The Gallerita!

Pasta Dinner

Next week-end is the Cinco Ranch Triathlon. There are alot of us participating in this event (Tim, Felicia, Kathleen, John, Patrick, Jennifer, Elizabeth and I.) Kathleen and I were talking about where I was staying and what we would be doing on Saturday. I am thinking of driving to Houston on Saturday. I will be staying at Margaret's house, but she is in Hawaii and will be there til Sunday. So, I will be only using her home for a place to sleep. I think that Jen and Stepan will be staying there as well. The hub of activity will be occurring at Kathleen's house. Patrick, Cynthia, Elizabeth and Jonathan will all be staying there. Kathleen, Jennifer, Stepan and I all have tickets to the spaghetti dinner that were offered as part of the triathlon. I am posting this in hopes that all who read it and are part of the tri-weekend will be attending the dinner as well. So, all you Cinco triathletes go back to the official site and purchase those tickets.

Speaking of triathlons; Jennifer and I have enrolled to participate in the Seaworld Triathlon in San Antonio on September 28. I think that Patrick will so enjoy the tri experience that he will enroll as well. Time will tell!

Ping Pong

Meredith sent this to me in an email. It is a link to a ping pong game that I thought everyone would appreciate seeing. You may watch it by double-clicking here.

His name was Kevin

There was a small piece in the Dallas Morning News about the accident that I came upon yesterday. His name was Kevin McVoy. He was 45 years old. He ran out of gas, pulled to the center of the interstate and was trying to cross it when he got hit. He died at the scene.

I See Dead People

Actually, I saw only one dead person, which is one more dead person than I ever wanted to see. The day started very early for me. I am car pooling now because of an assinine decision (that is a whole other entry, which I will make once it is resolved) made by my second line manager. Len, Doug and I met at the office close to my house to begin our commute to the Dallas office. En route, I asked Doug (my boss) what I would be doing today. He said he wanted me to accompany him to Grand Prarie. The subject got changed and when we got to Dallas it was then that I found out that most of the crew on duty at that time would be going to Grand Prairie to pick up some frame blocks with 300' of 100 pair cable attached. It seems a former employee that had control over ordering this type of material got very creative in his job. He had his mom open her own business, placed orders for the cable in excess of what he needed, had the overage sent to his mom's storage unit, and resold it to the phone company. He was very cooperative today when we went to retrieve the cables. I can surmise he was so, in an effort to reduce any sentence that might come his way. Anyway, Doug and I started our journey to GP at around 8:40AM. The I30 HOV stayed open til 9AM and since we qualified we decided to use that route to Grand Prairie. We were in the left most lane and a lady in the next lane driving evenly with us, decided she wanted to be where we were; exactly where we were. Doug, using evasive manuevers, avoided a collision with her. She was oblivious to our presence on the road. A few moments later, traffic was stopped. We were about the 5th car behind the lead car of our lane. The lanes ahead of that were empty. All the lanes to our right were stopped as well. We could not see what was causing our delay. I asked Doug if he wanted me to run and see what the problem was. It was about that time that I noticed the lead cars trickling down the highway---one car, a pickup truck, "oh I can see something in the road!---oh my God, it is a man!" The police cars were just arriving. Shortly, we were the lead car. He was still laying there, uncovered, not moving, his shoes about 15' away. The police were busy about the task of working the accident. A short distance away, a woman was consoling another woman who was distraught.

I tried to find the details of this accident before making this entry. I am assuming the man died because noone was attending to him. I could not see a vehicle that may have been caused in a mishap, so I am thinking that he may have been a pedestrian.

This Time Last Week

Does anyone else do what I have done all week? This past Tuesday, I thought to myself, "this time last week I was at a cocktail party with the former governor of Texas." I remember doing the same thing for both of the cruises I have been on and the trip to Hawaii and the trip to Canada. Tonight I am remembering what a wonderful evening I had with Deon and Meredith, this time last week. We went to a restaurant called The Crab House. It is on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River and offers a fantastic view of Manhattan. This time last week I was wondering if I would be successful getting back to Texas on my stand-by airline ticket. It is kind of funny, when I am on vacation for more than just a few days I long for home. When I am home I long to be back where I was this time last week.

Yakking in the middle of traffic

Here is a picture of me talking to my boss, Doug Furgerson, during the blackout. It was Doug that told me how widespread the blackout was. You can double click here to see more photos of the blackout and the rest of my trip to New York/New Jersey.

Can I Add a Video--let's see

Download file

This is a short video that I took as Meredith and I were making our way to the ferry after the blackout. I hope this works.

Home Sweet Home

What a perfect end to a wonderful week. When I was packing to come back to Texas on Saturday night, I felt it was an exercise in futility. However, to not make an attempt had a definite outcome so I continued packing and readying myself for my 7AM departure from Meredith's. I bid my farewells to Meredith, Sheeba and Deon. Robert was still abed, so I didn't get to say farewell to him--damn! I arrived at the airport with plenty of time to spare. I made way over to the correct terminal, went through security and stopped in The Presidents Club of Continental Airlines (a pass was one of the items in the TITC goody bags). I retrieved a NY Times, drank coffee and ate a blueberry muffin and an apple. I had asked the recetionist that if it became necessary to return to the club if I would need another pass. She said no. On my way out, I asked her if I needed a pass to return. She said no, that she would remember me. I told her good, because I was likely to return since I am flying stand-by. She asked my destination and checked her computer and told me she felt confidant that I would make the flight. Inspired with this confidence and a new bounce in my step, I made my way to the gate. I checked if stand-bys had been called. They had not. So, I sat myself down and was patient, like the good little Catholic girl that I am. While I waited I began chatting with a young woman who was also trying to get back to Dallas. She had a positive space ticket. When she got up to get inline for planing, I noticed she was limping. I asked her about it and she said she was a professional woman's football player and played for this team. She plays running back and tight end. Her player number is 42. She had some team postcards of which she is the cover girl. So, I now have an autographed postcard. In the middle of all this, I was called to the counter and handed my boarding pass. It was like gold to me. I checked my seat assignment and found that I was in 1A. I thought, Heh, I think I am in first class. I boarded the plane and sure enough, I was seated in first class. Life is great!

Okay, now back to reality. We are doing a maintenance hour job in the Benbrook CO. So, I was to report at 7PM to work through the night . Try as hard as I could I did not nap or catch even one Z when I returned. I was still on my great vacation high. I knew I would be good til about 1AM. And I was. I did start fading fast after that. By the time 5AM rolled around, I had been awake for almost 24 hours and I was ready for home and bed. I finally fell into bed at about 530AM and slept til 1115AM. I think tonight will go alot easier.

webshots update

I have posted some of the pictures from my trip to NYC. I have yet to post the ones from the blackout. However, double click here to see pictures from Ann's party.

Where Were You When The Lights Went Out?

Meredith and I were in Macy's. We were at the fine jewelry counter looking at some earrings. The lights dimmed somewhat and I asked the clerk, "does that happen often?" She said no. The lights went to normal and I said to Meredith, "Where were you when the lights went out?" A few seconds later that lights flickered off and on, then off. There was limited lighting from some of the counters so we were not plunged into total darkness. As long as we had some light we were going to continue our shopping. We walked up the escalator. Meredith found a really nice top that was on the 75% off rack and wanted to go try it on. It was at this point that the lights dimmed yet more. Someone came to our floor and said the power failure was throughtout the city. We did not believe that. Unfortunately, the personnel of Macy's intstructed us to leave the building. So we did. When we got to the street, we were met with crowds of people pouring out of the theatres and other businesses in Manhattan. The traffic lights were not working and all the cars were at a standstill. The sidewalks were so crowded that Meredith and I walked the streets. I had my camera with me and so I took some pictures. I even took a short moving picture that turned out ok. I am hoping to post it and the stills when I return home. My daughter is so smart. She insisted that we make a b-line for the ferry. I suggested we stop and have a drink and wait out the failure. She said no. So we rushed to the ferry. People were lined up for the buses in front of the ferry site. We got in the line for the ferry and made it on the first one that arrived. The ferry was very crowded (sro). I got some good pictures there and crossing the river to Weehawken. The phones were not working very well. I was able to get through to my daughter in Austin, Jennifer and my boss in Dallas. I had more luck with my phone than Meredith did with hers. She was thinking that it was because my phone is not based in the NYC area. I doubt that, buy who knows. By the time we got to the NJ side of the river, we had heard that the power failure was also affecting NJ. So, we walked to Meredith's house from the ferry, which included a trek up a set of stairs that are 200 in number and straight up. I had walked down them on Tuesday and I told Meredith that I never want to walk up them. Oh well! I got a really cute call from Danny. He was excited that indirectly he was a part of the 2003 blackout of the Northeast. He very well could have been more excited than we were. Deon was here tended to Sheeba. After a while we decided to go out and sit on the stoop. Most of the neighbors were out on their stoops as well. Peoole were washing cars, walking dogs and getting to know each other. It was great. The three of us decided to pile in Deon's car and try to find something to eat. We drove for a very long time. There were spots of areas that had electricity. We ended up eating at On The Border. The food and drink was good. We had fun. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the excitement that the blackout created. There is more to tell, but I will collect my thoughts and tell in another entry.

What a Great Lady

I attended a cocktail party hosted by Tex In The City for a book launch of Ann Richards new book about surviving with osteoporosis. I met Ann and spoke with her a bit. She is such a wonderful lady. TITC did a beautiful job of pulling it all together. For all you Gilligans Island fans, there was a major star from that show in attendance to honour Ann as well. We had so much fun.

I also had a world of fun with two of my sisters. The evening was made so much more special by their presence at this event. The muscles in my stomach are aching from all the belly laughing that they evoked tonight.

When I get back to Texas, I will post pictures from tonight on my webshots and link to them from this site. So, ya'll come back.

Hot Spots

Is it any wonder it is hot these days. You can see in this picture that there was a loop on the sun reaching for earth. I found this picture at this site.

Update

I have been remiss in attending to my blogging dutires. I will not be very complete on my reporting tonight. I wanted to report highlights of my week.

-I am on vacation next week. Going to be visiting the Big Apple. I'm gonna wake-up in the city that doesn't sleep.

-Thursday when I went back to my home base there were two huge red fire trucks in the parking lot. The power crew did a 5 hour engine run, which takes the building off commercial ac and runs it on auxilary power. Thursday was one of the hottest days we have had so far. At the end of the 5 hours, when the engine was turned off, leaves and debris that had collected on the grate of the engine stack settled on the extremely hot grate, ignited and sent smoke through out the building. The power tech did not know the smokes source so the building was vacated and fire trucks were called. Arlington FD has some very hunky looking firemen.

-I purchased a dress for me and Leah to wear in NYC. We are going to a book launch for Ann Richards book about living with osteoporosis. The dress I got for Leah had been abused and needed some zipper repair. I thought I could stitch the existing zipper and found today that I do not have the proper equipment to do that. So, I am trying to buy a zipper that I can add and still have pretty dress for Leah to wear. I tried the dress on and I love it. I hope Leah loves it too.

-I got to have dinner with two friends from the business office. We met at Mac's. It was wonderful, the food the atmosphere the conversation--were all great.

Addendem to the above entry. In paragraph number 4, I wrote that I purchased a dress for me and Leah---I actually purchased 2 dresses, one for me and one for Leah. In paragraph number 3 the building was not vacated, it was evacuated. In the last paragraph, the two friends that I had dinner with were Martha Muzyka and Debra Jensen.