Musings from “Life Is a Road” author–Daniel Meyer
Archive for October, 2007
I’m just happy it came up….
Oct 28th
I have to say…it’s a pleasure and a privilage for me to have my circle of friends…
Where else can somebody ask…with a straight face…and NOT in a rhetorical way:
“Lawyers or vampires?”
CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer
Well *that* can’t be good…
Oct 26th
Well, I’m off in Riverside, California…sent here by work and shaking my head at the MASSIVE amount of systems’ work that needs to be done here…I don’t even know where to start…good thing that really my role at the moment is to reconnoiter and come back with some recommendations…
Anyway, showering this morning in my hotel room and I heard the cable TV fail. Static noises drowned out the sound of the shower.
“Hmmm…that can’t be good…”
Ten seconds later, the power went out and the hotel was plunged into darkness.
Showering in the dark is only fun when there’s a naked woman with you…
“That’s definitely NOT good…”
Then the water pressure went away. ACK! I quickly rinsed the soap off with the remaining dribbles.
With all the smoke from the fires surrounding the city…and now no power…gotta wonder if the hotel is on fire or not. Time to leave.
As I was getting dressed I peered out the window could see that the entire city was out.
“Crap.” Gotta get to the newspaper and shut down critical systems orderly before the UPS systems run out of juice.
Kind of sucks to be on the 12th floor of the hotel in power outage.
No emergency lights in the halls or stairwell either. What the heck is with that?
Down 12 flights of stairs by the light of my cell phone. Sheesh. Had I been traveling on the bike I would have had an LED flashlight at the least. They get annoyed when you have that sort of thing on an airplane nowadays.
Ah well.
Anyway, an adventure for the day. Power’s back at the moment…no major system problems…but they are predicting another failure to get the city back on the main grid…but they won’t tell us when or for how long.
Yipee!
Oh, and breakfast was coffee and a diet coke…and a pretzel I stole from some hapless person in the hall.
CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer
Tools of the Trade
Oct 22nd
“Metric toolbox.”
“Check.”
“Standard toolbox.”
“Check.”
“Breaker bar.”
“Check.”
“Holy water.”
“Wha…Holy water?”
“Dude…it’s a Dodge.”
“Well, yeah, but Holy water?”
“It’s an electrical problem in a Dodge.”
“Ah, yeah. You’re right.”
“Holy water.”
“Nope. We’re fresh out.”
“No problem.” (holds up bucket of water). “Water.” (holds up Colt 45 1911 model) “Hole maker.”
*BLAM!! BLAM!! BLAM!! BLAM!! BLAM!! BLAM!!*
“There. Holy water.”
“Check.”
“Sledge hammer.”
“Check…wait…why do we need a sledge hammer?”
“Dude, it’s a Dodge…”
“*sigh*…Check.”
“Plasma Cutter.”
And so it goes. Swapped an alternator and voltage regulator on a friend’s truck yesterday. Also pulled the wheel on his bike so he can take it in and get a new tube (we’d have installed the tube if we had one). Gad. I hate spoked rims. Had to load up the tools and head for his place, as neither vehicle was in any condition to make the trip to my place. He was running out of things to drive. His other (main) bike is already in my garage waiting for the time to tinker on it.
Working on vehicles. Not my favorite past-time. But hey, the weather was great for it, and I got to spend some time with my friend. Life’s good!
CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer
You Might Ride too Much If…
Oct 19th
Hmmm…you might ride too much if you’ve ever had a phone conversation like this one…
My favorite On-LINE motorcycle parts place called…
Me: “elLo?”
Them: “Mr. Meyer?”
Me: “Yep.”
Them: “We were just calling to see how you were…”
Me: “What?” Now that’s customer service.
Them: “Well, you usually order a sh!tload of parts about this time each fall…looks like your usual is a case of oil filters, a couple front tires, a case of air filters, and a set of crash bars.”
Me: “My usual?”
Them: “Yeah. It’s been the same for 5 years. We were kind of worried we hadn’t heard from you.”
I pondered for a moment. A set of crash bars every year? I mean, I’ve had my adventures…and I’ve always claimed that only myself and my parts guys knew how many times I’ve dropped that big ‘ol beast (and I use multiple suppliers!)…but really?
Then I pondered some more.
Crud. Yep.
Me: “Yeah…send ‘em on.”
Them: “The whole usual order?”
Me: “Yeah. And throw in a windshield glass.”
Them: “Same glass as the last two?”
Sigh. I just call ‘em battle scars.
Ride ‘em hard…fix ‘em when they break.
CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer
An Unusual Night
Oct 12th
So, something really unusual for me…Tuesday night/Wednesday morning was a night of sheer terror…and the end result is a strong sense of foreboding that I simply can’t shake…and I’m not sure I should, even if I could. More >
Eye for the Road
Oct 4th
Y’all (that’s one ‘O those technical Texas terms) may know I’ve been painting a bit in my *cough*free*cough* time. There’s lots of stuff in my Gallery…the good and the bad.
This is a new one, and I’m really happy with how this came out. Check it out!
(click for larger)
CUAgain,
Daniel Meyer