Old skills

Around 3AM I heard Daughter #1 calls me. I hop out of bed and amble into the girls room to see what’s the matter.
“Daddy, I need to go to the bathroom.”, she says. Not an unusual comment from the girls who still prefer to have me walk them to the bathroom in the dark of night.
She walks in, announces that her tummy hurts and proceeds to power puke into the toilet. Old skills kick into play and I pull her hair back to avoid an even bigger mess.
Back in Mesozoic Era when I was in college, I first learned that girls with long hair and puking just didn’t mix well. Holding their hair out of the way while they drove the porcelain bus was the least you could do.
So there I was at 3AM holding the hair out of my eldest daughter’s face so she could hurl in relative cleanliness. I chalked it up to my indulging them with ice cream during the day and candy after dinner.
I placed the sick one into my bed to sleep with Michele and I wandered up front to sleep on the couch.
At about 5AM, Michele appeared in front of me, ashed faced. “Um, Mikey? Um, we are all puking, I need a little help.”
Sure enough all three girls had been puking sick while I slumbered. I took over the full nursemaid duties and began shuffling from bedroom to bathroom to bedroom, cleaning up and holding hair while my girls were sick. Sure enough some foul disease had struck the household.
Washing out a couple trash cans with the hose outside at 6AM is a novel way to wake up to the day. The fresh air was good. Using the plunger on not one, but two clogged toilets before breakfast is good morning exercise.
My basic remedy for all incidents of puking is Gatorade. You need that stuff to replace what you’ve been losing. Michele prefers 7-Up (not Sprite, mind you, it has to be 7-Up to have any medicinal purposes). Today she made the alternate call for Ginger Ale, another of her favored curealls. I run to the local liquor store to procure the supplies for the battle against upset tummies and run into a profoundly drunk man at 6:45AM having a conversation about lobster bisque with the clerk. Damn drunks…
On my drive home, an unpleasant rumble in my stomach makes it’s announcement. No, I cannot be sick. Two sick parents caring for two sick children is something out of a bad made-for-TV movie.
I say to myself, “Self, you cannot be sick today. Any other day, you can be sick, but today you need to be strong and clean up puke all day.” And so I am strong today, but I may be sick tomorrow.

Dumping Symantec

I’ve used Norton/Symantec anti-virus software for over five years. After having assorted trouble with it along the way, the last straw was snapped this week.
In the latest update, the anti-virus scanner is broken where it prevents me from getting my mail. To get my mail, I had to turn off the scanner. It’s a known problem with Symantec and they offer no good solution.
Enough is enough. I’m tried of uninstalling and reinstalling the software. I’m getting new anti-virus software.
After doing some research, I’ve narrowed it down to three candidates.
1) Trend Micro PC-Cillin Fast, inexpensive, full suite including anti-spyware
2) F-Secure – Full suite, includes Ad-aware integration, more expensive
3) Grisoft AVG – Fast, inexpensive, lacks anti-spyware
Any suggestions?

Weblogger Legal Defense Fund

Recent events on the internet, like the trouble Jason Kottke has had with Sony, point to the need for a way for webloggers in the cross-hairs of well financed companies to defend themselves in the courtroom.  The freedoms of speech and the press are fundamental to America and must be fought for over and over
Jeff Jarvis called for a Blogger Legal Defense Society and others seem to agree
I’d like to help, but IANAL (I am not a lawyer) and IANAWD (I am not a web designer).  What I can do is host a web site and cover the costs of it.  As a result I registered wldf.org (Weblogger Legal Defense Fund) and set up the hosting for it as well.
Pease go take a look at wldf.org.

Cats

Before I run out to lunch, a quick note.
I love that Tony Pierce doesn’t like cats. I hate the fuckers. They know that I know that they are just watching us and waiting for chance to eat us.
They play that game with purring and rubbing your leg and shit, but I know it’s all an act. Cats are lone hunters, stalking prey all the time. Wake up people, they will EAT you if you give them a chance.
Dogs are way different. Dogs are pack animals and stand by their group till death. Loyalty+++
If you don’t read Tony’s site, you should. His book, How to Blog, arrived this weekend. Didn’t read much of it yet with girls, WoW, and the NFL keeping me busy, but hopefully sometime this week I can pick it up. The first page says ‘none of this is true’, I started laughing right there.

The Triumphant Return of Gwar

Last night, Gwar played in Hollywood.
Earlier in the night was my company holiday where I shook many hands and drank a number of cocktails with my corporate co-workers. Around 8 o’clock I left and headed up Sunset to the Key Club where Gwar was playing.
Ready to become a loyal slave of Gwar, I changed into the requisite white t-shirt and headed to enter the club. Yoshi was the only one I knew brave enough to attend, but when we got there, the tickets were sold out. I had bought mine in advance, but Yoshi was out of luck.
Into the show I went and grabbed a beer. The last show was at the Whisky and cozy. The Key Club is bigger and has this stupid stairway down right in the middle of the floor.
After a good bit of crowd chanting ‘GWAR! GWAR! GWAR!’, the Scumdogs Of The Universe took the stage and it was on.


Beefcake the Mighty (L) and Oderous Urungus (R)

Pounding heavy metal riffs hit the crowd, and on stage Gwar dragged John Kerry onto stage and proceeded to cut his head off as a ‘fucking loser’. The crowd went nuts.
The songs were fast and furious and so were the killings, just as Gwar demands. Next up was Governor Arnold, Paris Hilton, and Michael Jackson. Blood and fluids sprayed with abandon through upon the crowd.
Next up was perhaps the most un-politically correct victim of the show, Laci Peterson, who was brought on stage for destruction as well. Moving back into more familiar territory. Osama bin Laden took the stage and swung around his nuclear bomb to the strains of my favorite Gwar song, ‘Bring Back the Bomb‘. Damn I love that song.
Osama was dispatched promptly and no sooner than was his carcass dragged off stage did the ‘special guest’ appear. Oderous first thanked the crowd for electing the ‘stupidest man ever’ which is ‘a very good thing for Gwar’ as President. Soon President Bush appeared on stage and crowd went into frenzy. The President spoke a little to the crowd, began to masterbate, and then Oderous said ‘Shut the Fuck Up’ and cleaved him in half. The crowd completely lost it at this point and I thought the building would collapse from the sound and fury inside.
After that Oderous went into a more gentle number that I didn’t know the name of and the blood rage of the crowd dropped a bit. Soon enough the ‘most fearsome foe’ Gwar has faced appeared on stage. The recently zombified Ronald Reagan had been combined with and M1 Abrams tank to form the Reaganator.

Oderous Urungus prepares to slay the Reaganator

After a titanic battle, the wily foe was slain and Oderous celebrated by covering the crowd in ‘syphilitic pus’ from his very own diseased phallus. We slaves were so lucky.
So, as all can plainly see, it was a great show. To those of you that could have gone, but didn’t, you fucking suck.

Busy with a new World

Last Tuesday I went with the guys from work to pick up a copy of World of Warcraft, the new MMORPG from Blizzard.
Long time Cruft readers may recall that I played one of the first MMORPGs, Ultima Online, for four years. In early 2001, I stopped playing Ultima regularly. I simply got tired of the stress from the virtual world. In the game I had been a vigilante, a Guild Leader, and even the Mayor of an imaginary town. I realized I really didn’t need the stress, despite the fun. The fun is recounted here in my stories.
I tried a couple other games but never got hooked. I decided to give World of Warcraft (WoW) a try. So far I’ve been having fun and enjoying all aspects of the game.
Here are a few pictures of the game so you get an idea of what it’s like.


Here I am (I’m the short Gnome) fighting an irate Mountain Buzzard


Flying on a griffon to the city of Ironforge

For more pictures and funny stuff, click more to see the rest…

Continue reading “Busy with a new World”

Thanksgiving

Today is Thanksgiving. I’ve been up since the wee hours getting the turkey & brisket into the smoker for dinner tonight.
On Thanksgiving people often consider what they are most thankful for in life. That question is easy for me.
I am most thankful for the health of my children. All other things pale in comparision to the fact that my daughters are healthy and free from disease, birth defects, or injuries.
Unfortunately, many parents are not so lucky with their children. So on this day of Thanksgiving, I urge you to consider them.
Angelwish.org is an organization devoted to helping children with HIV/AIDS. Through Angelwish, you can give directly to the children with this awful disease and make this holiday season a bit better for them.
Angelwish allows you to find children’s HIV/AIDS programs near you and send gifts directly to the children. They use Amazon’s gift service to allow the gift you buy to go directly the hospital where the child will recieve it.
I’ve donated several gifts to Miller Children’s Hospital – Pediatric and Family HIV Center, a hospital here in Los Angeles. It’s simple, you choose the hospital you want to help and follow the link to Amazon and choose a gift to send. With the gift option, the package goes directly to the hospital, not to a middleman.
I have never asked for donations on this site. There is no Paypal button or link to my Amazon wishlist. If you want to support my site, please consider donated a gift to a child with HIV/AIDS now. Also, please consider linking to Angelwish and urging others to donate to them.
Thanks and I hope you have a great Thanksgiving, I know I will!