Archive for April, 2009

• Stand by me – the global version

  Date: 2009.04.28 | Category: videos | Response: 0

  
  Playing For Change | Song Around The World “Stand By Me” from Concord Music Group on Vimeo

  This mashup was recorded at various places across the planet and mixed to create an amazing compilation. The run-time is around five minutes but it is one of the greatest versions of this song I’ve ever heard. It’s probably the coolest thing I have heard in the past month.

• Lost and burnt

  Date: 2009.04.21 | Category: Life as we know it | Response: 0

  I haven’t golfed a round of 18 in quite a while. The last time I played I was with my dad and uncles and we played best ball. When my shots flew errant it wasn’t a big deal because we didn’t necessarily have to play where my golf ball landed.

  On Saturday I played a round of 18 and I had quite a good time – mostly because I didn’t take it too serious. I ended up doing… what’s the best way to describe it? oh AWFUL but I did have fun. I was probably in the +40 range and I lost 14 or so golf balls during the course of the game. I didn’t loose any of them in the water – I simply lost them. At one point I drove four in a row across the fence and off the course. I didn’t count those as official shots – yep – the good ole mulligan. I acquired a set of golf clubs a few weeks ago and Jessica and I are going to engage in a round of bad golf at some point. I feel sorry for any people that happen to have a tee time behind us.

  I didn’t wear sunscreen and I got a rather interesting sunburn. I was wearing long sleeves, sunglasses, and a hat so my upper body was rather unscathed save for the back of my neck. What did get burned were my ankles. I have a nifty line where my socks were sitting. Luckily, you can’t tell that I have been burnt. Another guy that was with us was wearing a visor all day long – and he is bald. Yes – it looks a funny as you might imagine.

• Rock usually wins

  Date: 2009.04.13 | Category: Life as we know it | Response: 2

  In a game of paper-rock-scissors any of the three can win. In a game of rock, paper, scissors, lizard, Spock most people can’t keep track of the rules so the winner is seldom decided. When you play rock vs. eye rock always wins.

  On Friday I wanted to take care of as many chores around the house as I could before Jessica got home from work. I started by mowing the yard and it was rather uneventful. I had some grass to trim around the edges of the house so I grabbed the weed eater and fired it up. I made sure to wear my protective glasses because nobody wants to go blind – the chicks really don’t dig it. I was almost done when the really really crappy happened. I hit a rock.

  But wait you might say – you were wearing protective glasses and they should have prevented injuries. You are correct – I was but irony loves to kick me in the ass. Unfortunately rocks like to bounce and this one bounced off my cheek (directly beneath my eye socket), ricocheted off the glasses, and bounced off my eye. Yes – it was painful. Somehow all of that military training kicked in and I immediately shut of the weed trimmer and went inside to irrigate my eye to remove any remaining debris. I knew that I didn’t want to rub my eye or really keep it open. I grabbed my recall roster and called someone to give me a ride to the ER as I felt sheepish about calling an ambulance. Joe, Jessica’s dad, works in the same firehouse that would probably have responded and I didn’t need any excess attention – especially if it turned out that I was overreacting.

  I called Jessica and she wasn’t as calm as I was. I was scared that I would be blind – she was just scared. She quickly jetted out of work and headed down to the ER. She had a visitors pass but didn’t have tags on her car so she had to grab mine to get onto Ft. Lewis. I got to Madigan (the army hospital) about 20 minutes after it happened and I was triaged and quickly rushed through. Most of the people that are in the ER have colds and don’t want to make an appointment – when you have a life/limb/eyesight injury you get pushed right to the front of the line. I was the last one in the waiting room and one of the first ones out. Jessica got to the waiting room without stalling my car – imagine driving a picky clutch while you are extremely nervous while having little experience and driving in rush hour traffic on a Friday. All circumstances considered she did quite well.

  The doc in the ER numbed my eye (hooray for medicine) and went a little overboard with the eyedrops. For the next 30 minutes part of my face was numb. He wasn’t an ophthalmologist so he could only do a basic check to see that I had torn a chunk off my cornea and that it was hanging loose. Gross huh? He called for an ophthalmologist to come in and do a further consult.

  The other doc came and told me that the tear wasn’t in my central vision and I had a giant sigh of relief. I wasn’t going to be blind (HOORAY!). He removed the torn chunk with a Q-Tip and gave prescribed me some painkillers and some ointment. Yes, he touched my eye – some people in my family are probably squirming just thinking about someone else touching their eye. It’s not that big of a deal.

  We had a snafu getting the medication and it ended up taking an extra two hours after diagnosis and consult to get out of there but at least I knew that I was going to be ok. My eye is doing quite well and it should be mostly healed in another day or two.

  I’m a lucky guy – unfortunately I wasn’t lucky enough to have the rock bounce off the glasses in the first place.

• Award winning week

  Date: 2009.04.04 | Category: Life as we know it | Response: 0

  I’ve had an award winning week – of sorts. Last week I won the Knucklebuster award in the munitions maintenance category (a group level award). The annual award is given to the person that creates the most mission impact. Bottom line – as my boss says – I produce results.

  A few days ago I won the NCO of the quarter award for the squadron. This award looks at the whole person concept.

  I guess this means I’m doing the right things at work. It’s nice to get some form of recognition for my work. The unfortunate part is that I hate that actual act of receiving the award. Oh well – I guess its a price I have to pay.

• HA HA HA!

  Date: 2009.04.04 | Category: I was too lazy to organize these | Response: 0