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Captain Catastrophe
Captain Halloween
So this is Halloween. I love Halloween. Well, mostly. Kinda. Y’know.
There are two things to do at Halloween. The first is my favorite: scare children. I love Halloween because you can scare children and it’s perfectly okay. No one minds. Mostly. Kinda. Y’know.
So Halloween will come. I have the kids all programmed. I play spooky music on the porch. Sometimes, I run the fog machine, but that thing is mostly lame, so that isn’t always the case. Then I put out one of those bowls that has a hand sticking out and when someone reaches inside, it grabs you. It’s scary and fun. I love it.
Sometimes I like to dress scary, too. Or pretend to be a corpse and when the kid comes near I pop up and scream “Boo!” or “Join us in our unholy resting place.” Something creepy like that. Or I just stare at the kids while pulling the cord to start my chainsaw. Good times. Anything to help children learn a valuable lesson: the guy down the street hates children…I mean…don’t take candy from strangers. With chainsaws.
The other part of Halloween, the part I don’t like particularly, is the whole fighting the forces of evil angle. That gets mighty tiresome. You’d think coming up against a formidable opponent like the Captain here, they’d have had their fill. But, noooooo. They keep coming back for more. Suffering fools.
Now, I don’t want to say I’m attacked by monsters frequently. I don’t want to, but I think it is accurate. I mean, I’ve been attacked four times already. Four seems fairly frequent to me. If someone has been attacked five times, I’ll happily set aside my whole frequently attacked by monsters mantelpiece to ya, pal. You can have the plaque, the trophy, the whole durn thing.
Each time I’ve been attacked by a monster it’s been right in the heart of my birthday season. (My birthday is October 25th. Make checks payable to “Tim Kretschmann Monster Fighting Fund,” please.) Some people actually don’t know the idea of birthday seasons. These people are morons. Let me explain.
Your birthday season encompasses the time from your immediate family member’s nearest birthday until your birthday. During this “season” all other immediate family members must follow your every command. This is part of being the “birthday boy.” Obviously, some of us get screwed. My dad is the birthday before me but it is on September 23. My brother is after me in May sometime (he always tells me when it is coming up–why should I remember it? Kidding-May 26th. I think.) So clearly, you can see I am screwed. I only get one month. However, there is an odd ruling on this. Since my brother has nearly half a frigging year, it is not FAIR! Luckily the ruling states that since I’m the first born and my birthday lands on a 25th (this is key), my rule is absolute during its duration. Basically, this means I can declare his entire birthday season as null and void.
Hah!
Of course, this upsets the ancient ones and they send merchants of death to dispatch me which leads us to the whole monster attack thing. And you thought I forgot!
The first time I was attacked, I was in a gym exercising. So, you know, I was traumatized. And thus, I don’t do this anymore.
The second time I was eating some vegetables. Sad how these monsters attack my very lifestyle.
I’d like to say the next time I was attacked I was about to make love, but I want the story to sound plausible. Come to think of it, maybe this is why I keep getting attacked. They always come after the virgin. Somebody–please–save me.
Well, had to try.
This leads me to another thing…lousy law enforcement here. A number of law enforcement types read these columns and they need to know–I’ve yet to be saved from a Soul-Sucking Thaddeus Gorilla Monster from a member of law enforcement. C’mon, guys. You got to get on this. I don’t think you are taking the whole Gorilla Monster threat as seriously as you could. I would like to suggest a task force to fight this. And school uniforms. Get on it.
So this last time, this beast comes at me with its massive, blood drenched claws. Now, these were CLAWS not PAWS. Paws come on pets. It’s part of the alliteration from initial consonant sounds. Which means claws generally come from canaries. (Actually, for a true alliteration, the “cl-” sound should be repeated, but I couldn’t think of anything PG-13, so you are stuck with a canary clawed gorilla monster.)
It inched toward me reading the poetry of e.e.cummings, an obvious sadist. I, luckily, had an ancient amulet of Escorial and spoke the magic words, “Knowing is half the battle” (Yes, it’s a really obscure pop culture reference–we’ll see who gets it) which caused a cataclysmic bolt of energy as usually happens in this kind of situation.
The clean up was horrendous. Thank goodness from the trunk monkey.
Now some of ya’s are thinking, “No fair. Tim didn’t get injured. And this story isn’t even true. There is no such thing as monsters.”
Well, pish-posh. It was a real monster. And blonde, too. I’ll show you right where she pulled my heart out and stepped on it, if ya want.
And trust me, there were other “c” words to go with the claws, but I’m a gentleman.
Wishing you all a Happy Halloween and successful battles against monsters of all kinds,
Captain Catastrophe
There are two things to do at Halloween. The first is my favorite: scare children. I love Halloween because you can scare children and it’s perfectly okay. No one minds. Mostly. Kinda. Y’know.
So Halloween will come. I have the kids all programmed. I play spooky music on the porch. Sometimes, I run the fog machine, but that thing is mostly lame, so that isn’t always the case. Then I put out one of those bowls that has a hand sticking out and when someone reaches inside, it grabs you. It’s scary and fun. I love it.
Sometimes I like to dress scary, too. Or pretend to be a corpse and when the kid comes near I pop up and scream “Boo!” or “Join us in our unholy resting place.” Something creepy like that. Or I just stare at the kids while pulling the cord to start my chainsaw. Good times. Anything to help children learn a valuable lesson: the guy down the street hates children…I mean…don’t take candy from strangers. With chainsaws.
The other part of Halloween, the part I don’t like particularly, is the whole fighting the forces of evil angle. That gets mighty tiresome. You’d think coming up against a formidable opponent like the Captain here, they’d have had their fill. But, noooooo. They keep coming back for more. Suffering fools.
Now, I don’t want to say I’m attacked by monsters frequently. I don’t want to, but I think it is accurate. I mean, I’ve been attacked four times already. Four seems fairly frequent to me. If someone has been attacked five times, I’ll happily set aside my whole frequently attacked by monsters mantelpiece to ya, pal. You can have the plaque, the trophy, the whole durn thing.
Each time I’ve been attacked by a monster it’s been right in the heart of my birthday season. (My birthday is October 25th. Make checks payable to “Tim Kretschmann Monster Fighting Fund,” please.) Some people actually don’t know the idea of birthday seasons. These people are morons. Let me explain.
Your birthday season encompasses the time from your immediate family member’s nearest birthday until your birthday. During this “season” all other immediate family members must follow your every command. This is part of being the “birthday boy.” Obviously, some of us get screwed. My dad is the birthday before me but it is on September 23. My brother is after me in May sometime (he always tells me when it is coming up–why should I remember it? Kidding-May 26th. I think.) So clearly, you can see I am screwed. I only get one month. However, there is an odd ruling on this. Since my brother has nearly half a frigging year, it is not FAIR! Luckily the ruling states that since I’m the first born and my birthday lands on a 25th (this is key), my rule is absolute during its duration. Basically, this means I can declare his entire birthday season as null and void.
Hah!
Of course, this upsets the ancient ones and they send merchants of death to dispatch me which leads us to the whole monster attack thing. And you thought I forgot!
The first time I was attacked, I was in a gym exercising. So, you know, I was traumatized. And thus, I don’t do this anymore.
The second time I was eating some vegetables. Sad how these monsters attack my very lifestyle.
I’d like to say the next time I was attacked I was about to make love, but I want the story to sound plausible. Come to think of it, maybe this is why I keep getting attacked. They always come after the virgin. Somebody–please–save me.
Well, had to try.
This leads me to another thing…lousy law enforcement here. A number of law enforcement types read these columns and they need to know–I’ve yet to be saved from a Soul-Sucking Thaddeus Gorilla Monster from a member of law enforcement. C’mon, guys. You got to get on this. I don’t think you are taking the whole Gorilla Monster threat as seriously as you could. I would like to suggest a task force to fight this. And school uniforms. Get on it.
So this last time, this beast comes at me with its massive, blood drenched claws. Now, these were CLAWS not PAWS. Paws come on pets. It’s part of the alliteration from initial consonant sounds. Which means claws generally come from canaries. (Actually, for a true alliteration, the “cl-” sound should be repeated, but I couldn’t think of anything PG-13, so you are stuck with a canary clawed gorilla monster.)
It inched toward me reading the poetry of e.e.cummings, an obvious sadist. I, luckily, had an ancient amulet of Escorial and spoke the magic words, “Knowing is half the battle” (Yes, it’s a really obscure pop culture reference–we’ll see who gets it) which caused a cataclysmic bolt of energy as usually happens in this kind of situation.
The clean up was horrendous. Thank goodness from the trunk monkey.
Now some of ya’s are thinking, “No fair. Tim didn’t get injured. And this story isn’t even true. There is no such thing as monsters.”
Well, pish-posh. It was a real monster. And blonde, too. I’ll show you right where she pulled my heart out and stepped on it, if ya want.
And trust me, there were other “c” words to go with the claws, but I’m a gentleman.
Wishing you all a Happy Halloween and successful battles against monsters of all kinds,
Captain Catastrophe
The Captain Cooks
So there I am in my car. I used to call it the Red Rocket, but since I saw Cartman on South Park pleasure a dog to raise his “Red Rocket” I’ve taken to calling her Erika. Come to think of it, it’s sort of weird I have to name my cars…but there you are.
I kind of wish everything were as easy as being in my car. The past week has been really odd. I’ve felt a little lost, as of late, and had decided to “get back to the basics.” I’ve been eating out, pretty much exclusively, for the past two to three months and have always enjoyed eating at home. It was time to get back in the kitchen where things made sense. Like when I would make the Ramen Noodles when I first moved out because I was scared to death of my own budget to pay the mortgage.
Ahh…the good old days.
So I’m in the car, and I set the GPS (that’s “Gretchen” by the way) to the nearest Pick ‘n’ Save. Time to do a little grocery shopping. In my head, I’m trying to recall my favorite recipe as Gretchen calls out my next move.
My GPS is a life-saver. It sits on my dash, patiently, and calls out what I should do next. Turn right. Turn left. Make a U-turn. Best of all, if I miss my turn–it doesn’t get mad. It simply states:
Recalculating…
…and it figures out a new route. A new way to meet my goals. I would love to have a life GPS. Go to school. Graduate. Get a job. Get a better job. Buy a house. Get a girlfriend.
Oops. I missed my turn again.
Recalculating…
Some routes just are too difficult for me to follow. So I get to the store.
The way men shop is very different from women. I think it comes back to a matter of goals. Men shop only as a means to purchasing an object. Women shop as entertainment. Thus, men go into a store, find their object and if the price is tolerable, they are out of there. Women seemingly have no purpose to entering a store other than “browsing.” This is the opposite approach the sexes have to the Internet by the way. Women jump on, read their e-mail and they are off like a shot. I need to browse. Mainly for porn. It’s free, so why not?
Okay, maybe it doesn’t really translate. Well, I guess my point is I had a list in mind. It was clear. It was simple. But this was not my home Pick ‘n’ Save.
I found most of my items quickly because I’m all gifted and such, but for the life of me, I couldn’t find the last item: Nutmeg. Excuse me, but what the heck is nutmeg anyway? If it is nuts, just say you are nuts–no need for this Frenchified hassle and high minded wiggle words. What if turkey wanted to get all sophisticated–would it become turkeymeg? I think not.
So I’m pulling my hair out–which is not a good strategy by the way–and also not a good idea. If you saw my father, you would know I don’t need to pull my hair out. It will come out soon enough. I see this young lady in whatever it is they call that modified apron they make the Pick ‘n’ Slave (which is what my buddy Bob, who used to work there called it) employees wear.
“Excuse me, Miss. Could you help me?” I could tell by the way she turned, human relations was not a skill she particularly excelled in.
“So? What do you want?”
I wouldn’t mind a night with Angeline Jolie if she would kick that annoying Pitt fellow out of bed, but that wasn’t what I was there for. “I’m looking for nutmeg.”
–Had she said, “Good luck with that,” at this very moment I would not have been shocked. No, she put herself way out by vaguely pointing toward a sign half a mile off. I followed her pointer finger over to the intended target and by the time I turned back to see what the heck it was she was pointing at, she had vanished.
Now that’s talent. She has a future in upper management. I was still without my nutmeg.
Recalculating…
So, I found a matronly type and asked her. “Nutmeg? What are you going to use nutmeg for?”
“I thought I would use it as an alternate fuel in my automobile.”
“Yeah. Okay. I can see that.” She looked like the brunette from the B-52s. Or Boy George. Definitely from the 80s. I figured there was a screw loose there somewhere or some serious drug usage. That must affect the circulation to extremities, because this one chose NOT to point. “In aisle 10. By the spices.”
Spices? Why not by the nuts? What the heck? That little “meg” business made a big difference.
Turn left.
So I went to the aisle and I’m faced with two hundred little tiny little containers that look exactly the same except for a label in a type font the size of the fine print on a cigarette print ad–if such things were still allowed. Spices and soup. And cereal. I think I have spent at least three of my thirty-five years staring at these in grocery stores. Cereal was always the coupon for some kind of cereal that the grocery store didn’t have. At the soup, it was always trying to find that darn “Cream of Cheese” soup. –and making sure it was the good condensed stuff.
And spice. Well, this was my first trip here. What is this junk anyway? And where’s just some normal salt, for crying out loud?
Finally, I find the nutmeg after standing in place longer than one of those guards at Buckingham Guard that tourists with too much time on their hands always try to make laugh. I always want to tell those people, just do something really UNFUNNY. They don’t expect that. And they are British. They have that weird sense of humor. They’ll be putty in your hands.
Next time you are there, just whisper in their ear, “I believe I need to buy an egg.” See what happens. That’s big comedy to those British types. Then, offer to brush their teeth.
So I get back in the car, program the GPS to find my house (because I have this darn tendency to get lost) and take off for home.
I get out the mixing bowl, the wooden spoon, a pot for boiling water, the spaetzle maker, and a measuring cup. And I have at it.
4 eggs. Check.
3 cups of flour. Check.
1 tablespoon of that Frenchified nutmeg stuff. Check.
1 cup of water. Check.
Lots of Maggi. Trust me on that.
All in the mixing bowl. Boy, that looks pretty full. Maybe I should find a bigger mixing bowl.
Nah.
Once swish of the wooden spoon was all it took. Flour apparently has no relationship to gravity because once it became airborne, it was everywhere. Particularly on my clothes, which apparently fulfilled the role gravity would generally have. It looked like I just got hit by Milton Berle with that “MAKEUP” pad.
Recalculating…
So, I pull out the Dustbuster and clean up what was readily accessible telling myself that it is only flour and if I miss some, the maid will find it next week.
I should have bought a cordless model.
Right turn in 500 feet.
I reached for a far flung little bit of flour and out popped the electric cord. The plug landed right in the kitchen sink. In a bowl I had filled with water to soak milk out of it. I pulled the plug out and watched the viscous water with a white tint drip off of the thing.
Turn right now.
So I dried it off by blowing on it. To make it really dry, I stuck the plug in my armpit, lowered my arm to get my shirt wrapped around the plug and pulled it out. There. Perfectly dry.
The water in the pot was beginning to boil. Time to finish off the mixing. And this clean up!
So I plugged in the dustbuster again.
The sparks were pretty.
Recalculating…
I kind of wish everything were as easy as being in my car. The past week has been really odd. I’ve felt a little lost, as of late, and had decided to “get back to the basics.” I’ve been eating out, pretty much exclusively, for the past two to three months and have always enjoyed eating at home. It was time to get back in the kitchen where things made sense. Like when I would make the Ramen Noodles when I first moved out because I was scared to death of my own budget to pay the mortgage.
Ahh…the good old days.
So I’m in the car, and I set the GPS (that’s “Gretchen” by the way) to the nearest Pick ‘n’ Save. Time to do a little grocery shopping. In my head, I’m trying to recall my favorite recipe as Gretchen calls out my next move.
My GPS is a life-saver. It sits on my dash, patiently, and calls out what I should do next. Turn right. Turn left. Make a U-turn. Best of all, if I miss my turn–it doesn’t get mad. It simply states:
Recalculating…
…and it figures out a new route. A new way to meet my goals. I would love to have a life GPS. Go to school. Graduate. Get a job. Get a better job. Buy a house. Get a girlfriend.
Oops. I missed my turn again.
Recalculating…
Some routes just are too difficult for me to follow. So I get to the store.
The way men shop is very different from women. I think it comes back to a matter of goals. Men shop only as a means to purchasing an object. Women shop as entertainment. Thus, men go into a store, find their object and if the price is tolerable, they are out of there. Women seemingly have no purpose to entering a store other than “browsing.” This is the opposite approach the sexes have to the Internet by the way. Women jump on, read their e-mail and they are off like a shot. I need to browse. Mainly for porn. It’s free, so why not?
Okay, maybe it doesn’t really translate. Well, I guess my point is I had a list in mind. It was clear. It was simple. But this was not my home Pick ‘n’ Save.
I found most of my items quickly because I’m all gifted and such, but for the life of me, I couldn’t find the last item: Nutmeg. Excuse me, but what the heck is nutmeg anyway? If it is nuts, just say you are nuts–no need for this Frenchified hassle and high minded wiggle words. What if turkey wanted to get all sophisticated–would it become turkeymeg? I think not.
So I’m pulling my hair out–which is not a good strategy by the way–and also not a good idea. If you saw my father, you would know I don’t need to pull my hair out. It will come out soon enough. I see this young lady in whatever it is they call that modified apron they make the Pick ‘n’ Slave (which is what my buddy Bob, who used to work there called it) employees wear.
“Excuse me, Miss. Could you help me?” I could tell by the way she turned, human relations was not a skill she particularly excelled in.
“So? What do you want?”
I wouldn’t mind a night with Angeline Jolie if she would kick that annoying Pitt fellow out of bed, but that wasn’t what I was there for. “I’m looking for nutmeg.”
–Had she said, “Good luck with that,” at this very moment I would not have been shocked. No, she put herself way out by vaguely pointing toward a sign half a mile off. I followed her pointer finger over to the intended target and by the time I turned back to see what the heck it was she was pointing at, she had vanished.
Now that’s talent. She has a future in upper management. I was still without my nutmeg.
Recalculating…
So, I found a matronly type and asked her. “Nutmeg? What are you going to use nutmeg for?”
“I thought I would use it as an alternate fuel in my automobile.”
“Yeah. Okay. I can see that.” She looked like the brunette from the B-52s. Or Boy George. Definitely from the 80s. I figured there was a screw loose there somewhere or some serious drug usage. That must affect the circulation to extremities, because this one chose NOT to point. “In aisle 10. By the spices.”
Spices? Why not by the nuts? What the heck? That little “meg” business made a big difference.
Turn left.
So I went to the aisle and I’m faced with two hundred little tiny little containers that look exactly the same except for a label in a type font the size of the fine print on a cigarette print ad–if such things were still allowed. Spices and soup. And cereal. I think I have spent at least three of my thirty-five years staring at these in grocery stores. Cereal was always the coupon for some kind of cereal that the grocery store didn’t have. At the soup, it was always trying to find that darn “Cream of Cheese” soup. –and making sure it was the good condensed stuff.
And spice. Well, this was my first trip here. What is this junk anyway? And where’s just some normal salt, for crying out loud?
Finally, I find the nutmeg after standing in place longer than one of those guards at Buckingham Guard that tourists with too much time on their hands always try to make laugh. I always want to tell those people, just do something really UNFUNNY. They don’t expect that. And they are British. They have that weird sense of humor. They’ll be putty in your hands.
Next time you are there, just whisper in their ear, “I believe I need to buy an egg.” See what happens. That’s big comedy to those British types. Then, offer to brush their teeth.
So I get back in the car, program the GPS to find my house (because I have this darn tendency to get lost) and take off for home.
I get out the mixing bowl, the wooden spoon, a pot for boiling water, the spaetzle maker, and a measuring cup. And I have at it.
4 eggs. Check.
3 cups of flour. Check.
1 tablespoon of that Frenchified nutmeg stuff. Check.
1 cup of water. Check.
Lots of Maggi. Trust me on that.
All in the mixing bowl. Boy, that looks pretty full. Maybe I should find a bigger mixing bowl.
Nah.
Once swish of the wooden spoon was all it took. Flour apparently has no relationship to gravity because once it became airborne, it was everywhere. Particularly on my clothes, which apparently fulfilled the role gravity would generally have. It looked like I just got hit by Milton Berle with that “MAKEUP” pad.
Recalculating…
So, I pull out the Dustbuster and clean up what was readily accessible telling myself that it is only flour and if I miss some, the maid will find it next week.
I should have bought a cordless model.
Right turn in 500 feet.
I reached for a far flung little bit of flour and out popped the electric cord. The plug landed right in the kitchen sink. In a bowl I had filled with water to soak milk out of it. I pulled the plug out and watched the viscous water with a white tint drip off of the thing.
Turn right now.
So I dried it off by blowing on it. To make it really dry, I stuck the plug in my armpit, lowered my arm to get my shirt wrapped around the plug and pulled it out. There. Perfectly dry.
The water in the pot was beginning to boil. Time to finish off the mixing. And this clean up!
So I plugged in the dustbuster again.
The sparks were pretty.
Recalculating…
The Captain at the State Fair
Captain Catastrophe here.
It’s been a while, but something kind of happened today that I had to share.
Many of you that know me personally know that this year I went to State Fair quite a bit. Now, I’m really NOT a big State Fair fan. I mean, agriculture is not a big thing for me and frankly looking eyeball to eyeball what will later be a delicious main course isn’t my idea of a good time.
But I live in West Allis these days and see it almost as a point of civic pride to go. And our State Fair IS ranked one of the top fifty state fairs in the entire United States. Pretty much.
Think about it. What would State Fair in New Jersey be like? Well, folks, step right up and see the toxic waste disposal exhibit. Pet the oozing barrels of chemical substrate. I bet we’re at least ahead of New Jersey. At least.
Anyway, been eating too many items on a stick–never thought I’d express that sentiment–and my tummy ache is clearly going to take another nice evening of trips to the bathroom to clear up.
Oh, goody.
Apparently beer is something a lot of people drink at the Fair. Me? I find the Maple Syrup Root Beer. Why? First, it’s $1.50 and everything else down there is $3.00. And I mean everything. Cream puff? $3.00. Pretzel? $3.00. Chicken wings? $3.00. Corn dog? $3.00. Opportunity to perform surgery on a horsey? $3.00. Everything. Corn on the cob, oddly, is $2.50. They must have missed the memo.
The other reason is that Root Beer has more sugar than any other drink I’ve ever tried. Unbelievable amounts. I’ve had some German company here for German Fest and some relations this past months. On two separate occasions, these funny little foreigners have tried root beer and both said it tasted like the same thing: Bubble Gum. Obviously, these people eat too much pork to know what is tastes good. It’s sad, really. I cry for them.
On the first Saturday of the Fair, I went with some friends (I won’t mention who to protect Chrissy) and we saw this cow. It was a psychopathic cow.
The cow kept sticking its tongue out and it looked really funny. So comedian that I am, I decide to try to take a picture of the cow with the tongue hanging out. Only problem: I have a digital camera.
It’s a great camera. Lots of bells and whistles but it suffers from the same malady as all digital cameras and most senior citizens: when you finally give it the go-ahead it takes it’s sweet time and often misses the important event completely. Thus you push the button and a second later the picture is taken. But when a tongue is going in and out and seemingly random intervals; it’s hard to catch the funny cow. For digital cameras, you miss the shot. With senior citizens, mainly they miss the toilet bowl.
Well, one of those 4H type kids was watching with some amusement my problem as I took shot after shot of the cow and not catching the tongue hanging out. She comes up to me and says, “Are you trying to get a picture of the cow with its tongue out?”
“No,” I wanted to respond. “I want to have sexy photos of this cow to louse up its chances for a congressional seat run this fall.” Instead I lamely nodded my head.
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So she jumps into the hay there and starts grabbing inside the cow’s mouth. “Watch out,” I say, “it’s going to bite you.”
“Aw, no. It ain’t gonna. Cows only have teeth on the bottom of their mouth.”
Thought I’d throw in an educational moment in there for you. Proves I learned something at State Fair.
The resulting photo is right there. She pulled the tongue out for me to take a picture of it. Gross as all get out. Now it can give you nightmares, too.
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To wash the incident from our minds, we went to get a cream puff. Now, when I went with my friends, no incident. The line moved briskly, everyone got the correct order and no worries.
That’s because my superpowers had not yet kicked into high gear.
Friday, I went back to the Fair and decided to grab a cream puff. The line was rather lengthy but I couldn’t think of anything else to do and it moved pretty quick anyway. (Not like that darn “Superman” ride at Six Flags on Monday!) I got my Puff and actually ate that without incident either. However, the puff in my hands was not the one I should have had my eye on.
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A very evil cream puff was lying in wait for me on the blacktop. And I, with the skill of a panther, stepped right in it. I’m still shocked I didn’t fall completely over, but it was slick and it just must have been the fact that there were a lot of people nearby with good karma around that weren’t destined to have me fall on them.
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I was pretty po’ed, but I found a nice puddle that I’m sure already had decaying fecal matter from livestock already dissolving in it and rinsed the sole of my shoe.
Well, today I was at the Fair again and walking out of the park when I spied another cream puff lying in my path. I deftly navigated around it and found a park security person and told him about the puff. I said, “You better have someone clean that up. Someone could step in it and possibly injure themselves.”
He looked me in the eye, laughing and said, “What type of idiot would step in a cream puff? Let alone fall over?”
I nodded at him knowingly and said, “You’d be surprised how many idiots would do something just like that.”
Hope you had a great State Fair.
Sincerely,
Captain Catastrophe
It’s been a while, but something kind of happened today that I had to share.
Many of you that know me personally know that this year I went to State Fair quite a bit. Now, I’m really NOT a big State Fair fan. I mean, agriculture is not a big thing for me and frankly looking eyeball to eyeball what will later be a delicious main course isn’t my idea of a good time.
But I live in West Allis these days and see it almost as a point of civic pride to go. And our State Fair IS ranked one of the top fifty state fairs in the entire United States. Pretty much.
Think about it. What would State Fair in New Jersey be like? Well, folks, step right up and see the toxic waste disposal exhibit. Pet the oozing barrels of chemical substrate. I bet we’re at least ahead of New Jersey. At least.
Anyway, been eating too many items on a stick–never thought I’d express that sentiment–and my tummy ache is clearly going to take another nice evening of trips to the bathroom to clear up.
Oh, goody.
Apparently beer is something a lot of people drink at the Fair. Me? I find the Maple Syrup Root Beer. Why? First, it’s $1.50 and everything else down there is $3.00. And I mean everything. Cream puff? $3.00. Pretzel? $3.00. Chicken wings? $3.00. Corn dog? $3.00. Opportunity to perform surgery on a horsey? $3.00. Everything. Corn on the cob, oddly, is $2.50. They must have missed the memo.
The other reason is that Root Beer has more sugar than any other drink I’ve ever tried. Unbelievable amounts. I’ve had some German company here for German Fest and some relations this past months. On two separate occasions, these funny little foreigners have tried root beer and both said it tasted like the same thing: Bubble Gum. Obviously, these people eat too much pork to know what is tastes good. It’s sad, really. I cry for them.
On the first Saturday of the Fair, I went with some friends (I won’t mention who to protect Chrissy) and we saw this cow. It was a psychopathic cow.
The cow kept sticking its tongue out and it looked really funny. So comedian that I am, I decide to try to take a picture of the cow with the tongue hanging out. Only problem: I have a digital camera.
It’s a great camera. Lots of bells and whistles but it suffers from the same malady as all digital cameras and most senior citizens: when you finally give it the go-ahead it takes it’s sweet time and often misses the important event completely. Thus you push the button and a second later the picture is taken. But when a tongue is going in and out and seemingly random intervals; it’s hard to catch the funny cow. For digital cameras, you miss the shot. With senior citizens, mainly they miss the toilet bowl.
Well, one of those 4H type kids was watching with some amusement my problem as I took shot after shot of the cow and not catching the tongue hanging out. She comes up to me and says, “Are you trying to get a picture of the cow with its tongue out?”
“No,” I wanted to respond. “I want to have sexy photos of this cow to louse up its chances for a congressional seat run this fall.” Instead I lamely nodded my head.
So she jumps into the hay there and starts grabbing inside the cow’s mouth. “Watch out,” I say, “it’s going to bite you.”
“Aw, no. It ain’t gonna. Cows only have teeth on the bottom of their mouth.”
Thought I’d throw in an educational moment in there for you. Proves I learned something at State Fair.
The resulting photo is right there. She pulled the tongue out for me to take a picture of it. Gross as all get out. Now it can give you nightmares, too.
To wash the incident from our minds, we went to get a cream puff. Now, when I went with my friends, no incident. The line moved briskly, everyone got the correct order and no worries.
That’s because my superpowers had not yet kicked into high gear.
Friday, I went back to the Fair and decided to grab a cream puff. The line was rather lengthy but I couldn’t think of anything else to do and it moved pretty quick anyway. (Not like that darn “Superman” ride at Six Flags on Monday!) I got my Puff and actually ate that without incident either. However, the puff in my hands was not the one I should have had my eye on.
A very evil cream puff was lying in wait for me on the blacktop. And I, with the skill of a panther, stepped right in it. I’m still shocked I didn’t fall completely over, but it was slick and it just must have been the fact that there were a lot of people nearby with good karma around that weren’t destined to have me fall on them.
I was pretty po’ed, but I found a nice puddle that I’m sure already had decaying fecal matter from livestock already dissolving in it and rinsed the sole of my shoe.
Well, today I was at the Fair again and walking out of the park when I spied another cream puff lying in my path. I deftly navigated around it and found a park security person and told him about the puff. I said, “You better have someone clean that up. Someone could step in it and possibly injure themselves.”
He looked me in the eye, laughing and said, “What type of idiot would step in a cream puff? Let alone fall over?”
I nodded at him knowingly and said, “You’d be surprised how many idiots would do something just like that.”
Hope you had a great State Fair.
Sincerely,
Captain Catastrophe
Don’t Worry. I’m injured.
I can’t believe this. I only send that e-mail out to 20 or so people and two people replied yesterday that they were disappointed that I wasn’t injured!
You folks are sick. I won’t even tell you one of them was my mother. Sick, I tell you.
I mean, I do have plantar fasciitis, so I am limping around today. Six blocks was just this side of crazy for an old cripple like me. If, someday, I could extract that plastic insert in my shoe and melt it in the backyard like my old Star Wars action figures, I’d be the happiest man on Earth.
But, I want to make you all happy, so I’m bringing you a tale of woe.
Well, I’ve told this story once before, but it never got captured on the website (http://timkretschmann.blogspot.com)so I thought I would get after it. And German Fest is right around the corner, and that’s usually a good opportunity for me to be completely injured.
A couple of years at German Fest, I cooked Spanferkel. For the three of you that read this outside Milwaukee or without a German background, spanferkel is roast pig. Generally done on a spit. Not spit on. On a spit. C’mon, people, work with me.
Anyway, one year, the brain trust at German Fest decides to make a new menu selection: the Spanferkel Sandwich. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a roast HAM SANDWICH! That people were willing to shell out $6 for a bun with roast ham on it continues to mystify me. But people do what they do.
I was given an actual grill rig. A carousel with 6 trays rotated within it. Four removable drawers were along the bottom. You could fill these drawers with charcoal and a grate kept the coal from being from top to bottom. This kept air flow and maximum heat. We would get a BLUE FLAME on that coal fairly often. And blue flame is no joke.
A similar grating system was on each tray so the oil and grease would collect in the bottom of each tray and keep that really exciting ham out of that lard. Oh, yummy.
They still sell this by the way. I suggest the Rollbraten. I suggest the Schnitzel. I suggest if you want a Spanferkel Sandwich to buy $6 of ham, grill it and you’ll have 20 sandwiches for what this thing is. It tastes fine, mind you, but I just don’t get it when we have such good food.
Don’t believe there’s good food? Check out the previous post and my bouts with weight.
I digress.
So I’m shoveling this nasty charcoal into the drawers. And it’s heavy and filthy. It’s that charcoal that looks like wood–not the nice chemically treated briquettes. I get that into the drawer, start the fire and let it begin to cook. I then wash up (I would wash up like thirty times as I went between meat prep and shoveling coal. Necessary evil, I suppose.) and I would start to cut the slabs of meat. Everyone told me to cut “with the grain of the meat.”
I went with the “perpendicular is good enough” approach. Grain of the meat, my hind end. You go look for a butcher you want that crap. I cut the meat in half. There you go. Don’t like it? Hire a butcher.
I was so tough when I did this because I had a really big, sharp knife. By the end of the day, it would be as dull as a rerun of “Night Court” without John Larroquette and my hands would have grooves from where I applied pressure to chop the meat.
I’d place the meat on the trays and it would cook for approximately one hour. Halfway through, I would turn the meat over, so a nice grating pattern would grace both sides. Didn’t really need to, I suppose, since the meat would be sliced deli style afterwards, but I thought it cooked more thoroughly that way.
When a load was done, I’d take the meat off the grate and the grease would bubble away in the bottom of each tray. I’d take the meat in, shovel new coal into the drawers, and start the process over. After stoking the fire, I went inside to wash up and I came back to this.
The grease had caught fire.
I’ve never encountered a grease fire before and this baby was hot!
I was going to wait a while to see what happens, but it takes a long time to get a hot fire going and I needed at least one more load for the day.
So I commence to thinking. This is where things always go REALLY, REALLY wrong.
I really need to get going, so I decide to go over and take a look at things. Only a little flame spilling out the side. What I really ought to do is open the cover and take a good look.
At first, it was sort of surreal. A little flame danced on each rotating tray in the grease. I thought, well, that ain’t so bad. I’ll just take these out, restock and let that fire cook it. Maybe we’ll get a load in forty-five minutes this time. I’d have to put the little tray fires out, I suppose.
So I grabbed a pail and went inside.
Filled the pail with water.
Went outside.
Poured the water.
Stepped back and watched flames rise up with a mighty whoosh!
Slammed cover back down.
Opened cover up to take another look:
Okay. Not good.
I can tell. I can tell it is not good because a crowd is forming. Someone said, “You did not put water on a grease fire, did you?”
Was that wrong? How the heck was I supposed to know? Not a lot of fires over in my cube at work. Grease, electrical, paper–never had many fires over there. Now I’m a fireman? Not bloody likely.
My mother was so concerned when she saw this, her natural instincts went into action. She grabbed the camera and took these pictures here.
I wasn’t terribly injured but I did eat some smoke. The fireman on the German Fest grounds came in and blanketed the grill with so much foam that a fire would never start in the grill again. Well, until it had a through washing. I remember people being critical of the firemen foaming the heck out of it, because it was, afterall, a little fire. I always supported their choice since I knew had the grill been even slightly recoverable, we would have thrown another load in and cooked away. This way, we had to pressure wash the whole thing.
I should mention that German Fest volunteers on the whole are better at cooking than me. Afterall, not everyone is . . .
Captain
Catastrophe
You folks are sick. I won’t even tell you one of them was my mother. Sick, I tell you.
I mean, I do have plantar fasciitis, so I am limping around today. Six blocks was just this side of crazy for an old cripple like me. If, someday, I could extract that plastic insert in my shoe and melt it in the backyard like my old Star Wars action figures, I’d be the happiest man on Earth.
But, I want to make you all happy, so I’m bringing you a tale of woe.
Well, I’ve told this story once before, but it never got captured on the website (http://timkretschmann.blogspot.com)so I thought I would get after it. And German Fest is right around the corner, and that’s usually a good opportunity for me to be completely injured.
A couple of years at German Fest, I cooked Spanferkel. For the three of you that read this outside Milwaukee or without a German background, spanferkel is roast pig. Generally done on a spit. Not spit on. On a spit. C’mon, people, work with me.
Anyway, one year, the brain trust at German Fest decides to make a new menu selection: the Spanferkel Sandwich. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a roast HAM SANDWICH! That people were willing to shell out $6 for a bun with roast ham on it continues to mystify me. But people do what they do.
I was given an actual grill rig. A carousel with 6 trays rotated within it. Four removable drawers were along the bottom. You could fill these drawers with charcoal and a grate kept the coal from being from top to bottom. This kept air flow and maximum heat. We would get a BLUE FLAME on that coal fairly often. And blue flame is no joke.
A similar grating system was on each tray so the oil and grease would collect in the bottom of each tray and keep that really exciting ham out of that lard. Oh, yummy.
They still sell this by the way. I suggest the Rollbraten. I suggest the Schnitzel. I suggest if you want a Spanferkel Sandwich to buy $6 of ham, grill it and you’ll have 20 sandwiches for what this thing is. It tastes fine, mind you, but I just don’t get it when we have such good food.
Don’t believe there’s good food? Check out the previous post and my bouts with weight.
I digress.
So I’m shoveling this nasty charcoal into the drawers. And it’s heavy and filthy. It’s that charcoal that looks like wood–not the nice chemically treated briquettes. I get that into the drawer, start the fire and let it begin to cook. I then wash up (I would wash up like thirty times as I went between meat prep and shoveling coal. Necessary evil, I suppose.) and I would start to cut the slabs of meat. Everyone told me to cut “with the grain of the meat.”
I went with the “perpendicular is good enough” approach. Grain of the meat, my hind end. You go look for a butcher you want that crap. I cut the meat in half. There you go. Don’t like it? Hire a butcher.
I was so tough when I did this because I had a really big, sharp knife. By the end of the day, it would be as dull as a rerun of “Night Court” without John Larroquette and my hands would have grooves from where I applied pressure to chop the meat.
I’d place the meat on the trays and it would cook for approximately one hour. Halfway through, I would turn the meat over, so a nice grating pattern would grace both sides. Didn’t really need to, I suppose, since the meat would be sliced deli style afterwards, but I thought it cooked more thoroughly that way.
When a load was done, I’d take the meat off the grate and the grease would bubble away in the bottom of each tray. I’d take the meat in, shovel new coal into the drawers, and start the process over. After stoking the fire, I went inside to wash up and I came back to this.
The grease had caught fire.
I’ve never encountered a grease fire before and this baby was hot!
I was going to wait a while to see what happens, but it takes a long time to get a hot fire going and I needed at least one more load for the day.
So I commence to thinking. This is where things always go REALLY, REALLY wrong.
I really need to get going, so I decide to go over and take a look at things. Only a little flame spilling out the side. What I really ought to do is open the cover and take a good look.
At first, it was sort of surreal. A little flame danced on each rotating tray in the grease. I thought, well, that ain’t so bad. I’ll just take these out, restock and let that fire cook it. Maybe we’ll get a load in forty-five minutes this time. I’d have to put the little tray fires out, I suppose.
So I grabbed a pail and went inside.
Filled the pail with water.
Went outside.
Poured the water.
Stepped back and watched flames rise up with a mighty whoosh!
Slammed cover back down.
Opened cover up to take another look:
Okay. Not good.
I can tell. I can tell it is not good because a crowd is forming. Someone said, “You did not put water on a grease fire, did you?”
Was that wrong? How the heck was I supposed to know? Not a lot of fires over in my cube at work. Grease, electrical, paper–never had many fires over there. Now I’m a fireman? Not bloody likely.
My mother was so concerned when she saw this, her natural instincts went into action. She grabbed the camera and took these pictures here.
I wasn’t terribly injured but I did eat some smoke. The fireman on the German Fest grounds came in and blanketed the grill with so much foam that a fire would never start in the grill again. Well, until it had a through washing. I remember people being critical of the firemen foaming the heck out of it, because it was, afterall, a little fire. I always supported their choice since I knew had the grill been even slightly recoverable, we would have thrown another load in and cooked away. This way, we had to pressure wash the whole thing.
I should mention that German Fest volunteers on the whole are better at cooking than me. Afterall, not everyone is . . .
Captain
Catastrophe
The Captain Catastrophe Diet Plan
It’s been a while. So I’ll keep it short. Captain Catastrophe has been busy. My radio show keeps getting interviews with really exciting guests, German Fest is celebrating 25 years, and I spend hours every night working on the radio show website. (Not the Captain Catastrophe one, which you can visit for past stories at : http://timkretschmann.blogspot.com/ –Hey, I’m adding new people all the time, so this is the best way to catch up.)
Anyway, as you know, I’m still not riding my bicycle because of the hideous implications—and by that I mean the very near death experiences the last times I went out. So tonight, with that wonderful 80 degree weather, I decided to take a walk.
Most people engage in exercise to keep their weight in check. Well, I checked my weight and I’m plenty heavy. I’m not trying to lose weight anymore; that hasn’t been working. My new goal is to grow seven inches. I figure that would proportion the weight a little better. Maybe eight.
So, I leave the house—and computer—behind and go out the back door. I go out the back door because the front door is perpetually locked in position this time of year. The wood swells and it tightens to the point that should you ever manage to open the thing with anything short of a blast of dynamite, you sure wouldn’t get the darn thing closed again.
Who needs deadbolts?
I decided to go on an errand my maid had sent me on. Apparently, I was out of Soft Scrub. I can hardly imagine why. That bottle lasted me darn near seven years with nary a complaint, and now I have to get ANOTHER one? What is she doing with the stuff anyway?
So I start walking and I go past the house with the gigantic dog. Could be a doberman. Might be a dragon. Can’t tell, but it makes a heck of a noise behind the eight foot tall tight picket fence around their yard. And it scares me half to death. See, dogs love to eat German boys. Want to know why?
Taste like pork. At least, that’s what someone told some of the earliest dogs. And dogs are real gullible. Everyone knows that Germans really taste like a spinach/cauliflower dip with a dollop of sour cream, but like I say, dogs are real gullible.
I have a theory that the 1970’s Energy Crisis was simply the panicked conversations of Collies and Golden Retrievers. Y2K bug smells of the Dachshunds and Irish Setters. That has a lot to do with how much time Setters set in front of the computer. They still love to play Pac Man, even though we all know Asteroids is the better game.
I digress.
I get to the grocery store and there’s Jerry from work. Eight o’clock at night and he’s wearing a three piece suit. He just came out of a meeting at an office building nearby. He commenced to tell me about Bruno (that’s another guy at work) and his new diet.
Understand now: Bruno always has a new diet. I’ve known him like three years and he has to have been on two dozen diets by now. He’s a dieting machine. He gets on the diet. Loses 10-12 pounds. Decides to celebrate his success at DiMarini’s or Mama Mia’s or Buca’s or something like that. Return to the start. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
I really think I may be on the right track. Much better to grown the seven inches. Or eight.
Anyway, as you know, I’m still not riding my bicycle because of the hideous implications—and by that I mean the very near death experiences the last times I went out. So tonight, with that wonderful 80 degree weather, I decided to take a walk.
Most people engage in exercise to keep their weight in check. Well, I checked my weight and I’m plenty heavy. I’m not trying to lose weight anymore; that hasn’t been working. My new goal is to grow seven inches. I figure that would proportion the weight a little better. Maybe eight.
So, I leave the house—and computer—behind and go out the back door. I go out the back door because the front door is perpetually locked in position this time of year. The wood swells and it tightens to the point that should you ever manage to open the thing with anything short of a blast of dynamite, you sure wouldn’t get the darn thing closed again.
Who needs deadbolts?
I decided to go on an errand my maid had sent me on. Apparently, I was out of Soft Scrub. I can hardly imagine why. That bottle lasted me darn near seven years with nary a complaint, and now I have to get ANOTHER one? What is she doing with the stuff anyway?
So I start walking and I go past the house with the gigantic dog. Could be a doberman. Might be a dragon. Can’t tell, but it makes a heck of a noise behind the eight foot tall tight picket fence around their yard. And it scares me half to death. See, dogs love to eat German boys. Want to know why?
Taste like pork. At least, that’s what someone told some of the earliest dogs. And dogs are real gullible. Everyone knows that Germans really taste like a spinach/cauliflower dip with a dollop of sour cream, but like I say, dogs are real gullible.
I have a theory that the 1970’s Energy Crisis was simply the panicked conversations of Collies and Golden Retrievers. Y2K bug smells of the Dachshunds and Irish Setters. That has a lot to do with how much time Setters set in front of the computer. They still love to play Pac Man, even though we all know Asteroids is the better game.
I digress.
I get to the grocery store and there’s Jerry from work. Eight o’clock at night and he’s wearing a three piece suit. He just came out of a meeting at an office building nearby. He commenced to tell me about Bruno (that’s another guy at work) and his new diet.
Understand now: Bruno always has a new diet. I’ve known him like three years and he has to have been on two dozen diets by now. He’s a dieting machine. He gets on the diet. Loses 10-12 pounds. Decides to celebrate his success at DiMarini’s or Mama Mia’s or Buca’s or something like that. Return to the start. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.
I really think I may be on the right track. Much better to grown the seven inches. Or eight.
Captain Catastrophe and the infinite hole
Some have suspected that the Captain took off for Memorial Day weekend. I mean, you can’t injure yourself all the time–you have to stay healthy some times.
But I’m driven. Driven to accomplish new levels of exciting pain at the most inopportune time.
This Memorial Day Weekend, my parents came over to help me construct a new fence in my backyard. My old white picket fence was a scary sight. The wood was rotting out even before I bought the place. I couldn’t see painting the thing because it was already coming apart–so I never did. That just accelerated the demise of the thing. I looked like twisted debris after a bombing run.
As you can tell, I was emotionally attached.
My dad, who is reveling in his new status as a retiree, decided a couple weeks ago to yank the fence out from its very moorings. As he tells the story, he did it with his bare hands. A garage full of tools I know aren’t mine, pointed to another version of the tale. You decide.
So on Memorial Day I got a call early on that my parents had just picked up a two-man post hole digger (that scary drill looking rig) and we’re doing the fence today.
This sounded like a lot of work to me. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to be here. Not a very good attitude, but I specialize in bad attitudes as most of you know.
To add to the fun, my back yard is riddled with prehistoric petrified roots coming out of my trees–not the easiest stuff in the world to drill through. Half the holes we drilled were also in clay soil–that was really fun. It was so fun, in fact, we decided to drill an extra hole. Or that had something to do with a bad measurement. It was either for fun or a bad measurement. Something like that there.
Anyway, soon my backyard looked like the gopher from Caddyshack had taken up residence–which would explain partially the evil plots the squirrels have for me. I think this is all coming together at last.
Well, we were picking up a post to place into one of the holes and I was walking backwards and didn’t really see where I was stepping. Even though most of the yard was still in tact, my right foot–the one with the plantar fascitis issues–found a hole and went down pretty well the full three feet. My foot folded up to accommodate the smallness of the hole–thoughtful of that foot. I began howling out in pain, like a complete coward.
My dad, of course, suspects I’m faking. Now, don’t think poorly of Dad for that–he usually would have been right. I was kind of thinking to doing exactly that so I could supervise the rest of the afternoon. That’s more my speed.
But in this rare instance, I really was in pain. That isn’t to say I didn’t drama queen it a little. I mean, the opportunity was there. Would have been a shame not to.
I shook it off after a little bit and we continued to work and I have to admit. It’s a great fence! Looks really good. Once we get all these extra holes filled in, it would be a great place for a cookout.
Maybe before I fill in the holes, I can lure a squirrel or two into one.
Nah. Too much work.
Yours in anguish,
Captain Catastrophe
But I’m driven. Driven to accomplish new levels of exciting pain at the most inopportune time.
This Memorial Day Weekend, my parents came over to help me construct a new fence in my backyard. My old white picket fence was a scary sight. The wood was rotting out even before I bought the place. I couldn’t see painting the thing because it was already coming apart–so I never did. That just accelerated the demise of the thing. I looked like twisted debris after a bombing run.
As you can tell, I was emotionally attached.
My dad, who is reveling in his new status as a retiree, decided a couple weeks ago to yank the fence out from its very moorings. As he tells the story, he did it with his bare hands. A garage full of tools I know aren’t mine, pointed to another version of the tale. You decide.
So on Memorial Day I got a call early on that my parents had just picked up a two-man post hole digger (that scary drill looking rig) and we’re doing the fence today.
This sounded like a lot of work to me. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to be here. Not a very good attitude, but I specialize in bad attitudes as most of you know.
To add to the fun, my back yard is riddled with prehistoric petrified roots coming out of my trees–not the easiest stuff in the world to drill through. Half the holes we drilled were also in clay soil–that was really fun. It was so fun, in fact, we decided to drill an extra hole. Or that had something to do with a bad measurement. It was either for fun or a bad measurement. Something like that there.
Anyway, soon my backyard looked like the gopher from Caddyshack had taken up residence–which would explain partially the evil plots the squirrels have for me. I think this is all coming together at last.
Well, we were picking up a post to place into one of the holes and I was walking backwards and didn’t really see where I was stepping. Even though most of the yard was still in tact, my right foot–the one with the plantar fascitis issues–found a hole and went down pretty well the full three feet. My foot folded up to accommodate the smallness of the hole–thoughtful of that foot. I began howling out in pain, like a complete coward.
My dad, of course, suspects I’m faking. Now, don’t think poorly of Dad for that–he usually would have been right. I was kind of thinking to doing exactly that so I could supervise the rest of the afternoon. That’s more my speed.
But in this rare instance, I really was in pain. That isn’t to say I didn’t drama queen it a little. I mean, the opportunity was there. Would have been a shame not to.
I shook it off after a little bit and we continued to work and I have to admit. It’s a great fence! Looks really good. Once we get all these extra holes filled in, it would be a great place for a cookout.
Maybe before I fill in the holes, I can lure a squirrel or two into one.
Nah. Too much work.
Yours in anguish,
Captain Catastrophe
Seagull Catastrophe
If you’ve received any of these Captain Catastrophe articles before, you know that if anything is more impressive than the complete lack of hand-eye coordination I seem to possess, it would be the lengths to which the animal world seems to be plotting against me.
This is why I don’t eat vegetables. See, I figure if animals start to attack me, the vegetables would rush to my aid–since I don’t hurt them. Now, you might be wondering why I don’t eat vegetables and enlist the aid of the animal population, but I have a simple answer to that: animals are far more tasty. So that’s that.
Anyway, the walk from the Public Service Building of We Energies (where I work sometimes up to four times a week) to my parking building is about a block. It seems longer because I’m pretty lazy when you get down to it, but it’s only about a block. On that walk is a lot where an old decrepit warehouse used to exist. They pulled it down earlier this year; most think so they could put in a parking lot. It had to be done. Windows were broken and I’m not the only one that suspect rats thrived in there. All I ever saw was a little white mouse, but that made me shriek “Eeeek!” fairly good.
The site has been replaced with a covering of gravel and seagulls have fallen in love with the place. In that little block, there has to be forty some gulls hanging out. Walking around on the gravel. Making lots of noise. And nesting.
I walk past this site most evenings and I usually take that little alley flanking it. I was grooving to the tunes on my iPod-like Zen mp3 player and didn’t notice the new gull.
The day before, I walked on the side by the gulls and saw a nesting gull. I thought it might be fun to see how close I could guess.
Not too close it turns out.
The daddy instantly saw me, though I had deployed my stealth like ninja abilities. He made one heck of a caw-type of call from his beak. He launched into the air, and hovered on the wind while staring at me. It looked like that shot from “The Birds” where the gulls are watching the gas station burn from the sky. It was surreal as he hovered there looking at me like he was going to kill me.
I did what any strong young man would have done. I ran away as fast as I could while mumbling “Not the face! Not the face!”
Well, tonight, I was a little more cautious as I walked by, but I still like walking on that side of the alley. The site is surrounded by a silt fence and I neglected to notice one gull actually nested on the other side, the alley side of the fence. Unfortunately, I was watching the couple that yesterday had scared me so bad. And since I had my mp3 player going, full blast with Whitesnake of all things, I didn’t hear the warning calls.
I almost stepped on him and his nest.
I looked down and there was this 200 pound gull with an angry grimace on his beak. Luckily, he didn’t peck at me because I immediately ran for it.
All part of the conspiracy. When I got home, a little bunny was waiting in my backyard again. Your plot didn’t work this time, Bugs. Keep planning–and I’ll keep eating the rest of your friends in the animal kingdom.
That’ll learn ya.
This is why I don’t eat vegetables. See, I figure if animals start to attack me, the vegetables would rush to my aid–since I don’t hurt them. Now, you might be wondering why I don’t eat vegetables and enlist the aid of the animal population, but I have a simple answer to that: animals are far more tasty. So that’s that.
Anyway, the walk from the Public Service Building of We Energies (where I work sometimes up to four times a week) to my parking building is about a block. It seems longer because I’m pretty lazy when you get down to it, but it’s only about a block. On that walk is a lot where an old decrepit warehouse used to exist. They pulled it down earlier this year; most think so they could put in a parking lot. It had to be done. Windows were broken and I’m not the only one that suspect rats thrived in there. All I ever saw was a little white mouse, but that made me shriek “Eeeek!” fairly good.
The site has been replaced with a covering of gravel and seagulls have fallen in love with the place. In that little block, there has to be forty some gulls hanging out. Walking around on the gravel. Making lots of noise. And nesting.
I walk past this site most evenings and I usually take that little alley flanking it. I was grooving to the tunes on my iPod-like Zen mp3 player and didn’t notice the new gull.
The day before, I walked on the side by the gulls and saw a nesting gull. I thought it might be fun to see how close I could guess.
Not too close it turns out.
The daddy instantly saw me, though I had deployed my stealth like ninja abilities. He made one heck of a caw-type of call from his beak. He launched into the air, and hovered on the wind while staring at me. It looked like that shot from “The Birds” where the gulls are watching the gas station burn from the sky. It was surreal as he hovered there looking at me like he was going to kill me.
I did what any strong young man would have done. I ran away as fast as I could while mumbling “Not the face! Not the face!”
Well, tonight, I was a little more cautious as I walked by, but I still like walking on that side of the alley. The site is surrounded by a silt fence and I neglected to notice one gull actually nested on the other side, the alley side of the fence. Unfortunately, I was watching the couple that yesterday had scared me so bad. And since I had my mp3 player going, full blast with Whitesnake of all things, I didn’t hear the warning calls.
I almost stepped on him and his nest.
I looked down and there was this 200 pound gull with an angry grimace on his beak. Luckily, he didn’t peck at me because I immediately ran for it.
All part of the conspiracy. When I got home, a little bunny was waiting in my backyard again. Your plot didn’t work this time, Bugs. Keep planning–and I’ll keep eating the rest of your friends in the animal kingdom.
That’ll learn ya.
Walking ain’t that fun
Most of you know my opinion of exercise. Exercise, in my humble and yet highly developed opinion, is a worthless exercise.
Just the same, I bought one of those fancy-schmancy pedometers to count my little footy-steps each day. Now, mainly I’ve been using it for what I call efficency testing. It’s 212 steps to the place where I pick up the laptop if I take this route, but 257 if I go this way. Obviously, the first is best.
Effectively, I’ve defeated the entire purpose. I love it when I do that.
Anyway, they keep drilling it into my head that I need 10,000 steps a day, which is approximately 9,975 more steps than I want to take each day. Well, maybe 9,928. If you figure in a run to the mailbox. But who needs that? If I want junk mail, I can read my spam. At least that features lots and lots of dirty pictures.
I digress. I usually do in these things.
Tonight, I decided to walk over to the State Fair Park and buy a new bike. (By the way, folks. Thanks for all the advice about what type of helmet I should get. Everyone seemed to emphasize that with me. I’m not so sure why.) They have the big Wheel & Sprocket Expo over there and I figure if I’m going to do this anyway–might as well.
So I start to hoof it. I’m exercising away so I decide to give myself a little treat. I order the big basket of onion rings with the double cheesebutterburger at Cream City Custard. Now this is exercise!
Hobbling out of my booth at the Custard place, I notice my pedometer hitting 5500 steps. This isn’t good. My little footies suffer from platar fascitis or fascitaris or some such nonsense. Anyway, after about 6000 steps (this has been figured out by some testing in various theme parks in Florida–the only reason to walk so far is a lift hill going clack-clack-clack and a good first drop), my little feetskers start to scream out a chorus.
Well, I’m halfway so I figure–may as well. So I go over to the Expo.
The frigging place is packed. I mean, seriously packed. Little fartmaster kids all over the place (though they better watch out–I did have onion rings and soon they will call ME master.) Lots of old farts, too, which scared me. These bicycle dealers just dealing out heart attacks to these poor old people–I warned a few that all that pedalling might kill–particularly with their advanced age–but most seemed not to appreciate my sage advice, so I decided to let them die.
Then, I nearly died. I saw a price tag.
$1,000! Are they smoking pot? Are they chasing the dragon? Put down the crack pipe, baby, because you be nutso. Not every bike was this ridiculous, but plenty were over $500.
I decided to put my purchasing background into play and scored some major savings with my favorite form of savings: the avoided purchase. I thought, “Okay, the WalMart special is destroyed at home, but that old Huffy one-speed is in fine condition. All I have to do is reattach the old big fat seat on that and I’m good to go.” Besides, now I can get that LCD monitor I wanted.
Stay tuned for that Catastrophe in the future.
So I run out of there. My mother continually tells me I have no sale resistance. Hogwash! Why, everytime I enter a grocery store, I avoid buying any sort of vegetable. Or anything organic. Now that’s will power!
So I’m hobbling out of there and the Sun has gone down. And it’s getting cold. I guess that simple Spring jacket that seemed like overkill earlier just wasn’t enough now. I’m walking along Greenfield and actually starting to shiver. It’s about 8:00 p.m. and my nose is growing cold. Seems to always affect my nose first.
I can’t afford a cold, so I decide I have to dive in some place to warm up. In West Allis, the only places open that late is the taverns about every five feet. But I hate taverns being a non-drinker. So where am I going to go?
How about that place with all the action up ahead there? Look at all the cars pulling in there… Nice sign, too. “Church and Chapel.”
It’s true that I’m perfectly comfortable in funeral homes. I’ve gone to plenty. Not as many as my father, though. When he was president of the German club, he seemed to go every other day. The funeral directors would shout out “Elmar!” like the bar patrons in Cheers! would yell out “Norm!”
But this is crashing a funeral. Something is wrong about that. So I went in, anyway.
The great thing about a funeral home is all the great furniture. I found a real big sofa and plunked myself down. I was probably the only guy there in blue jeans and grooving to tunes on his MP3 player (NOT AN IPOD! –Apple got enough of my money when I was a Mac user. Ever meet an ex-Machead? We’re like ex-smokers. We get all evangelical on your backside about the evils of the old habit. Meanwhile, we secretly still crave the old habit. We have a word for that in our family: Ernie.)
End of rant.
An old guy sits down next to me. I quickly look around the room. Okay, they are all white folks. I just thought, geez, at least they couldn’t tell I didn’t fit in so obviously this time. I’ve done enough Captain stories where that’s happened already.
He looks me over, “What are you listening to?”
I look at the MP3 player and it says “K.C. and the Sunshine Band.” So I look him in the eyes and say, “Maroon 5.”
He nods and turns to me again, “So how did you know him?” He said the name…but I’ve already forgot it. It some old guy name. Like Herb. Or Ralph. Or Elmar. Something like that. Not something young and hip. Like Tim.
So, I figure I could tell this nice gentleman I was just passing through–he sure as heck wouldn’t care–or I could do the usual and make up a story. “I grew up in his neighborhood. I’m visiting my parents and they brought me along.”
Good, hunh? You may want to remember that one when you crash a funeral. You may want to print this one out. I demand credit for that one!!
I’m warmed up by then and I decide to beat it out of there (to Michael Jackson’s “Beat It”–I’m going through another Disco phase. It will pass. I pray. Huey Lewis–I need you! Save me!)
I’m walking along and I’m passing that overpriced Owl Imports place when I see this huge guy in camouflage and a red and white bandana. His face is half covered in facial hair from a huge beard and he has a scar across his forehead.
He looked pretty darn tough. Now, me–tough isn’t usually a word used to describe me. Potential victim of a violent crime. Designated punching bag. These are words usually used for me.
My brother always tells me to look this sort of character in the eyes so they know you aren’t afraid of them. This is easy for him to do. He’s half a head taller than me, in shape and if he were to throw a punch it would feel more like a mule kicking than the tip-tapping of a sparrow that my punches would best be compared to.
So I divert my eyes. Well, this guy’s a head case, because he takes offense and says “What’s up with you?”
Now, I actually am scared.
So I point at the funeral home and say, “He’s gone. He’s gone.” And I turn and walk away. The guy didn’t say another word and just walked away.
Again, I deserve points.
But this wasn’t the weirdest person I met on my walk home. That is reserved for the guy with the megaphone dressed as Uncle Sam. He is spouting the gospel of Liberty Tax Service. Now, at least he isn’t the usual for them which is some overweight biker-type with a big beard dressed as Lady Liberty. That always freaks me out–say, I wonder if that other guy was coming off his shift???
Anyway, Uncle Sam is shouting into the megaphone, which frankly seems counterproductive to me, about getting to Liberty Tax Service and beat the April 15 deadline. By now, I’m in that weird place I get at this point in a day.
It always reminds me of a scene in “The Secret of My Success” with the pre-cancer version of Michael J. Fox and he’s on this ferryboat in New York Harbor and has learned he’s sleeping with the boss’s wife, which is his aunt, and his boss’s mistress and they are all about to spend the weekend at the same retreat. The line goes something like “There is a calm place you get to when you are completely screwed. And you stop worrying.”
I get to that place often. This was one of those times. I stuff my ear buds in a pocket and I approach the guy in the star-spangled cape. All I’ve got at this point, (remember I had some beauts earlier), is: “So, are you Captain Ameritax?”
Now, I expect kind of a chuckle, maybe a grin, a nod of the head and off we go. Ameritax, though, goes all pricky on me. “Whatever, guy. Get out of here.”
I could have left at that, but this guy was considerably smaller than the guy with the scars so I’m considerably braver. “Why are you even out here? Isn’t the tax place closed?”
He lowers the megaphone. “No, we’re open late. Aren’t you listening?”
“I was supposed to listen?”
Captain Ameritax sighs and walks away.
And I go to warm up in the tax preparation office. It’s still a long way home. 3,594 steps in fact.
Sincerely,
Captain Catastrophe
Just the same, I bought one of those fancy-schmancy pedometers to count my little footy-steps each day. Now, mainly I’ve been using it for what I call efficency testing. It’s 212 steps to the place where I pick up the laptop if I take this route, but 257 if I go this way. Obviously, the first is best.
Effectively, I’ve defeated the entire purpose. I love it when I do that.
Anyway, they keep drilling it into my head that I need 10,000 steps a day, which is approximately 9,975 more steps than I want to take each day. Well, maybe 9,928. If you figure in a run to the mailbox. But who needs that? If I want junk mail, I can read my spam. At least that features lots and lots of dirty pictures.
I digress. I usually do in these things.
Tonight, I decided to walk over to the State Fair Park and buy a new bike. (By the way, folks. Thanks for all the advice about what type of helmet I should get. Everyone seemed to emphasize that with me. I’m not so sure why.) They have the big Wheel & Sprocket Expo over there and I figure if I’m going to do this anyway–might as well.
So I start to hoof it. I’m exercising away so I decide to give myself a little treat. I order the big basket of onion rings with the double cheesebutterburger at Cream City Custard. Now this is exercise!
Hobbling out of my booth at the Custard place, I notice my pedometer hitting 5500 steps. This isn’t good. My little footies suffer from platar fascitis or fascitaris or some such nonsense. Anyway, after about 6000 steps (this has been figured out by some testing in various theme parks in Florida–the only reason to walk so far is a lift hill going clack-clack-clack and a good first drop), my little feetskers start to scream out a chorus.
Well, I’m halfway so I figure–may as well. So I go over to the Expo.
The frigging place is packed. I mean, seriously packed. Little fartmaster kids all over the place (though they better watch out–I did have onion rings and soon they will call ME master.) Lots of old farts, too, which scared me. These bicycle dealers just dealing out heart attacks to these poor old people–I warned a few that all that pedalling might kill–particularly with their advanced age–but most seemed not to appreciate my sage advice, so I decided to let them die.
Then, I nearly died. I saw a price tag.
$1,000! Are they smoking pot? Are they chasing the dragon? Put down the crack pipe, baby, because you be nutso. Not every bike was this ridiculous, but plenty were over $500.
I decided to put my purchasing background into play and scored some major savings with my favorite form of savings: the avoided purchase. I thought, “Okay, the WalMart special is destroyed at home, but that old Huffy one-speed is in fine condition. All I have to do is reattach the old big fat seat on that and I’m good to go.” Besides, now I can get that LCD monitor I wanted.
Stay tuned for that Catastrophe in the future.
So I run out of there. My mother continually tells me I have no sale resistance. Hogwash! Why, everytime I enter a grocery store, I avoid buying any sort of vegetable. Or anything organic. Now that’s will power!
So I’m hobbling out of there and the Sun has gone down. And it’s getting cold. I guess that simple Spring jacket that seemed like overkill earlier just wasn’t enough now. I’m walking along Greenfield and actually starting to shiver. It’s about 8:00 p.m. and my nose is growing cold. Seems to always affect my nose first.
I can’t afford a cold, so I decide I have to dive in some place to warm up. In West Allis, the only places open that late is the taverns about every five feet. But I hate taverns being a non-drinker. So where am I going to go?
How about that place with all the action up ahead there? Look at all the cars pulling in there… Nice sign, too. “Church and Chapel.”
It’s true that I’m perfectly comfortable in funeral homes. I’ve gone to plenty. Not as many as my father, though. When he was president of the German club, he seemed to go every other day. The funeral directors would shout out “Elmar!” like the bar patrons in Cheers! would yell out “Norm!”
But this is crashing a funeral. Something is wrong about that. So I went in, anyway.
The great thing about a funeral home is all the great furniture. I found a real big sofa and plunked myself down. I was probably the only guy there in blue jeans and grooving to tunes on his MP3 player (NOT AN IPOD! –Apple got enough of my money when I was a Mac user. Ever meet an ex-Machead? We’re like ex-smokers. We get all evangelical on your backside about the evils of the old habit. Meanwhile, we secretly still crave the old habit. We have a word for that in our family: Ernie.)
End of rant.
An old guy sits down next to me. I quickly look around the room. Okay, they are all white folks. I just thought, geez, at least they couldn’t tell I didn’t fit in so obviously this time. I’ve done enough Captain stories where that’s happened already.
He looks me over, “What are you listening to?”
I look at the MP3 player and it says “K.C. and the Sunshine Band.” So I look him in the eyes and say, “Maroon 5.”
He nods and turns to me again, “So how did you know him?” He said the name…but I’ve already forgot it. It some old guy name. Like Herb. Or Ralph. Or Elmar. Something like that. Not something young and hip. Like Tim.
So, I figure I could tell this nice gentleman I was just passing through–he sure as heck wouldn’t care–or I could do the usual and make up a story. “I grew up in his neighborhood. I’m visiting my parents and they brought me along.”
Good, hunh? You may want to remember that one when you crash a funeral. You may want to print this one out. I demand credit for that one!!
I’m warmed up by then and I decide to beat it out of there (to Michael Jackson’s “Beat It”–I’m going through another Disco phase. It will pass. I pray. Huey Lewis–I need you! Save me!)
I’m walking along and I’m passing that overpriced Owl Imports place when I see this huge guy in camouflage and a red and white bandana. His face is half covered in facial hair from a huge beard and he has a scar across his forehead.
He looked pretty darn tough. Now, me–tough isn’t usually a word used to describe me. Potential victim of a violent crime. Designated punching bag. These are words usually used for me.
My brother always tells me to look this sort of character in the eyes so they know you aren’t afraid of them. This is easy for him to do. He’s half a head taller than me, in shape and if he were to throw a punch it would feel more like a mule kicking than the tip-tapping of a sparrow that my punches would best be compared to.
So I divert my eyes. Well, this guy’s a head case, because he takes offense and says “What’s up with you?”
Now, I actually am scared.
So I point at the funeral home and say, “He’s gone. He’s gone.” And I turn and walk away. The guy didn’t say another word and just walked away.
Again, I deserve points.
But this wasn’t the weirdest person I met on my walk home. That is reserved for the guy with the megaphone dressed as Uncle Sam. He is spouting the gospel of Liberty Tax Service. Now, at least he isn’t the usual for them which is some overweight biker-type with a big beard dressed as Lady Liberty. That always freaks me out–say, I wonder if that other guy was coming off his shift???
Anyway, Uncle Sam is shouting into the megaphone, which frankly seems counterproductive to me, about getting to Liberty Tax Service and beat the April 15 deadline. By now, I’m in that weird place I get at this point in a day.
It always reminds me of a scene in “The Secret of My Success” with the pre-cancer version of Michael J. Fox and he’s on this ferryboat in New York Harbor and has learned he’s sleeping with the boss’s wife, which is his aunt, and his boss’s mistress and they are all about to spend the weekend at the same retreat. The line goes something like “There is a calm place you get to when you are completely screwed. And you stop worrying.”
I get to that place often. This was one of those times. I stuff my ear buds in a pocket and I approach the guy in the star-spangled cape. All I’ve got at this point, (remember I had some beauts earlier), is: “So, are you Captain Ameritax?”
Now, I expect kind of a chuckle, maybe a grin, a nod of the head and off we go. Ameritax, though, goes all pricky on me. “Whatever, guy. Get out of here.”
I could have left at that, but this guy was considerably smaller than the guy with the scars so I’m considerably braver. “Why are you even out here? Isn’t the tax place closed?”
He lowers the megaphone. “No, we’re open late. Aren’t you listening?”
“I was supposed to listen?”
Captain Ameritax sighs and walks away.
And I go to warm up in the tax preparation office. It’s still a long way home. 3,594 steps in fact.
Sincerely,
Captain Catastrophe
The Captain goes to the Beauty Pageant
A lot of you know I’ve been interviewing many beauty pageant titleholders on my radio program. I even judged one not long ago. Well, when it came time for the St. Francis pageant, I had to go. Nikki had come in to sing Stille Nacht special for the program and it will always be one of the highlights of our show in 2004.
You also know nothing ever comes easy for me. Simply getting to an event…on time…can be a major effort. There’s tires that go flat. Injuries that just freakishly manifest themselves upon me. Urges to go on vacation–well, I do tend to go on vacation frequently. You have to admit.
So I know what date the event is…but have no idea when it will happen. I e-mail Nikki. You’d figure she knows and she tells me “7:00 p.m., I think.” Okay, that wasn’t exactly authoritative. So now I’m picturing trying to sneak into the auditorium when it is underway. I figure 6:30 to be safe.
Yeah. Safety. All about the safety. That’s me.
So I have the time. I have the date. Where is it being held? “Thomas More Auditorium.” What the hell is that? Time to pull out all the research stops. So I google Thomas More Auditorium, St. Francis. Nothing definitive. I further find out this location is on the corner of KK & Warnimont. Great, so I look that up. But Warnimont changes name and splits a couple of places. Sweating now. MapQuest, GoogleMaps, MapBlast, YahooMaps…all open in separate browsers. Comparing, contrasting…looking for an actual address to input into my GPS in the car.
Nothing, but I had it narrowed down.
See, I figured out Warnimont becomes Lake Drive. And I found a St. Francis Seminary. I figured, “Thomas More was a famous religious type character. Must be the name of one of the buildings there.”
So I get in the car at 6:00 (to be safe) and dial in 3257 S Lake Dr.
It writes itself from there, don’t it.
The sun is setting and I’m following my GPS’s commands. For the most part. I kind of know where St. Francis is, but I don’t have much call to go out there, so I’m basically blindly following the GPS commands. Which hurts me in the Marquette. It considered going straight, toward the lake, an “exit” which threw me. I knew I did something wrong as I started going north on 43 when the GPS announced: “Off route. Recalculating.” I always thought they should allow you to download different voices. I would get the Homer Simpson model so when I’d pull a maneuver like that, it would just announce, “Doh!”
So now I’m the only Milwaukee native ever to go north from the Marquette in an attempt to find St. Francis.
This also explains why I bought a GPS in the first place.
Well, that and it’s electronics. We all know I love electronics. Unfortunately, they don’t love me back.
I somehow exit and get back on the freeway and give it another go. I’m driving along on the Hoan Bridge (which as a kid I always thought was the “Home Bridge” and the most embarrassing name of landmark ever. That was before the U.S. Bank company defaced my beloved First Wisconsin Building, but I digress.) I noticed the Port of Milwaukee, which I started thinking I should really go explore some time. I had read that the Port of Milwaukee is actually more active than the Chicago Port and thought that might be exciting . . .
Okay, missed another exit.
“Off route. Recalculating.” She kind of sounded like that female voice that announces how much time until the self-destruct of the bad guy’s lair sounds in all the James Bond movies. I really need Homer. Or like Moe from the Three Stooges. “Eh…wise guy, hunh?”
I somehow get myself on Oklahoma and I’m going straight for the lake. Stay on target, I murmur to myself in some sort of Star Wars flashback. Stay on target.
Oddly, I get to the lake and I turn right. I do not drive into the drink. Anyway, there were houses in the way. They would have stopped me.
I go past some beautiful church-like stuff on my right, but I figure this just didn’t look right. I keep driving. And driving. My GPS is saying, “Make a U – Turn.” So I figure it must have been that church looking place.
But there was no one in the parking lot. And it was ten to seven. Seems odd.
Wait a minute, I think. Nikki said 7:00 p.m., I think! If it were 7:30, I’d be 40 minutes early. I did it! I found the place. In fact, the approach was so gorgeous I decided to pull out my new digital camera and snap a shot of the exterior.
As I get out of the car, I see signs for the “Seminary Theater.” That’s got to be it, I think. Then I see a little sheet of paper taped below the sign. “This way to the Talent Show.” That’s odd, I thought. Usually, they call these pageants, but whatever.
I walk in and another sign says go in elevator to Talent show. Third floor for Talent Show. Well, I think, they certainly have enough signs.
The place is like a hundred years old. The lights are dim and I slowly step down the hallway under these unshielded bulbs of maybe 30 watts a piece. Prerecorded rap music is playing at the end of the hallway. This should be interesting, I think. Never saw someone “rap” for their talent.
No one is manning the ticket table. I pat myself on the back, again, for being so early. I seek out one of the ladies at the refreshments booth. They seemed very surprised to see me.
That’s when I look around and notice I’m the only white guy in the place. Heck, I’m the only guy.
It’s starting to sink in. This is why they call it being thick.
“Uh, is this the Thomas More Auditorium?”
“No.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“No. We could probably find somebody.”
I look at my watch. Five to seven.
“That won’t be necessary. Do you have a corner in which I can curl up and have a good cry?”
They just look as I quickly make for the door.
FIVE MINUTES! How am I going to find a place that I have no address for in FIVE MINUTES!
Can’t wait for the elevator. Gotta hurry. Here’s the steps. Wait a minute, no lights on in here. No, no, gotta hurry. Got to get moving. Steps are all the same. Don’t need lights. Even though this is building I’ve never been in before. And every floor seems to list to the left. And it’s excruciating dark already . . .
Ever try to walk down steps in the dark? Well, before you criticize me on this, you ought to try it. Particularly if the landings are unusually, well, shallow.
That’s right. Walked right into the wall. My response? Instead of the usual, “Owie!” or “Not the face!” was just, “Well, I guess I have some writing ahead of me.”
Rubbing my schnoz, I emerge from the building AND STILL NO ONE is in the parking lot. That talent show must be at eight or something. Why am I even wondering? I have like three minutes left. And at pageants, they don’t play coming attractions and Mountain Dew ads before the show.
I hop into the Red Rocket (yeah, that’s the car) and I just shake my head. Now what? Well, on the way here I went past KK. Why don’t I just drive the length of it in St. Francis? That was the best I could do at this point.
That’s what I did. One or two blocks from where I crossed KK, was a huge lit sign “Thomas More High School.” I’m swearing under my breath, “What’s up with Google not having that &@$! thing?” What’s more I’m following other cars back to a parking lot…this has GOT to be the place!
People are still arriving, so even if I’m late, I shouldn’t be too bad. It was only 7:05. I’d just sneak in the back . . .
Just bought my ticket. It reads 7:30 on the ticket face. Hmmm. Guess I didn’t need to rush quite so much, did I?
The lady selling the ticket asks, “Who are you here for?”
I look at her and mumble, “I guess the groom.” I think I’m preconditioned. She thought I was trying to be funny. In reality, I think I bonked my head more than I thought in that dark stairwell.
“And how many?”
I look around. There is no one within 20 feet of me. I hate this question. When I’m at the movies. When I go out to eat. Everytime, the admission question becomes a personal affront to my lifestyle. “One,” I say quietly. In today’s society, being a party of one is just a shave better than full on leprosy. I wonder if any of those pageant queens will ever adopt a platform of “Stop the persecution of the alone.” I’ve finally grown into being comfortable with always being alone and yet that persistent question.
Rant over.
I find my seat and I get the camera ready. It’s my new Canon PowerShot SD110 3.2MP Digital Elph with a 2x Optical Zoom with a 16Mb SD card standard–I upgraded to the 256Mb…I’m geeking out a little now, right? Sorry. Tell me to stop when that happens again.
Anyway, I figure this will be a great test for it. Dark auditorium and I’m back in the H row, so that’s a good 60-70 yards from the action I figure. Well, feet maybe. I dunno. I was getting all prepared for metric and we never went and now I can’t judge distances. Darn 70s. They should have never said that to us kids.
Rant over.
So I turn on the camera and note the “LOW BATTERY” icon. Oh, no! Not at the beginning. I figure I can sneak three or four shots, maybe. So I shoot two and notice it taking a while to recharge. Better save the battery.
I put the camera away and that’s when I hear the host announce the swimsuit competition. GADNABIT! My camera is out of commission!
By the way, the swimsuit competition is far too short. I just thought I’d mention this. I’m thinking you could budget, oh, let’s say 30 minutes or so for this. It would give the young ladies time to change into their outfits for the talent portion as it takes time to get through all the ladies in the suits.
Just thought I’d make the suggestion. I was enjoying the presentation immensely. The guy next to me had some sort of 500 power telescopic lens on his camera and ate up two rolls of film during the 20 seconds that competition seems to take.
During the talent, we had singers, dancers, a young lady played flute and then we had one young woman that was an art major and drew a picture of Jim Morrison to the Doors tune “Light my Fire.” They were all very talented young people.
During intermission, I met one of the young ladies that will be on my show in the near future and we took a few pictures that turned out just fine. This was good, because everything I took of action up on stage–what little I chanced–was pathetic. The flash just didn’t travel all that distance–traditional or metric.
We get to Nikki’s goodbye speech and she absolutely floors me by mentioning me by name. That was really something. She’s such a class act.
I attempt to take a photo as she’s taking off the crown, but the flash won’t recharge. Then when she takes it off, she holds the crown out for all to see. However, I’m messing around so much with the camera, I just see her move the crown out and I figure, “Holy Christmas! She’s going to throw the tiara into the crowd! Just like a Brewers game.” Luckily, Nikki’s relations with about 20 really large cousins is in front of me, so I’m not frightened I’ll get beamed with it. Either way, I flinched. The camera dude next to me snickers and continues snapping away.
I did squeeze off one more photo. I probably have juice for just one more. They are about to announce the new Miss St. Francis . . . and . . . my . . . battery . . . dies.
Okay. That just isn’t right.
Anyway, the night was great. I did find the place and saw some great entertainment. Nikki mentioned me in her farewell speech and she saw I was there. Sure, they sneaked the newly crowned Miss St. Francis out the back door like the President amid Secret Service so I couldn’t invite her on the show…but it was a great night as it was.
I figure, why try my luck?
Captain Catastrophe
P.S. I’m going to the Wheel & Sprocket bike show next week to get a new bike. Any suggestions? (And a helpful suggestion–not something like upping my insurance.)
You also know nothing ever comes easy for me. Simply getting to an event…on time…can be a major effort. There’s tires that go flat. Injuries that just freakishly manifest themselves upon me. Urges to go on vacation–well, I do tend to go on vacation frequently. You have to admit.
So I know what date the event is…but have no idea when it will happen. I e-mail Nikki. You’d figure she knows and she tells me “7:00 p.m., I think.” Okay, that wasn’t exactly authoritative. So now I’m picturing trying to sneak into the auditorium when it is underway. I figure 6:30 to be safe.
Yeah. Safety. All about the safety. That’s me.
So I have the time. I have the date. Where is it being held? “Thomas More Auditorium.” What the hell is that? Time to pull out all the research stops. So I google Thomas More Auditorium, St. Francis. Nothing definitive. I further find out this location is on the corner of KK & Warnimont. Great, so I look that up. But Warnimont changes name and splits a couple of places. Sweating now. MapQuest, GoogleMaps, MapBlast, YahooMaps…all open in separate browsers. Comparing, contrasting…looking for an actual address to input into my GPS in the car.
Nothing, but I had it narrowed down.
See, I figured out Warnimont becomes Lake Drive. And I found a St. Francis Seminary. I figured, “Thomas More was a famous religious type character. Must be the name of one of the buildings there.”
So I get in the car at 6:00 (to be safe) and dial in 3257 S Lake Dr.
It writes itself from there, don’t it.
The sun is setting and I’m following my GPS’s commands. For the most part. I kind of know where St. Francis is, but I don’t have much call to go out there, so I’m basically blindly following the GPS commands. Which hurts me in the Marquette. It considered going straight, toward the lake, an “exit” which threw me. I knew I did something wrong as I started going north on 43 when the GPS announced: “Off route. Recalculating.” I always thought they should allow you to download different voices. I would get the Homer Simpson model so when I’d pull a maneuver like that, it would just announce, “Doh!”
So now I’m the only Milwaukee native ever to go north from the Marquette in an attempt to find St. Francis.
This also explains why I bought a GPS in the first place.
Well, that and it’s electronics. We all know I love electronics. Unfortunately, they don’t love me back.
I somehow exit and get back on the freeway and give it another go. I’m driving along on the Hoan Bridge (which as a kid I always thought was the “Home Bridge” and the most embarrassing name of landmark ever. That was before the U.S. Bank company defaced my beloved First Wisconsin Building, but I digress.) I noticed the Port of Milwaukee, which I started thinking I should really go explore some time. I had read that the Port of Milwaukee is actually more active than the Chicago Port and thought that might be exciting . . .
Okay, missed another exit.
“Off route. Recalculating.” She kind of sounded like that female voice that announces how much time until the self-destruct of the bad guy’s lair sounds in all the James Bond movies. I really need Homer. Or like Moe from the Three Stooges. “Eh…wise guy, hunh?”
I somehow get myself on Oklahoma and I’m going straight for the lake. Stay on target, I murmur to myself in some sort of Star Wars flashback. Stay on target.
Oddly, I get to the lake and I turn right. I do not drive into the drink. Anyway, there were houses in the way. They would have stopped me.
I go past some beautiful church-like stuff on my right, but I figure this just didn’t look right. I keep driving. And driving. My GPS is saying, “Make a U – Turn.” So I figure it must have been that church looking place.
But there was no one in the parking lot. And it was ten to seven. Seems odd.
Wait a minute, I think. Nikki said 7:00 p.m., I think! If it were 7:30, I’d be 40 minutes early. I did it! I found the place. In fact, the approach was so gorgeous I decided to pull out my new digital camera and snap a shot of the exterior.
As I get out of the car, I see signs for the “Seminary Theater.” That’s got to be it, I think. Then I see a little sheet of paper taped below the sign. “This way to the Talent Show.” That’s odd, I thought. Usually, they call these pageants, but whatever.
I walk in and another sign says go in elevator to Talent show. Third floor for Talent Show. Well, I think, they certainly have enough signs.
The place is like a hundred years old. The lights are dim and I slowly step down the hallway under these unshielded bulbs of maybe 30 watts a piece. Prerecorded rap music is playing at the end of the hallway. This should be interesting, I think. Never saw someone “rap” for their talent.
No one is manning the ticket table. I pat myself on the back, again, for being so early. I seek out one of the ladies at the refreshments booth. They seemed very surprised to see me.
That’s when I look around and notice I’m the only white guy in the place. Heck, I’m the only guy.
It’s starting to sink in. This is why they call it being thick.
“Uh, is this the Thomas More Auditorium?”
“No.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“No. We could probably find somebody.”
I look at my watch. Five to seven.
“That won’t be necessary. Do you have a corner in which I can curl up and have a good cry?”
They just look as I quickly make for the door.
FIVE MINUTES! How am I going to find a place that I have no address for in FIVE MINUTES!
Can’t wait for the elevator. Gotta hurry. Here’s the steps. Wait a minute, no lights on in here. No, no, gotta hurry. Got to get moving. Steps are all the same. Don’t need lights. Even though this is building I’ve never been in before. And every floor seems to list to the left. And it’s excruciating dark already . . .
Ever try to walk down steps in the dark? Well, before you criticize me on this, you ought to try it. Particularly if the landings are unusually, well, shallow.
That’s right. Walked right into the wall. My response? Instead of the usual, “Owie!” or “Not the face!” was just, “Well, I guess I have some writing ahead of me.”
Rubbing my schnoz, I emerge from the building AND STILL NO ONE is in the parking lot. That talent show must be at eight or something. Why am I even wondering? I have like three minutes left. And at pageants, they don’t play coming attractions and Mountain Dew ads before the show.
I hop into the Red Rocket (yeah, that’s the car) and I just shake my head. Now what? Well, on the way here I went past KK. Why don’t I just drive the length of it in St. Francis? That was the best I could do at this point.
That’s what I did. One or two blocks from where I crossed KK, was a huge lit sign “Thomas More High School.” I’m swearing under my breath, “What’s up with Google not having that &@$! thing?” What’s more I’m following other cars back to a parking lot…this has GOT to be the place!
People are still arriving, so even if I’m late, I shouldn’t be too bad. It was only 7:05. I’d just sneak in the back . . .
Just bought my ticket. It reads 7:30 on the ticket face. Hmmm. Guess I didn’t need to rush quite so much, did I?
The lady selling the ticket asks, “Who are you here for?”
I look at her and mumble, “I guess the groom.” I think I’m preconditioned. She thought I was trying to be funny. In reality, I think I bonked my head more than I thought in that dark stairwell.
“And how many?”
I look around. There is no one within 20 feet of me. I hate this question. When I’m at the movies. When I go out to eat. Everytime, the admission question becomes a personal affront to my lifestyle. “One,” I say quietly. In today’s society, being a party of one is just a shave better than full on leprosy. I wonder if any of those pageant queens will ever adopt a platform of “Stop the persecution of the alone.” I’ve finally grown into being comfortable with always being alone and yet that persistent question.
Rant over.
I find my seat and I get the camera ready. It’s my new Canon PowerShot SD110 3.2MP Digital Elph with a 2x Optical Zoom with a 16Mb SD card standard–I upgraded to the 256Mb…I’m geeking out a little now, right? Sorry. Tell me to stop when that happens again.
Anyway, I figure this will be a great test for it. Dark auditorium and I’m back in the H row, so that’s a good 60-70 yards from the action I figure. Well, feet maybe. I dunno. I was getting all prepared for metric and we never went and now I can’t judge distances. Darn 70s. They should have never said that to us kids.
Rant over.
So I turn on the camera and note the “LOW BATTERY” icon. Oh, no! Not at the beginning. I figure I can sneak three or four shots, maybe. So I shoot two and notice it taking a while to recharge. Better save the battery.
I put the camera away and that’s when I hear the host announce the swimsuit competition. GADNABIT! My camera is out of commission!
By the way, the swimsuit competition is far too short. I just thought I’d mention this. I’m thinking you could budget, oh, let’s say 30 minutes or so for this. It would give the young ladies time to change into their outfits for the talent portion as it takes time to get through all the ladies in the suits.
Just thought I’d make the suggestion. I was enjoying the presentation immensely. The guy next to me had some sort of 500 power telescopic lens on his camera and ate up two rolls of film during the 20 seconds that competition seems to take.
During the talent, we had singers, dancers, a young lady played flute and then we had one young woman that was an art major and drew a picture of Jim Morrison to the Doors tune “Light my Fire.” They were all very talented young people.
During intermission, I met one of the young ladies that will be on my show in the near future and we took a few pictures that turned out just fine. This was good, because everything I took of action up on stage–what little I chanced–was pathetic. The flash just didn’t travel all that distance–traditional or metric.
We get to Nikki’s goodbye speech and she absolutely floors me by mentioning me by name. That was really something. She’s such a class act.
I attempt to take a photo as she’s taking off the crown, but the flash won’t recharge. Then when she takes it off, she holds the crown out for all to see. However, I’m messing around so much with the camera, I just see her move the crown out and I figure, “Holy Christmas! She’s going to throw the tiara into the crowd! Just like a Brewers game.” Luckily, Nikki’s relations with about 20 really large cousins is in front of me, so I’m not frightened I’ll get beamed with it. Either way, I flinched. The camera dude next to me snickers and continues snapping away.
I did squeeze off one more photo. I probably have juice for just one more. They are about to announce the new Miss St. Francis . . . and . . . my . . . battery . . . dies.
Okay. That just isn’t right.
Anyway, the night was great. I did find the place and saw some great entertainment. Nikki mentioned me in her farewell speech and she saw I was there. Sure, they sneaked the newly crowned Miss St. Francis out the back door like the President amid Secret Service so I couldn’t invite her on the show…but it was a great night as it was.
I figure, why try my luck?
Captain Catastrophe
P.S. I’m going to the Wheel & Sprocket bike show next week to get a new bike. Any suggestions? (And a helpful suggestion–not something like upping my insurance.)