Fish Fear Me

No Escape

I think that "No one does Christmas, like Kmart does Christmas" jingle is burning a hole in my brain. The damn thing seems to be everywhere on TV right now.

Snowy Saturday

(Six deck chairs, no waiting)

Greetings from the North Shore of Lake Superior, where it is a snowy start to Saturday. Only 2" total is expected today, but the waves are building on the lake and I might get to see some five or six foot waves come in. I love it when the lake is rockin' a bit.

Just barely missed a deer on the way up. I always try to get up here by dusk because Hwy. 61 is such a deer riddled road, but I missed that goal of getting out of dodge by noon yesterday. So it was full on night by the time I was tooling along north of Two Harbors. The darn thing appeared like a ghost, just on my side of the centerline. It froze and I slammed on the brakes and swerved. It could have kissed the fender as I went by it. There was no damage to it or the truck, but my heart could be a different story.

I've been a bit out of sorts the last few weeks, so maybe a long weekend of solitude will get me recharged and in the Christmas spirit. I'm kind of feeling a bit of that already this morning.

Some Minor Venting

My fantasy football team laid a giant egg this weekend. I still have a chance for a small consolation prize, just enough to keep me and the other losing owner interested. Oh well, it was a fun run to make the playoffs at all after a fairly dismal start.

Momentum has built for a new stadium for the Vikings and the discussions finally got serious a couple of months ago. Zygy Wilf wants a site in the northern suburbs of St. Paul because it would have lots of other land around it that he could make big bucks developing. The thing is though, it also needs about $300 million in new roads and other infrastructure that already exists to support the Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis. One would think that it would be a nobrainer to put the new stadium in downtown Minneapolis, but its political and business leaders have dropped the ball while proponents of other sites built serious proposals. Now they can't even get their act together among themselves and agree on a site downtown. Clowns. We're being led by clowns.

Rob saw some bad NFL officiating this week and so did I. A blatant facemask of Vikings QB on the last play of the game, with the Vikings on the Detroit 1-yard-line, went uncalled and denied the Vikings a chance to win the game. Earlier I saw a Redskins player get called for a non-existent blow to Tom Brady's head. I think this is the worst season ever for officiating. I don't expect any game to be called perfectly, but if the NFL doesn't step up here they are going to lose credibility.

This car trouble thing is catchy. Now I have issues to deal with. Looks like it's my turn to do my part for the economy.  ;)

Why People Distrust Mechanics

Last week the exhaust on my dad's car broke right where it attaches to the manifold. As you can imagine, the darn thing was incredibly loud, so I drove it over to a nearby Midas place for him and he bit the bullet on a pretty costly repair, mainly because the pipe that broke included the catalytic convertor. Oh well, such is life for a car owner, right? Right. It's what happened next that bugs me.

A few days after that repair now, the check engine light has come on and there is a strange and intermittent vibration noise that seems to be coming from the back of the engine where the exhause repair was done. I have an OBD II reader and the error code that has caused the check engine light to come on is P1133, which is a problem with the exhaust oxygen sensor that is located...wait for it...just in front of where the repair work was done. 

Coincidence? Well, it's possible I guess, but I'm suspicious. Unfortunately, I don't think there's any way to prove anything. I'm going to take it back to Midas this afternoon and see what they say, but I'm not optimistic that they will do anything but hand me an overpriced estimate. We'll see I guess. 

This is just another example of how you take a car in to get one thing fixed and all sorts of other things start going bad.

Which, personally, I think is a pretty darn good reason not to go to the doctor either.  ;)

Thursday Catch Up

A combination of things, some good some bad, have kept me mostly offline the last week or so, but now I'm back.

Blech: PC problems at home and at work were a royal pain in the you know what. Hardware problems at home, a nasty virus problem at work. Both should be fixed now. 

FFL: I've clawed my way into the upper division playoffs with three victories in a row. Six teams play for the big money and four try to avoid having to host the end of season party. I'm glad to have a shot at the big money, but I don't have big expectations; I'm the sixth seed out of six. Even if I get lucky this week, I'll face the best team in the league the next.

Pearl Harbor: With yesterday's 70th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor it really hit home how quickly that event is now fading from living memory. I read a story in the Strib yesterday about how there were once 500 Minnesotans in a survivors association and that number is now down to just 10. My parents were both six at the time and really don't have any memory of it. My grandparents have all passed on. I don't think I truly understood what a surprise punch to the national gut the attack was until 9/11. It didn't just pull us into a very brutal war, it ignited a deep hatred that lived on for many years in some people before time faded it away. When I was a kid more than 25 years later it was still acceptable to spit out "Japs" as an epithet. While we mourn the passing of the men and woman who fought that day and later, we can also be grateful that the old hates that were spawned that day have mostly faded away now. 

Speaking of Pearl Harbor: I have little time for the annual conspiracy theories about FDR knowing and blah, blah, blah. The same with an attempted whitewashing Yamamoto in the NY Times yesterday. Yes, the man thought attacking the US was a bad idea, but he did create a plan for that and he did execute it. Whatever his battles with the militarists behind the scene he did what he did. I don't see any need to rehabilitate him. On the other hand, getting upset that Sidwell School had Asian food on the menu yesterday strikes me as more than just a little silly. As they say, sometimes edamame are just edamame. Well, always actually.

Alec Baldwin: Asshat of the Month. FAA rules require that all electronic devices be turned off when the door is closed and a plane is ready for departure. We all have been through the drill who knows how many times. But not Alec Baldwin, no, he's Mr. Special. Good for American Airlines when they threw him off for refusing to do what every other passenger did and his subsequent hissy fit. I can usually separate an entertainer's work from his politics, but not in this guy's case. He's not just rude when he talks about people with different views, he's vile. Screw him. Screw his work. Screw anybody who associates with that asshole. I'm not a violent man, but I would dearly love to punch that smarmy look off his face.

Fire Frazier?: I'm not ready to join any fire Frazier bandwagon, but I wouldn't be shocked if his stint as head coach of the Vikings comes to an end this year. I liked the guy as defensive coordinator and I still like the man even as I have my doubts about him as head coach. At this point in the season though, he hasn't proved that he has the chops to make it at that level. McNabb turned out to be a disaster and while he doesn't deserve all of the blame for that, he has to take a hit. Then there are more than a few game decisions that have been less than brilliant. He was handed a tough job at the beginning of the year, no doubt. Maybe too tough for him though.

The North Woods: Trying to get a few things done in order to get some time up north before Christmas. I need to get away for a few days.