Dogs And Cats

I tend to have these spells where I think about life, the universe and everything and I do most of this thinking the same place I think most red-blooded males do their thinking......in the restroom.  Afterall,  it's pretty much the only place within one's home that a married man has peace and quiet to do that serious thinking that he needs to do.  Yes, we have tinkering in the garage, swinging iron on the links, or mowing the lawn but those all involve leaving the conforts of the home.

Well, as I said I've been doing some thinking and observing as of late and I suddenly noticed something about dogs and cats I don't think I ever noticed before.

As I said, I have been doing doing alot of this thinking in the restroom and that usually involves closing the door so as to not disturb those around you.  Well, there has been a few times where I haven't shut the door all the way.  Sure enough within seconds of shutting the door, the dog is pushing his head through the crack and looking around.  As soon as she spots me you can almost see the look on her face saying, "Oh, there you are.  All is right in the world".  The thing that always makes me laugh is that I literally just walked into the bathroom and she comes looking for me.  It reminds me of when I'm at my brother's house and his children want to always know where I am.  I also have noticed that my brother's kids are always wanting to play and especially with their uncle.  It's always, "Uncle Ray, will you play with me?".  Well, I've noticed the dog is also like this.  It's always, "Will you pet me?", "Will you throw the ball?",  "Will you run in the backyard with me?".

It's these traits I love about our dogs and other dogs my friends take care of.

Now onto cats.  I only know a few people with cats, but the personality traits seem to be the same.  They could care less if you were there.  You could be gone a week and when you announce your presence back at home, they just look at you with a look that says, "You were gone?  I didn't notice."  If you start playing with them and they get irritated, I can almost see them as little Joe Pesci's from Wiseguys,
"But, I'm funny how? Funny like a clown? I amuse you? I make you laugh?".  Then they proceed to beat the crap out of you.

Rollerbat 2006 Revisited.....A Brother's Response

In reference to the blog Rollerbat 2006, my brother had the following commentary that he initially provided as a comment on the article in question. I thought it was an excellent retort and deserved a place in the front where it can get the attention it deserves:

There are several matters that you have glossed over in your rather lean and anti-septic description of "Rollerbat"

• Its Roll - a - bat. "Rollerbat" as you have it listed seems to imply there would be some kinda roller skates involved. And possibly batting or in the very least something bat and/or guano related. While thats a cool sounding game(perhaps played by bulky Germanic wimmin with clubs) i feel compelled to give you a B+ on memory retention. It neglects the robust history of the name of the game. Roll at a bat. Roll-a-bat.
• The reason that when we were younger fights erupted was because the rules were looser when we were kids. Hitting a fly ball that clips the tops of the trees, careens of two buildings and get caught by someone is frustrating. As children the rules seem to perfectly accept running down the field with the bat, and beating the crap out of the catcher. Everything dies down and the game continued on. Which only enhanced play. The catcher is thinking....you know i'm going to run across the yard jump the steps, and hurdle the hedges to get that buttheads next pop fly. As a game it promotes athletics, tumbling, good cardio vascular health, and coping skills, as well as its own unique talents and skill parameters. ( hitting a ball that you plan to bounce off two houses, and drop behind the dog pool on the wet side...is not easy and requires highly tuned motor skills and a fair amount of the right stuff) The game on the other hand is not endorsed by the National Coalition of Parents In Support of Peacful Backyard Games Foundation L.L.C. So care should be exercised before launching yourself into a strict regime to make the Multi-National-Roll-a-Bat All-Star Olympic Try Outs in November. It'll be on E.S.P.N. 8 "The ocho" the whole month.
• The game is flexible and has a multitude of applications limited only by the inventors mind. Example A: I throw a cold beer into the air. The Swedish Bikini and Oil Wrestling Diva squad tries to catch it. Oh the dilemna ! Will Svenka catch the hurtling beverage!? *gasp* Drama ! Intrigue ! Action Romance ! Stay tuned for the next episode of Beerman all you beerfans. Same beertime....same beer channel. ! See and that is just off the top of my head. You could play Volley-bat. Soccer-bat. Xtreme Snoboardin-a-bat. Look for that in the X games. Also on "the Ocho".
• This is too long and with my screen up to its highest resolution, i get this itty bitty box to type in. I feel like I'm trying to label the Constitution on the side of an asprin bottle with a No. 2 Pencil.
• Typos and grammar mistakes free of charge. I look at my hands when i type not the screen and with the text window at that size, there is no way I'll go back and edit.
  

The great purge of '06

So Nancy and I decided to put our house on the market. Well, in order to put the best foot forward with those people who are walking through our home we decided we needed to "declutter". Declutter is a 4-letter word for homeowners. George Carlin said it best:

So when you get right down it it, your house is nothing more than a place to keep your stuff...while you go out and get...more stuff. 'Cause that's what this country is all about. Tryin' to get more stuff. Stuff you don't want, stuff you don't need, stuff that's poorly made, stuff that's overpriced. Even stuff you can't afford! Gotta keep on gettin' more stuff. Otherwise someone else might wind up with more stuff. Can't let that happen. Gotta have the most stuff.

So you keep getting' more and more stuff, and puttin' it in different places. In the closets, in the attic, in the basement, in the garage. And there might even be some stuff you left at your parents' house: baseball cards, comic books, photographs, souvenirs. Actually, your parents threw that stuff out long ago.

So now you have a houseful of stuff. And, even though you might like your house, you gotta move. Gotta get a bigger house. Why? Too much stuff! And that means you gotta move all your stuff. Or maybe, put some of your stuff in storage. Storage! Image that. There's a whole industry based on keepin' an eye on other people's stuff.

I am by far the worst pack rat on the planet. Correction, I'm the second worst pack rat on the planet. My dad is the worst. He inherited the designation from his father when he passed away.

I digress.....

Nancy and I spent 4 days working on our "decluttering". Of those 4 days, most of one day was spent cleaning up the flower beds with some new mulch and weeding. The other 3 days was spent "decluttering" my office. Nancy took care of the rest of the house. I had stuff everywhere. There was stuff crammed into the file cabinet, I had stuff in boxes in the closet. Most of my stuff was paper related stuff. We ended up filling seven 13-gallon garbage bags with confetti from the shredder before giving up and we weren't even half way through the stack of paper that needed to be shredded. I was shredding bank statements going back 13 years.

There were a few bits of history uncovered. I found a "letter of intent" from a job I was offered 10 years ago. I have come a long way in 10 years. To think I thought 15,000/year was a lot of money back then. When I got that letter I thought I was going to be rich.

Boy did I throw alot of stuff away. I was pretty proud of myself. I felt like I was on an episode of Clean Sweep.

Needless to say, my office is unrecognizable. It's actually useable.

After the 4 days were done, our house looks awesome. I hope that we can keep it up