Camping In December

This post is about a week late, but that's better than most of the stories on here.

Jillian and I took that Jayco pop-up camper out for it's maiden voyage last weekend. Our main goals were to make sure Stella Blue (Jillian's dog) would be comfortable sleeping in the camper and to make notes of possible camper improvements. It just so happens that there is a state park roughly an hour outside of Mobile, in Uriah. Little River Park turned out to be a nice little place. the camping spots were roomy (even more so because, apart from a couple people who seemed to be semi-permanent residents, we were the only ones there) and there was a small lake nearby with rental canoes available.

We didn't bring much cash with us, having the mindset that primitive camp sites are inexpensive (so why not camper sites), and I ended up writing a $20 check for one night of power and water. After parking and setting up the camper, I learned very quickly that the cord for the power hook-up extended only about half a foot from the trailer; not nearly enough to plug in to the camp-site power box. Luckily, I happened to run into the on-site maintenance guy and he had recently purchased an extra 30 amp extension cord, which he was kind enough to let me borrow. I didn't realize at the time how huge a blessing that was b/c there were no hardware stores open in town that sold them.

A couple hours after having arrived, we had the camp site all set up, included a pretty sweet fire pit. We took a short trip to a nearby dollar general for some miscellaneous items and made it back just in time grab some wood from the grounds and get a fire going before the sun went down. Campfire hotdogs and s'mores were the only things on the menu and turned out perfect (b/c it's really difficult to screw those two things up). It didn't take long after the sun completely set for the temperature to drop into the low 40s, and lacking an infinite amount of firewood, took the party inside the camper.

Back to the extension cord. As it turns out, the camper's heater, that runs off propane, has an electric pilot with no way to manually ignite with a lighter. I also had nothing for warmth but a hoodie, a sheet and a comforter so the heater was an absolute must. If you've never been in a popup camper I will let you know that vinyl walls do not do the best job of containing heat, so even though the camper would heat up very quickly, it would turn into an icebox in an equal amount of time. I wouldn't categorize the night at my best or worst night of camping. I slept when the heater was on, and spent the rest of the time awake and praying for the heater to kick back on.

Over all, it was a great trip. Stella Blue didn't cry or bark during the night, even when the deer started showing up around the campsite. We also figured out a lot of things that we had not previously thought of. If anyone cares, I would definitely recommend Little River State Park to anyone looking to get out of town for a night or two. Great place to get away from it all without driving too far.

November Wrap Up

It's nearly the end of November and I have yet again neglected to write anything in a while. I'm not doing a great job of keeping up with, what I had originally planned to be, weekly posts.
A few things have happened this Month worth mentioning. First off, I purchased a pop-up camper. That news doesn't immediately jump out as something overly exciting but, being a fan of anything that involves the outdoors, it was for me. It's a 1993 Jayco camper so it's got a few years on it, but it's still in good shape and it only cost me $450 (averaging $1k online). In my mind, if I can get at least 3 or 4 weekend trips out of it, it will have paid for itself (based on hotel prices). If I can keep it in good shape for a couple years, I might even be able to take it up to Auburn for football game tailgating. Picture below:

Secondly, I learned a bit about motorcycle competitions this past Sunday. Jillian and I took her vintage Honda CL 125 to Fort Conde in downtown Mobile, AL for the annual bike show put on there by the Mobile Bay Vintage Motorcycle Club. It was the first competition that Jillian had entered her bike in so it was pretty exciting for both of us. There were a few categories for bikes to be placed in, but most of them were pretty specific to the make and year (Ex. European, Japanese, Cafe Racers, Custom builds). The only thing that we weren't clear on was the "unrestored" category so, instead of asking, we just entered her bike in 'Japanese pre-1975'. Lining it up with other bikes it was clear that the other bikes were a bit different. Where as Jillian had brought in a working bike she rides regularly, the bikes around us looked like they have just been removed from a 1970's show floor. New chrome, paint and wiring on everything. After a quick chat with some of the other bikers and a guy at the sign-in table we figured out that "unrestored" bikes basically boiled down to those with original paint and without extensive modifications; the exact description of the Honda we brought. Needless to say, going against fully restored bikes, we didn't win anything but I think we would have had a pretty good shot against the other unrestored bikes. Maybe next year. Other than that it was a pretty nice day, we saw some really cool bikes and I saw the inside of Fort Conde for the first time in my life.

Thanksgiving is tomorrow and everyone will be heading over to my parent's house for lunch. My mom has been off work for the last month with a back injury so she's been preparing this buffet-style feast for the last three weeks. If I don't succumb to gluttony within the first 20 minutes of showing up, I'll be amazed. Jillian bought the family some famous smoked turkey from Texas so I'm a little excited to try that out. Hopefully lunch isn't some long drawn out ordeal b/c I have some football to watch... specifically Texas and Texas A&M's final rivalry game before A&M joins the SEC.

All for now. Happy Thanksgiving

Blog Vacation Over

I've neglected to write anything recently due to my indulgence in a new relationship, but I've decided to take the opportunity during the work week to recap some things that are currently sticking out in my mind. If you can make it past the first lame story, I promise a nice little set of videos at the end of the second.
Okay, so a month or two ago I managed to kill the offspring of my old friend Steve. This is Steve (or a close relative):

Not long after my brother and I moved into my house, we met Steve. I'd like to think of Steve as a plumber at heart b/c he managed to always be discovered in the bathtub drain of both the bathrooms. Anyway, it is believed that Steve met his untimely end the weekend my parents left their cat at our house while they vacationed in Ireland. Luckily, Steve managed to get his gecko groove on with some lady lizard and a few months later Steve Jr's started showing up.
Unlike their father, the Steve Jr's did not take after their father and stick to the bathrooms. This adventurous spirit turns out to have not worked in their favor.
The death of Steve Jr #1 happened on what was a relatively normal start to a work day. I got dressed, put on my shoes and started heading towards the door to leave and made a pit-stop at the living room couch to take off my shoe to get rid of the wrinkle in my sock. Upon further review, the rolled up sock was actually a rolled up Steve Jr who had been snoozing in my loafer.
An unconfirmed murder happened a couple weeks later. I was cleaning the house and as I walked into the kitchen I saw a roach run behind the leg of my dinner table so I ran and grabbed can of raid and soaked the whole area. Not a second after I coated the whole floor, Steve Jr #2 pokes his head out from around the corner. I freaked out and grabbed towels and water to clean up as much of the poison as I could but I think the damage may have already been done. He ran off and I've yet to see him again. It sounds ridiculous, but I was really upset about both occasions.

The less lame story:

This past weekend, Jillian invited me to Birmingham to go with her to the 7th Annual Barber Vintage Motorcycle Festival. It was pretty awesome. We showed up just in time to see the end of the sidecar race. I thought it was one of the more entertaining concepts for races. You have these flat sidecars and the passenger on the bike has to shift their weight around to take each turn. It makes for a lot of interesting poses on the bikes; like so...

 After walking around the track we got a nice shaded spot on the backside straightaway just as the lunch-time air show started. The vintage festival included a quartet of stunt pilots flying old World War II AT-6 "Texan"s. As a fan of all things WWII era, I ate it up. I wasn't really aware of how freaking loud those planes were. I'll post a video below.
After the airshow, they had the 'Century Race' on the track. The only motorcyles allowed on the track for this event had to be over 100 years old, so they were all basically bicycles with engines strapped on. They were still very impressive at a roughly 35mph top speed. It was definitely a crowd pleaser.

Once the Century Race ended, we headed toward the swap meet where you can buy basically anything related to motorcycles: Parts, posters, manuals and even the vintage bikes themselves.
It was a pretty cool festival. I'd definitely go again... and perhaps next time I'll actually buy a bike.
As promised:

  

A couple productive days / An agreeable coincidence

This past Friday I left work around 2pm to come home and clean my house. The next five hours produced the most thorough cleaning this house has seen in the last two years. I was pretty happy with myself. I made up for my productivity on Friday by not doing a damn thing Saturday, and I felt like a total piece of crap for just laying around the house watching Australian Rules Football all day so I decided Sunday would have to be more like Friday.
Quick Note: I went to two impressive restaurants this weekend. The first was Royal Scam with Jillian and the second was True Midtown Mobile with the Roberts family, Jana and Barron. They were both excellent. I'm not usually a fan of fine dining but these places are an excellent exception.

Back to Sunday. I decided that I should get an early jump on activities and got my dad to go kayaking with me in the northern section of the Mobile Bay called 5 Rivers. The paddle only lasted a couple hours because it was hot as hell; to a point at which my dad even said he was sweating like a whore in church. It was a very scenic paddle though.

We followed the paddle up with some air conditioning and pizza at Bentz's Pizza Pub in Daphne with my mom and youngest brother. Just after lunch, some rain clouds rolled in so I took the opportunity to take a nap at my parents house.
Saturday morning Jillian ran off to the beach with her mom for a few days so I decided that I was going to do something nice for her while she was gone. A few days prior to her leaving, we had a conversation about her front yard and flower bed and that she was given an estimate that it would cost around $300 to pull up all the weeds and put down new mulch, which I thought was ridiculous.So as a surprise, I decided I would edge her driveway, back porch and front walkway and then get rid of her flowerbed weeds. I also thought I might need to cut her grass as well, so I ran to a gas station to fill a tank with a few gallons of gas. When I got there, it turns out that I didn't need to cut the grass. I did, however, edge and pull weeds for two hours. A job pretty well done if I do say so myself. Afterward, I decided to stop at a gas station to grab a Gatorade on the way home. As I was leaving, a man who appeared to be deaf and/or mute came up to me and showed me the screen on his phone. It said, "could you help me out with a little gas. I need to get to Foley" (down the road 10 or 20 miles). Under normal circumstances I probably would have said no, but remembering I had just put $17 worth of gas in a plastic tank I decided that this was more than a coincidence. After putting about half the tank in his old jeep, he stopped me from pouring anymore, thanked me profusely and drove off. Though there is always the chance this guy had just scammed me into some free gas, I couldn't help but feel like I had been put in that situation for a good reason. So with another productive day and an unexpected act of charity under my belt, I took my party to the house. End of Weekend.

Boston: The dog, not the city

I suppose my brother decided that his life was so void of responsibilities that getting a dog would usher him into the land of adulthood. He displayed his new-found dependability by leaving his dog at my house for the weekend. If you ignore the multiple times my living room and kitchen were used as a toilet, the dog was fun to have around. I shot a couple videos of him. You'll notice he is both easily entertained and does a lot of running in his sleep.

New Orleans Bachelor Party

This should have been posted around 7/30/11 but I had some trouble loading the video to YouTube.

I took the day off last Friday to head down to New Orleans with my buddy Joey for his last hoorah. Our original plan for the night was to meet up with his college friends and head out on a couple airboats for bow-fishing on the bayou. The weather was pretty awful so that was ruled out. Instead we decided to do a little gambling before we hit bourbon street. It didn't start off so well...

In all I think a couple of the guys ended up losing a couple thousand dollars. I ended up winning all but $10 back at the roulette wheel. The night didn't get too wild beyond that, although one of the guys wandered off on the way back to our place (dubbs) and ended up sleeping in the streets.
The house we stayed in was really nice. It was just off Royal Street and apparently Leonardo De'Caprio was staying there the week before. There were two Picasso paintings (supposedly originals) bolted to the walls. Why they would let people rent out the place is beyond me.

Collection of Stories

I recently took another trip to Lake Martin (just north of Montgomery, AL) for a friend's ... I'm not even sure what to call it. A wedding party... party. Basically, the wedding party was invited to this lake house so everyone could meet and get to know each other before the bachelor party and actual wedding festivities. None of this is really important information because this post has nothing to do with Lake Martin. In fact, this post has more to do with the trip there.

Nick, whom I've known since high school and is also noted in some of my colorful posts in the past, was also going on this weekend trip with his wife so I struck a gas sharing deal with him. During our drive up, Nick and I started sharing old college and drinking stories that I ended up writing down. They go like so:

First Ride in the Back of a Cop Car:
My first trip to Athens, Georgia was during a summer semester at Auburn and was to celebrate the birthday of my friend Raf. There were a number of great moments during this night of drinking. The following picture adequately describes my level of sobriety midway through the evening:

A few hours and many drinks later, I'm in the mood to get food and go to sleep. The only things standing in my way is the fact that Raf and I have just been left behind by our sober driver. We begin walking.
Under normal circumstances my sense of direction is exceptional. I've navigated through the streets of NYC black out drunk (not my proudest moment) but for some reason Athens has my number. I can't tell up from down and the ten blocks we need to walk might as well have been one hundred. It took very little time to make our way from the bars to the UGA football stadium where it became painfully obvious that neither of us had any idea where we were. What was worse; no one we knew was answering their phone and there were no cabs to be found. For a while, there were actually no vehicles to be found. Like beams from heaven a pair of headlights came upon us quick, so I flag the vehicle down for a chance to beg for a ride. Enter police spotlight.
It took very little time to realize what I've just done. Of all the cars I wanted to see, the police cruiser was at the bottom of that list. I expected a short chat, a field sobriety test and a trip to jail without passing GO. What I got was a rolled down window and a pleasant surprise. After an explanation of our situation, we were offered a back seat  less the trip to jail.
Neither Raf nor I knew the address but had noticed two distinct landmarks down the road. We asked the officer to drop us off near the Waffle House across from the fire station. I'm pretty sure this raised suspicions about our story, but after asking a couple follow up questions he let it go. Five minutes later Raf and I were eating pancakes and trying to decide the best way to tell everyone else that a cop drove us to waffle house. Looking back, I'm amazed that I didn't wake up in a cell.

Recalled for a Reason: (this one is shorter I swear)
While I was in college I drove a 1989 Jeep Wrangler Islander Edition. A pretty sweet ride if I do say so myself. For all it's glory, it had a few faults; such as everything under the hood was crap, smoke from an oil leak would occasionally fill inside with choking amounts of smoke and the tires turned out to be those Firestones that had been recalled in 2000.
I believe it was a Friday because I had finished up classes and was driving to my parents home for the weekend. I make it out of Auburn pretty early in the day and hit I85 south towards Montgomery. I haven't gone ten miles and I start to notice a bit of a shake in my rear left tire. I'm going 70 mph so I start to slow down, thinking its the beginning of a flat. As I'm slowing down the shaking becomes much more violent. At what I estimate was 40-50 mph the tread on my tire explodes off and slaps the back of my jeep; tearing my cloth top, shooting the wheel well guard in 3 different directions and crumpling up my license plate like a paper ball.
I panic and slam on the breaks. As you can probably guess, that was an extreme err in judgment. I start sliding on the interstate, forward at first and quickly find myself sideways. I'm a dead man. In a jeep wrangler sliding sideways, the chance of rolling is somewhere in the 600% range. I have been in few terrifying vehicle situations in my life, so I'm not sure what possessed me to cut the wheel as hard as I could, but I did. A quick spin and a second later I was motionless and upright; the perfect combination. I was, however, now facing the traffic I had just been "racing" seconds earlier and they did not appreciate it. For someone who had just pulled a 180 on the interstate, I would have thought drivers would have shown a little more understanding and not laid on their horns as they passed but that was not the case.
When I was finally able to convince my hands to release their death-grip on the steering wheel, I attempted to crank the car up again to get it off the road. No luck. Two things can be said about God; He's always looking out for you, and he has an interesting sense of humor. It turned out that day that the only people around to help me push my car out of the road were in orange jump suits and had been cleaning the side of the road. After a nod from the corrections officer, they ran across traffic and gave me a push to safety. Once in the clear, I was asked for cigarettes and pot. Unfortunately, I had neither to gratefully distribute. I eventually made it home that evening on a spare and got rid of the three remaining tires, but the damage was done. More so to my psyche than to my vehicle. It's been nearly ten years since this happened and I'm still super paranoid about the condition of my tires before any trip. I suppose it's not a terrible thing.

To be continued...

Roller Derby Date

This past weekend I made the short drive to Saraland to experience my first Roller Derby match. Even better, I had a date to share it with. I'll say this about the sport. It's not the easiest thing to pick up as a first time spectator. It took me a good half hour and to figure out the scoring system. It's also not quite as exciting as tv and movies have made it out to be. The pace for the majority of the skaters was on par with that of a snail. Over all, it was an entertaining experience but if I ever go again, there will be alcohol involved.

Congratulations to the Mississippi team for ripping the Mobile team to pieces. It was pretty ugly.

Month in Review: May 2011

As I sit in the dark, working through my worst hangover in years, I try to distract myself from the urge to yet again hover over the toilet. This sad fact I credit to my lack of resistance to peer pressure and a unpleasant new liquid enemy named 'Fireball'. These pleasantries aside, I have a couple stories from this last month that I would like to share.

My youngest brother graduated from High School. Being just over a decade since I graduated, it was the end of an era for the family. My parents had a lot to by happy about. Mainly because this was one of the final steps to finally having all the kids out of the house. To commemorated the moment, my dad insisted that we take a photo of the sons that matched one he took when I graduated. Unfortunately, I don't have a copy of the old one, but I do have the new one. On a separate note, my Aunt showed up which was nice. She has recently decided to join the 21st century and get a smart phone and Jonathan (middle brother) and I spent half the graduation ceremony teaching her how to set up her email and play angry birds.

Use of one of my PTO days and Memorial day gave me a nice four day weekend. What was originally supposed to be a kayaking/camping trip in Missouri/Arkansas turned into an equally enjoyable three day trip to Lake Martin (Just north of Montgomery, AL). There's really nothing better than being in a stress free environment like a lake house with a perfect mix of old friends and open good humored strangers. It's also really nice when the scenery is like this...

I managed to get the two kayaks up to the lake for the weekend and even managed to go "fishing" a couple times. I put fishing in quotations b/c the fish were on to my game from the start and had nothing to do with me. I'm not positive, but I think I even heard a striped bass laugh at me. Anyway... here's a little video:

Last but certainly not least, my old office finally closed it's doors on the final day of the month. What may sound like a normal occurrence was anything but normal. Usually, a single person doesn't move everything out of the building and clean it IN A SINGLE DAY. That, however, was exactly the case. Of the fifteen hours I was at work, ten of them were spent moving boxes of files and the rest involved trips to a dumpster. Pictures of my o' so fun Tuesday below. The first is all the boxes moved and the second is of my old office after it's been emptied out. I actually miss that office a lot. You don't realize how great windows are until you no longer have them.

Graduation / River Guide

My friend Thomas was in town this past weekend for his doctoral graduation. In true professional fashion, he neglected to pay attention to any of the details associated with his graduation ceremonies. This includes the location and appropriate dress code. The morning of graduation he starts looking up this information on the internet and realizes ever clothing item required for 'walking' is absent from his suitcase. It's a bit of a scramble to come up with the right items from my house. To find the humor in this situation, you would have to understand that Thomas is roughly six inches shorter than myself with about a third less girth. Sticking to some of the clothes I had outgrown years ago was slightly difficult. Luckily I still had a pair of black slacks that I was planning to give to my younger brother. In the end, we found everything we needed but it was definitely not a perfect match. The picture below may not do complete justice, but I'm pretty sure MC Hammer used to wear more form-fitting attire. With shoes two sizes too big, I think the saving grace of this outfit was that I had a black belt with just enough notches to keep everything strapped together, like bungee cords keeping a tarp down in the back of a pickup truck.

Not a lot went on after the graduation ceremonies, of which I did not attend. Thomas ended up going to a graduation house party and I headed downtown to have a few drinks with friends at the Bike Shop. I wasn't expecting much out of the event but we all lucked up with the live music. A fellow by the name of Brooks Hubbert was rocking the socks off the back patio. Like the dick van dike of Mary Poppins, Brooks was providing all the instruments of a full band with the help of a foot petal recording device and an iphone app. He would beatbox out the percussion, sing any backup singer and synthesizer parts and use his guitar to cover the base line. I'm sure this isn't the first time someone has used this technique, but Brooks did it with deadly precision. It was nothing short of amazing. At the end of the night, we actually asked him if he would be willing to play one of our house/lawn parties.

Fast forward to Sunday morning around 10am; Thomas and I get ready for his first kayaking trip. We had to drive downtown to get the camera he had misplaced at his house party so I decided Dog River would be the closest body of fresh water (apart from the open waters of the Bay). Unfortunately for Thomas, he had to endure my growing pains as a kayaking instructor. In my initial instructions I neglected to mention the importance of setting your foot pegs within the kayak so the first half hour we were on the water he used twice as much energy to paddle around. It's tough to have fun in a kayak when you're exhausted. When we finally got all the basics down, we had a nice two hour float and got to explore a bit of Dog River I had yet to see. We were also about ten minutes short of seeing a train go across the river above us and another five minutes short of seeing a gentleman incorrectly cut down a tree with a chainsaw. Good trip though.

The rest of my Sunday was fairly busy. I had about an hour after we finished kayaking to get ready for a banquet dinner sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. I volunteered to help in the kitchen and ended up being a speaker. That was interesting. Afterwards I went out to Municipal Park to run for a while. The final day of running in my C25K (Couch to 5K) program required a series of 90 second and 3 minute runs so I decided to try and make it around the two small lakes. Roughly 2/3 the way around my timer sounded so I decided to do one extra run cycle... that nearly ended with me running over a little girl near a playground (VERY embarrassing). With running accomplished I drove home and in a less than masculine finish to the weekend, I fell asleep on the couch while introducing Thomas to the world of Harry Potter movies.

Lake Forest Lake

This past Saturday, a day before Mother's day, I went out to the lake near my parents home. It's a small lake and perfect for a casual paddle. There's not too terribly much to tell other than the fact that the water level was a little low making it difficult to get around in some areas. I did run into three "firsts" for my kayaking trips. The first and probably most dangerous was an eight foot alligator. I was a bit unprepared for an animal of this type but luckily it appeared to be afraid of our ten foot kayaks so it kept its distance while we were there.

The second did not keep it's distance as much as I would have liked. Half an hour into our paddle, while I was near the shoreline, some type of snake dropped out of a tree roughly 5 yards from me. I didn't care to get close enough to identify it. The last "first" was a beaver dam. There was significantly less danger associated with this first so I didn't hesitate getting close to the little waterfall it had created. I don't know why I didn't take a picture of it, but I didn't. C'est la vie.

Here are a couple more photos that I did take. Enjoy.

The longest minute

I recently mentioned that I started a running program called "couch to 5k". Well, today I began week two of training. In the first week, the cycle called for eight sets of running and walking; a minute of running and a minute and a half a walking.

Starting week two, I neglected to check for any changes in this run/walk cycle. It turned out that the eight, one minute runs had changed to six, 90 second runs. (I've been watching TV for the last 2 hours while trying to write these two paragraphs and I've completely lost all motivation) Long story short, when the phone app tried to tell me to start my cool down walk, I thought it was saying to start my 7 turn of running... so I ran a lot longer than I was supposed to.

Yeah, not interesting at all... back to TV.

Fish River

I went out on Fish River today with my dad for what was a bit of an exploratory float. I had planned out a route down the river the day before but it was completely based on Google maps' satellite images. I wasn't even completely sure, due to the tree line, that  kayaks would even make it down the five mile stretch I was hoping to navigate.

We took two trucks down; one to leave at our take out spot downstream. It just so happened that a few years ago, I had come across put in spot a few years ago so I knew the public park there was a great place to start out.

Just as we are about to put in, a married couple walk up to us and start talking about kayaks and let us know that they have been down the river from that point before, but only a short distance. I was glad to hear that the river was wide and deep enough to travel.

The trip overall took about two and a half hours, starting off at county rd 48 and ending at fish river bridge. We ended up only taking one short break for a couple beers and there were zero accidents. About 2/3 of the trip was AMAZING. While the water was shallow and we had a current behind us we paddled through some great natural scenery. Later as the river got deeper, a lot more houses started to appear as well as fishing boats and a few jet skis. Those things I could have done without, but not every trip can be perfect.

5k Training

I've neglected to post anything for the last few days, though not for a lack of things to action in my life. So, I suppose it's time to break the trend.

Just a quick review of the past weekend for my own personal reflections at a future date, and then on to the meat of this blog. Friday afternoon, my friend James showed up in Mobile just in time for a surprise birthday party. The party went well but the political debate that went on until 5 am was not a crowd pleaser, unless you just consider the crowd as James and myself.

Saturday, James and I shook off the fact that we had only slept roughly three hours and went shopping for baby shower presents. Yes, baby shower. The couples baby shower is an uncommon event, and one I had never experienced. It was about what I expected; A high number of "Awww" followed by "That's so cute" and a strong desire to drink heavily.

Sunday, for the most part was low-key. A nice pot roast lunch with the family to celebrate Easter. Afterwards a pointless trip to Walmart (to view but not buy camping/kayaking gear) and then home to catch up on the sleep I so desperately needed.

Now the meat, as promised. I had decided last week, after miserably failing to run a full 5k, that I should start some sort of training. It was apparent that running once or twice a year was no the best way to keep in shape. Luckily, James was quick to offer a solution. He had recently come across a system called "Couch to 5K" or C25K for short. This nine week program only required about half an hour of my day, three times a week. The best part was that there was an Android phone application that runs in the background so you can listen to your favorite music and it occasionally notifies you when it's time to start running or walking.

I started today and I have to say, if the rest of the runs are as pleasant as this one was, I will have no problem finishing. The next step is probably getting decent running shoes.

I know this wasn't the most entertaining blog post, but it will have to do for now.

Dog River 1

Today is special for two reasons. The one I wont really go into is that Auburn's spring game is going on today. In fact, I'm watching it on espn3 as I write this post. The second is that my brother and I took an early day trip up Dog River.

We put in at Luscher Park around 10am after a short conversation with the coast guard reserve. Apparently there was going to be a high number of kayakers showing up around 2pm for the first annual 'Dog River Run' and they were making sure everyone that showed up had a life vest and whiste; two mandatory items for any kayak. 

Despite the park being right in the middle of a neighborhood, the quality scenery didn't take long to find. A couple hundred yard from the pier we came across a nice old school paddle boat replica, used as a party boat/patio. Even further down was what appeared to be some kind of drilling rig with a city of mobile seal on the sides. I'll throw in a picture of the rig b/c it was an interesting addition to the river, and even more interesting for the fact that it appeared to be an expensive piece of city property rotting away, abandoned in a river.

After a couple hours of solid paddling and finding a great spot to fish on my next visit, we started heading back towards to park. As is usually the case, the wind decided to change directions and required we paddle against the waves. Our take out time was around 1:30 giving us ample time to make it home for this spring game (which just ended, perfect timing). All in all, a really nice trip. There were a number of directions we were unable to explore so we'll definitely make our way out here again in the near future.

Oh, The video quality for this trip should be better than those previously posted. I ended up getting a new cell phone that takes HD video...
Winning!

Coughs on a Plane

Back in January, I made my way out to Phoenix, Arizona for Auburn's run at the NCAA football championship. About a week before the game, I flew out to Vegas with a stop in Dallas to switch planes. The meat of this story is based on that layover.

I had a mid-day flight out of Mobile so I touched down in Dallas around 11:30 and decided to grab lunch while waiting for my plane. I have an irrational fear of missing flights due to unknown changes in flight times and departure gates, so I spent the majority of my lunch juggling a fork, beer and smart phone. Thirty minutes in the airport restaurant and my anxiety forces me to head back to the gate, where, shortly after, I will learn that our gate has indeed been switched.
Paranoia 1, Rational Thought 0.

In addition to the nice little walk that accompanies a gate change, I also get an adjustment in scenery. People are forced to find new seating arrangements so you get to do a little selective people watching that encompasses those who are about to share a giant flying coffin with you. Even though I have no say in the matter, I like to make a mental list of whom I would prefer to have sit beside me, and ready myself with person specific conversation topics should the need to fake personal interest arise. In the middle of this passenger screening I notice a woman who looks absolutely miserable. Crying and coughing, she tries her best to lay down in a chair. The woman is slightly obese and advanced in years. Because I am heartless and selfish, the first thing that enters my brain is "dear god, please don't let her sit by me on this plane. I know the odds are in my favor due to the planes size, but you know how my luck is. I'm not asking much... just for a little distance".

Fast forward four hours of flight delays...
SIDE STORY: I want to touch on this real quick before I forget. I was extremely pissed off that our flight was so late. So angry in fact, that I actually struck up conversations with strangers just so I could bitch about it. After we get on the plane, the captain explains that the prior flight had to be turned around midway b/c an older gentleman had a heart attack. I felt a bit like an ass about that one.
AND... we're back...

I've boarded the plane and stowed my carry-on luggage and make a visual sweep of the plane for the sick woman's location. A no-show. Excellent news because the plane is nearly full and there is a fair chance that this woman isn't even on my flight. I find my middle seat and say hello to the guy occupying the one closest the window. Not two seconds later, I look up to the front of the plane and she appears. Her presence and string of coughs through the first class section throw me into a panic. I know there are still ten or more seats open in front of me, so I watch her eyes for confirmation of a recognized seat number. Finally, a facial expression confirms that my worst case scenario has been realized. She will occupy my aisle seat.

The next three hours consist of me attempting to not vomit in my mouth every time she coughs without covering her mouth and invading the personal space of my window seat companion during my hopeless attempt to exit my own skin. In my list of worst things that could happen on a flight, this ranks just below everything that ends in a horrible fiery death. I would gladly have traded this for a plane where every seat is occupied by a crying baby except for the seats directly in front and behind me which are filled with 3-6 year olds that like to adjust/jump in and kick chairs respectively.

YET ANOTHER SIDE NOTE: The window seat guy was nice. He was in town for the electronics expo. The adult movie awards were also being held in Vegas that week, and I decided it was best not to attend.

After touching down, I shot out of the plane as quickly as the seatbelt sign went off. I knew it was too late to avoid catching whatever she had but I had to try. Three days passed with no warning signs. The morning we hit the road for Arizona it hits me. I feel awful and there's nothing I can do about it. Her time-bomb detonates just in time for my viewing of the national championship game. I felt like crap for the next three days, but having a crystal ball return to Auburn makes it more bearable.

The end.

"Adultification" pt 1

A few days ago I realized that I'm still living in a house that basically equates to a series of interconnected college dorm rooms. I can't say bachelor pad b/c in my mind, a bachelor pad is well decorated, clean and has a pool tables in any space large enough to manage it. Basically, I imagine a well decorated pool hall. ANYWAY...


So I've decided to start what I'm calling the "adultification" of my life. I'm not far off from 30 years old so my home should probably reflect that. To begin this process, I chose to update the living room.

This should be a three step process:
1. Replace the entertainment center erea.
2. Replace my garage sale furniture
3. Paint. (b/c my entire house is the exact same color in every room: beige)

STEP 1.

What I thought would be the easiest part of this plan turned out to be quite time consuming. I thank Walmart for it's small selection of very inexpensive entertainment centers. Though there may not have been much to choose from, I lucked up and found one I liked. Twelve hours later I've finished putting together this complicated monster. Out with the old and in with the new. Step one complete.

Before:

After:

The Kayak / Robber's Island

About six months ago I bought a kayak, and unlike the majority of impulse buys based around outdoor activities, I've actually put this thing to use enough times to officially say it was not a waste of money. The initial idea was that I wanted to get back into fishing but I didn't want to do anymore fishing from the sides of rivers and lakes like I had done through high school. The problem was that purchasing a boat right after buying a new truck was far over the line of fiscal irresponsibility. It just so happened that around that time a friend of mine named Joey had been talking about going kayak fishing on the bay. The stars aligned and I became the owner of a inexpensive (NOT CHEAP or poorly made) angler kayak from Bass Pro Shop. The kayak by itself cost me about $500, but the other items I purchased to make it fishing worthy, plus my fishing license, set me back another Benjamin. In the end, It looked like so:

So far I've been fishing in it three times, which probably doesn't seem like a lot. That's probably because it's not. The real value has come from casual paddles. The most recent being a casual paddle around Robber's Island, on the northern edge of Mobile, AL.

 Robber's Island is a great place to paddle, especially if you are the curious type and like looking in people's back yards. It's extremely peaceful, due to the lack of motorboat traffic. There were even geese and a few turtles sunning on the exposed ends of fallen trees. There's not much else to say, so I'll just include a video of my brother and I paddling around a bit.

A Close Call

I don't know what prompted my mind to dig up this memory while I was at work, but I felt compelled to write it down.

For a couple of months after college, and before I had my first accounting job, I worked at a blockbuster movie rental place. Not as a manager mind you. I was just an normal hourly employee. Well, halfway through my employment there, the manager hired a very cute blond to work the evening hours. Upon first meeting her, you could tell she was raised in an area that could only be described as "very very country". Her accent was thick and she was a bit rough around the edges but very sweet.

After a few shifts working together I got up the courage to ask her out, and surprisingly got a very excited 'yes'. The happiness I had for this situation was short lived. The next evening, which happened to be my day off, her ex-boyfriend convinced her to help him rob the store after it closed. They were both caught and prosecuted.

The New Roof

 I just wanted to share. I put a new roof on my house. With two people working we were able to complete this project in roughly two days. There are a couple things I learned during this home improvement. The first is that roofing really isn't as difficult as it seems. You just need good directions and a little time (and money). The second is that shingles are REALLY heavy, and carrying them up a ladder is not fun at all. That may honestly be the worst part.I guess I'll also add a third note. Owning a nail gun and a giant magnet come in really handy.

I'll throw in a picture at the bottom to explain why you want to own a magnet for this project. While I was up on the roof, I occasionally would notice a nail or two slipping away from me while I was ripping up old shingles but I was completely unaware of the true number. After everything was finished on the roof, I strapped a large magnet to the under-side of a shovel a began sweeping it back and forth over the front and back yard. My initial estimate was a couple dozen. The result was, as seen below, over a hundred.

So that's all for now. I plan on demolishing my back porch in the near future so I may take some video of that as well. Also, I just bought a ENO brand camping hammock for kayak trips. I'm sure I'll end up talking about it, either when it arrives or later when I finally get to use it on the trips I have coming up.

How Not to Steal a Joke

I just received an Auburn joke via email from a friend, who in the past appeared to be of neutral "fandom" within the state of Alabama. I will spare you the majority of the joke's filler, but it goes mostly like so:

A farmer is with his cows and hears a noise coming from one of his cows. He gets closer and notices that the Auburn Fight Song is coming from the rear of one of his smaller calves. The farmer takes his cow to a local veterinarian who is a 4th generation University of Alabama graduate. The vet takes a listen, and agrees that the sound is the Auburn Fight Song. The farmer asks, "Why aren't you as surprised as me?" and the Vet replies, "I've been hearing that song come out of assholes for years".

Nice joke right? I thought so too, when I heard it as a joke about Alabama fans. It appears that a member of the Alabama NON-Alumni Association decided it would look better the other way around. I only assume that this fan did not graduate from either school because I would like to believe the majority of people who attend either school know that the University of Alabama does not have a veterinary program (A pre-vet undgrad does not count). Auburn, however, does.

If your going to steal a joke, pay attention to the details.

Something New

After eight solid hours of moving blog posts from MySpace, I'm finally free to start writing something new.

Although I really have nothing to say at the moment, I would like to take this opportunity to thank my friend Nathan for inspiring me to start writing again. You can check out his blog here.

There will definitely be new material within the next few days.

The Power of Three

Originally Posted: December 5, 2008

I wouldn't normally write about the crazy things I see during the day, but the things I witnessed were, within each instance, so odd that I could not go without sharing.

1. When I left my place, on the way to work this morning, I pulled out onto Hillcrest Rd behind a truck that looked to have a dog hanging onto the back of a truck bed for dear life. I realized very quickly that this dog was indeed already dead, stuffed and mounted on the rear end of a truck. "Mike's Taxidermy" on a sticker accompanied the once moving animal carcass. I understand the power of shock advertising... and it worked... I will never forget that a guy named mike will stuff anything that I decide to kill, but a dog?! I have to wonder if the dog shown was once his pet and he just felt obligated to mistreat his pet continuing into the afterlife.

2. The faker: I have just left the Compass bank on Hillcrest and noticed a Wave bus stopping down the road. For those of you unfamiliar with the "wave", it is Mobile's form of public transportation via bus. Anyway, the bus stops and a middle aged gentleman rolls up in an electric scooter, something around the 'Hover-round' variety, and the bus driver puts the bus in to Mexicano gangster mode. The hydraulics kick in for the chair lift and all of a sudden the guy pops out of his seat and grabs his scooter as if he is going to pick it up and lift it onto the bus. WTF?!
I didn't actually see him lift it b/c the light I was at turned green and I had to move along.

3. removed

(edited for reasons of drunken non-sense)

The Great Game of Golf

Originally Posted: November 29, 2008

Golf: (Noun) A sport intended to cause pain and anguish, instill a sense of humility as well as irrational optimism and create an unquenchable blood lusting hatred for all things nature in any and all persons attempting to play it.

I played golf with my Dad and Uncle this morning in Destin, Florida. The following thoughts went through my head today, just as they do every time I play golf:

1. " I should really put new grips on these clubs. My hands are starting to look like swiss cheese"
2. " I need to invest in sunscreen"
3. " Did I bring enough golf balls?"
4. " I wonder if someone will loan me some golf balls"
5. " Oh great, I left my pitching wedge on the last hole"
6. "I wonder if anyone else saw me only hit that ball 3 feet"
7. " I will NEVER be good at this game"
8. "I need to get a new fishing license"
9. "when is the beer cart girl coming around again?"
10. "Why did I wear slacks to a golf course just off the beach?"
11. "18 holes is way too many... what are we on? 16? Thank God... I will never play this game again"
12. Always on hole 18: "Man... those were some great shots. Maybe I should play next weekend"



On another note...
There may be a city ordinance that requires every Destin home within one mile of the beach to have an outdoor, screened in swimming pool. It is probably also recommended that you plant a lemon tree or two in your backyard. Next time you go there. Check it out... it's nuts. You live right by the beach and ALL of your neighbors have a swimming pool. Do you REALLY need your own?

Mobile Drivers, Chill the F Out

Originally Posted: November 24, 2008

Current mood:full

When I first drove to Atlanta, I was sure that this had to be the worst group of drivers in all of the country. Later I moved to Auburn and found that to be untrue. Five years later Birmingham scored the number one spot with their Christmas traffic.
Now, the torch is close to being passed on to Mobile, where not more than 3 months after I moved here was rear-ended at a red light... moving on.

I know I've already touched on bad driving before but I think this needs mentioning.

1. Personally, and this may be an annoyance for other drivers, I like to avoid stopping in front of side streets and entrance/exits to businesses as a courtesy to other drivers. Well, I was approaching a red light the other day and a couple of cars were trying to come out of a gas station and get into the opposite direction of traffic. I slowed to a stop with just enough distance between myself and the car ahead of me to allow these two cars to exit, and as the second car pulls out I begin to hear a car horn from directly behind me. The cars have exited, I pull up SIX FEET to let the car behind me us the same side street as an entrance and the horn stops. The car does not exit the main road as I thought it would. They just wanted their precious 72 inches of head start. What in the world could be so important that you require all cars to be bumper to bumper at all times. Are you going to miss the first two seconds of Judge Judy if I don't move up? Did your water just break and you needed the space to assure your timely arrival at the hospital? CHILL OUT! This is Mobile... wherever you are going... your not going to miss anything.
PS. THE LIGHT IS STILL RED!!!

2. Why is 8-12 miles over the speed limit not enough? I try to please you people and yet you still ride my ass. I'm going to start going 10 mph below the speed limit and take up multiple lanes again if yall don't watch it.

3. Did you all just buy your car yesterday? Are you unaware of the length of the front of your vehicle? Have you realized that while looking for an opening in traffic, you have already placed yourself halfway in the road? I can loan you all a tape measure... but your new prescription glasses will have to come out of your own pocket.

4. (I guess I will end with this) I understand the timing of lights in mobile is terrible, so this is the lesser of all evils, but the number of red lights run in this town is staggering. We could be leading the country in red light's run per capita. Lights along Airport Blvd alone have become a mere suggestion.

Running is for the birds

Originally Posted: October 29, 2008

Current mood:exhausted

I was convinced last week that today I would run 3 miles for discounted food and beer from Mellow Mushroom. Sounds simple right? Sure it does. Unless perhaps you're like me and haven't jogged further than half a mile since the Fairhope Two Mile Fun Run... of 1991.

Of the 27 years of my existence, I have no clue what life event convinced me that running such a distance out of the blue was a good decision. It definitely could not have been the repeated years of bronchitis I get when hanging out in cold weather, the childhood asthma or my general lack of interest in distance running. This said, I still did it.

The run started off well enough, and my initial thought was "this may not be that bad". Literally 6 blocks down the road I was whisked back to reality when I began to cry internally. Being a ninja, I have trained my tears to fall inward to hide weakness... but that is an entirely different story. My 3 mile run quickly turned into a single mile run with a nice 2 mile walking tour of midtown at dusk followed by an awful headache and rubber legs. A fine evening by anyone's standards.

There is something to be said about a sport where you start and stop in generally the same spot using the longest, most out of the way route to get there while and the ultimate goal is to be allowed to stop doing the activity. If not for the health benefits, I'm quite sure this could be classified as an act of insanity.

As much as I have complained about the run... there is a decent chance I will do this again next week as long as it is a bit warmer out. It gets me out of the house... and what else am I going to do? Go to the gym that is closer to my house and that I'm currently paying for until my contract ends in a year? Yeah right...

Blame it on my youth

Originally Posted: October 27, 2008

1) I would like to apologize to all Alabama drivers of the past for the use of my sub woofers. That shit is SO ANNOYING! Why I ever thought it was cool is a mystery. I don't want to hear the base of your GD retarded rap song. Turn that shit off. I like my music with the original vacancy of trunk rattle.

2) Ladies, please take out your nose rings. They are disgusting. The small, single diamond stud whatever the hell it is isn't so terrible... but the ring... give it up. You might as well have a metal chain connecting it to your wallet. It looks awful.
This also goes for tongue jewelry. It was cool in the 90s, but as we all well know... the 90s was a mistake... ... ALL OF IT.

Super Dogs

Originally Posted: October 23, 2008

It is roughly 3am, and I have just made it back to my apartment. Normally I would go directly to sleep but I feel it necessary to get the word out immediately for fear that I may be found out overnight and killed in my sleep.

Attention all,

Super Dogs are roaming the streets of Mobile, AL. They may seem to be normal dogs at first glance but let me assure you... they are incredibly intelligent and I can only assume are planning to take over the southern most part of Mobile and possibly Baldwin county.

These dogs, as of tonight, have mastered the art of the crosswalk... which I personally witnessed on the way home after 3 hours of watching "The Office:Season Four?" on DVD. At a red light that will not be mentioned, for the purpose of protecting myself from rabis and other such k9 diseases, A mass of dogs which amounts to roughly 7) were crossing the street just before the light turned red. At that exact moment, two dogs on the corner stopped, waited for traffic to pass and then continued across the street.

"PURE COINCIDENCE" you may say to yourself... in such a smug way... while sipping your whine and eating your fancy cheeses. NAY, I tell you good sir. These dogs were totally aware of their surroundings and an air of mischief was upon them. Beware for the era of the Super Dog is upon us! Tis a cursed fortnight... and I am ... obviously still drunk...

I'm going to bed... but those dogs were smart as hell... you should have seen them. It was very impressive.

Way of the WeMo

Originally Posted: October 20, 2008

Current mood:working

In the past few months there have been two "fundraisers" at the corner of Grelot and Hillcrest Road. The first was by a group of African-American individuals in Church attire raising funds for what I can only assume is for a new building. The second was a group of male marines holding signs that read "Marines helping Marines".

Now I wasn't at this location all day when either of these events occurred but living nearby I passed these groups a couple times and was a little surprised by the results. The majority of people, some JUST leaving church, did not give money to the church fundraisers but people were giving the marines cash hand over fist. Now I'm not going to make judgement about people in my neck of the woods... b/c I never carry cash and didn't give to either group, and it could be the case with other people. I just found it interesting that in the bible belt, people were less willing to help out a religious group.

The "One Breathalyzer for Every Computer" Campaign

Originally Posted: October 17, 2008

Current mood:hungover

All new computers should come with built in breathalyzers that operationally kick in at roughly 9pm each evening.

The device should prohibit all postings to social networking sites and disallow the use of credit card information.

The reasoning: Only when drunk does one think a toaster oven welded to a clothes iron sound like a good Ebay purchase. "Wow! Imagine all the time I could save each morning". Worse than terrible purchases is the fact that you think every girl you know wants to hear how once you had an involuntary enema while water skiing. Guess what chief... they don't.

This is the start of my petition to Dell to get the ball rolling on this idea:

Sign Below:

Adam McKelroy

Attention Homeless People...

Originally Posted: October 10, 2008

Current mood:peaceful

Attention all homeless people... who happen to have computer/internet access and a myspace account... ... and are interested in my blogs

I would like to inform the... probably one or fewer of you in the world based on those odds... that every day there is a box, bag and/or small cooler of food outside my neighbors door around noon and just after 5pm. I don't know where it comes from but it is guaranteed to be there daily, and my guess is that it is Delicious.

Having said this, here is fair warning. I have reason to believe that the person or people that live in that apartment are vampires and probably will kill you. They have never been seen entering or leaving that apartment during the daytime... or any time for that matter, so I can only assume that one possibility. With that, You can also expect that the food I mentioned is probably just bloody organs or those hospital bags of blood from blood banks.

Let me start over. For any of you homeless vampires or werewolves that have the internet, a myspace account, live in Mobile and read my blogs... I have reason to believe there are containers of blood outside my neighbors apartment every day at noon and 5pm. Help yourself to it... b/c I'm tired of seeing the shit there.

When It Rains

Originally Posted: September 17, 2008

When it rains... it doesn't always pour... sometimes it just drizzles... ALL DAY.

This story is as boring. Read at your own risk.

I woke up an hour early this morning to take my busted car into the shop (add no air conditioning to the list of things that need fixing) after a night of drinking whine and watching football until midnight (well the football didn't last that long). I have no one to blame but myself so I'll move .. taking my car into the repair shop... Enterprise wouldn't answer the phone so I had one of the mechanics drive me to the store so I wouldn't be late for work. Upon arrival and reservation check, I was informed my reservation claim number was being used by someone in Hoover, AL so I had to wait for the guy at the counter to call the insurance company and get a new number. This wasn't a terrible hassle... just time consuming for what little time I had to spare this morning. With that fixed, I ran into another obstacle. Apparently my drivers license expired last month so I couldn't be issued a car until I got a new one. "Perfect!"
The guy at the counter ended up driving me to work and Stacey (my "Fun Office" partner in crime) took me to the DMV over lunch. Neither of these things were terrible... you can just think of a thousand better things to spend your time on than going to the DMV... especially if you are there b/c someone else is a dumb ass that doesn't get his license renewed before it expires. Sorry Stacey.
Work was good... but I forgot to call Enterprise again until about 20 minutes before 5o'clock which I knew immediately spelled disaster. The guy I talked to on the phone who wrote down the directions to my place of work told me it would be a couple of minutes but I knew better. This may sound mean... and that's probably b/c it is... but sometimes you can tell over the phone if someone is "slow", and this was one of those time. Of course I turned out to be right... as it took the man over an hour to find me. This is why God created GPS... which he DID... so don't bother arguing that point.
As far as my trip back to the Enterprise building... lets just say I didn't realize and Altima could go from 0 to 60 in 3 seconds, nor that it could go from 60 to 0 in 3 seconds. I also didn't know that a smelly 60 yr old man could make me so uncomfortable in the passenger seat of a car. You would think someone that works at a car rental place would be safe... or at least demonstrate safe and proper driving habits before renting out a car to someone. This however was not the case. I dare say that he was the most frightening sober driver I have ever encountered... and I was in the car with him. Terrifying.
Anyway... I'm driving around a Ford Explorer for about a week. It rides smooth but has about as many blind spots as a Howitzer.

To sum up... it wasn't a terrible day... but it could have been much better. Just not having to step into the DMV would have made it that much more enjoyable. That place is like the breeding ground for future carnival attractions...