For my father

Time for a new motovideo

After a week of being held hostage by story sources who lacked the courtesy to return my calls promptly, I seized the chance to get out and do what I wanted to do yesterday.

That included trying a new camera angle for a motovideo. All of my previous videos on the bikes were shot with the camera mounted atop my helmet. The results were okay, but since I tilt my head to keep my eyes level with the horizon in the turns, they didn’t give a true sense of the lean angles. You can only get that by attaching the camera to the bike.

So I removed the tank bag from my K1200GT and used the industrial-strength suction cup mount to secure the camera in a position that showed the instrument cluster as well as the road. I wasn’t sure I could get the windscreen clean enough for a clear view and I also worried that the curvature of the plexiglass would distort the view. I needn’t have worried.

Here’s about 10 minutes of a romp up Ark. 351 and west on Ark. 358.

The time is now

Saturday morning

It’s 11 a.m. Saturday and we’re having a late breakfast at Cracker Barrel.

Austin is in Indiana this weekend, so we’re enjoying our temporary empty nest status.

My Mini 9’s webcam doesn’t know how to deal with the lighting in here.

A whole week shot to hell

I put out calls and emails starting on Monday for this story I’m supposed to write and, so far, I’ve only talked with one person who is no longer on the board of the organization about which I’m writing.

The president is a woman who is notorious for not returning calls. I left a voicemail on her office phone on Monday, followed up on Tuesday and sent her an email (which I know she saw because a source told me she always checks her email on her Blackberry).

I left a message on the organization’s voicemail on Monday, but have since learned the organization ran out of money months ago and terminated its administrative assistant, so there is no one to listen to or respond to that message.

I should have guess that when I noticed their web site hasn’t been updated since June 9, 2008.

I now have a call out to a Realtor in hopes that she can say something useful to the story.

Because nobody answers their phone anymore, I have wasted an entire week waiting for people – mainly the organization president – to call me back.

I like to be helpful, but this is just not something I ever want to do again. Increasing difficulty in reaching sources is one of the things that made early retirement from The Indianapolis Star attractive. Well, that and the fact that Gannett practices Management By Fear and I was too old and too professional to put up with that crap.

So this will be the last of these pieces I agree to take on. My time is worth more to me than the modest compensation this work will bring.

Jesse James cheated on Sandra Bullock for this?

Another item for the World Gone Mad File

I don’t ordinarily give a rat’s ass about the Hollywood marriage-go-round or celebrities’ chronic inability to keep their lives between the guardrails, but I like Sandra Bullock. She’s beautiful, smart and witty. So this week’s revelation that her marriage to Jesse James is on the rocks because he shacked up with another woman makes me wonder why she married such an idiot. Here’s what FoxNews says about the other woman:

Jesse James’ self-proclaimed mistress Michelle 'Bombshell' McGee told In Touch magazine she first contacted the “Monster Garage” star via MySpace, and it turns out McGee is indeed quite web savvy.

The tattoo model is featured on a site called SoCalGlamourGirls.com, where viewers can pay to see her on a webcam, or chat with her on the Internet.

FOX411: Tattoo Model Says She Slept With Sandra Bullock's Husband.

"I am the hottest busty tattoo and fetish model you will ever meet on a webcam,” her profile reads. “Come have a hot and steamy affair with inked girls like me on live video."

On the site, McGee claims that she’s currently working on her Masters degree in biochemistry.

SLIDESHOW: Meet Michelle 'Bombshell' McGee.

Stating that she has a BS in biology, the Internet performer also claims to have completed two years of medical school.

However, she’s listed as 24 years-old on the site, so unless she’s some kind of leather-clad Doogie Howser, her college curricula just barely adds up.

Noting that she’s “really wild in the sack” and “looking for the right sugardady” [sic], Michelle, continuing her medical theme, says she especially loves “to have affairs with doctors.”

The inked Internet entrepreneur also mentions her foot fetish and dominatrix work, stating “I mostly wear leather and chains for my video chat customers.”

SSD Drama

The RunCore 32GB Pro PATA Mini Zif Solid State Drive I bought from My Digital Discount has crashed and died.

It was on back order when I made my purchase last Nov. 2 and it finally arrived Dec. 21. I followed the enclosed instructions and cloned my Windows XP operating system and files from my original 8GB drive onto the new SSD. It worked pretty well for a month or so.

Then it started giving me the Blue Screen of Death with increasing frequency. I re-cloned the old drive onto it and it worked ok for a few days before reverting to the BSD routine.

So I bit the bullet, bought an external CD drive (since my Dell Mini 9 has no CD drive) and did a clean install of XP and reloaded all of my programs and files. It worked like a champ and my Mini 9 was faster than ever. I was a happy camper.

For two weeks.

Then last Friday morning I fired up the computer and the motherboard searched and searched and finally reported it could find no operating system, i.e., no SSD. So I put the old 8GB SSD back in and it runs fine, albeit slower and with less than 700 megabytes of free space.

Consequently, I sent the following message to My Digital Discount’s Customer Service Department this morning:

I purchased a RunCore 32GB Pro IV 50mm T-Style PCI-e PATA Solid State Drive SSD on 11/2/09 and received it 12/21/09. I initially cloned my 8GB drive to it and it ran fine for a month or so before it started crashing. I did a clean install of WindowsXP and it ran perfectly until last week when it crashed to the point where my Dell Mini 9 can't even see it. I have since gone back to the old drive.
What are my warranty options?
Sorry about the lack of an order #. It's not on the confirmation email I received when I ordered the SSD.

I’ll let you know how they respond.

Benjamin Franklin on entitlement programs and the poor

…I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means.—I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.

In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.

There is no country in the world [but England] where so many provisions are established for them; so many hospitals to receive them when they are sick or lame, founded and maintained by voluntary charities; so many alms-houses for the aged of both sexes, together with a solemn general law made by the rich to subject their estates to a heavy tax for the support of the poor.

Under all these obligations, are our poor modest, humble, and thankful; and do they use their best endeavours to maintain themselves, and lighten our shoulders of this burthen?—On the contrary, I affirm that there is no country in the world in which the poor are more idle, dissolute, drunken, and insolent. The day you passed that act, you took away from before their eyes the greatest of all inducements to industry, frugality, and sobriety, by giving them a dependence on somewhat else than a careful accumulation during youth and health, for support in age or sickness.

In short, you offered a premium for the encouragement of idleness, and you should not now wonder that it has had its effect in the increase of poverty. Repeal that law, and you will soon see a change in their manners. St. Monday, and St. Tuesday, will cease to be holidays. SIX days shalt thou labour, though one of the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them.

[From Benjamin Franklin, "On the Price of Corn and the Management of the Poor" (1766), Writings (New York: Library of America, 1987), 587-88.]

Just in time for the riding season

The 2010 BMW Motorcycle Owners of America Anonymous book was about the only interesting thing in today’s mail.

Now that I’ve scanned it for this blog entry, it’ll go into the tank bag on my K1200GT.

The Anonymous book is a 5”x7” 222-page paperback that has a state-by-state, city-by-city list of BMW MOA members who stand ready to help you if you have trouble on the road. Each listing is anonymous, in that there is no name – just a phone number – and codes like c (camping or tent space), ws (space to work on a motorcycle), wt (tools for working on a motorcycle), ss (storage space), or t (truck or trailer available). It also lists all of the BMW motorcycle dealers in the U.S. and Canada (including the recently defunct dealership in Little Rock), as well as important contacts worldwide. There are lists of phone numbers for motel chains, airlines, car rental, railroads, traveler’s checks, and on and on.

I never leave for a trip without mine. Last year’s will go into the saddlebag of Maria’s K75S.

Ooops!

Somebody at American Advisors Group didn’t get the memo to pull the commercial featuring Peter Graves.

The actor died yesterday, but the commercial is still running today.

Monday, Monday

This headline probably doesn’t strike anyone around here as humorous, but it made me snicker.

We passed a quiet weekend at home and now. I took the rest of the week off from my writing assignment that’s due on March 22. Now that the new week is upon me, I’m back in procrastination mode. I do, however, have semi-firm plans to make some phone calls in search of information starting after lunch today. Unless something more interesting comes up.

I discovered a new (to me) blog this morning that, if you’re of a conservative inclination, is a fun read. Of course, now that I’m on board as a reader, she’ll probably abandon it, but Bride of Rove is worth the effort.

Also, friend Lauri has invited me to contribute to her blog: Mad Meanderings. That’s incredibly flattering and I’ll have to give some thought to what I should write.

And it’s cold and cloudy too…

It’s 1:20 p.m. and I’m having my first cup of coffee of the day. I’m at Books-a-Million, having hit the post office and the Parker Road Walmart pharmacy and Kroger.

The entire medical insurance world has figured out that I turn 65 on July 14 because they’re flooding our mailbox with offers for Medicare supplemental insurance. I suppose I should start thinking about it, but not today.

There are two Walmarts in Jonesboro – an older store on Highland and the newer Super Walmart way the hell down south on Parker Road. (We live about 8 miles north of town.) I would rather have a rat in my mouth than go to the Highland Walmart. So when I asked my doctor’s nurse to phone a prescription in for me, I specified the PARKER FUCKING ROAD WALMART.

When I showed up to claim it the pharmacy tech checked and reported they had not received a prescription from my doc. I asked her to check with the Highland store and, sure enough, it had been called to that pharmacy. Did I want it transferred to the Parker Road pharmacy? Well, that’s where I’m standing with charge card in hand, so the answer is yes. Actually, it’s FUCK YES, but there’s no point in taking it out on her.

So instead of a simple grab-and-pay, like I would normally experience when dealing with alert, competent people, I got to piss away 20 minutes while the pharmacist filled the prescription from scratch. Oh, and when I was talking with the doc’s nurse yesterday, I asked her if this stuff was on Walmart’s $4 generic list. Yes, she said.

So imagine my surprise when the charge was $8 and change.

How can this be so hard?

And I should also mention that the 32GB Solid State Drive (SSD) I bought a few months ago for this netbook died yesterday after working wonderfully for a week or so on a clean install of Windows XP. The system can’t even see the drive.

Consequently, I put the original 8GB SSD back in and will limp along with less than 700 megabytes of free space until I figure out a new solution.

It’s always something.

Happy Birthday, Lauri

Here she is with the flowers we sent.

Freakin’ Frog

My son Steve on bass at Tuesday open mic night at the Freakin’ Frog in Las Vegas. It’s good to see him playing jazz again.

Sunny Thursday

It’s 61 degrees and I’m on the bike for the day.

My first stop was the post office where I noticed someone had dropped their ear plugs. I left them there on the pavement. Using someone else’s ear plugs is like using a stranger’s toothbrush. Besides, I didn’t want to get hearing AIDS.

After not enough thought, as it turns out, I decided on breakfast at Waffle House.

Even though I was wearing my fluorescent lime green riding jacket, I was apparently invisible to the waitress for several minutes. When she brought my silverware, she apparently noticed a problem with the knife – or else figured I couldn’t be trusted with it - and left only the fork and spoon on a napkin.

I ordered coffee and a 3-egg ham and cheese omelet with hash browns and toast. Naturally, the meal showed up with a packet of mixed fruit jelly. Who the hell likes or buys mixed fruit? I’ve long contended that Mixed Fruit is what they package at the end of the day with the leftovers.

When the waitress brought my check, I asked her for a packet of strawberry jelly in exchange for the mixed fruit. She brought it, but still hadn’t noticed that she’d shorted me a knife. Have you ever tried to apply jelly to toast with a fork or a spoon?

And, by the way, Waffle House coffee is fucking awful.

Now I’m at Hastings sipping some real coffee and using their free Wifi.

I thought long and hard yesterday about driving up to Indiana for my cousin’s memorial service this afternoon. I don’t know that my presence would have made that much difference to her sisters and brother. They might have been impressed that I’d care enough to drive all the way from Arkansas, but mostly their minds would be on other things and 14 hours is a long time to spend in a car for a short event like that.

Instead, I sent flowers and resolved to make time later this year to drive/ride over to Nashville and spend time with her brother, Sam. Sam is close to my age and at various times in our lives, we could pass for brothers, or maybe even twins.

From the post office bulletin board

This flyer showed up on the post office community bulletin board this week.

Midnight Cowboy isn’t a particularly imaginative wrestler name, but I kinda like Family of Pain and Loose Cannon.

Godspeed, Cousin Susie

Edens, Suellen G.

Suellen Groninger Edens 70, Indianapolis, died Mar. 8, 2010. Memorial service: 2 p.m. Mar. 11 in Myers Chapel of Memories, Lebanon. Interment: Deer Creek Cemetery, Deer Creek, IN.

Suellen Groninger Edens

Ms. Suellen Groninger Edens, 70, of Indianapolis, died Monday, March 8, 2010, at Westview Hospital in Indianapolis.
Suellen Edens was born January 4, 1940, in Flora. She was the daughter of the late Herbert U. and Ruth L. (Dietz) Groninger. She graduated from Lebanon High School in 1958 and attended Purdue University.
She married Tony Edens in 1959, in Indianapolis; they later divorced.
Ms. Edens lived in Lafayette, Bloomington and Grand Rapids, Mich. She moved to Indianapolis in the early 1980s, and  remained there.
She was a member of Tri Kappa Sorority in Lebanon.
Survivors include two children, Kimberly S. Faison of Santa Barbara, Calif., and Kent A. Edens of Hoboken, N.J.; one brother, Samuel H. Groninger and wife, Mary Ann, of Nashville, Tenn.; two sisters, Kay L. Boatman-Sampson and husband , Richard, of Lebanon and Jo Anne Sutter of Elkhart; and one grandson, several nieces and nephews, and several great-nieces and great-nephews.
Memorial funeral services are to be held at 2 p.m. Thursday, March 11, at Myers Chapel of Memories, 1502 N. Lebanon St., Lebanon, with the Rev. Vey Kidney officiating. Interment will follow cremation at the Deer Creek Cemetery in Deer Creek.
No Visitation is planned.
Memorial contributions may be made to Heartland Hospice, 931 E. 86th St., Suite 208, Indianapolis, IN 46240.
Online condolences may be made at www.myersmortuary.com.

Those are the obits from this morning’s Indianapolis Star and yesterday’s Lebanon Reporter for my cousin Susie. Her mother and mine were sisters and she was my favorite girl cousin when I was a little kid. She doted on me and I had sort of a crush on her.

She was all flash and glamour as a teenager and a young adult. She modeled and did TV commercials, but her marriage fell apart when she was in her 30s and she struggled with mental illness and alcoholism for the rest of her life.

It’s hard for me to get my brain wrapped around the image of her as an old woman, suffering from emphysema in an Indianapolis nursing home. She turned 70 in January and I guess she decided that was enough.

She’ll be buried tomorrow in the little church cemetery north of Deer Creek, Ind., where our Dietz and McCain ancestors lie.

I love these commercials

This is the new wallpaper on my netbook.

Successful operation

My granddaughter Lisa had outpatient surgery this morning to have tubes put into her ears. She’d become so congested that she could hardly hear.

Here she is with her mom, Nicky, after the surgery. Steve says everything went well.

Gorgeous!

This is Lauri’s latest creation. See it and others at http://www.etsy.com/shop/madmodiste