RobZerrvations
Musings from a Meandering, Mischievous Mind
I Am An Unmarked Man
I will soon be 53 years old. Outside of the marks Mother Nature and my own clumsiness have provided me with, my skin is still a virgin. You see, I do not have any tattoos. My mother does. She got the rose on her forearm when she was in her 60s. I have dated, lived with and been married to women who have had tattoos. I have admired others who have beautiful ink on their bodies. Yet, I do not have any myself. It's not the thought of a bunch of needles being stuck in my arm, though I do profess...
I Think My Neighbor Isn’t Telling Me Everything
I got a mailing from my neighbor yesterday here in OFC (Old Fart Central). I don't think I like what he's telling me. No, it's not his tone. It's friendly and welcoming enough. It's the subject matter. It was presented in glowing terms, mind you. Perhaps a little too glowing for my tastes. My neighbor is a nuke plant. The mailing was entitled, "Safety Planning Information for Neighbors of FPL's St. Lucie Nuclear Plant." Since I have worked in corporate communications, I have had the pleasure...
Flirtations With The Great Outdoors
As many of you know, I was born and raised in the Seattle area. The great Pacific Northwest, one of the only places on earth where you can spend the morning hiking on an ocean beach, do a little kayaking on Lake Union in the afternoon and head up to the mountains for a little night skiing - all in a single day. It's a sportsman's and outdoorsman's paradise. Unfortunately, I am neither. It was no paradise for a "hammock under a palm tree" kind of guy. Lord knows, I've tried. I have camped,...
A Moving Experience
For the first 22 years of my life, I managed to stay in the same place. I lived in the family home in Renton all the way up until my graduation from college. I don't think that was too unusual, but what happened afterwards my not be a common occurrence. By last count, I have moved 20 times in the 30 years since then. It started when I moved from my childhood home because my then wife couldn't stand my mother (move #1) and it has brought me here to the old-fart capital of the world, Fort...
The U.S. House of Nimrods
I had originally planned to write about how I hate parades and my odd attraction to moving today, but unfortunately, today's headlines set me off. The high fiving white guys in the House have said they will shut down the U.S. government if they don't get their way. That means people like my 84 year old mother, who relies on Medicare and Social Security to survive, won't get any money. And that really pisses me off. Of course, the threat comes over the whole national debt issue, which has been...
Living In Our Wonderful Meocracy
I have discovered over the last year or so that I am a bane to the political system. The reason is simple. I'm not a "Johnny come lately" independent, I've been one all my life. I have voted in elections since 1976. The vote is split evenly between Democrats and Republicans for president and governor. I've bitched for many a year that if God wanted us to vote, he'd give us candidates. I only put forth John Kerry and John McCain as examples and you'll see the truth of this. So you can imagine...
Bless Me Father For I Have Sinned
I grew up Catholic. I'm not really one now. A divorce or two and a subsequent crisis of faith took care of that. That's not to say I'm not spiritual. I am, in fact, more spiritual than when I went to organized church. My faith is very strong, and it's defined in terms that cross the spectrum of religions. I am, in effect, a religious mutt. Even if I had stayed in the church I don't think I could ever reconcile one of the great conflicts of faith. As any Catholic knows, we're supposed to feel...
What’s It With Hotels?
I was enjoying a shower in my Super8 cube when the hilarity of hotels came to mind. Now granted, the Super8 isn't top of the line. But I've also spent time in some amazing five star luxury resorts and the story always seems to be the same. As we enter the room, we invariably say, "Well, this is nice." And even if it's a total dive, we try to justify it in homey terms: "My, this is spacious," "What a view," "OMG, it has a mini fridge and a microwave," "What a cozy little home away from home."...
Don’t Ever Start a Band!
Jimmy Buffett had warned me well with his sage advice at the beginning of "The Weather Is Here, Wish You Were Beautiful." Don't ever start a band. I didn't listen of course. And now I look back on being a performer for 30 years and wonder where all the time went. How did I get into this in the first place. Well, I'll tell you. As I've mentioned, I was a band geek in school. I played trumpet, then switched to French horn in 10th grade when I found out the law of supply and demand. 1 of 25...
Ahead Of My Time And I Didn’t Know It
I was watching a PBS special the other day on how technology is making us less social and that we are becoming isolated drones who are being destroyed by all these advances around us. I just want to say -- BULLS**T. How can I fly in the face of all these so-called experts in society? How can I argue with their learned points of view? Simple. I live this life. It was during a segment on virtual work environments that this though occurred to me. It was showing how IBM works virtually now with...
Does Anybody Know What Time It Is?
Time is an odd thing and yet we're all consumed by it. Jim Croce wanted to put it into a bottle. H.G. Wells wanted to travel through it with the machine he created. Tony and Doug entered into it through a Tunnel on TV in the 1960s. And for the vast majority of us, it just seems to slip away. Since the age when we were first able to stand upright, we've wondered about time and tried become its masters. We started with sticks in the ground, then moved up to the sundial. We convinced ourselves...
The File Cabinets of My Mind
I know that it may surprise no one here but I actually went to therapy once. It wasn't for any psychological imbalance, mind you, though you probably wouldn't be shocked to hear that either. Instead, it was for a crumbling marriage. I never thought I would go to a therapist, but hey, I really didn't want to have to move again. So there I was, just me and the therapist. She asked me to talk a bit about myself. The session lasted an entire hour and she never asked another question after that. I...