Man at Work

During construction of the plant, I wear the hat and vest.

Wife is NOT Roommate

Did you know that having a roommate is NOT the same as having a wife.?

You see, in the past, I have had several roommates. I have had some great roomies and some not so great. My best friend, Justin, and I were roommates without much issue at all. In fact Justin and I had a third roommate that changed the locks on the door when we left his VCR on!

So, a roommate is someone that you are around but don't really have to like. In most cases I did like my roomies, but not always. When I didn't like my roommates, we had separate rooms and lives. Simply, we only had to interact once in a while.

It is not the same with a wife. You could do that, but you might not want to. Unlike a roommate, you have to communicate often. If you have an argument, you don't go to another room and slam the door. You now share a room. So, when you want to get away, it's not that easy.

In many ways, Sarah and I are like roommates. We have fun together, share the bills, and work at keeping the house tidy. We eat Chinese food, watch TV, and hang out together.

It is tough at times. When I just want to be alone, we share a bed. It is not the kind of thing to take lightly. When you share a bed with your spouse, you have to figure it out. I have gone to bed angry, always about stupid things like money. It sucks laying in bed next to someone you don't want to talk to, much less touch.

I realized that someone was right when they said "Never go to bed angry." They didn't say with your spouse, but now I know that is what they meant. We are very happy, but like roommates, we have our times when things just ain't so fun.

It seems that we are starting to understand this a little more. It's not so much marriage as it is close-quarters cohabitation. No matter what, I have to come home and be with my wife/roomie.

No one said it would be easy, but no one said it would be this much fun either!

Poodle Sitters

Sarah and I are poodle sitting tonight. The neighbors asked us to watch thier dog, Cosmo, while they attended a soccer tourney. Below is Cosmo and Sarah.

And the Reward:

For Sicker or Poorer

My wife said to me tonight, "Why didn't you fart like this before I married you!"

How to Ruin a Pizza

It's hard to do...ruin a pizza, and I did it.

Pizza is so simple, anyone can do it!

I had the pizza crust, fresh mozzarella, pepperoni, and sauce. Well, actually we had left over sauce from spaghetti. That's the same thing as pizza sauce right? Sure, it's all just tomato sauce.

I was sure that Sarah wouldn't even notice. I'll just put a whole bunch of cheese and pepperoni and it will be great!

It came out of the oven nice and crisp from the pizza stone. It looked YUMMY!

Sarah took one bite and said "This is spaghetti sauce!" She ate only a few bites and left the slices for the cats.

Apparently it is not the same a pizza sauce. Spaghetti sauce may look, smell, have the same seasonings, but it is definitively NOT pizza sauce!

I have been banned from making pizza, for life.

[This will go well with my ban on making chinese food and salads that have more than three ingredients.]

Sunday

Today was a great day with the local brew club.  We learned a bit about flavors and smells in beer.  Sometimes beer can have "off flavors" and it is good to recognize these when brewing your own.  A funny thing about it was that Rolling Rock beer was used as an example of dimethyl Sulfide.  The beer has a different flavor, that most beers do not.  Apparently drinkers of Rolling Rock like this because when Anheuser-Busch bought the company and fixed the brewery so no "off" flavors were produced, customers complained.  The dimethyl sulfide was then returned somehow to the process.  This month was Irish style beer month at the club meeting, so I got to try all sorts of smoky flavored beers.

As you may have read, I have been reading the Jenna Jameson autobiography.  It is a decent read, but I found it to be far too predictable and even a bit of a let down.  If I would have guessed the background of a porn star, it would be just like hers.  She came from a difficult childhood with no "real" parental support.  She chose a bad man, got heavily into drugs, became a stripper, and viola...a porn star is born.  Of course along the way she thinks she is choosing it all to make a better life for herself, but really just did most things because she had low self esteem.  Oh well, she's fine now, I think.  I guess I just wanted to hear her side of the story.  

So, back to the beer subject.  I will soon be submitting some of my homebrews in a local contest...Next the WORLD!!! (cue evil laugh)

Truth is Stranger Than Fiction

My name is Tom and I am a non-fiction junky. I am sure I have read over a hundred. If it is reported to be interesting, and the person who did something interesting wants to tell the story, then I want to hear it.

Autobiographies and mostly-true stories, these are what I live for. I prefer first hand accounts. I have an affinity for non-fiction and prefer it to fiction. I am not sure why I care what Lance Armstrong was thinking while riding up a hill in the Tour de France. Why Do I care what inspires other people? I don't know why I like story after story of what makes a person who they are. Am I looking for an insight or "secret" to life? I don't know.

For some reason, I just like reading and hearing stories about peoples experiences in life. I have read the story of a black woman who got a law degree at Harvard and said the whole Harvard thing was a joke. I continue to read fishing stories of men in pursuit of wild trout.
(Note: Many do not think fishing stories are non-fiction or any actual form of literature)

In high school I had a great class, Multicultural Literature. The instructor was a passionate Latina who showed us a whole new group of authors that I had never heard of. People from all walks of life and various cultures that had interesting stories. For an impressionable white boy from a small town, these stories of a growing up in a barrio or ghetto were incredible. The stories of people surviving war, famine, rape, and near death really grabs a hold of me, still to this day.

When I look at my bookshelf, I have many books on many subjects. Most are non-fiction. I do like some fiction such as Michael Crichton, Mark Twain, or the Harry Potter series.

I have read some stories that possibly changed my life. The book "Why the Caged Bird Sings" by Maya Angelou and "A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier" by Ishmael Beah.

Some I read just because I wondered who these people "really" are. For example, the autobiographies from Tony Hawk, Lance Armstrong, Dog the Bounty Hunter, or Chef Gordon Ramsey. When you read Gordon Ramsey's book, you will see why he is the way he is.

I read books to peer into other cultures or places I would otherwise never be able to. People such as Richard Wright and Ernesto Galarz's "Barrio Boy" opened my eyes.

Some books are because of an interest in science. A book by Richard Feynman gave me humorous insight a physicists' mind and the making of the first hydrogen bombs. An untold story written by two astronauts "Two Sides of the Moon", told the tale of the space race to the moon by the USA and Russia.

Sometimes I go on a tangent of topics like sports or Mt. Everest. I read four or five books by people who had climbed and survived Mt. Everest. I even got DVD's on Everest. I think Sarah thought I was going to take off and go the mountain. These stories of exceptional endurance and not giving up are great reads to me. The best book I read about climbing Mt. Everest was "Left for Dead" by Beck Weathers.

I just ordered two new non-fiction titles.

The first one I just couldn't help myself, retired porn star Jenna Jameson's "How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale." Complete with lovely pictures of her. The second book is "The Ice Opinion" by Law and Order actor Ice T. He talks about where he came from, gangs in L.A., politics, and other topics. I somehow find this stuff interesting.

Maybe I just like to read.

Poo Plant Diary: Week 4

I knew today would be an interesting day at the poo plant when I heard on NPR that global warming protesters would be out in a snowstorm in D.C. Irony you might say.

This was a basic Monday. Most people were in a bad mood, and I just starting finding things to do. At some point one of my coworkers told the secretary that she had the air conditioning too cold and people were getting sick because of it. Oh boy, that started a day long fuss about who is changing the settings and who should be. The conversation was brought up on our two way radios for all to hear. This led to an impromptu "safety" meeting about how people can get sick at work.

I am not in the building long enough to care. If it's hot, I leave. If it's cold, I have a jacket. This stupid issue was carried throughout the day. When the secretary left, she was said something about how difficult it was to work here.

I am starting to settle in at the new job. I actually have been sent to do various tasks around the plant on my own. I am not aloud to make any changes to the plant or process without direct supervision. I work in teams and on my own.

Today, my boss said there was a "grease log" at the influent headworks (where the poop comes in the plant). In a sewage system there is grease, oils, and other things that are sticky and float. This crap can build up in pipes leading up to the plant and then form a large plug, partially blocking the flow of the pipe, much like a clogged artery. Anyways, it turned out to be no big deal. We broke it up with high pressure water hoses and went about normal business.

It's easy to be humble when a mixture of hose water and sewage splashes you in the face. You quickly learn to keep your mouth shut while doing these things.