I’ve Been Busy…

Posted under How I See It

No excuses.  I’ve been really busy lately.  No not a job.  Well not a real job anyways.  In fact my wife chuckles everytime I mention what I’ve been doing lately.  I’ve been writing.  Actually I’ve been writing my butt off lately.  That’s probably why I haven’t been updating this blog in a while. 

You see, in my effort to stay busy, contribute to the household income and to keep from going insane, I’ve been writing for a couple of websites.  The money is not great, in fact it sucks.  But, as I said, it keeps me sane (sort of). 

In addition to this site and my cigar site, I’ve been contributing to this one and this one.  They’ve been fun and I’ve been excited to see where my writing may take me.

On another subject, the family had our pictures taken recently at the beach.  We found a photographer in Laguana Beach.  She was fantastic and we got some great posed and candid shots.  Enjoy…

 

The Fish Died…

Posted under How I See It, Work

When I left work several months ago, I took with me the office fish.  Yes, I said the office fish.  It was a male beta fish that took up residence in the office where I worked. 

This fish was the just one of many that my office mates and I had through the years.  Some people collect mugs or potted plants.  We had our fish. 

When I left work the fish became my property – probably because no one else wanted to take him, and no one had the guts to flush him down the sink.  So I bundled him up and brought him home.  He’s been living in a flower vase on my wife’s dresser ever since. 

In a strange way the fish has been my connection to that part of my past.  My coworkers and I don’t see each other much.  We’ve all gone on to pursue different paths.  Some have found jobs; others like me are still searching. 

Sometimes we touch base by email, or texting, or Facebook, but that’s about it.  And as the months drag on we touch base less often.

So, the fish died yesterday.  I found him bobbing upside down and not moving (I could be a detective).  I should be happy, one less mouth to feed.  No more need to change his water.  No stupid puffy fish attitude when I get close to his bowl. 

Even so, I’m a bit sad.  An empty vase is just a reminder that part of my past is gone and with it a connection to some of the people with whom I spent a better part of seven years. 

On the other hand, he was just a fish… 

I wonder if PetsSmart is having a sale?

Hello, Is Anybody Home?

Posted under Daughters, Family, How I See It, Wife

I woke up this morning and shook the sleep out of my head.  I turned to my right expecting to see my wife asleep next to me. 

Not there. 

I swung my legs to the ground and stood up.  Lazily I shuffled to the door to see if anyone else was home.  Fortunately I looked down before openning the door and realized I had better grab some clothes first.  No need to shock the teenagers this early in the morning. 

Clothed and a little better awake I started to roam the house.  Where was everyone?  Most days this house is full.  A wife and three teenagers are usually up and running around in the morning, breakfast, makeup, phone calls, laughing, arguing or some nonsense. 

But no, nothing, just dead silence.  Well, except for that damn puppy next door that just can’t seem to shut up. 

But there was no human noise. 

Then it dawned on me.  Everyone had someplace to go.  The wife to work and the girls to school.  The summer vacations were over.  I had been left to fend for myself.

You see, I had lost my job in late May just as schools were about to start their summer vacations.  Being that my wife is a teacher she was going to be enjoying some time off this summer as well.  So I was spoiled.  I had a full house most of the summer.  My kids running around, the neighbor kids running around, lots of commotion.

But now the house just seems empty.  No one to talk to, no one to bounce ideas off of.  Just me, a keyboard and the vast electronic expanse of the Internet.

I think I’m going to make myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich now. 

Maybe the dog has some ideas…

Where Were You When….

Posted under How I See It

This is a reprint from a post I did a year ago to commemorate the Day of Remembrance.

It was about six thirty in the morning West Coast time.

My ex and I had just recently completed our divorce and I was living alone.  I had recently lost my job at a software firm (tech bubble burst) and was kind of enjoying the time off.  An extended vacation if you will.  I was heading to the ex’s house to pick up the kids and take them to school. 

I popped into Starbucks for something to get the cobwebs out of my head.  I don’t do mornings well.  There was some guy mentioning while in line for his brew that a plane had flew into one of New York’s twin towers. 

My mind went, “huh, weird.” 

I grabbed my coffee and headed out the door to get the girls to school.  When I got to the house they had the television on.  Man, it looked bad.  Smoke everywhere, just an eerie site.  This was a really bad accident. 

I gathered the kids into the car and drove them to school.  Everyone was talking about it at the school yard and the consensus was what a tragic mishap.  I got in the car and headed back home.  The radio was full of the stories and then it came.  A second plane hit the other tower. 

“Oh my God.” 

I got home and ran to the tv to watched the video of the second plane.  What the hell is happening?  What is going on?  I sat mesmerized by the images.  Smoke, people, paper looking like confetti in the air.  Why?

“A plane flew into the Pentagon?” 

Now I’m freaked out.  I call the ex and we decided to leave the kids in school.  No reports on the West Coast and I am literally ten minutes from the school if something happens.  My youngest is seven and the oldest is thirteen.  It was better to have them preoccupied with school today. 

The rest of the day was kind of a blur.  Another plane crashed in Pennsylvania.  The Towers began to crumble to the earth, office workers, firemen, policemen, it all seemed surreal.  

The next day the kids stayed home with their mom.  I got a call from my church.  They asked if I would help.  They were opening the sanctuary for people to come pray.  I was glad I had something to do and wanted to support those who were hurt and confused about the day before. 

Every generation has had a “where were you when”.  Our grandparents had World War II.  Our parents had the Kennedy assassination.  We have 9-11.

Let’s hope the generation we are raising doesn’t have a “where were you when”.

I Got Hijacked…

Posted under How I See It

 

Wednesday morning I woke up and went through my normal routine.  Grabbed my running clothes, kissed my wife as she got ready for work and I was out the door for my morning ritual of abusing my body for three miles.  I came home, showered, grabbed the dog leash and Casey and I headed for coffee.  Usually on this walk in the morning my inspiration to write comes to me.  I had this post all ready to punch out about how the kids are now back in school and my wife is back at work and how it really does now feel like I’m a househusband.  More on this later.

So when Casey (the dog) and I got back I ran upstairs to start writing.  Booted the computer up, grabbed cereal and sat down to start my creative process (don’t laugh).  I go to log into my website and all I find is a blank grey screen with a “r00t-x uid=0(root) r00tx@hotmail.com ~” written at the bottom.

My host confirmed that I was hacked and somehow they got to me through my local machine, hacked my password to my ftp site and screwed with my index.php file.  Well, that just made my morning, the assholes…

So I spent the better part of the day running antivirus software on all my machines (found a couple of trojons) getting passwords changed and asking  my host to reload from the last backup.  Are we having fun yet?

Am I bitter?  Yeah a little, but it also reminded me that I need to be protective of my stuff.  Getting lazy will one day catch up with you.  I think I should have hired Matt over at Mattdaddy to help me secure this site down.  He’s supposed to be a genius when it comes to this stuff. 

I’ll even forgive him for being a Red Sox fan…