All Kinds Of Stuff

Grab a cup of coffee or some hot chocolate and settle in for a nice long post. There is no work tonight, all of my employees are off working in other departments, and I have little to do, and a few things to talk about.

First of all, it is frickin' freezing outside. It doesn't do much for my throat, which is teatering on the edge of being okay and not being okay. I'm not coughing much, but am still sneezing regularly- snotty sneezes. Eeewww. At least there is no chest congestion or aches to deal with at this point. I'm more than ready for normal Jersey winter weather again- rainy and low 40s.

I got tagged on Facebook with one of those things where you list twenty five facts about yourself then tag twenty five other people. I'll do it, but I don't think I know that many people on there yet. I'll have to think of some interesting facts. I'm sure there are a few, like when I went to Japan. How many people have made that trip that you know of? It was a great two weeks, other than the fourteen hour non-stop plane ride. I love it there. What's really interesting to me about Japan is that they are very limited on living space, real estate is at such a premium, so they all live in these tiny houses or apartments. Living in such quarters, they don't have room to accumulate all of the posessions and junk like we do. So, what do they spend their money on? Eating out, going drinking, socializing and taking trips. These people lead great, very busy social lives, nothing like we do here. Well, more on that another time.

Another great story about my grandfather: When I was little, like second grade, my grandfather lived with us for a while. He was divorced from my grandmother at this point, and was a man about town. One Saturday my mom went out shopping. Grandpa had some girly stripper movies that he wanted my father to see. They wanted to get this done before my mom got home because he knew she would flip. It was raining outside and grandpa was, in his rush, carrying from his car the film projector, screen and canisters of films all at once. He slipped on a step on the front porch, and down he went. He ended up taking a trip to the hospital in an ambulance. He broke his leg in three places.

When he came home he was in a cast from foot to hip. He was on crutches and could not sit down or get up on his own. He was home on the couch all day. My father would help him go to the bathroom before he left for work and when he came home in the evening. He was a big guy, just too big for my mother to handle. So, my father would come home from work and grandpa would be waiting to go. "Thank God you're here Don", he would say, "I've been about ready to pee my pants for an hour." My father would look at him and say, "Well if you have to go John, just get up and go.", and then he would walk off into the kitchen, leaving my grandfather sitting there cussing him out. My father would eventually take him, but not until grandpa had used up every swear in the book.

Us kids got in on the action, too. We learned quickly how far grandpa could reach with a crutch while sitting down. We would stand just far enough away that he could not reach us and make faces at him and call him a silly old fart. Or we would wait until he was absorbed in a TV show, then we would coume along and change the channel on him, knowing that there was nothing he could do about it. Of course, having his own sense of humor, my father encouraged this behavior on our part. This all went on every day for the eight weeks that my grandfather had the cast on, and we never let him live down how he came to get the cast in the first place.

Well, that's it for now. I'll post some more later on this evening.