Simple as a Snowball Throw

Every morning before work and every night when I get home, I take Hokie outside and throw snowballs back and forth for her to chase (up here, that's about 6 months a year). The moment her first paw hits the snow, her tail is wagging so fast it's a blur. I feel like it's the least I can do, seeing as how she comes to work with us each day and waits patiently between customers and their treats to go home and start the routine all over again.

As I've mentioned on these posts before, we have a hot-tub, a 100" screen for our HD projector, and 4 theater chairs. We have a lot of "stuff" which in a way might reflect some modicum of "success". I don't have a lot of friends up here, which due to my own introverted ways is my own fault.

I don't need to watch football anymore. I don't think I've seen more than 3 or 4 quarters all year. Watching illiterate millionaire athletes doesn't do it for me anymore.
I could care less that North Korea is threatening the south with nuclear war. I don't take any pleasure out of watching the evening news like I used to during the gulf war. None of it impacts my here-and-now.
As much as I'd like to see Sarah Palin gored by a moose on her stupid Alaska reality show, I won't tune in for the chance to see that, either.
I still dig 80's music and I still turn it up loud when John's not home. Thanks, grooveshark.com.
I still avoid a fair bit of social interaction; gets too complicated sometimes. I know I'm guilty of it, too, but most people just want to bitch or complain about something that happened during their day.

Most times nothing compares to a game of "go-get-it" with Hokie. She is happy; it's all she wants out of life. Plain and simple.

Neverending Renovation

The very day we took possession of this house, a year ago June, our hot tub was delivered. The very next day, we started painting...John the upstairs, myself the basement. Throughout the past year we have (quite evenly spaced out, I might add) done the following:

* Completely remodeled the upstairs washroom, slate tile flooring, door-less glass shower..even a new toilet.
* New wood floor in the master bedroom, along with new closet.
* New wood floor in "hot-tub" room (I recently restored a travel-kitchen my grandfather made 40 years ago, and turned it into a side-table)
* New wood floor in theater room (more on that later)
* New vinyl floor in laundry/weight room
* New carpet in room opposite theater room, adjoining the laundry room
* Built a deck for the hot tub, and one for the sliding-glass door (for the BBQ)
* Removed the pole holding up the ceiling in the theater room and replaced it with a beam, giving us more room (the beam was in the middle of the room!)
* Had theater chairs delivered (John's idea) that with a push of a button, prop your feet up. Also holds beer.
...and most recently, using what remains of our slate tile to finish off the downstairs washroom.

Can anyone guess what we're avoiding? Anyone? Anyone?? Bueller?

That's right, boys and girls. It's the Kitchen. Estimates range from 20-30k. That's a lot of computers. Unfortunately, with the kitchen resembling something you'd see in a circa-1970's episode of "Mama's Family" the contrast with the rest of the house is too much to deal with. I almost expect Rod Serling to be standing in the corner of the kitchen when I walk in for breakfast:
"Portrait of a cheap procrastinator: Every morning David Bragg walks into this very kitchen to feed his golden retriever and to pour himself a bowl of cereal. And every morning he sighs with shame as he gazes at he out-dated flooring and aged pine cabinets. His life has earned itself a motto "Repeat". Regret, ignore, continue. And the next morning.. and the next morning."

Here's hoping that in 2011 I finally enter the Twilight Zone and finally stop caring so much about money.

QWOP

Last night John showed me a website http://www.foddy.net/Athletics.html where you attempt with the aid of 4 keys QWOP to make an animated runner run 100 meters. Sounds simple enough in theory, but I imagine Helen Keller after 4 martinis would have just as much luck. After trying every conceivable sequence of the letters QWOP (which control thighs and calves), my "runner" always seems to be getting hit with machine-gun fire; that is, flailing around and falling backward on his ass or his head.

I think it would have made more sense if they had called the game "KRAMER".....or maybe "MEL GIBSON".

Starting Over

Three days ago my Great-Uncle Hartley died at the age of 99. Last year he self-published a journal "Hartley's Journal" of his thoughts and opinions of current and past events, along with some stories from his past that are humorous, if not relevant (which they were). The last page reads "Thank you for reading my journal...now go write your own."

My last two posts are from over a year ago, so I'll start over from here. What follows is the eulogy I wrote for his funeral next week, which my father will read for me in my absence. Uncle Hartley read my eulogy for my grandmother 7 years ago.

Let me start off by saying that I hope everyone here can forgive my dad for not being able to do the Donald duck voice. Uncle Hartley’s impressions resonate through my mind as if he was standing next to me right now and it would have been a cool way to start this speech: “Hi everybody, why are you all so sad? Turn that frown upside down! 99 years is a long time for a duck.”

I hope everyone here is in a mood to celebrate Uncle Hartley’s long and amazing life. While no one can be entirely prepared for this day, we should all be smiling with the memories of the funny stories he told and the boyish, sheepish grin with which he told them.

I envy those of you who got to spend the better part of their lives with or close to Hartley. Living so far away makes times like this difficult for me because in the end, all we have is family. We make this journey through life sort of like how Hartley and Clare travelled. We go from place to place for a random length of time, attempting to experience new things and places with our own independent points of view, hoping to find things to inspire us…while always “checking in” with the folks back home. They matter the most, after all. “Are the kids ok? Just making sure. Need a hand with anything? …are you sure you don’t need us to come back home early?” (Maybe all of this was from a payphone in Albuquerque). The point being: we are never entirely alone, even if you live in the middle-of-nowhere Ontario like me.

I know that all of you who were lucky enough to live closer to Hartley than myself treasured every experience with him. Not just for the funny stories, but for the inspiration of his never-ending will to learn and experience new things, as well as the genuine interest he took in all of your lives. I’m grateful that despite the distance between myself and Hartley, that the internet brought us closer together in the last few years. There’s nothing like feeling needed and for someone like him to need me in any capacity is an honor I’ll hold on to for the rest of my life.

The same goes for family in general. You need to all need each other for life to be worth living. Look at your loved ones right now and reflect on that for just a minute.

Goodbye Hartley

I’ll miss you forever… and yes, I’m still fascinated by how that toilet worked in the RV you had back in 1980. Thanks for helping me keep my mind young. I’ll keep smiling like you, as if I were 10 years old.

Love-

Dave