still exists, but so far I haven’t.
Gretchen- I’m from Bucks County, you? Oh sure all the rich kids went to Stone Harbor. Us poor kids had to stay in the campgrounds on the other side of the Parkway. Thanks WB and Bikerchick. I still don’t feel bad using Jeff’s page to announce my bday. Psst…it’s the 20th anniversary of my 21st.
Karla, that’s cool, isn’t that place gorgeous? We actually live in Chicago, but we are frequent visitors of Wisconsin.
OMG those ants! We had em again yesterday!!!!!!!!!! The Raid with the comforting aroma must’ve wore off…sigh.
Happy Birthday Whistle Dick!
No Summer vacation plans. We vacation in the late Fall and Winter. Take off every Friday in November and December with a big 10-11 days off over Christmas and New Years. We go into the woods at this time and murder innocent forest creatures and eat them.
Summer plans: NONE! And thats the way I like it.
Change: Hand it over sister. If I was to make a return, would I be given 21 dollars? No, I would be given the amount stated on the reciept.
Same with the coffee shop, a while back there was this chick working there (she doesn’t warrant the term woman, or lady) who gave me the evil eye everytime I waited for my two pennys in change. One day being quiet in there, I got the old evil eye again so I said hey look, change is change, and I would be willing to bet that you would not let me leave here if I stiffed you by two cents everyday. I think it sunk in with her. I hate when clerks decide to skim from the till by trying to pass it off as some sort of minor change issue.
Happy Birthday Whistle Dick!
that was fun to type. =-)
Same thing, different year. Avoiding the tourists who line up in droves for “bucket dining” at many of North Myrtle Beach’s finest buffets while I marinate in humidity and anxiously await the coming “bourbon season”.
Zoe: Montgomery County. And I only saw Stone Harbor once as an adult, but it seemed real nice. We stayed in the campgrounds near O.C. too (this is back in the 70s and early 80s). My folks had a camper. Always loved the O.C. boardwalk at night too.
summer vacation, good one.
I may go to St. Louis this saturday, beyond that random trips to Ohio.
We shall leave what I now affectionately refer to as Satan’s Anus (NC) and head to the back woods of VT for a week. It’s maybe in the 60s there right now.
While there, we plan to tour the Ben and Jerry’s factory, because my 9 year old daughter thinks they’re rock stars. We will also walk outside extensively, without wishing we were dead.
I can’t wait.
Our summer is half over, back to work on the 25th. Meantime we’re hanging out in Santa Barbara learning to paraglide. Maybe I’m a little old to learn how to sail a few hundred feet in the air on a piece of nylon suspended by what appears to be fishing line, but what a cool feeling when you get settled in and flying. I had 10 or 11 little flights off the 200ft training hill this morning with just a couple minor incidents. Better than the first day out, for sure. The wife is scared shitless of heights and she’s into it too. It’s just that cool. I highly recommend this activity. By the way, we left the day after the 14 year old granddaughter’s 8th grade “graduation”. She did get a couple awards for acaemic accomplishment and all, and we were justifiably proud. But I don’t remember anything of the sort back in 1969 when I was unceremoniously booted from the 8th grade. And Happy B-Day, Whistle Dick. Hope you have a great day.
I would burn a store to the ground over the principle of 20 cents that was rightfully owed me…just sayin’.
We’re headed to Maine to visit my family for TWO fun filled, vodka soaked, beer guzzling weeks!
First we will drive for two days, arriving half dead and exhausted. My uncle will be sloppy drunk and trying to expose himself to our dog. My grandmother will greet us with an affectionate, “I’m glad I didn’t DIE before you came back to see me again” and as soon as my mother flies in on her broom, her bossy nit picking attitude will make me want to throw myself in front of a stampeding moose.
Instead, I will start drinking and I will not stop until we get ready to leave.
When they drag me to five THOUSAND yard sales, all located in the French speaking part of Aroostook county, I WILL BE DRUNK!
When we go to the steak supper at the Legion and some world war II Legionnaire tries to cop a feel, I’LL BE DRUNK!
When my cousins all show up and I can’t remember all their names, it’ll be ok because I’LL BE DRUNK AND SO WILL THEY!
When the Swedish polka music starts playing during the 4th of July BBQ, I will be dancing naked around the maypole DRUNK!
It’s my family.
There is a HUGE need for booze.
When I get a video camera I’ll tape it for all of you. You’ll never believe it unless you see it on video.
A shameless plug for one of my favorite bars:
A local blog in Cincinnati is having a best bar contest. It’s down to The Crazy Fox and Dana’s. I like Dana’s but it’s no Crazy Fox. If you wouldn’t mind please go to this link and vote for the Fox. You can vote every two hours. Thanks.
http://thecincinnatiman.com/2nd-annual-best-bar-in-cincinnati-final/
No summer vacations. My life is just one long day.
I’m not sure how much I’d over react over 20 cents. It depends on the situation. I spend a lot at BN and I get the 10% discount so I’m ok with 20 cent.
However I just went to my local subway which is irritation fodder. This time it wasn’t the subway people except they are now doing the thing like at Moe’s where you get a half assed welcome to subway.
What was annoying is the fat people who should have drowned in the floods yesterday (but wouldn’t because they are fat, but might because they couldn’t keep their mouths closed).
Anyway, 3 people, 6 sandwiches, and of course they were short on cash. And I don’t care how cute little sally is, if you’re god damn pre-cunt can’t make up her mind about what toppings she wants just order for her already.
Sorry, it was really hot in there, I was on my way to work, and it was Subway.
One more post to follow.
Pour one out for Touchdown Jesus.
http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100615/NEWS01/306160001/1055/NEWS/Rebuilding-plan-Make-it-fireproof
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchdown_Jesus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_of_Kings_(statue)
Tammie, I love you and your family because except for the witch of a mother, it sounds a lot like my family.
t-storm: Be sure to check out my link above of the 911 calls made about that incident.
Tammie: I sympathize whole heartedly. I required one obscenely large Mai Tai and several margaritas to get through the last two days with my family.