Year: 2008

Wall-E

Donna and I risked life and limb by walking to the Concord Mills Mall this morning. It really wasn’t that dangerous as it was 8:30 and not many people were up yet. None of the stores were open in the mall yet, but the doors were open for walkers and such. When we got to the other end of the mall the box office for the movies weren’t even open. We bought tickets to the 9:25am showing from a kiosk that was out front and killed the next 45 minutes until the gates opened window shopping.

Go see this movie. If it weren’t for (what I thought) was kind of a heavy handed comment on humans being fat, lazy and ruining the planet we live on, this would have been a perfect movie. Its a love story. Its an adventure flick. The animation is pitch perfect. When you are on the dusty, deserted earth the colors are muted you can feel the grit and when the action is set on the cruising space ship it is bright and joyous.

After the movie we made another circuit of the mall and did a little shopping. I went into FYE to look over the bargain DVDs, hoping to find another bargain gem like Test Tube Babies. I ended up buying the first (and only) season of Firefly. After lunch in the food court (big mistake), with the temperatures now in the 90s and the traffic exponentially heavier than this morning, we called the hotel up and took advantage of their free shuttle back.

To overcome today’s bad lunch experience, we did the same thing we did yesterday, dinner at Razzoo’s!

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 225

Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez

We took this afternoon off and had intended to go home and eat lunch before heading out, but didn’t make it, we ended up eating at Popeyes. Longtime readers will know that Popeyes and the Bogardi have a checkered past and will wonder just what the heck we were doing there again considering our history there. The rest of you will now be able to ask that question the next time we eat there, which will probably be during a weak moment several months from now.

It was 11:45 and before the lunch crowd so I walked right up and placed an order. We decided to split a #9 meal, popcorn shrimp with 3 catfish strips, dirty rice, a biscuit and a medium drink. Donna filled the drink and found a table while I waited near the counter for our lunch. There was already someone there waiting for his lunch and soon we were joined by a number of other diners as the order takers were more efficient than the order makers. Well, really, order maker because there was only one of him.

If you ordered chicken you were in luck because that was ready, but as usual, anything else needed to be cooked. I could see our order half filled sitting there with the rice and shrimp as we waited on the catfish. Donna by this time had joined all of us near the counter to chat up the poor guy who was waiting when we walked in and still was. Turns out he was waiting on a couple of po’boys. After about 6-7 minutes more his sandwiches were done and the lady tossed an apple pie in his bag for having to wait so long.

We were next and she put a couple of pies on our tray too, but tried to hand us red beans & rice instead of dirty rice. She corrected that and we headed for a table. Once seated Donna had to go back up to get some of the promised tartar sauce and an extra spork for the rice. Wasn’t until we were done that we realized we didn’t get a biscuit either. By then we didn’t want it either. We split one of the apple pie things and gave the second one away to a fellow sitting behind us.

Dinner was also Naw’lins style but a much nicer experience. Then again we have never had a bad meal at Razzo’s in Concord, NC. Donna had a shrimp po’boy and I had my favorite Andouille/Red Beanz ‘N’ Rice. I wish this place was closer to Aiken as I’d like to eat here once a week or so. Probably get old after a while, but I’d like to find out how long that would take. Tomorrow we will drop in at Razzoo’s again to pick up an order of Rat Toes to go. There is someone back in Aiken (Hi Mark) who would be very unhappy If I didn’t bring him back some.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 225

Watch the Watch

It was entertainment night at the Old Folks Home and the Amazing Claude was topping the bill. People came from miles around to see the famed hypnotist do his stuff.

As Claude went to the front of the meeting room, he announced, “Unlike most hypnotists who invite two or three people up here to be put into a trance, I intend to hypnotize each and every member of the audience.”

The excitement was almost electric as Claude withdrew a beautiful antique pocket watch from his coat. “I want you each to keep your eye on this antique watch. It’s a very special watch. It’s been in my family five or six generations.”

He began to swing the watch gently back and forth while quietly chanting, “Watch the watch, watch the watch, watch the watch.” The crowd became mesmerized as the watch swayed back and forth, light gleaming off its polished surface. Hundreds of pairs of eyes followed the swaying watch, until, suddenly, it slipped from the hypnotist’s fingers and fell to the floor, breaking into a hundred pieces.

“Shit,” said Claude.

It took three days to clean up the Old Folks Home.

HIPPA To Be Square

A local hospital’s mobile mammogram bus visits the plant every year. The nurse makes a schedule of when each person is supposed to go get their test done. She makes up a little spreadsheet, but gets me to print it out at 18 x 24 on my plotter. It gets posted on a stand in the main entrance corridor between her office and HR.

When we walked by it the other day on our way for one of our walks on break, Donna commented that maybe that shouldn’t be there because maybe the participants didn’t want everyone else to see it. I quipped something about HIPPA and she said, “Well my name isn’t on there, so I’m not going to worry about it.”

Later that morning as I was walking by the sign, a woman who was on the list, wondered aloud, like me, if maybe that didn’t violate HIPPA (feel free to try and figure that out, here is a link to the 101 page PDF.) She must have said something to Human Resources because the next time I passed that way, the schedule was gone.

That afternoon as I sat in my cube working, I heard that same woman passing by and she must have came upon a friend going in the opposite direction because she announced to her (loud enough to be heard over a 100′ radius), “I can’t talk now, I’m off to get my mammogram!”

So much for taking down the schedule so people wouldn’t know…

Started up, went down, back up, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 224

Be Careful What You Wish For

Last night we went for a little bike ride with the express purpose of ending up downtown for an ice cream cone. We almost blew it, didn’t realize that they closed at eight o’clock on week nights and we walked in just before quitting time. When we left the store, one of the employees followed us to the door and flipped the sign from OPEN to CLOSED. As we sat on the chairs on the sidewalk outside the Sweet Cow Creamery several people had to turn away empty handed. I almost felt bad sitting there eating my cup of Moose Tracks, almost.

One of the young guys who worked there when he finished mopping the floor, came out to take down the ice cream cone shaped flag. When he passed by us Donna asked him, “Because you work here, do you get to eat all the ice cream you want?” “Yep,” he replied. “Ever eat too much?” “Yeah,” he told us, “made myself sick a couple of times.” As he walked back inside he said, “Be careful what you wish for.”

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 221

Press 1 For Incompetence, Press 2 For Frustration

We picked up the cable converter box last night, but I didn’t hook it up until just before leaving for work this morning. I didn’t have time to put the batteries into the remote, but when the TV was tuned to channel 3, I did get a cable channel.

Tonight when we got home from work there was a message from the cable company saying they had a man at my house at 3:15 PM to upgrade my service and I should call back and reschedule. Huh? I didn’t need any upgrade, when I asked for the converter box I told them I wanted it so I could have the digital basic line-up. As the woman handed me the box I also asked did she need to program it or anything (the last couple years this was the procedure) and she said no. So I was mystified as to why they needed to send someone out, until I checked the channel line up, I didn’t have any of the upper channels (which is what I wanted.) Guess I better call them.

I dialed the local number and was greeted by a message stating that the number was no longer in service and I should dial the 1-888 toll free number. I did and it was answered after one ring and I was dumped into voice mail hell. Press 1 if you blah, blah, blah, Press 2 for yadda yadda, Press 3 for whatever, etc. I try 1 and get a secondary menu with no options that I need, press 9 to back up one menu. Try 2, but that leads no where as well. Third time is a charm because I just punch in zero for a customer service representative. Wait, wait, wait while listening for advertisements for their internet service, their phone service and a friendly reminder that on February 19th of 2009 I better have all my TVs hooked to their cable or I’ll be out of luck. The office is less than a mile from my house so just about the time I decide to just unhook the box and take it back, I get a human. Dan takes my info and asks some basic questions: Is the box hooked up? Am I home and in front of it? Do I have any picture? Yes, yes and yes. He says, “Let me send a signal to your box.” “Try a channel above 100. Anything?” No I tell him. “Let’s try again,” he says. “still nothing. He suggests “re-booting” the box. I unplug it, wait 10 seconds and plug it back in. A sequence of lights flicker and I’m in business. Dan comments that he didn’t know why they didn’t do that in the office. I tell him I didn’t think that the woman I was dealing with yesterday in the office was the sharpest crayon in the box.

How come I can set a couple different lists of favorites, but I cannot subtract channels I don’t want to see, or hear, in the case of the music channels?

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 219

TV Stars

MAL: We’re not gonna die. We can’t die, Bendis. You know why? Because we are so very pretty. We are just too pretty for God to let us die. Huh? Look at that chiseled jaw.

This is what happens when you win the World Series, you get to play on TV a lot. Last Saturday on FOX, yesterday on TBS, tonight on ESPN and this coming Wednesday on ESPN2. So far the FRS are 1 and 1 and trailing by one run tonight going into the 9th.

Hasn’t left much time for Netflix disc watching. We still have 3 episodes of Due South to watch on the first disc of Season One and we also have P.S. I Love You collecting dust on the coffee table.

On the way home from work tonight we stopped by the cable company and picked up a converter box. We need the box to get Versus, Le Tour starts in less than two weeks.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 217