My Blue "Vette" Heaven

"I have a need. A need for speed." As quoted by Tom Cruise (one of the biggest idiot actors of our generation) from the movie Top Gun.

Well, I have a need for speed too.  BIG time need for speed.  Ever since I can remember my very first roller coaster ride, I have wanted to go fast.  I tricked out my early motorcycles for extra HP.  My first car was a Dodge Charger, and holy cow, did I ever pay the big bucks for that beauty to have extra speed gear added on.  It's wasn't the fastest Dodge Charger in high school, Scott Ambler had that beast, but it was a worthy challenger.

I've had an adult only Kawasaki rice rocket that was so fast it was scary (and was the culprit for putting me in defensive driving school and having my license revoked for 3 months). I've owned a Datsun 280Z, a Firebird Formula 400, a TransAm 400HD, a TransAm 400SD, a TransAm Turbo, a Buick Regal Turbo; and then the mid 80's and 90's happened and I became a sensible Dad driving mostly Cadillac Sedans . . .

But, I could only hold off the speed bug for so long, so in 2000, my first Vette was purchased, and you've seen my previous blog about her.  A gorgeous red head turning stunner.  Fast, goodness she was fast, and in only 3 weeks time after I put her up for sale, she was adopted by an even older grandpa than me, that has since given her a good home in Bartlesville.  (It was his 6th Vette to own).

Then, along came blue.  She was named Bliss by the previous owner, and she's still going through a bit of an identity crisis as I've only had her for 5 weeks.  I've been calling her Blue, and VII (although she is technically the newer VII, not the original), and Joe named her 1Nation, which I like a lot too, and might end up getting her tagged that way.  Her color is Jet Stream Blue Metallic.

She just turned 4, and had 13k on her when purchased.  Not a blemish to be found inside or out, under, or beneath; just like a car like her should be.

She is my land jet.  Rocket fast.  6 speed manual gears of pure fun, super charged adrenaline.  Man does she have an incredible growl when you ignite her after burners.  And the Z06 air intake hood vent amps up the volume.  I read that the top speed is 197, but I'll only do that if I can get on a race track, or out to the Bonneville salt flats.  For now, I am limited to on-ramps, and have to shut her down before merging :-).  Joe and Angela both were able to experience the thrill of 83 in 2nd gear, and we got there pretty quick . . .

Before you ask, I've only been to 92, and that was for a brief stretch of lonely highway while I was driving her home from Indy.  Her previous owner lives in a suburb of Indy, and I made a flight to Indy to pick her up and drive her home, where we became quite familiar with each other on that 14 hour road trip home spread over 2 days.

Good gosh, she is so quiet on the inside.  The faster you go, the quieter she becomes.  Low speeds, she moans, she groans, she whines, she cracks, she pops; she HATES to go slow.  But get her onto the open road and open her up, and everything seals, she hunkers down for low drag, has no wind noise, and her big soft luxuriously soft leather seats just envelope you and lull you into race mode.  (Her seats are actually more comfortable than my Lexus seats were). 

And the sound system.  Wow.  I've got an incredible sound system at home with all kinds of techno gizmo's, amps, tuners, high watt speakers, super cool Elite Sound that surrounds me and cracks the plaster on the walls at about 3/4th's volume.  But, inside the Vette, especially with some classic Queen or classic Def Leppard; oh man, be prepared to be amazed.  And of course, when Flo Rida's bass hook kicks in on "I've Got A Good Feeling", people probably wonder about my ethnicity; especially when it is cranked up.

Yes, if you come to my home for a visit, I'll gladly take you for a 'test ride' as my co-pilot; though please don't ask to pilot :-).

Happy 35th Wedding Anniversary

Happy 35th anniversary to Pam.  The Love of my life.  I love you with all my heart, and every fiber of my being.  I can not imagine loving you more.

How is it possible to continue being deeper in love with someone every year?  All we hear is how someone fell out of love, how someone found someone else much younger, how someone is no longer compatible, how they gotta go find themselves, etc.  That's all ca ca.  That's all from the devil spewing his venom over our society.  I'm telling you right now that if you are truly in love with someone, you're never going to fall out of love with them.  It's impossible.  You think Jesus can stop loving me?  No, no matter what I do.  And His love is eons of infinity deeper than what we humans are able to handle.

I absolutely adore our daughters.  They are two of the finest mothers and wives that I've known, and God blessed me to be their Dad.  I'm just now reaching an age where I am able to enjoy them as adults, not just my children.  You think it is possible for me to one day stop loving them?  Never.  And their children ~ good golly miss molly ~ I melt into their eyes when I am around them.  I turn into a gelatinous tub of pliable goo willing to do almost anything in the world that they ask for (I draw the line though at going to the Zoo, or getting a dog).  What other reason is there for me to allow them to do (or have) things that neither of their parents would have ever been allowed to do or have?  It's another kind of love.  Not a deeper love, but a different love, and a love that I could never abandon.  I'd rather be dead.

For our mates, there is no such thing as fully compatible.  We're all imperfect; we just have to adapt to various levels of each others incompatibility.  It's about learning to balance the things you dislike with things you like, and that turns into love.  Deep, abiding, committed, fully functional love.  Simpatico.  The pinnacle of perfection.  Pam dislikes more things about me than I can probably count on both hands and feet.  But, it works; incredibly well.  Gods love bonds us together. 

How do I grow deeper in love with this woman every year?  I have no idea; I just know that I do.  Today is our 35th wedding anniversary.  She is more beautiful to me now that when I first lusted after her when she was 16 and in her blue polyester pants.  This woman puts the jones in my bones.  When she gets all spruced up, geez, to this day, it's all I can do to not foam at the mouth like a rapid dog.  And usually I do . . .

~

Now, about these guns.  As you may or may not know; I started carrying a Ruger 9mm last fall, and after the initial license training class, I have since taken a defensive technique class, and have added a Beretta 9mm Nano to my collection.  I rotate carrying either, as one is more easily concealed than the other.  I am looking forward to Nov. 1st though, as I'll most likely always open-carry every where I go.  And, I do have my eye on a nice little .380 made by Smith & Wesson.  The ultimate in concealment.  (Note to those with large generous giving hearts; my birthday is Oct. 19th) :-).

Last Sunday, we went shooting with my brother in law and son in law.  These men are master marksman (they have accuracy skills I can only dream about), and the combined ownership gun total of their Dads would probably be enough for them to hold their own gun show at Expo Square if they wanted to.

Pam did not want to go shooting at the range, though Angela did, and dude, is she ever a dead-eye natural.  She was making head shots from 17 yards out like she's gone through 10,000 boxes of practice cartridges!

We get back to the house, and Pam finally relented to the peer pressure of shooting a gun, and she ended up loving the various ones so much that she decided to take this assault rifle home with her ~ and dared anyone to come and take it away from her!

~

Ah, my wife, finally a gunner.

Yep, she's got a great personality.

Yep, she's got a great sense of humor.

Yep, she's got a over-flowing gift of mercy.

And yep, she looks great in those jeans!

I love you Pamela Jean.  I love my life with you, and I am thankful for our 35 years together. 

I know I will love you even more after 36, but I do not know how.  - Mike

Happy 3rd Birthday O'Mike!

Happy Birthday Owen Michael!

Judging by his height and level of intelligence, you would probably not believe that this little 'boy' turns 3 tomorrow.  Yes, he still craps his pants, but other than those smelly impositions; our Owen Michael is quite the character, exceptionally mature, and smart as a whip.  Truth be told, he knows about using the stool, he just likes to peeve his Mom by showing a stubborn reluctance to use it.  Hmmm, stubbornness; is he related to Me?

O'Mike can walk, talk, and chew gum; all at the same time.  This is a coordinated skill that neither his Mom, his Pappy, or his older brother WP have ever been able to master.  If trying to do all three at once; WP would trip on the sidewalk crack, I'd stumble on the piece of gravel, and Jackie would do a herky trying to avoid me and WP, but then would not be able to 'nail that landing' and would end up with a twisted ankle.

Plus, just to make it interesting, O'Mike throws in hopping, skipping, and jumping all into the mix at the same time to really throw everyone a curve while he 'shows off' his multiple talents of coordination and bravery.  Show off?  Yes, absolutely.  This little guy works a room, works a crowd, works the buzz, works the laughs, and works the eyes; and it's only going to be more intense with every passing year.

Busy?  Who-boy, is this little guy busy.  He makes the energizer bunny look like a corpse by comparison.  Go, go, go.  Even worse than his Mom; affectionately known as go-go-gackie.  Busy with the capital B.  Busy as only his Nini can define Busy, as she lived being Busy during the same age.  Look at Nini's pictures when she was 3.  She was never standing still.  The legs are blurry, the arms are in running posture mode.  The hair has wind effects blowing by.  That's our Nini, and that's our O'Mike.

Lungs?  Are you kidding me.  This boy's diaphragm and lungs must have received special injections of HGH while in-utero.  I've heard lions that can't roar as loud as O'Mike.  Command attention?  Hello? Who do you think gets looked at?  This 3 year old magic-mouth, that's who.

Of course, it doesn't hurt that he's got great looks though either.  Between his Dad, his Mom, and his Nini, good grief, could he be any cuter?  The gene pool sure came together perfectly on each of my g'kids.  No need for modesty, they really are all great looking.  O'Mike has my eye shape, my head bumps, and my calves though ~ you can't deny that!  Good grief, now that I look at their pictures on my desk again, all 6 of my Pappy's Place young-uns really do have looks that will melt your heart, and will be leaving many broken hearts in their dating futures (both male, AND female!).

O'Mike is off the charts tall, measuring at 3 what most 4 year olds measure.  He's smart, vocal, has great posture, good pronunciation of his words, loves to eat, and is showing tendencies of being a natural jock.  Skill sets are evident for golfing, basketball, football, and baseball.  His basketball pose and shooting abilities will blow you away ~ it was never taught ~ it was completely natural.

I love you Owen Michael.  Happy Birthday #3 to my precious little boy.  - Pappy

Happy Birthday Emma Jo!

Emma Jo; my sweet little Spaz is 4!  Happy Birthday darling, I look forward to giving you belated birthday loving when you get back from vacation.  Your smile continues to melt my heart, and your bear hugs are pretty great too.  I'm so proud that you've finally learned the 'world peace' hand wave; that took many months of practice, but we can now certainly look forward to your tiara.

Emma Jo (Short-Stack, EJ, Spaz) has been enjoying her 1st vacation the last few weeks.  She had her 1st flight on SWA.  She did a vacation 'walk-by' of The Alamo (that was a shame ~ she missed out on all the history), and she's been to Sea World, which I hear was a big hit after the 7th log ride, and she's done a boat ride on the riverwalk, eaten at the world's best Mexican Restaurant with Casa Rio, has been able to swim daily at the RI; slept through Madigascar3 (not that she didn't like the movie ~ just that you don't mess with Spaz's sleep patterns ~ no matter the day).  She met her cousin Carter for the 1st time this week, and is headed to the beach at CC this weekend for beach doings before heading home.

When she gets home, her life will get back to normal; that is normal for her I mean.  Eating 12 meals a day, 14 snacks an hour, a 12 hour nightly sleep, followed by a 5 hour nap, and a few other 'rest' breaks, because she just does soooo much with her remaining 7 hours of awake time.  My my, you've heard me say it for years, but this little girl can sleep ~ too bad it is not an Olympic event, she'd 'nail that landing'.

Emma Jo is my little loner with Ava as her best friend, she's Momma's clingon, and she's a mini-me clone of her Daddy.  To use her Momma's word, wowzers, she's not only a Daddy's girl, but she looks just like him too.

I love you Spaz, and looking at this picture just makes me miss you more. 

See you soon, Happy 4th Birthday sweetheart. - Pappy

Dad's

So I was at chickolay this morning for breakfast; and right beside me was this handsome young man and his two beautiful daughters.  My heart quickened a bit, as I love to see Dad's interact with their daughters.  He was probably 37, with a night and day daughter.  The night was about 10, and the day was about 7, and looked to be a splitting image of her Dad, so night had to have looked like Mom.

I have a special appreciation/admiration for daughter Daddy's (being one myself), not that I have anything at all against boy Daddy's, since they have a special role to play too in raising their apes to one day be about 10% worthy of marrying off the daughter's of the world.  But, my bond is with the daughter Daddy's.

This guy could easily have been misinterpreted as mean (as I have been myself).  He was almost identical to me in size from the butt up at 6'1", 220 lbs, had a nice broad chest to waist ratio, shoulders back, and bald.  Shaved bald like me too.  (I should have started doing that in my 30's). 

He had a natural aire of intimidation to him (which I've been accused of 10,001 times in my life), complete with a bicep tattoo on one arm, and a nice diamond stud in one ear.  No, I'll always skip on the tats and earrings for my bod, and things like that would have bothered me 20 years ago when I was more judgemental, but this guy was doing it for style, and it looked really good on him.

I knew though when I saw him smile at his daughters; knew when I saw him listen to them; knew when I saw him rub night's hair, and then touch day's face; that this guy was pretty cool in my book, as they loved him as their Daddy just as much as he was loving them.  He loved his daughter's, and was probably heading to work at Life Fitness across the street given the workout outfit that he had on.

He does need to work on those calves though.  Goodness, those are some bad birdlegs (kind of reminded me of WP's birdlegs, whom is also the one that while speaking Wuh, calls Chick-Fil-A by his name of chickolay.)

Yesterday was Father's Day.  Duh.  My day is 33, and my night is 31.  I love my girls, and am absolutely as proud to be their Dad today as I was on the day they were born.  I know this mystery breakfast man at chickolay feels the same way about his girls ~ way to go Dad, you're doing it right.

VII

She's been a great and faithful car for 10 years. She will be missed, but her big brother (I'll blog about shortly) is ready to take the lead :-).

Her name is VII (pronounced 7), I love Roman Numerals. 7 is the biblical number of perfection/completion, and she has been perfect for me.  She will be missed, but she needs a new home.  How about you?  Follow the link below for all the details.

http://www.autotrader.com/cars-for-sale/vehicledetails.xhtml?searchRadius=0&listingId=323792954

Kansas City Royals

My Dad (age 80.5) enjoying his first ever KC Royals ballgame.  He'd never been to the stadium, and I had no idea.  It had always been an assumption that since Paul has lived in KC for 30 years, and Ken had lived in KC for 25 years, that at some point, they'd all gone to a game(s), but nope, never one.  Made me kind of sad.  Dad loved the game, had a smile on his face for the hour of pre-game, and for the first hour of the game.  This photo also is Paul, my brother, and James, my nephew. John, another one of my nephew's also went with us to the game, but refused to have a picture taken of himself; afraid the girls would be swarming after him. It was James and John's first Royals game too.

As a young boy, Dad had taken me to several KC Athletic's games, before they moved to Oakland, and became the Oakland A's.  It was in the old stadium downtown, in a ghetto part of town, but I always felt safe when I went with Dad.  One of my most fond memories at the time was in '67 when I caught the foul ball, and Dad hunted down Ewing Kauffman, the team owner, and escorted me down to the front row behind homeplate where Mr. Kauffman then signed the ball for me.  Yep, I've still got the ball!

We had a 4-1 lead going into this inning, but we brought in our 'ace' closer out of the bullpen, whom promptly lost the lead, and then the game. Stadium was about 3/4's full tonight.  Despite the Royals being in last place, tonight had $1 hotdogs, peanuts, and Pepsi.  That brought them in for sure, as the normal price of a dog is $5.  Our seats were pretty good, but we were right on an aisle, an aisle filled with gaggles of girl teenagers whose sole lot in life (or at least for this game), was to get up and leave their seats as often as humanly possible, to come back 5-10 minutes later, to do it all over again 5 minutes after that. It happened all night, so aggravating.  Not that we lost, but that these Clydesdale's were constantly in the aisle blocking the views.

I was surprised that my camera phone got this picture, but it turned out pretty good.  The fountains had some pretty cool special effects in between innings, and especially when it got dark for the fireworks.  This was no nickle-dime fireworks show; this was a whole enchilada, wow, it lasted about 30 minutes, and they had some tricky fireworks aerials that were a visual feast.  The way they coordinated it with the fountains, the lights, and the music made for a great after-game treat.  The finale was one for the ages.  Reminded me of the finale you watch when the Olympics finish.

Oops, this one is out of order. Oh well; I was trying to show the jet flyover that was timed perfectly.

Okay, the indent is jacked on this blog, so be it.

 

Our day started with lunch about 3p at the original 1957 location for Jack Stack BBQ.  Unquestionably, the world's best BBQ.  As a young child, I lived in KC for 12 years, and still love it to this day, enjoying every trip, and wishing I could visit the city more often.  We pulled up into the parking lot, and the smell of smoke overwhelmed us.  I had a good picture of it, but it did not send, so that kind of sucks.

Our server was Linda, the same one in the same round corner that we'd eaten at many times before.  She's not been there since '57, but close.  She was perfect as usual.  I had the burnt ends, and the rest of them had "the special", which today was supposed to have been 5 ribs and 2 sides for $10.  Each plate though was delivered with 12 ribs, and the boys enhaled their slaw so quickly that Linda brought more bowls of slaw for the whole table.  The value today was amazing.

These weren't old dried out ribs, these were the pick of the liter ribs.  Falling off the bone moist, tender, delicious.  I know, because after I finished my burnt ends, I was offered a few of Paul's, which I woofed down too.  James finished all 12 of his, plus 2 of John's, whom finished all of his with James' help.  Paul was able to polish off about 1/2 of his, and most surprising, Dad ate about 2/3 of his, leaving 5 ribs (which is what the meal was supposed to have started with!).  The doggie bag of leftovers was finished around midnight that night . . ., which is right about when we made it back to the room after the game.

 

Paul and the boys stayed up with TV till about 2a; and Dad & I were then up for good shortly after 6a, with Dad saying "Let's go! Time for breakfast!", which we went down together, and did eat quite a bit.

 

But, when the boys showed up 20 minutes later, the kitchen staff had to lock the doors after Paul, James, and John had cleaned out the buffet, plus the refill of the buffet, plus at least one more refill after that.  MAN, these boys can eat (and took about an hour to do so).  Jimminy, they sure enjoyed their food this weekend!  I felt sorry for the rest of the hotel guests that didn't get to eat breakfast that morning . . .

So, how soon can I come back?  Would love to see another game before the year is over.