A Stress Reliever…

October 13th, 2009

I drove three hours to Cleveland today to fix some machinery. That’s what I do. If you follow me on Facebook, you see my updates every now and again from different parts of the country…fixing machinery.

It is very stressful. If they call me in to fix the machine there has many times been two or three other people before me that couldn’t.

Traveling, long hours, tough problems, businesses losing money because their equipment is not running, and it is all on my shoulders to make this large machine do it’s job once again. I am the last defense.

Well, today I was stressed out because I was waiting for UPS to arrive with the part I needed to fix this particular problem. It was delaying me by a couple hours already and I really wanted to get out of there and start that three hour drive home, so that I could sleep in my bed tonight…not a hotels.

My cell phone rang. The caller ID said it was from our house phone.

I answered, “Hello?” All I heard was silence…

“Heeelllooo?”, I said.

And then plain as day I hear, “Hi Daddy! (Click)”

I call our house back and Momma answers the phone. I asked her if she just called me and handed the phone to Ace to say “Hi”, and she said “No?”.

Momma has tried and tried and tried to get Ace to say “Hi Daddy!” over the phone when I am out of town for work, and he never does. He listens for a while and then starts pushing buttons. 😀

And today? He picked up the phone and called me all by himself…just to say “Hi Daddy!”

Yup. Today was a good day. 😀

Tags: phone, talking, work
Posted in: Growing Up, Learing To Talk |
Views: 5,022
5 Comments »

Don’t Blink!

July 21st, 2008

12 Comments »

Photo By: _StaR_DusT_

A couple days ago I was working out of town with a co-worker, and after work we went to get some dinner. My co-worker was driving and parked his car in the parking lot at a fast food restaurant next door to the the sit-down place where we were going because there was very little parking.
We walked next door and went inside, sat down, got a beer, and ordered our food when the waitress walks up to our table. She said that there was a car accident outside in the parking lot and a car fitting the description of my co-workers car was one of the two involved
I pictured a fender bender. Someone backed into his car, right? A big deal, but not as big as what we were walking in to.

We went outside and were met by three ambulances, two fire trucks, and two cop cars!

There was a minivan against the back of my co-worker’s car. My co-worker’s car had been pushed by the minivan over top of a parking block and was sitting about 6 feet forward of where we parked it.

As we walked around to the other side of the car we saw the driver of the minivan on the ground getting CPR from the EMTs.

I had never first hand witnessed someone in a life and death situation. It is not something cool like you see on TV. Not even a little bit…

I found out from some witnesses that the guy was ordering food at the drive thru when he started rolling away and then accelerated at a very high rate of speed before crashing into the back of my co-worker’s car.

I’m not sure what actually caused this guy to go out of control, but whatever it was…was serious. I watched the man die right there on the pavement in the parking lot.

The EMTs stopped CPR and casually loaded him into the back of the ambulance. No one said that he didn’t make it, but my gut told me that he had passed away right there in front of my eyes.

About an hour later the man’s family arrived at the scene of the accident and they were informed of their loved one’s passing. The screams were like nothing I have ever heard before…and hope to never hear again.

What if that was me in the minivan? What if out of no where my body goes crazy? One minute I would be ordering food and the next I would be dead in the parking lot!

Those screams could have been from Momma and my family, and Ace could be the one left without a Dad.

I’m taking nothing for granted anymore…and staying away from fast food…

Tags: death, work
Posted in: Misc Ramblings |
Views: 5,796
12 Comments »

If I Die From McDonald’s Rootbeer…

April 9th, 2008

24 Comments »

McDonalds Cup I left the house at 4AM this morning to catch a 6AM flight to Baton Rouge, LA for work. I arrived in Baton Rouge about 9:30.

I was hungry. I skipped breakfast, so I stopped at McDonald’s and got a breakfast meal…somewhere around 9:45 AM. I usually get orange juice with my McDonald’s breakfast, but since I had a two hour drive ahead of me I got a root-beer. The root-beer is bigger and would last longer.

Anyways, I was driving down the highway enjoying my breakfast and root-beer on the way to the place I was working. Over the course of the two hour drive I finished the root-beer. It was flat and tasted a bit funny, but I was thirsty so I drank it anyways!

I finished my job and hit the road at about 2:00 PM. I was thirsty again, so I stopped at a gas station to get a drink. When I picked up the McDonald’s cup out of the cup holder, I shook it to see if it was empty. To my surprise I heard…

THUMP….THUMP…

Why was the cup thumping when I shook it? It had been sitting in the 80 degree car for over four hours. All the ice should have been melted, right?

I opened the lid of the cup to see what the hell was going on. What I saw made my stomach wrench!

I’m sure you’ve heard the stories about finding fingertips, mice, and other strange objects in fast food. What I saw was not as bad as a fingertip or dead mouse, but it still grossed me out!

I saw a soggy chicken nugget!

Somehow a chicken nugget found it’s way into my root-beer…and I drank the whole thing without noticing…

The chicken nugget was just lying there at the bottom of my cup. All of the breading had become soggy and broke off. Pieces of the breading were covering the inside of the cup. I probably sucked up most of the breading through my straw when I was drinking it though…

The thought of a chicken nugget being in my drink doesn’t gross me out. Added protein, right? 😀

What grosses me out is that it was 9:45 in the morning. They were still serving breakfast… Chicken nuggets shouldn’t have even been out and about yet. So where did this chicken nugget come from?

Did someone find it on the floor from the previous night and put it in my cup? Ya know, after the mice, flies, and bugs got through nibbling and shitting on it?

Was it an uncooked chicken nugget that someone put in my drink? Can you say salmonella..!

So, if I die from drinking McDonald’s root-beer I want all of the Mom and Dad bloggers out there to unite and form a group. The group will be named P.A.C.I.F.I.E.R.

Parents
Against
Chicken Nuggets
In
Fast-food’s
Icy Drinks,
Especially
Root-beer

Take McDonald’s to court. Sue them. Give some money to Momma and Ace to make sure they will be taken care of for the rest of their lives, and donate the rest to charity.

Can I count on all of ya to follow through with this?

I’ve got other things to think about right now…like keeping my dinner down. 😐

McDonald’s cup photo by SoloXis

Tags: eating, food, Health, traveling, work, working
Posted in: Health, Misc Ramblings |
Views: 14,192
24 Comments »

Working Dad

December 19th, 2007

10 Comments »

As most of you know, I am a working Dad. Sometimes I work more than I would like, but it is necessary to support my family. Here lately working has consumed most of my life. I think I worked over 70 hours last week, rode on 6 different airplanes, stayed in two different hotels, and stepped foot in Ohio, Colorado, Georgia, and Alabama.

Right now I am sitting in the airport waiting to go on my way back down to Alabama. I usually do not work weekends, but I volunteered to work the next two weekends. (Who can pass up double and triple time?!) I do get Christmas day off though, which is good.

So if you don’t see many posts from me over the next few weeks you can bet that I am either rolling in the money that I am making or passed out from exhaustion.

Instead of boring all of you with my ramblings about work, I’ll point you to some of the cool sites and posts that I have discovered this week.

The Stay At Home Dad
The Working Dad over at the Hossman Family Blog recently quits his job to be a Stay At Home Dad, and shares his thoughts and considerations leading up to the decision.

TheFatherLife.com
This is a new magazine that states, “We are the only men’s magazine geared toward fathers; a magazine for guys who work hard, play hard, and father hard!“. Check ’em out!

DadGoneMad.com
This Dad was featured on TheFatherLife.com in the Dad Blog Spotlight. After reading the excerpt from his post about getting a vasectomy…I knew this guy was getting a spot in my feed reader. 🙂

SupDad.com
SupDad is a social community for parents. “a place for dads…and moms to talk about what’s important…the kids!” I just started a profile, but after having a look around it looks like a pretty cool place! If you happen to join add me as a friend!

Tags: Family, Links, work, working
Posted in: Links, Misc Ramblings, Money |
Views: 6,592
10 Comments »

I Wish I Was A Kid Again

December 5th, 2007

6 Comments »

We just got our first snow last night in central Ohio. I woke up this morning to a wonderful snow covered landscape. It was so peaceful, yet exciting at the same time.

Remember when we were kids? I remember waking up seeing the snow and before I was even out of bed, yelling, “Mom! Is school canceled?”

“Not yet!,” Mom replied, “Come get some breakfast!”

The entire time my brother and I were eating an entire loaf worth of cinnamon toast, we were planning what we were going to do with our snow day.

Should we build a snowman? Should we build a fort and have snowball fights? Should we dig tunnels into the snow drifts? Will anyone take us sledding?

After patiently waiting for the radio to go through all of the school cancellations we finally heard the name of our school. We would jump up and down and rejoice!

Diving into the closet we would break out our slew of winter clothes. Snow pants, coats, hats, gloves, long underwear, boots, and those thick socks.

Did you have multiple sets of winter clothes? Remember playing outside for so long that your gloves and the knees of your pants were just soaked! Snot was dried onto your face mask, and spit crystals formed around the mouth of it?

Mom would call us in for lunch. We would come inside and strip down to our skibbies. We scarfed down whatever she whipped up that day. Mom would put the snow clothes from the morning play session on top of the furnace ducts so that they would be dry if we needed to change yet again that day. Then we put on our second set of fresh, dry, snot free snow clothes. Then we put on our second set of fresh, dry, snot free snow clothes and ran outside to do it all over again!

*** At this point I leave dream world and snap back into reality ***

Well, today was nothing like that for me. I didn’t eat breakfast because that requires me to get up 15 minutes earlier. There was no getting excited about anything. I didn’t listen to the radio for a work cancellation…because that just doesn’t happen. Since work wasn’t cancelled I hopped in my truck and drove across town. The normal 45 minute drive turned into 2.5 hours.

I was THIIIS close to turning around, going home, and taking a ~~snow~~ sick day.

Man, I wish I was a kid again!

I guess I can wait until Ace is in school and starts getting snow days. Maybe then I could justify staying home from work and playing in the snow all day long. Snotty snow mask and all! 😀

Tags: snow, snow day, truck, winter, work
Posted in: Growing Up, Looking Back, Pictures |
Views: 5,700
6 Comments »