09.25.06
Posted in Worldview at 7:33 am by Roger
This isn’t necessarily aimed at anyone or any particular topic… specifically.
I’ve just run into several examples lately where it seems that “personal responsibility” is becoming a lost art, and that sucks.
One thing I’ve always done my best to teach my kids is that no one is responsible for your problems but you. There may actually be external forces/actions/events that contribute to those problems, but when you get right down to it, you can either find situations that you could have avoided or decisions that you could have made better. And, when you get right down to it, no one else is ultimately responsible for the resolution of those problems.
It all goes back to character… “doing the right thing when no one else is around to see you doing it.”
/Roger steps off of soapbox.
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08.06.06
Posted in Family news at 8:15 pm by Roger
Kathy and I took the kids to England just a couple of weeks ago for 10 days of fun across the pond!
Lots of pictures here.
The Balettie Bunch – high atop the London Eye:
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06.06.06
Posted in Worldview at 1:55 pm by Roger
Take some time today to remember those brave men who made the ultimate sacrifice as part of the Normandy invasion in World War II. (a good history here)
"This operation is not being planned with any alternatives. This operation is planned as a victory, and that's the way it's going to be. We're going down there, and we're throwing everything we have into it, and we're going to make it a success."
—General Dwight D. Eisenhower
Remember the beaches… Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, Sword… remember Pointe Du Hoc.
Remember them all… and thank them in your silent hearts… just for a moment… for they saved your world that day.
"As our boat touched sand and the ramp went down, I became a visitor to hell." —PVT Charles Neighbor, 29th Division, Omaha Beach.
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05.15.06
Posted in Family news at 8:54 am by Roger
Melanie and Andrew had their performance of “L-O-V-E” last Friday night at the RRHS Choir Spring Show… it went really great. Melanie sang the classic song with Andrew providing an alto sax solo in the middle. VERY cool for both!
They both sounded super and got a huge applause before and after! I’m a bit biased… but we had a couple of others come up to us afterwards and say that Mel and Andrew were the best two of the evening! 
I’ve got the video here (WMV format), if you’d like to take a look/listen!
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04.30.06
Posted in Humor at 8:09 pm by Roger
Okay… So, I’m ready to leave this armpit of civilization (NJ) and come back to God’s Country, right? I get up at freaking oh-dark-thirty so I can make the trek up the Garden State Parkway/NJ turnpike back to Newark… it’s dark. I’m tired. There’s traffic.
Yay.
After a few miles, all the traffic goes “bye bye”. I look around to make sure I’m still on the road, or that some weird EMP has shut down all the electronic devices around but me.
Nope… still cars on the road, just for some reason, the pack I was driving with must have been women and decided to all go to the bathroom at the same time.
So, anyway… flying up the turnpike towards Newark, I can see the NYC skyline in the distance… very cool… then I remember I need to fill the rental car up with gas. Fortunately, I see ONE exit before the airport and zip off…
WTF? There’s like five billion cars in line at the gas pumps.
Turns out that, at 7:00am, all gas prices in NJ were magically going up 14 cents per gallon and everyone and their dog decided to fill up before they had to pay that extra couple of bucks.
Oh… and if you’ve never had to get gas in NJ… there’s no such thing as “self-serve”. The Unions there have taken over gas pumping, too.
So… you’re wondering… “Roger? What does this have to do with Hulk Hogan?”
Glad you asked.
I get to the airport, turn in the car, check in and drop off my luggage (first class, baby!), and head for the security screening. There are four lines, separated by plexiglass… each one offset from the others by about 30 feet or so. This way, those people being scanned and groped by the TSA workers are seen through the plexiglass fishbowl by everyone else waiting to take their shoes off and laptops out to be scanned in the other lines.
So… here I am… waiting to take off my shoes and take my laptop out, when I notice a few teenage girls pointing and giggling in the line next to me. Fortunately… not AT me… that would’ve ruined my entire day.
Nope. Who’s being scanned in the line two over from me?
You’ve probably guessed by now… you’re smart like that… yup. Hulk Hogan is being scanned and patted down like he’s Abdul Hogan or something. He looks totally pissed.
I really wanted him to body slam someone… but he seemed to take it okay, but probably didn’t like everyone staring at him.
It was ironic that he’d be singled out as a threat, especially after he did this classic video: Hulk Hogan: Real American
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04.17.06
Posted in Uncategorized at 8:04 pm by Roger
... or so say the statistics.
I was at Fry’s Saturday night, picking up a new power supply for my computer and heading over to LW’s to meet a few people, when I get a phone call… it’s my ex-wife’s house number.
“Hello?”
“Hi Dad,” says Andrew…
“What’s up, bud?”
“I kinda messed up my car.”
(pause)
“What?”
“I kinda messed up my car.”
“I heard that. What happened?”
“I was going a little fast and it slid a little bit and the back end kinda hit a tree.”
(pause)
“Are you alright?”
“Yes.”
“Is your car driveable?”
“Yes.”
(starting to get annoyed now) “Are you going to give me any more information, or do I have to play 20 questions with you?”
“I was driving on a small road back from the lake and when I went around a corner, I hit some gravel and my car slid into a tree. It kinda screwed up the back of the car.”
........
To make a long story short (too late!), I finally made him admit that he was driving too fast (40 MPH on a 30 MPH stretch of road) and going around a tight corner too fast. He hit a gravel patch, lost the back end, and it smacked a small tree right about where the right rear tire is. It shattered the rear passenger window and did some pretty significant cosmetic damage, but fortunately, it doesn’t look like any immediate structural damage was done—the passenger door opens and closes, the passenger window goes up and down, and the trunk opens and closes.
He’ll take it to a body shop for estimates tomorrow after school.
Suffice it to say he feels really upset with himself right now.
I’m just glad he’s still alive. A mile down the road, there were no trees. There was a cliff.
Thank you, God, for small miracles. Now to hammer this lesson home HARD for the next 20 years.
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03.13.06
Posted in Humor at 10:58 am by Roger
- First, it’s pronounced AWS-TUN. It doesn’t matter how they say it in other places.
- Forget the traffic rules you learned elsewhere. Austin has its own set of traffic rules. There’s no book about them. All you can do is get in your car and hope you survive to learn them.
- All directions start with “Go down Mopac…’cause you don’t want to get on I-35.” No one knows for sure what ‘Mopac’ means.
- Burnet Road, Braker Lane, and Lamar Blvd. have no beginning and no end.
- It is impossible to go around a block and wind up on the same street that you started on. The Chamber of Commerce calls this a scenic drive.
- The 8:00am rush hour is from 6:30am to 9:30am. The 5:00pm rush hour is from 3:30p to 7:15pm. Friday’s rush hour starts on Thursday morning.
- If you actually stop at a yellow light, then you cannot be from Austin. You may only apply your brakes when the end of a yellow light and the beginning of the red light create a burnt-orange hue. This is Longhorn Country, after all.
- If you like being an individual, don’t even think of working for Dell. You’ll be branded like cattle and made to walk all over town with your Dell Tag around your neck or clipped on to your belt loop. Ninety-eight percent of the people within a 200 mile radius work for Dell. When someone says “Michael Dell”, Dell employees are trained to face Round Rock, hit their knees, put their face to the ground, weep, and rock back and forth.
- Just remember that Mopac IS Loop 1; Capital of Texas Hwy IS 360; and U.S.183 IS Research Blvd., Anderson Lane, Ed Bluestein Blvd. and Old Bastrop Hwy; 2222 IS Northland Dr. or Allendale Rd. or Koenig Lane. Don’t try to figure it out. Just accept it. If you question the intelligence behind this naming convention, people will simply tilt their heads to the right and stare at you.
- If moisture is determined to be rain, and not sweat, all traffic must immediately come to a screeching halt; ditto for daylight savings time, a female UT student applying eye-shadow across the street, or a flat tire three lanes over.
- DO NOT attempt to access any road after an apocalyptic event like snow or SXSW (South by Southwest Music Convention). Construction on I-35 AND U.S. 183 is a way of life and a permanent form of entertainment. Get used to it!
- Attn: All telephone solicitors…DO NOT correct my pronunciation when I say I live in Manchaca, TX. It’s pronounced MAN-shack (just like a man living in shack). Also realize that the city of Manchaca (MANshack) is in Hays and Travis Counties, and there is also a very long street in Austin named Manchaca (MANshack)! The city of Manor and Manor Rd. are pronounced ‘MAY-ner’. We don’t like corrections on that either. And, for God’s sake, DON’T pronounce the ‘E’ at the end of Guadalupe. It’s Gwada-LOOP and we like it that way!
- Burnet Road is pronounced BURN-it, not Bur-NET. Koenig Lane is pronounced KAE-nig not KOE-nig. The old airport (Robert Mueller) is pronounced Robert Miller and is on Airport Boulevard. The new airport (Austin-Bergstrom) is no where near Airport Boulevard. It’s in the city of Del Valle pronounced Dell Valley!
- Keep in mind that the sloppily dressed ‘hippie’ in worn-out sandals and earrings is probably the latest IPO millionaire around here.
- Stay away from the Congress Ave. bridge at sundown if you do not like the thought of being in an Alfred Hitchcock movie. (Largest Mexican Free Tail Bat Population in the US)
- And, yes, we all know that there’s a man in a teddy and a tiara on Congress Ave. It’s Leslie and he probably makes more money than you do (Surely, you have a homeless, celebrity drag queen that likes to run for Mayor where you live, too, right?).
And you wonder why there are so many bumper stickers that say ‘Keep Austin Weird’!
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03.06.06
Posted in Family news at 10:39 am by Roger
I know it’s been a few weeks… sorry.
Things are looking up for my grandmother a bit. While she still is, essentially, bed-ridden, she’s making progress in physical therapy at a rehab hospital. She has motion in her neck back (couldn’t turn it before), has some feeling back in her leg and arm, and the therapists are actually having her stand, from a sitting position, with their help. She can then stand up, while holding onto the back of a chair, so there is still some hope that she’ll get some limited use of her left leg back.
We’re looking into an assisted-living location for her and Grandpa now… it’s sad, but it is so much better than it was before.
Thanks to God for coming through with another miracle.
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02.14.06
Posted in Family news at 12:21 pm by Roger
I rec’d a call from my Dad yesterday morning. My grandmother (my Mom’s mother) had a stroke early Monday morning and was at the hospital. She had a fairly major one about 12 years ago, but recovered all but her short-term memory, which was about 70-80% of what it was before.
I dropped everything and went to the hospital. Grandma’s entire left side was pretty much gone. You could tell by looking at her face, too…
However… as the day went on, and as we finally got them to allow her some liquid and get her some food by about 7:00pm (she hadn’t eaten anything since dinner the night before!), she was showing some definite improvement. The neurologist thought she’d only recover, at best, 50% on her left side… and that, with therapy.
I talked with Dad today, and he said that Grandma was doing a little bit better today. They’re doing both physical and speech therapy on her today, along with a second CT scan to make sure there’s no residual bleeding from the stroke.
They’re planning on moving her to a rehab/therapy facility later this week, where she’ll stay for a few months.
Given the very long day yesterday… this was about as best as we could hope for, I’d think.
I’m not ready … it’s not time for her to go yet…
We’ll see… and hope that God has a miracle up his sleeve for my grandmother.
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02.13.06
Posted in Family news at 10:31 am by Roger
Cool…
Andrew had his band Solo and Ensemble contest today. He got “1” (Superior) ratings on both his solo and for his sax trio. The trio gets to go on and compete for State ensemble contest now. Since he didn’t memorize his solo, he won’t be going to State for that… not bad for a sophomore!
Melanie had a “mini-rodeo” today where she sang the National Anthem (beautifully) and was, at last check, doing pretty good in a few events. She won the poles for her age group (Ladies 15-25 yrs).
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