Reunion

It came and went pretty darn fast.

I had my 20th class reunion, high school that is, last weekend and it was a blast. I ran into current friends and people I probably never said more than "hello" in my life, but we all caught up just nicely.

The big thing about a 20-year reunion, perhaps compared to a 10-year one, is how people have aged. I had classmates who looked 50, some who looked 38 and others who tried to look 18. In all though, we were still a pretty good-looking group.

I have to admit, however, graduating with about 185 and having about 110 attend, I only was stumped on one person.

I MC'd the 10-year reunion and I guess the organizers had no plans on handing the mic over to me again. It's especially notable since this year's MC started out address by saying, "The reason I'm up here today is because, well, Kim (the organizer) had 'MC- Rob Beer??' on the planning agenda" and the group immediately froze.

I guess my humor 10 years ago was a bit too much to handle. But I've grown and I told them afterward that I'd be "could've" played it straight, if so needed.

I still found a way to get a microphone in my hands, however. First, at the mixer Friday night, I believe I belted out about eight karoke songs and, of course, during the reunion itself, a friend came up to me and handed me the mic later in the night, saying "Someone who works here asked me to give this to you to get this place going."

Apparently, the only time one dances is in high school or during the last hour of a reunion when the booze kicks in.

Fortunately, my favorite AC/DC song was offered by the DJ and I tried to trump Brian Johnson's vocals. I thought I did a pretty mean Johnson the night earlier, though I was scared I'd rip my vocal chords out.

I'll say this, however, the weekend felt just like high school - 20 years later. As much as you want to get out of school, sometimes you really just want to get back in with your friends.

Posted by: Beers on 10/16/2008 at 11:55 PM | Comments (2) | Permalink

Wastebook

I joined Facebook yesterday and I don't know why. My wife joined today and she doesn't know why, either. In fact, we both spent two hours tonight doing things on there while we don't really know what we did or why we did them.

Can anyone tell me if that site somehow filters addictive drugs through the keyboard and into the user's bloodstream?

Seriously, and maybe because the site doesn't have a very big help menu, but I appeared to spend a large chunk of time just figuring out how to upload a photo, or explaining to my wife tonight why all these people she knew came up on her page a millionth of a second after she created her profile.

I will say this, outside of my parents who don't own a computer, they might be the only ones NOT on Facebook. My gosh, I ran into long-lost friends and classmates almost instantly, too.

Maybe that's the whole point of Facebook. I'm really not sure.

The thing is, we haven't even heard from some of these people in years. They don't return phone calls, don't attend a party we went to and it's like prying teeth to get an e-mail response. But within five minutes, they confirmed my "add a friend" request to Facebook.

I don't get it.

I had to get off the site for a while since I've already revised my "favorite TV shows" one too many times. I mean, why am I revising it? Who cares. I listed three shows and realized I really do like four shows, so I had to go back and tell the world "You know, I watch Boston Legal, too, and since I do, you should, too, because I listed it as one of my favorite shows and since you're on my site, you must think I'm pretty cool and show excellent judgment, so I'm assuming you'll watch the show, too, because you want to be like me."

Good grief.

Posted by: Beers on 9/30/2008 at 1:39 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Busy fall

I haven't mowed my lawn in three weeks. And neither have some of my neighbors.

Don't get me wrong, it needs a trim. But oddly, even after good share of rain and sun these past few weeks, the lawn isn't out of control as green as it is.

It's not that I don't want to mow, I do. It's been a very busy time "around the house" and when I do have a free hour, I've been walking outside in the backyard barefoot, perhaps sizing up my thoughts whether it is time to mow or not.

It's become a fight really. How long can I go? Can I go another week? I asked myself that two weeks ago before I left for Vegas, nearly asking the neighbor if he could come over and mow while I was away.

There's something oddly romantic about mowing a lawn. Maybe because I get to step foot on every square inch of property we own, sort of like, "this is my turf!" Or maybe it's just the buzz of the motor and letting my mind wander for a while. No cell phones. No crying children. And it sure beats doing dishes.

I've always wanted a riding mower, perhaps because I love small, motorized things. Go-karts are great. Perhaps its because when I was pre-driving age, I loved driving grandpa's riding lawnmower, at least until I put the front wheel into a depression and nearly flipped the darn thing over. (I work at the paper and believe me, I've read more stories about odd deaths via lawnmower than I've wanted to.)

But those ZTR machines? C'mon. Even a smallish yard like mine, that'd be a fun ride.

Posted by: Beers on 9/21/2008 at 2:52 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Live from Vegas

Wrapping up a conference here in Vegas today and as a first timer, it's a fun city. I can't get into specifics because of that "What happens in Vegas... " thing. Very warm out here, first day was 103 or so.

This is a look out to the pool area at the Red Rock Casino. I haven't had an In-N-Out Burger yet, but I will try tonight.

UPDATE: I love GPS. I don't have the fancy dashboard-type or OnStar, but the Verizon Navigator works just fine. (Well, except for that 20 @#!^!^# minutes it didn't work as we drove around the backstreets of Vegas trying to either find a) an In-N-Out joint or b) our hotel.)

Rant #1: You're a PHONE company, but why is it so hard to call the company? When my cell phone GPS went bezerk (said it was unavailable) I trying to call Verizon to see what was going on. "It's pound-something" I was saying to my friend driving the car. At 2 a.m. local Vegas time, the only person who I thought would know is a buddy back in Fargo who I knew was up that time of night. "No idea," he says when I reached him. "Maybe Dan knows."

So I call Dan. He fiddled with some web site online and he couldn't come up with an answer.

Guh!

We drove around and eventually found a road we'd been on the previous night. So much for finding the In-N-Out Burger joint.

The next day we actually drove past one and I locked the address in on GPS. It was on Dean Martin Drive, which was cool because, well, it's Dean Martin Drive for cryin out loud. So later that night we drove there, but not to the Dean Martin one because, well GPS rules so we found one a little closer to our route.

We ordered. The In-N-Out sign looks like a McDonald's sign on crack. It's red and has a slanted yellow line arrow thing. There isn't too much to order. I mean, it's a simple burger joint and you have the option of ordering the value menu of 1, 2 or 3, or something else.

I ordered the standard hamburger #3 with the typical fixins. You get a large amount of julienned fries with your burger. The burger reminds me a bit of a Whopper. Both are good but I wasn't overly impressed with the INO burger. It's good, but the hype killed it perhaps. Plus, no one in their right mind would eat all those fries, so perhaps that's why it's a popular site for after-bar hours, which is basically anytime in Vegas.

Posted by: Beers on 9/09/2008 at 8:59 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Vikings and Twins prediction time / rants

Adrian Peterson and the massive additions, Vikings finish 9-7 this year and miss playoffs. I will not, can not and should not trust this team until it wins the Super Bowl two times, and it won't be this season.

Twins, meanwhile, edge WSox for division and advance to World Series, but lose to Cubs 4 games to 1.

Holy cow!

And is it only our family which has half rolls of outdated postage stamps around?

And universal wireless access to all. I just bought a notebook computer and, while I can access my home's wireless network, I want to get on free everywhere I go.

Posted by: Beers on 8/30/2008 at 10:58 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Big bang theory

Somewhere right before I started my previous blog post, I heard a giant boom coming from the direction of my backyard, which faces east towards Concordia College.

It was so loud, I jumped a bit from my computer chair. My newborn was sleeping near me and since it was extremely late, I didn't have the energy to go explore the sound. Plus, since the sound had a gunshot-type echo, I wasn't about to go outside an encounter someone who probably shouldn't be up that time of night.

I made sure the doors were locked and resumed my business at the computer. About a half-hour later, another giant boom shook the joint and I heard something that sounded like a police scanner outside through the open window.

Usually nothing gets me too riled up, or at least riled up enough to call the police. But I had to. Something strange was going on. I couldn't believe my wife and oldest son in the other room didn't wake up from all that commotion.

I chatted with the dispatcher a bit, not to make it sound too exciting because, frankly, I had no idea what was going on. And I told her that it probably wasn't a gunshot because of it's low pitch, but it definitely had some explosive-type qualities.

About 15 minutes later - and what freaked me out the most - is our wireless doorbell, I believe - made the strangest, eeriest, scariest sound. (It sounded again like a police scanner.) And it was loud! The darn thing is a year old and usually just makes a ding-dong sound (or "Dixie," like the General Lee). I couldn't believe what was going on.

I sat there frozen in my chair like I was waiting for aliens to take me away without a fight.

Then my cell rang.

It was an officer telling me that a transformer blew on the end of the block. It's been years since I've heard one of those blow, but it made sense all the same.

That explained the booms. Now someone please explain my doorbell.

Posted by: Beers on 8/09/2008 at 10:36 PM | Comments (2) | Permalink

Elmo's view

A Ticketmaster e-mail a few months ago alerted me that Elmo would be in Grand Forks. My oldest son is a pretty big fan so I thought it'd be nice for us to go see him and have a little trip together.

So to the Alerus we went for "Sesame Street Live" Friday night. After scrambling to eat, have my wife prep the diaper bag and having to swing back a couple blocks after I forgot some money, I was glad I could drive 75 on I-29.

Like most shows, the tickets that get you in door are just tickets to really open your wallet. The ticket prices were reasonable. The hour drive was reasonable. Even parking at $5 was reasonable.

The seating arrangements were not so reasonable. The "number of the day" was 8 and that's about how tall in feet I wish I was.

First, consider that about half the floor seating were kids from 0 to 5 years old. The others were grown-ups who are tall. I held my son for the entire performance just so he could attempt to have a clear view of the stage, as did many other parents. Even I had line-of-sight difficulties sometimes and my son's eye level was still below mine.

Of course, when I couldn't see, I sat up taller. I held Caden up at times, knowing I'm part of this chain reaction from the third row to the 25th row. Where is that 8-foot Big Bird when you need him? My child isn't comfortable and holding him while eating cotton candy (reasonable price) and holding a small tub of popcorn (again, reasonably priced) isn't comfortable either.

During intermission, I joked with someone behind me why I bothered to buy two seats when we're really only using one. As we chatted, a man started selling helium Elmo ballons (surprise, for $8 each, the "NOTD" as previously noted). I was glad to hear those had to be stashed under chairs when the show resumed. If we had to see around those, I'd consider bending Telly Monster's triangle into a baton. 

Here's a thought: Move the stage up to the bleacher seats so the angled seating takes care of everyone.

Posted by: Beers on 8/09/2008 at 2:56 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Quiet zone

Since Carson's birth, rare is it that our family has been in a quiet zone. Carson is a wonderful newborn, mind you, and he's about as quiet as any newborn can be. But mix in a sometimes hyper 2-year-old brother and the house can become one issue after another.

It's been a blessing that Caden has taken to his little brother, and it's very cute how he says "Baby brother Carson." And Caden, because his interest level is so high in everything right now, is getting plenty of attention from us, too, especially since daddy is enjoying a two-week break from work.

Having two kids isn't as difficult as I imagined, partly because Carson is such a wonderful little boy and Caden is growing more independent each day. (We still need to get him out of diapers, but that's a different blog post altogether.)

Speaking of diapers, my wife and I gave Carson a bath this evening and, about 15 minutes later, as I sat down with him tucked under my arm to catch up on the Twins at the computer, well, so much for that fresh diaper and clean skin. Ha.

I told my wife tonight that I should design baby clothes. First of all, why all the snaps? I'm all for one big zipper. Seriously, did the people who put 16 snaps on an outfit have kids? Listen, if you have to change five or six diapers a day, that's nearly 100 snaps a day. I thought I solved my problem when I found another outfit, the poncho-type, in his dresser, but my gosh, you try putting baby's arms in a long sleeve.

I'm serious. A diaper/outfit change should not take 15 minutes in modern times.

Perhaps I got spoiled after Caden grew out of infant clothes.

Carson is a night owl, much like the rest of the family. He gets his rest, but right now he fussed while in his bassinet after a feeding. So our Plan B is the Fisher-Price swing. Usually that works, and tonight it did.

Caden is also learning a lot about his brother, especially the kinds of things he's subject to. Like baths in the portable tub, baby oil wipedowns and onesies. I keep telling Caden that he used to be that little and do the same things, but I'm not sure he quite understands that. In fact, I pulled up some photos of "baby" Caden on the computer last night and Caden would point and say "Carson." Then when I say that's him, he says "Oh reaaally?"

Caden's often(overused) phrase is "Oh, reaaally." But it's cute and his eyes just light up when he's that curious. Carson is getting that way, too, with his eyes opening much wider these days and the world looking so much bigger to him as we get him out and about a bit.

By the way, thanks for the nice messages on my previous post. - rob

Posted by: Beers on 7/19/2008 at 1:28 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink