Sick

Yesterday afternoon I didn't feel well at work. No big deal or so I thought. I didn't sleep well the previous night and thought that might have been a part of it. So, I made it through the day, got home, and went to bed.

At 6 pm.

Yeah, I felt pretty crappy by yesterday afternoon and it is a rare day when I want to go to sleep that early (even if I was on a midnight shift!). Needless to say, it went downhill from there. I'll just say that this is a stomach virus that cleaned everything out from Christmas Dinner 1997 or some other date several years back.

I have been blessed with good health. In the 10 or so years that I've been working for my unnamed employer, I've only had to take off two...well, three now...sick days. That's not to say that I haven't been sick in the past. I have. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it) the other times I have been sick have been when I've already had days off and could recuperate without losing time at work. Those times were different though. I could go to the doctor and get some antibiotics, cough suppressant, and allergy medicine and feel fine in two or three days. Not this time. It also doesn't help in that I have NO clue where I picked this thing up. For all I know, it could be waiting for me at work when I go back there tomorrow.

Stomach viruses are bad. No medicine helps. Gotta wait for the gastrointestinal tract to "reset" itself. No food for the first 24 hours and possibly longer. Good luck trying to keep down liquids, and BTW, no tasty beverages only clear stuff. Once that time has elapsed you can TRY food, but only bland food. Spicy enchiladas are out of the question for a while. If you can handle the bland stuff, you can start to add more flavorful entries as time goes by. Hopefully in 1 to 3 days, and hopefully not 3 to 5 days, you will be back to your normal self! Or so the doctor says.

But there are other side effects. I slept...well, laid in bed with some sleep here and there...for 15 hours so now I don't feel like doing anything. Then there is soreness from muscles that I didn't even know existed but got used in abundance early this morning. I also can't forget the aversion of looking at, forget smelling, food which I'll have to do when I go to the grocery store to get the aforementioned clear liquids and bland food. Worst of all is that I'm going home this weekend and if my digestive tract isn't back to 100%, I'll have to miss out on mom's home cookin'.

Yup, it's official. Being sick sucks.

Your SUV is not a Jeep, My Jeep is not an SUV

It started off innocently enough as a request from a co-worker to accompany him on a hunt for geocaches at the Canadian River OHV area. Now, before I go further you should probably understand what a "geocache" is by following this link. It is something that I've been interested in because of the travels that I do in my Jeep to many remote and difficult places to reach. My coworker knew that I had spent time at the Canadian River with friends and knew the area well and wanted me to act as a tour guide as well as an emergency vehicle should the need arise.

My coworker drives a 1996 Ford Exploder Sport 4x4 which was Ford's attempt at cutting into the Jeep Cherokee market. His vehicle has over 200,000 miles on it and has been off-road a grand total of 4 times since it's completion date. Stock tires, stock rims, stock axles, stock clearance, stock manual transmission. Fortunately for my co-worker, the places he needed to go to search for the caches were not too difficult, save one.

After finding the first one easily, traversing the 4-inch deep river to the second one, and nearly getting both of us stuck in the sand, we started our trek up the river bed to the third one. This was a bit more difficult as we crossed several areas of mud bogs, thick sand, and a few deeper spots of Canadian River Red water. We made it to the third cache and loaded up the waypoint for the fourth and final location...another 10 miles downstream. That would make it about 17 miles from the Highway 87 bridge. Coworker stated he felt comfortable with the conditions and off we went up the river towards Boys Ranch.

Everything is going great until I spot a location that could be interesting for our annual Canadian River Run/Off-road trip. I swing the steering wheel over to take a look. Little did I know that the sand was a good 12 inches deep and VERY soft! The initial attempt to drive forward failed so I threw the Jeep into 4-low hit the gas, and dug my way back onto more solid ground. Swinging my Jeep around, I noticed that Coworker's vehicle was slowly sinking. I grabbed the radio and told him that he needed to get out of there because he was sinking. Unfortunately by then, it was too late:

Yes, let's just say a few "colorful metaphors" were flown by the occupants of the Exploder and I was sizing up the situation. An attempt by me to pull Coworker out failed miserably as six angry squirrels under the hood was just not enough to pull out an Exploder stuck in quicksand. Now my 4-hour tour was going to become a whole-day ordeal.

A phone call to W.C. and his brother-in-law for emergency assistance was placed around 10:56 am with hopes he could get away from his activities and save the day. Brother-in-law's assistance was then requested at 11:07 am when I realized I wasn't going to be able to pull Coworker out. The rescue squad arrived at 1 pm...missing a vehicle! Apparently, W.C.'s pickup had gotten stuck halfway between our location and the bridge. This was not a good sign! With the assistance of two Jeeps yielding a total of 12 angry squirrels under the hood (or about 475 horses for those more in-tune with automotive terms), we were finally able to extract the Exploder from it's sandy and wet spot and headed back to the W.C. pickup.

Upon arriving at the second scene of vehicular impairment, this is what we saw:

Another hopelessly stuck vehicle. SO, brother-in-law and I hook up once again and unleash our total of 12 angry squirrels:

And SUCCESS!

We proceeded back to the Highway 87 bridge and Coworker treated us to Lunch at the Canadian River Cafe.

So, what lessons were learned you ask?

1. Mud tires are essential.
2. Never stop on quicksand...keep rolling.
3. Geocaching can potentially be hazardous to vehicular health.
4. I need a winch, place to keep my Hi-Lift jack, a better tow rope, and a hand-held GPS unit.
5. It takes about 3 hours to wash 3 vehicles with a power washer to get all the mud off.

And last but not least:

6. An Explorer or other SUV is not a Jeep and my Jeep once again proves it is more than a SUV!

Oh, one other thing...yes, I had fun!

Cheering on the Losers

Editor's note: this has been sitting in draft form since the 22nd as various events have postponed it's release...

Having grown up in the Metromess, otherwise known as Fort Worth-Dallas, I grew up a fan of the Texas Rangers. When I was much younger, I could care less that they were an average team. All I cared about was that I was getting to go to this really neat place where people could be loud and spend time with my Dad. I was very fortunate as the bank Dad worked for had box seats so I was treated to things most folks don't get to experience. I was also lucky enough to see Nolan Ryan on several occasions (unfortunately none of the milestones of his career like the 5,000 K, or 6th and 7th no-hitters). The Texas Rangers won a few games, lost many more we were at, and languished in mediocrity for much of my adolescence.

Then things changed.

1994. It is just a number of some year in the 20th century. However, in that year things changed for the Rangers. Something clicked with the residents of the Metromess and a beautiful new home was built for the Rangers, always and forever known in my mind as THE Ballpark in Arlington. A new Manager (and amazing Christian) was hired by then name of Johnny Oates. The All-Star game came to town the next year. Then the greatness of the late 1990s Texas Rangers happened with 3 AL West Division Championships, only to lose to the Evil Empire (a.k.a. the NY Yankees) in 1996, 1998, AND 1999. It was a short glimpse of glory that Dad and I were able to participate in going to many games over the summers. Could the Rangers finally become a premier team and make it all the way to the World Series and be crowned kings of the baseball world???

But then things changed again.

New ownership, new management. Johnny Oates leaves for medical reasons. The team Oates had molded that won the AL West three out of the last four years of the 20th century was dismantled and once again the Texas Rangers were demoted back down to a mediocre, and in some years BAD, baseball team. Yes, there are shining moments in the past 7 years such as yesterdays 30-3 walloping of the Baltimore Orioles which, BTW, set these following Modern History MLB records amongst others:

• Most runs scored against an opponent (27) since 1897
• Most RBIs in a double-header (which was set in the FIRST game alone!)
• Tied the most at-bats in a 9-inning game (57, tied with Milwaukee)
• Most RBIs in a single game since 1927, when that statistic was first recorded
  

It amazes me that in a year as bad as the Rangers have been having, a group of individuals can work together and achieve something that replaces records over 100 years old. That in a brief moment, a team that is still trying to meld accomplishes something so unusual. That regardless of how bad they are, I still root, root root for the Rangers. That a losing team can still conjure up memories of when Dad and I attended games on those hot, muggy, North Texas nights.

From my perspective, it seems that many people have become "fair weather" fans, cheering on whomever is the "hot" team, item, person, or thing around. As soon as that "thing" becomes cold, they go in search of the latest, greatest, and best thing around. For me though, it is knowing things are bad now but that I can say I stood by my team through the dark times when they finally are on top of the world; champions. I'm not saying that I'd be smug, "Told you So!" kind of person but I'll be celebrating with a much deeper sense of joy because I stuck through the hard times to reach the good.

Hmmm...sorta sounds like what being a person that loves Jesus is about as well. Cheering for the underdog/losers/bottom of the barrel/cellar-dwellers knowing that someday, we will be having the grandest of grand parties with all those before and after us who have silently cheered on those who it seemed were losing.

The similarities between Baseball and loving Jesus. Sounds like a thesis title to me...

Learning a new trade

It is ninteyfrigginhot (O.K...95) degrees this afternoon and I've made a quick trip home to grab some stuff I've forgot. Earlier, I learned how to send posts from my CrackBerry to here which is a nice treat. However, that's not what I've learned this afternoon. The reason I'm writing this is to take a bit to cool off (really to see if I've got a sunburn) and to say that I am learning a new trade. Today I am learning (at work of all places!) how to smoke.

GOTCHA! No...not tobacco! You can pick your jaw up off the ground now. Perhaps most people would associate what I am doing as barbecue. The REAL barbecue.

Tomorrow is our volunteer appreciation picnic which gives us a chance to thank our storm spotters, cooperative observers, and other folks we work with for all the weather information they pass on to us. We had someone BBQ brisket last year but they have moved so we were trying to figure out what to do. Fortunately, a coworker/friend had picked up a smoker/grill from his father-in-law and I had some oak from my Hill Country home that we are using to generate smoke. I am learning the intricacies of seasoning the brisket, maintaining the proper fire in the smoke box to keep the proper temperature, and how time consuming smoking meat truly is. Besides the meat we are smoking for the picnic, I've also got two chickens in the smoker with some fine Texas Shiner Bock up their butt so include learning how to do Beer Butt Chicken (get your mind out of the gutter...look it up on google) to the list. Tomorrow will be burgers, sausage, and chicken legs plus a pot of beans on the smoke box griddle. When I left to come home, I started drooling like Pavlov's dogs smelling the sweet aroma of smoking meat wafting from the cooker.

Matter of fact, I should get out there before someone snags my chicken and calls it their own. Back to the heat, chiggers, and other assortments of flying insects...