Thanks to John via Chris for this one.

Here’s a meme with 50 seemingly random questions that I will answer with my expert writing abilities.

1. What do you add to your coffee? I love the smell of coffee but generally need creamer to withstand the taste. Actually as I age and my taste buds die off, black coffee is starting to work for me.
2. What are you reading now? I have kids. When do I have time to read? During vacation next week, I plan on reading Who in Hell is Wanda Fuca? by G.M. Ford.
3. Do you own a gun?  No, two (evil laughter).
4. Are you registered to vote? Absolutely. If you don’t want to participate in our democracy, shut up if you don’t like what’s going on.
5. Do you get nervous before doctor appointments? Doctors freak me out. I have to lay down when they draw blood out of fear of passing out.
6. What do you think of hot dogs? I love them, but don’t ever tell me what’s in them or how they are made. 
7. Favorite Christmas Song? No contest. Bing Crosby’s White Christmas
8. What do you prefer to drink in the morning? Diet Mountain Dew
9. Can you do push ups? I don’t know. It’s better that I not try…I might be embarrased.
10. What was the name of your first boyfriend/girlfriend? I’m such a freak. My first girlfriend’s name was Lee. And this was in college (laugh amongst yourselves). The kicker is that I turned her into a lesbian. Yes, I was the last guy she dated before switching teams.
11. What’s your favorite piece of jewelry? My wedding ring is my favorite (and only) jewelry I wear.
12. Favorite hobby? I have kids. When do I have time for hobbies? I guess the closest thing I have to a hobby is blogging.
13. Do you work with people who idolize you? (Dies laughing and is unable to answer)
14. Do you have ADD? I do not believe so.
15. What’s one trait that you hate about yourself? I’ll answer tomorrow.
16. What’s your Middle name? Too paranoid to answer. You might track me down.
17. Name 3 thoughts at this exact moment. How can I find a way to be on vacation permanently? Pizza rules. Beer rules.
18. Name 3 things you bought yesterday. Gas, t-shirt, dinner at Subway.
19. Name 3 beverages you regularly drink. Diet Mountain Dew, water, beer.
20. Current worry right now?  Being successful in my new job.
21. What side do you dress to? I’m not really sure what this means. Left-right? Gay-straight? I don’t know how to answer.
22. Favorite place to be? The Oregon Coast
23. How did you bring in the New Year? I watched New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with the Younger Daughter.
24. Where would you like to go? Hawaii
25. Name three people who will complete this. No
26. Whose answers do you want to read the most? I want everyone to play along. Do it.
27. What color shirt are you wearing? Dark blue
28. Do you like sleeping on satin sheets?.  No, I’m not a chick.
29. Can you whistle?  Yes
30. Favorite color? Red
31. Could you be a pirate? Unlikely
32. What songs do you sing in the shower? Our of respect for my family members, I do not sing in the shower.
33. Favorite girls name?  Heather
34. Favorite boy’s name? Jeff
35. What’s in your pocket right now?  Cell phone, keys, and $0.50
36. Last thing that made you laugh? I looked in the mirror.
37. Best bed sheets as a child? Star Wars
38. Worst injury you’ve ever had? I sprained my ankle so badly when I was a junior in high school that I was on crutches for several day.
39. Do you love where you live? I like it, but don’t love it.
40. How many TVs do you have in your house?  5, but only 2 are used regularly.
41. Who is your loudest friend?  Probably John (sorry John)
42. How many dogs do you have? Two
43. Does anyone have a crush on you? Not that I’m aware of.
44. What are the most fun things you ever did? I don’t know.
45. What are your favorite books? Refer back to #2.
46. What is your favorite candy? M&Ms
47. Favorite Team? Portland Trailblazers
48. What songs do you want played at your funeral? I don’t want a funeral. Please have a party and laugh about the good times we had.
49. What were you doing at 12 AM? On the computer when I should have been sleeping.
50. What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? Morning comes much to early in the day. Can we start it at about noon?

For the next week, DITH will be on location in beautiful Cascade, Idaho keeping you up to date on the latest events there. This may include none, one, some, or all of the following:

• Reflections on my recently-completed employment of 17 years (yawn)
• Thoughts on my new job starting soon (double yawn)
• Exciting happenings in Cascade (crickets)
• Random blatherings from my mind (razor blades to the wrist)
• Fishing experiences from novice fishermen, fisherpeople..whatever we have to call them now (there may actually be something funny stuff from this).

As always, this exclusive content is available at no extra charge. However, contributions are always happily accepted.

What did the duck say to the bartender? “Put it on my bill.”

For the first time in 17 years, I found myself unemployed on Friday. Regular readers know that I found out that I would be losing my job last fall and that I have, in fact, found a new job that I will start in about a week. So I’m actually only going to be unemployed for a week. But it makes for a good headline, no?

The final week at the old job was quite a challenge. I had accepted the finality of it and just wanted the week to be over so that I could move on. I grew more excited that the end was near as the week wore on. Then Friday rolled around. I had decided that I would spend the morning saying good-bye to as many people as I could. As I made the rounds, I felt a profound sadness. After all, these are the folks that I have shared a substantial part of my last 17 years with. We have shared teamwork, laughter, hard work, success (most of the time), and failure (occasionally). But we have always been a team…at times like a family. That’s the toughest thing to leave behind–the wonderful people.

As I walked out the door for the final time, a smile swept across my face. And in fact this smile lasted the rest of the day. It was a selfish smile. One celebrating the accomplishments of my time there, the fact that the turmoil is finished for me, and that I am moving on to a new, exciting chapter in my career.

For my colleagues that remain, I wish nothing but the best for them. Despite the huge personnel cuts, I still have a lot of friends at the company and the company means a lot to the local economy. I wish nothing but success for the company and my former colleagues going forward.

As a kid, I loved going fishing with my dad. However, it was about 25 years ago, as a teenager, that I grew bored with fishing and stopped going with my him. My guess is that it probably broke his heart to lose that special time.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago when we were discussing our upcoming camping trip with the Younger Daughter. She informed us that she would like to learn how to fish. I have actually been wanting to take the girls fishing for a number of years, but things just never fell into place. I decided that this time, nothing was going to stand in the way of making it happen.

Last weekend, we went down to the local sporting goods store. I was a deer in the headlights looking at the overwhelming variety of gear available. Thankfully, a friendly and helpful lady helped us to pick out the appropriate pole, hooks, sinkers, bobbers, and bait that we would need to catch some tasty trout. Just a smidge over $100 later, we were out of there.

Now it seems that she was simply too excited to wait a week for the camping trip to commence and wanted to give it a whirl yesterday evening. Not wanting to disappoint, I relented. Given my typical bad luck, I was sure that I would fall in the water, end up hopelessly tangled up in fishing line, have fishing hooks stuck in my face, and get arrested for catching some obscure fish that is on the endangered species list.

Thankfully, things were not even close to being that bad. Yes, some things went wrong. We did have some minor tangling of line here and there. Oh, and I managed to drop the pliars through the slats of the dock…never to be seen again. But it was an amazingly relaxing and peaceful time together. It was quiet except for the birds and the sounds of fish jumping.

So, after 25 years, I again have the patience to enjoy sitting in a chair, lazily waiting for a fish to bite. Whether one actually bites or not doesn’t really matter. It’s amazing sitting with my daugher and enjoying some very special together time in a peacful setting. I realize that in all likelyhood, she’ll one day find this to be boring and move on. But I’m going to enjoy every moment until then.

The butcher backed up into the meat grinder and got a little behind in his work.

If I hear this song played just one more time on the radio, I might swerve my car into the the nearest power pole in hopes of dying in a fiery crash. What is so appealing about this song? Yet it is so catchy that my brain radio keeps playing it and I can’t seem to change the station.

For the record, I have also kissed a girl and I also liked it. I have also eaten a cheeseburger and I liked it. But I didn’t write a song about it.

If you haven’t heard it yet, please have a listen so that you can join my tortured world.

When we go out to eat, I always get the same silly question: “Would you like super salad?” Well, my answer is always yes. Why would I settle for the just average salad when I can have the super one, right?

I don’t do this very often, but let me take a moment to toot my own horn. DITH has surpassed the 10,000 visitor mark! The first 10,000 is the most difficult right? Kind of like saving the first $1 million is the most difficult? Well, I wouldn’t know because I’m still about $998,472.15 short. Okay, now if you’ll just allow me to spew some useless facts your way, I’ll let you go about your merry way.

According to www.alexa.com, this is the 6,187,952nd most popular website and reaches about 0.000009% of global Internet users. Yes, I know, very impressive numbers. You definitely have a right to be jealous.

And now (drum roll), the 10 most popular posts of all time.  If you’ve missed any of these, you might want to check them out.

Oregon Special Edition Barbie Dolls
1968 Retrospect: Fashion
George Carlin Quotes
Men and Public Restrooms
The Worst Song Ever: I’ve Got a Brand New Pair of Rollerskates
Am I Deaf?
HP Sucks
Boise: A Terrorist Target?
Bathroom Rules Violation
Dumb Marketing Slogans

I took a look at the bottom 10 to see if maybe there was maybe a gem there that everyone missed. There wasn’t. The bottom 10 do actually suck.

Also, a big thanks to my top referrers of traffic. I wouldn’t be hitting this milestone without your links to me. Be sure to check out these blogs if you haven’t yet–they are all very good.
Nectarville!
Boise Goodlife
That’s What She Blogged
SaintPaulGrrl’s Northern Exposure
Rejecting Your Reality
Tailgating Ideas
Jon’s Other Blog

I don’t think that anyone can dispute that we are in a full-fledged energy crisis. Skyrocketing oil prices are endangering our economic security and standard of living. We have seen the immediate impact at the pump, but sharply higher prices on the way with every good and service in our economy since everything is dependant upon oil in some way.

Do we need to conserve? Yes. Do we need more wind solutions? Absolutely. Do we need to look at solar energy? Of course. How about hybrid, electric, and hydrogen fuel cell cars? Duh.

We must do everything in our power to attack this energy crisis. That includes drilling for the oil we are currently sitting on in this country. We are the only country in the world prohibiting itself from further development of its own natural resources. Drilling can be done without major environmental impacts and must be done to protect our national security.

American Solutions is a non-partisan organization trying to rise above partisan politics to provide real solutions to our most significant problems. They are currently runing a petition drive demanding that our politicians remove the restrictions on domestic oil production for the sake of our economy and national security. I urge you to check them out and sign the petition if you are so inclined.

Check out this new commercial from Dairy Queen. It’s very cute and very funny.

Those of you that follow this blog regularly may recall that I found out last fall that I would be losing my job to outsourcing in July. I’ve been looking inside and outside my company since then and had not been successful in finding something that was a good fit.

Well, that has finally changed for the good. I was just offered a position as the IT Administrator for a small manufacturing company. Basically, I’m going to be their one-man IT department. It is going to be a radical change from being in a very specialized position at a large company to a jack of all trades at a small company. However, I’m looking forward to the new challenge, and thankfully they are willing let me work through the learning curve on some of the areas that I’m not as strong in.

Since one blog is not enough, I’m starting a new blog called One Man IT Shop to chronicle my transformation from a Fortune 500 IT foot soldier to the general of a one-man IT army. It’s going to bore the snot out of just about everyone. I put the chances at less than 50% that even one person will be interested. But it’s mostly there for me anyway.

As you may recall from a previous post, I had a “little” fire incident not too long ago. A few days after that, I was looking over the areas that didn’t get burned and decided that I’d better get it mowed to reduce the danger of another fire. The grass was pretty tall and very dry. So I went out and spent about an hour mowing it. The ground was very dry and I was kicking up dust like crazy. When I was finished, I was covered in dust from head to toe.

I went inside and got cleaned up. About 20 minutes later, I just went to the back door to have a look outside. To my horror, I saw 3 fire trucks out in our field. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t imagine that I had started a fire while mowing without noticing it. I slipped some shoes on, grabbed a flashlight, and headed out. While walking out, I didn’t see any smoke or flames. I was puzzled.

I walked up and greeted the guys and asked what was going on. They said that they had received reports of smoke in the area and thought that maybe our fire from a few days ago had flared up. So they were headed up to check it out. I explained that I had been mowing and that had stirred up a lot of dust, so that might be what what people were seeing.

I was also puzzled as to why they were just sitting there rather than continuing on up to where the previous fire was (you know, they area they wanted to check out). It was then that I noticed that the lead truck was buried up to its axle in mud. We had done some irrigation since the fire and the ground they tried to drive across was saturated. It probably took them 20 minutes to finally get the truck pulled out of the mud.

Sheesh, now I can’t even mow without the fire department being involved. We may yet be asked to leave town.

My creative juices have been running a bit dry lately, so this week’s pun is courtesy of Bekki. Thanks for saving my bacon!

What happens when a frog mates with a bunny? He croaks.

In case you have been trying in vain to find more ways to burn less calories, help is on the way. The folks over at SeeFred have developed some products that will help you conserve energy. In these trying economic times, we really do need to conserve all we can.

 First up is the Motorized Ice Cream Cone. Yes, just pop some batteries into this puppy and you’ll never again have to waste calories or risk carpal tunnel syndrome by turning the ice cream cone with your hand. This handy device will take care of the task for you.

But what about spaghetti, you ask? It’s such a strenuous task to twirl the fork to get the spaghetti on it. Not to worry–we’ve got you covered here also. Similar to the ice cream cone, just put some batteries in, push the button and the Spaghetti Fork will take care of the rest.

Really,  how lazy could you possibly be to not want to spin your own fork or ice cream cone? These products just put us one step closer to being brains in a jar that have no need for muscles. Simply outrageous.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some shopping to do.

It really was with the best of intentions that I set some piles of used animal bedding on fire last Wednesday. It was burning along quite nicely. Then along came the wind. No sweat though. I was ready with a shovel and the water hose. I actually spent a couple of hours dousing it. It seems that the pesky fire didn’t want to go out. Finally, it seemed to be out. However, to my surprise, it was smoldering again Thursday morning. No biggie. I doused it again for awhile. Then when The Wife got home from work, she turned the sprinkler on it.

She went to bed and asked the Older Daughter to keep an eye on things. In the mid-afternoon, the Older Daughter told The Wife that there were some flames. No problem. She was instructed to move the sprinkler over to water that hot spot. Well, thing starting going bad really fast from here. Now it seems that the Older Daughter simply had to take a shower as The Wife went back to sleep. Oh yeah, and Mr. Wind decided that this was a good time for him to blow.

The Wife was awakened to the kids screaming about the field being on fire. Looking out, she saw 5-foot-high flames and a racing fire. She called 911 and then headed out with the kids to do what they could while waiting for the fire department. She first stopped the flames heading toward the house. Then she raced over and put herself between the flames and the pasture fence to prevent it from spreading into the horse pasture.

Several hours and several fire trucks later, the fire was under control. Probably about 4 acres were charred. Here’s a small section of the burn:

Now I was at work when this all started. When I got the call from The Wife, she had some choice words for me that I really can’t repeat here. Also, I believe there was some sort of mention of homicide or something like that. Somehow, I survived and am able to report to you. (In other words, she didn’t break my fingers to prevent me from setting more fires.)

Hey, here’s something you don’t see everyday. Where else can you find a cow, a fire truck, and a fire fighter dousing flames…all in the same picture? This may by an Internet first.

By the way, thankfully no humans, animals, or property were harmed in the making of this fire.

His musical passing of gas is a work of fart.

No, we didn’t go out and get any new animals…really. I just thought I would provide a quick update on our meager attempt at a garden. Behold baby cucumbers plants:

And baby pumpkin plants:

I looked at my thumb and it is still not green. However the plant are, so that’s good. I heavy dose of rain helped for the first 10 days. Now that the temperatures are getting into the 90s, I have to remember to give the things water.

This weekend we may plant another hill of cucumbers so that we have an ongoing supply through late summer and early fall.

The other day, The Wife and I were getting ready to do some watering outside. Just out of the blue she asked me to go get the hos. Wow, I never realized that she was so open-minded. And don’t overlook that fact that it is plural. I have an amazing wife!

Our best friends visited us this weekend. The male of the couple was talking about some very interesting celebrity story. When I asked him where he heard about it, he replied “The Oprah Show”. The reason that I cannot remember what he was talking about, is that the mention of The Oprah Show caused an immediate erasure of any memories associated with reference to the show.

I demanded the immediate surrender of his Man Club card pending official ruling by the Supreme Council of Men on the matter. I don’t believe that a male can willingly view The Oprah Show for any period of time and still retain his membership. I don’t care if Angelina Jolie, Jessica Simpson, and Pamela Anderson are appearing and if the FCC has temporarily suspended it’s standards to allow nudity. A man simply cannot view this show.

Your thoughts?

For awhile, I was trying to make some extra cash by buying books at yard sales and then selling them on eBay, half.com, or amazon.com. I just ran across an old box of books and found a book called Riley Farm-Rhymes by James Whitcomb Riley. It was originally written in 1883, though this particular edition was printed in 1901. On the dedication page, it says “Inscribed with all grateful esteem to the good old-fashioned people.”

It’s actually a book of poems. I could be jeopardizing my Man Card by doing this, but I’m going to share part of one of the poems with you. It has 8 (verses?). But I like the first one, because I can identify with the laziness it expresses. Here you go:

KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE

I

Tell you what I like the best–

‘Long about knee-deep in June,

‘Bout the time strawberries melts

On the vine,–some afternoon

Likes to jes’ git out and rest,

And not work at nothin’ else!

A birder had a mynah problem but with no egrets.

Okay, somebody needs to stop us. We can’t seem to stop adding animals to our petting zoo. Let me introduce you to our ducks:

Okay, so here’s the real story. It turns out that the chickens are not going to work out with the petting zoo. Despite the fact that we have been handling them on a daily basis to try and keep them tame, they still freak out every time they are touched. That doesn’t work so good when you are having small children try to pet them. It just so happens that these adorable ducks absolutely love attention and cuddling. They are a much better fit.

Not to worry about the chickens. We are keeping them around for the eggs.

In the winter my dog wears his coat, but in the summer he wears his coat and pants.

As you may know, we have approximately 5 billion animals. Okay, that may be a bit of an exaggeration. I believe the Older Daughter took the time to count and found that the number was 26.

Anyway, since we have so much free time on our hands, we decided to start a small garden this year. A few weeks ago, I planted a couple of tomato starts courtesy of a friend who had way too many. Funny thing is, The Wife is the only one in the household that likes tomatoes. She even asked why I was planting them. My reply was, “can’t we do something nice just for you?”

The Younger Daughter and I went out this evening and planted a hill of cucumbers and 3 hills of pumpkins. So the tomatoes and cucumbers will be for our use and any we’ll give any extras to friends. With the pumpkins, we’ll keep a couple but hope to sell the rest. You know, another attempt to make this ranch pay its own way. It won’t be any sort of huge windfall, but every little bit helps.

We have talked about having a garden for years, but this is the first time we actually followed through. So I have no idea if this thing will actually work. I mean, I took a look at my thumb and it is not the least bit green. Good or bad, you’ll see and here the results right here. Stay tuned…

Am I becoming a grumpy old man? You be the judge.

Okay, I have no problem with the Muscular Dystrophy Association–in fact I have given money on and off over the years. I also have no problem with firefighters. These folks are heroes that are always there and stand ready to risk their lives to save ours. I have no problem with streets–they are a wonderful tool to get us from point A to point B.

What I can’t stand is the one time every year where these three wonderful entities converge to piss me off. Yes, it’s the annual Fill the Boot campaign. This is where thousands of firefighters across the country take to the streets to clog up traffic and endlessly badger motorists to throw some money into some smelly old boot for MDA.

How can this be legal? Who else can stand out in the middle of the street, beg for money, and get away with it? That’s right, no one. But apparently law enforcement looks the other way because it’s the firefighters. For like the last 5 years, I’ve threatened to complain to law enforcement to get this harrassment stopped. But I never have. And I probably won’t this year. And probably never will. I’ll just keep complaining to anyone else that will listen.

I’m getting tired of the knuckleheads on Capitol Hill wasting time parading oil executives into hearing rooms to pummel them over profits every week rather than actually solving the problem. Isn’t this still America? Aren’t we still a capitalist nation? A quick lesson on the purpose of a business: to make money. Yes, it’s that simple. The purpose is no greater or less than that. We should be cheering their profits.

Let’s say I were to grant you that a corporation could make “too much” money (I won’t, but let’s say I did). The oil industry has a profit margin well below the average of all industries. The reason for the huge profits in absolute numbers is simply the fact that it is the largest industry in the world. It would be like Joe’s Bar & Grill complaining that Applebee’s makes too much in comparison.

Anyway, let’s move on. Let’s take a look at what the mental midgets in Washington have done to address the issue of high oil prices:

• They have made ANWR off limits to drilling
• They forbid drilling off of the Florida and California coasts
• They will not allow leases for drilling in the Gulf while China and Venezuela have signed leases
• They are shutting down oil fields in Colorado
• They won’t allow shale oil field development in some Western states
• The EPA just added polar bear to the protected list even though their numbers have increased substantially. Oh yeah, and the polar bears are in the same area where we need to drill for oil.
• They passed legislation allowing us to sue OPEC–I’m sure that won’t piss them off and cause them to cut off our oil.
• There have been rumblings of a windfall profits tax (even though I pointed out earlier that they are below average in their profit margins). Trust me, increasing a company’s expenses, will not lead to lower prices.
• All 3 presidential candidates have promised to pass cap and trade legislation (to fight the phantom global warming problem). The EPA estimates that this will increase the price of gasoline by $1.50 per gallon–other say it could be more like $5.00 per gallon.
• They have not allowed the construction of a new refinery in over 30 years.
• They will not allow the deployment of coal-to-oil technology. We are the Saudi Arabia of coal and could be energy independent with this technology.
• They won’t reduce the federal gas tax–not even for the summer.

And they’re asking the oil executives why prices are so high? Stop the political grandstanding and provide real solutions folks.

The DITH art department always strives to bring you cutting edge material that you just won’t see anywhere else. The latest innovation: cats and chainsaws. We searched the Internet for tens of seconds and couldn’t find anyone else covering this vital discipline of creative photography. So, here it is for your viewing pleasure.

I loved listening to the Dr. Demento show as a teen. The parody and comedy songs he plays are the perfect fit for my wacky brand of humor. One of my favorites is Wet Dream by Kip Adotta. It is the ultimate pun in the form of a song. If you like puns at all, you have to check it out.

As if having a birth wasn’t enough, it was also just an all-around beautiful day. The temperature was perfect and we got lots of work done. Of course, I’d rather just sit on my butt, but it was a satisfyingly productive day. The bonus was the skies. The clouds were amazing. They almost appeared to be too crisp and perfect–like they were animated.

In the evening, we were treated to a great sunset:

Awesome day!