Rain, rain, go away.

So, my boss thinks he's funny.  His email begins:

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This week’s Key Performance Indicator report follows:

   1. I’d like to indicate that my key has been working fine all week.
   2. . . .
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While the rain has cooled things off nicely, I'm ready for it to stop.  The dampness is a boon for the fire department on the 4th of July weekend, but it just means I'll be cutting a lot of grass.  In my neighborhood, the fireworks are indistinguishable from gunfire or the sound of a car crash.  I need the neighbors to set off one more M80 to really get my adrenaline going.

Speaking of adrenaline.  This article really fired me up.  http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/542.html  40 percent of the U.S. population are outside of the federal income tax system.  Of those who file tax returns, a third pay no income tax, and some of them get a refund above what they actually paid in just for having lots of babies.  I know the guy who cuts my hair files no return.  I know some other cash economy types who don't either.  That makes those tax numbers on my pay stub cut just a little harder.  I'm all for repealing the income tax, which is totally unfair, and having a national sales tax now.  I was previously casually for it, but it's time for the illegals and dealers and hos and hairdressers to help out.  You buy bling, you pay tax.  The legit folks are getting shafted. I'm a single, white guy with no kids. I pay more in taxes than most people make period. . . and I vote!

No gelatin, just fun.

Well, our team lost badly tonight. There was frustration on the bench, in the locker room, and most evidently on the ice. I recognized my mistakes as I made them, but they were mostly a result of a lack of communication with the defensemen, or just being a little out of position at times. I wasn't the only one missing passes. A comment was made afterwards that we have the talent, but we have just not gelled yet.  The fact is, the other team played great defense and their goalie was on fire.  I would like to thank the friends I invited for not showing up, because it was not pretty.  Since the teams were redrafted, we haven't played an easy team yet.  I'm beginning to think we are it.

On the real!  http://www.zoomcom.ca/beerleague/  This 5 minute video portrays almost exactly what it's like.

Victor Wooten simply jams.

After a crazy morning working an outage in Kansas which turned out to be a wiring issue, then setting up a test network in a lab in OP, followed by a truck taking out two poles which held fiber and power for a section of KCK, then a very brief lunch, followed by the writing of make-work procedure documents, I got an unexpected Tuesday afternoon call asking me to play hockey at the last minute. It was unexpected because I had not emailed Ric to volunteer, because I had concert tickets. Oh, well. I would rather have not known about the ice time opportunity. I chose correctly.  We ate at Mad Greek, which is my favorite Lawrence restaurant. Plus, Victor Wooten is still probably the best electric bass player alive, if not the fastest. Tonight, I was trying to imagine seeing Victor Wooten play with Dick Dale, since I've now seen them both recently and they both play very fast. I got a late start on my midnight maintenance due to the Soul Circus show ending at midnight and the drive time back from Lawrence. Milwaukee Mike stayed up after his network maintenance to verify my work. I'm finally crashing. I hope the phone doesn't ring too early. The siding dudes are supposed to begin work on one of my houses in the morning. I suspect I'll get 3 hours of sleep before they start calling. The benefit this week is that I'm on-call Thursday and Friday, so no office hours. I can nap during the day, theoretically.  I hope the holiday weekend is quiet on the work front.  It's possible, but the odds are slim.

Thaiday

Yup. The Thai Place in Westport is good. Nuff said.

Road trip wrap-up

After a long drive Friday night, and a good night's sleep, for once, Saturday I went with my folks to a dirt track in Nashville, AR and watched the stock car races. We brought dad's car and unloaded it, but while they were packing the track, he noticed an engine problem, so we didn't get to see him race. I was happy to just watch, though. I have fun whenever I go to Lakeside Speedway in KCK. The Nashville track is similar, smaller, and just a little more redneck. I'll add pics when I copy them off of the camera. Today is a return to normalcy, whatever that is. I'm planning to work out, unpack, and relax.

The last push before the weekend!

After a semi-busy day of meeting siding contractors and actually working my day job, Ric called me at 4:44 about playing hockey at 7.  He had someone cancel at the last minute.  I reluctantly agreed, as my gear is still wet from having played the previous two nights. I went home after another hour of work and aired it out under a fan on the back porch as much as possible.  I washed and dried the necessary sundries. I made it to the rink at about 6:50. I had no tape. My garter was missing a clip. I borrowed a plastic clip and a bit of tape and made it onto the ice in time for a brief warm-up skate. I made a lot of new friends in a short time. They had bratwursts and bleu cheese burgers on the grill outside afterwards. And beer. It was tasty. I had never had Koop's "Arizona Heat" mustard.  Great stuff.  On my second bratwurst, the guys tried to pass Sriracha sauce off as ketchup.  I saw the rooster on the bottle and was not fooled.  But I played along with the supposed joke and loaded up my bratwurst bun with it.  "That's gonna burn your keester tomorrow."  I did not flinch.  I did not shed a tear.  I am acclimatized.  That's the "good ketchup."  We go through quarts of that in the break room at the office.  Besides, I've been eating Vietnamese food on a regular basis since college.  Some measure of respect was earned by the quantity of sriracha on my bratwurst.  I have to say, it's a good combination.  Then I stopped over to pick up a lost/found remote for my car at my brother's place, then I went to work at 11:30pm for more midnight maintenance, which I just finished. Now, I get to go home and do the pre-housekeeper housekeeping. She doesn't do dishes and laundry, so I have to get that stuff out of her way.  I'm taking a weekend road trip to see my folks tomorrow afternoon, so I'll be packing for that, as well.  I might get to bed by 4am.  Then I have a 10am meeting in Overland Park.  Five hours of sleep will have to be sufficient.  My body will hate me tomorrow.

Work, play, and one fine dinner.

It's officially summer and the teams in the 30 and Over hockey league at Pepsi Ice Midwest have been redrafted. My team has never played together and it showed. We lost 2-4. I think Bob and Curt, defensemen, and Sam, a forward, are the only ones I've skated with before.  I was still learning forwards' names in the 3rd period.  I hope we pull together some sort of synergy soon.

I worked in OP today, so I was able to try the touted Tiesta Casa Paloma (81st & Metcalf). You pay Taco Bell prices for great food.  And the salsa bar is so advanced of the Hot, Mild, or Fire fare, I'm hooked.  That place is a gem.  I'm going for the Tres Leche Cake next time.  This time I was overstuffed from the Carne Asada Tortas.  I'm still a Pancho's fan, for many of the same reasons plus the 24-hour drive-thru, but if I find myself in the vicinity, Casa Paloma has my business.