Restaurant Review- The Counter

Went to a new restaurant on Saturday with Kitty Kat. It's called The Counter. It's in the Fountains there in Roseville. That's the new "lifestyle" shopping center with huge fountains, a train for the kids, etc... across the street from the Galleria. The center itself is very nice with lots of cool new stores. The Counter is a burger place but not just any burger place.

I keep wondering when the recession will hit Roseville. I know it will hit but it hasn't hit hard yet... as we waited in line 15 minutes for a table on Saturday. Yes it was the lunch hour but I was surprised to have to wait for a table. Anyway, we sat down and took in the atmosphere. The place has, of course, a nice long counter. Sort of a 50's diner style but throw in a couple of flat screen TVs to watch the games. It then has a large number of tables and some outdoor tables... oh ya, and people were braving that Iowa cold air and sitting out there. Burrrrrr.....

There were plenty of wait staff to give good service. We had a minor complaint about a small issue and the manager fielded it like Brooks "the vacumn" Robinson scooping up a sharp ground ball. Man that guy was smooth! Anyway, they have about 5 million combinations of hamburgers. Really impressive I must say. You can put every combination of cheese, sauce, onions of all varieties, etc.... Kitty Kat had something with cranberries, pineapple and something else. I went for crumbled blue cheese, some fancy salsa and two different kinds of grilled onions.


They have all sizes of burgers and varieties of meats. I went for a 1/3 pound burger. They also had turkey and some other variety. The 1/3 pound burger is $7.95 and includes choice of the above stuff, and 1,000 other things, plus choice of bun. A few things are additional but for the base price you can get a LOADED burger! It was really quite good.

Oh ya, and the fries! They have top notch fries, good looking onion rings and off the hook "sweet fries" (sweet potatoes of course). Kitty Kat and I split a basket of half regular fries and half sweet fries. They were both excellent. I wanted some onion rings but we did not order them. I guess we will have to go back!

The servers kept our drinks full in top style.

All in all I would give this place an A-.

peace out.

R.I.P. - Lil' Jesse

Well, I had planned to write today about people insisting on wishing you a "merry christmas"... regardless of what religion you are... but more serious news took ahold of our family yesterday. My little nephew up in Utah died in a tragic snowmobile accident the morning of December 24th. I suppose any accident that involves a death is "tragic" but you get the point.

My step dad, the Deli, got the call and they immediately hit the road back to Utah. That's a 12 hour drive without bad snow... sounds like it will be 3 days with bad snow. I feel bad for the Deli as I am sure that drive home is a tough one....

Lil' Jesse was at the top of some canyon, up around Logan, when a avalanche happened... and wham-o him and one of his homies didn't make it out. The "good" news is that two other homies they were with did survive the avalanche from what I have heard.

I was not close with Jesse but I have known him just about all of his 23 short years on this earth. I remember spending christmas morning at their house many times over the years when he was a cute little kid eagerly opening every gift that came his way. From all accounts Jesse was a good man. His family are a group of outdoorsey people and this stuff happens... and I know Jesse knew the risks. I hope to make it out to Utah for the funeral. R.I.P.

peace out.

Friday Night Lights

Growing up in Cali you don't see a lot of Friday Night Lights... big time high school football. I read the book about 1988 or so, when I was in college, and remember thinking that Texas Friday Nights Lights was a LOT different than Cali high school football. I grew up near a school called "Hami" and went to a few of their games. Not sure if it was the band with electric guitars instead of marchers or what but it didn't seem like Friday Night Lights. Plus, the apathetic 100, or so, fans didn't really liven the soul either!

Up here in SacTown they do a little better job with Friday Night Lights as people do get into it a little bit. Not like Texas, of course, but they sometimes show some spirit. There are some good teams around SacTown like Jesuit, Granite Bay, Cordova, Nevada Union, Elk Grove and Grant. Today we are talking about Grant High.

For many years Grant did not have "Friday Night Lights" as they had a little too much gang violence. Or put another way I imagine the "white" schools were scared to come play Grant on a Friday night in Del Paso Heights. Shoot, most white people were probably scared of going to Del Paso Heights on a Saturday afternoon! Anyway, for many years Grant has been one of the premiere local high school football teams. It's a primarily African American school with a heavy dose of Pacific Islanders these days. Not a lot of white boys at Grant! Except the coach... like the White Shadow!

This year marked just the third year of Cali having state wide "championship" games. Well, actually just bowl games where some committee subjectively decides who is the "best" in each division. This year they picked 5 teams from Nor Cal and 5 teams from So Cal to meet, in So Cal, for the state "championship" in 4 levels plus the "Open Championship." Though Grant was 13-0 I think everybody expected Concord De La Salle to be picked for the open game. DLS is a private school, has produced countless pro athletes, is home to many children of the rich and famous, and frankly has been a national power house in football. I believe at one time they won about 125 games in a row even though they played a tough national schedule! No way they would pick little old Grant High from the ghetto in SacTown... or would they?

Well, the selection committee DID pick Grant to play in the state open championship game against So Cal powerhouse Long Beach Poly... the school that has produced more NFL players than any school in the country and ranked #2 in the whole country! All week the "experts" gave Grant no chance against mighty Long Beach Poly. The SacTownGuy, himself, gave Grant no chance against the mighty Long Beach Poly. Grant High has produced one above average NFL player in recent years (Dante Stallworth) and one drug addicted could have been an NFL star (Onterio Smith) and that's about it. Poly famous alum include NFL'ers DeSean Jackson, Willie McGinist, Marcedes Lewis and the list goes on and on. Plus, Tony Gwynn and Snoop Dog to name other famous alum of this 5,000 student school! Little ol' Grant has about 2,000 people at it's Del Paso Heights campus. Why even play the game....

So Cal won the first 4 bowl games this year. No doubt the open championship would be a clean sweep for So Cal. The experts were saying the open championship should have been Poly against some other So Cal powerhouse... not little ol' Grant. I mean Poly was voted in 2005, by Sports Illustrated, as the high school of the CENTURY! That's not so bad.

I turned the game on about 7:00 and watched the pre-game festivities. I watched the hype and the build up. If Vegas put odds on games this would have been Poly by 28. I figured I would watch for 10 minutes, Poly would be up by three touchdowns and I would turn it off....

The game finally started and Grant looked ok. Their defense was stronger than I expected. Their offense didn't do much until all of a sudden the Grant QB dropped back to pass and dropped a bomb for a TOUCHDOWN! Then the extra point... wait, did the kicker (who is also the QB) just do a straight on TOE-JOB like he was Tom Dempsey? Didn't they stop kicking like that in 1974 or so!? The dude put it through the uprights and it was seven nil!

The defensive battle continued and then Grant dropped another TD on them. The kicker missed his second toe kick and it was thirteen to NOTHING. Poly stole one to make it 13-7 and before long another to make it 14-13. I am not a play by play guy so it came down to the wire. According to the SacTown paper the Grant QB said to his players in the huddle, "you give me a time and I will march us down field for a touchdown." Guess what?

Well, Kitty Kat and I sat in bed and watched the third quarter before she nodded off. The next morning the first thing Kitty Kat asked me was, "did we win?" We take pride in SacTown of OUR teams and Grant was OUR team! I told her she had to look at this picture to decide who won....

Ok, you either know the outcome or you know the outcome... little Grant High took down the mighty powerhouse! To be honest Grant dominated the first half and held on in the second half... and then added the last minute TD for the win. Grant's defense was awesome. I will take a wild guess that Poly will put 10-15 kids onto D-1 rosters next year and Grant might put 2 or 3. If they played again I don't know who would win. I do know that on this one night Grant won.



The thing is a win like this goes deep. Del Paso Heights is a tough neighborhood in a small city. When Derrick Lee hits a home run for the Cub's the local TV news sports guy will say, "... and El Camino High's Derrick Lee hit a home run today as the Cub's won...." I think Tom Hanks went to school at Sac State for one semester and we still act like he lives here! The small town pride is even deeper in a neighborhood like Del Paso Heights. That win might be the pinnacle of life for several players on that team but they have that pinnacle forever. I am sure many players, with their new level of confidence, will use that win to propel themselves forward in life... or at least I hope they do!



There is a parade today from Grant High to downtown Sac. Mayor KJ will be the primary speaker as the Govenator is busy. I won't be at the parade today... at least not in person as I have a client meeting. However, I will be there in spirit as many people from all around SacTown will be. It's really a great accomplishment and gives great civic pride to all of us. I was more excited with that win, Saturday night, then when the King's finally broke through to win a playoff series in about 2000. Let me tell you I was REALLY excited when the King's finaly won! This was a huge victory and I want to thank Grant High for providing the fun and excitment! It's good to be in SacTown today!

Peace out.

People

Not to say I am perfect but some people... some people... some people are just plain awful. Case in point: I was at the local Safeway up in the Bay yesterday. It's a pretty nice looking crowd in there generally. I am not saying they are models but it's a pretty fit to above averagely fit crowd with a fair amount of elective surgery work. I headed toward the check stand to pay. I then noticed a guy in front of me loading up the conveyor belt with loaves of white bread, sausages, hot dogs, huge packs of meat, packages of Pillsbury dough, etc....

I had no problems with the guy. Sure he weighed about 450, had breasts larger than most women, and was buying a ton of crap food but what do I care... I thought all this as I loaded my carrots, apples, bananas, multi-grain nut bread, etc... onto the conveyor belt. Our two cart fulls of food could not have been more different. I am not hating here. I mean he was a BIG man and that's fine. I am just saying....

Then I noticed his wife. Oy vey! If he was 450 she was 375. Let me start by saying, I AM NOT EXAGGERATING. These two people were really f'ing large. Unhealthy and pretty disgusting looking. She had a very similar body to his. Her boobs sort of melded into her body. They were just round people. It was really gross. I am not sure who had bigger boobs between the husband and the wife. However, they were both friendly. They were chit chatting with the checker. The wife bragging about her gasoline discount (they were going to cash in this week and fill up their diesel - I pictured a very large dully to carry the load) and their airline miles (I stared at her butt and wondered how on earth she could fit that into one seat with the arm rests down). They seemed liked perfectly nice people.

Again, I had no problem with them at that point. Yes, they looked disgusting, and yes the food they were ingesting was disgusting, but whatever, two fat people. Of course they had real soda bottles on the counter because why he even bother trying? Why drink diet soda at that point? What's another few hundred calories?

Then my feelings changed... and changed quickly. These two incredibly large, and grotesque looking, children came waddling up. My feelings then changed to pure hatred. Do what you want fatties. Eat your sausages, drink your Sprite, nibble on your Pillsbury... but look at your kids. Oh my gosh. Those are your kids you are raising to be "mini" (and I use that word very loosely) versions of the parent. The son, about 12 or 13, was bagging the groceries. He was huffing and puffing as he did it. He weighed about 275 and I am NOT exaggerating. He had boobs like his mom and dad. He looked dorky and a little repulsive. However, I felt bad for him because I blame his parents. Then I saw his older sister, a few feet over, sipping on a Coke, looking slobbingly with shirt hanging out the bottom of a high school sweatshirt that I know to be in the lesser neighborhood to our west (good, they weren't local to the Bay). Her jeans were seriously about size 50 around the waist and she had them pulled up very high to try and hide her waist? Oh my, oh my, oh my! She had a body like her mom, weighed about 325, and was just awful looking. Again, I only felt bad for the kids and anger toward the parents.

I had my fingers on my phone in my pocket as I wondered if I could snap off a picture or two but I just wasn't sure I could do it. I resisted. Please hear me on this: the weight estimates above, and every detail, are accurate with no exaggeration. These people looked like they could go on Jerry Springer with the kids telling of all the awful foods, and I am darn sure NO exercise program, at their house!

In the spirit of the holidays I won't say anything mean about these people and just end it here.

peace out.

Dumb People

Sadly it seems that often when I title a post as "Dumb People" it is about people that work at Mickey D's. Hmmmmmmm....

Well, today is FRIDAY so I thought I would get myself a special treat. I am out in RoseTown so can't go for my usual whole grain bagel at the SacTown office building. I thus decided I would go to Noah's to grab a bagel (maybe with some low fat veggie smear-- very light amount of course) and a hot tea. It's COLD out there. Feels like I am in Utah or something! Well, at the last second I decided Mickey D's was closer and I really just wanted the hot tea anyway. I rolled up to the drive thru and decided to get some plain McGriddles too. I know they can't be good for you but I really like them.

Ok, I ordered as follows: "hello, I would like a large hot tea with one equal in it and a plain order of McGriddles."

The response, with a voice like I must be really stupid, "you don't want no meat or no egg or nothing on it?"

I replied, "nope, just the plain McGriddles."

The voice replied, "ok, so plain McGriddles... anything else?"

I patiently said, "yes, a hot tea with one Equal in it."

Well, I got up to the window to pay... the second window today. Why wasn't the first window in operation? Anyway, I paid my $2.24. A minute later I am given a bagel with my plain McGriddles. I am then given a cup of hot water, with a lid, a tea bag on top and a thing of Equal on top. I asked, "you don't put the tea bag and Equal in the tea anymore?" The real life human said, "nope."

I would write to Ronald McDonald himself but that did not bring a satisfactory answer last time. Instead I will just tell you that I have to imagine it is not Mickey D policy to give someone tea with the bag on top. As it was, I drove through the parking lot, worked that lid off, almost burned the crap out of my leg, and finally got the tea bag and the Equal into the cup. I just KNOW that is not what Ronald envisioned one of his customers to do!

peace out.

Bowl Games

I was just listening to ESPN Radio on the way to the office from the gym. Had a nice 90 minutes or cardio, a few minutes of weights, and I am feeling good. I am now nibbling on a whole grain bagel and sipping my iced tea as I relay to you what I was listening to. "The Herd" on ESPN Radio is normally hosted by Colin Cowherd. I find him to be a very amusing radio host. He often has creative intros. Today he has a sub in for him, Eric Casilias, who is an ESPN regular. Casilias happens to be a lawyer so I like him!

Anyway, Casilias did a Cowherd type presentation on bowl games. He said you better get your holiday shopping done today and tomorrow because this weekend is full of football including some bowl games. He said that the bowl "season" starts Saturday. He commented that the bowl games, except for the BCS Championship Game, mean absolutely nothing. They are merely exhibitions. How true. Other than for fans of a certain college who really cares who wins ANY bowl game!?

After beating up bowl games and explaining how pointless they are he did say the ultimate truth. "However, if you are going to a holiday party at some friend of your wife's house... there is nothing better than watching a bowl game." Casilias said it doesn't matter which bowl game is on... it's better than talking to some guy about the time be bogeyed the 9th at Pinehurst, here what cute thing his daughter did at school last week, etc.... Casilias said that bowl games are the ultimate party excuse. "Oh sorry, can't talk now... look the Poinsettia Bowl is on...."



He went on and one with the one liners. You know the party hosts ask if they should start a video from their trip to Hawaii... "no, sorry I am watching Navy...." Or somebody wants to talk to you about some inane topic, "sorry, I have NC State winning this so have to watch...."

How true it is! How many of us have watched, with some intensity, a game we could care less about... as it often beats the alternative!? That's not to say all parties are bad or anything like that but there are times when watching the Meinike Car Care Bowl is better than hearing about the hosts incredible ability to make martinis... just ask him and he will tell you AGAIN!

With that... I am out. Happy Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, Xmas, or nothing (if you are a JW).

peace out.

Kids

It's Saturday morning and I am still sick so no workout this morning. This sucks! I start anti-biotics yesterday so should be feeling better by tomorrow. Anyway, I am here at home checking out the WWW and my little dude just got up. Today his is 6th birthday. Kids are so fun. My momz came to town this week, rolling her Sub, and brought a bunch of toys with her. Toys that used to be mine when I was 6 years old or so! Here's a quick snap shot I took with the camera phone of 3 guys every kid of the 70's should recognize. Actually the one is hard... and the picture isn't too good but give it your best shot. I will post some more in a few days. Momz brought all my Big Jim's with their vehicles, accessories, etc....

Momz, momz, momz.... She had a big box of stuffed animals... like cheap ones I won at carnivals and stuff. Ok, they are going straight to Goodwill... but will have to drop and ditch before the Goodwill employee notices as I am not so sure they will want them! She also found some more of my old coins... cha ching! That should be a quick five hundo on the Bay! Momz seems to have kept just about everything my youth. I suppose it's good as now I can sort it out. However, she didn't find my Lego's and my little dude is really into those right now. I might go visit momz to look for myself but we shall see about that....

Well, I am sitting here and the little dude tells me he wants to watch something on the OnDemand page on our Comcast cable. He assured me he knew how to get to Ying Yang Yo, which is what he wanted to watch, and voila... it's on now. Amazing how kids figure stuff out isn't it!? I hope he doesn't figure out where the adult OnDemand channels are, in a few years, cuz then we will really go broke!

The answer to the above picture:
Oscar Goldman, Six Million Dollar Man and GI Joe. Yes, that's a REAL GI Joe with the fuzzy beard and hair!

peace out.

Gas Prices

How the heck did gas prices fall so quickly and so far? Of course I am not about to go out and buy a Hummer as I realize the price could go back up even quicker. However, it truly is amazing. Here's a snap shot of Kitty Kat's fill up yesterday. Yes, she really paid 83.9 cents a callon yesterday! Ok, ok so maybe there is more to the story... she has been hording her Safeway 10 cent per gallon discounts for a while. Thus she got eighty cents off per gallon.

However, still would have been $1.63(and 9/10) per gallon without the discount. Shoot, a buck sixty three, are you kidding me!? Wasn't that long ago we were happy if we "only" had to pay FOUR sixty three a gallon. I am not smart enough to understand it. Economics, cartels, etc... but whatever the heck it is I will take these prices! Now let's lower the prices of professional sports events.

peace out.

da King's Game

My 10 year old niece had a few friends over for a slumber party at Casa de SacTownGuy last night so I took my nephew and my little dude out to Arco Arena for a boy's night. I must say I might send a copy of this to some peeps over at the King's organization because I was really dissatisfied with a few things. However, that's not the point of this post. It was a great night with the boys and I hope we can do it again!

Not even talking about how god awful bad the King's are. Oy vey! In the first quarter the Nuggets had about 5 or 6 blocks, and 5 or 6 steals... though most of the "steals" were just the King's GIVING the ball to the Nuggets. The King's just looked awful. Anyway, let me tell you about the evening.

My dude is turning 6 next week and my nephew is 8. Thus they are prime to go to the King's game. I can remember going to games about 1974-1975 down in LA. I actually turned my grampa down when he wanted to take me to the 1974 World Series (A's at Dodger's) but I was going to UCLA hoops and football games at that time. Starting in '75 I went to Dodger's and Laker's games with some regularity. I also remember going to Merlin Olson's last game for the Ram's but that was probably '77 or '78!?

I knew there would be plenty of tickets available but I checked on-line first. Knowing we wouldn't be there all game and not choosing to spend my money on tickets I checked for some upper level tickets. $25.50 seats look fine but WAIT... $6.75 PER F'ING TICKET finance charge!? ARE YOU F'ING KIDDING ME!? I opted to get them AT Arco... and save the twenty bucks of BS charges!

Well, anyway I wanted to make it a fun night for the boys so I let them choose where we would have dinner. I was hoping they might want to go to C'Webb's restaurant near Arco but they ended up battling between Mickey's D's and BK... and of course Mickey D's won based on the idea they would have better happy meal's toys. I respect that choice because they don't care about the food quality anyway so why fake it.

We hit Mickey D's. Surprisingly my health conscious nephew chose the Big Mac. You can't get a Big Mac in a happy meal so I got him a separate toy. It was some Bioncle toy that both boys seemed happy with. The boys ate their grub. At one point my nephew was disappointed to note his burger had cheese so I assisted in dismantling it. He commented that the Whopper does not come with cheese (which I recalled from my days working at BK was correct) but "the Big Mac has that special sauce... I really like that special sauce... I wonder what's in the special sauce...?" He had the cutest expression as he said it too... like he really was honestly curious what might be in that magical sauce.

We finished our fueling and headed to Arco. We parked pretty close, since nobody was there, and walked to the ticket office. A dude was scalping outside the ticket box but I didn't feel like negotiating so I walked inside. I told the lady I wanted twenty or twenty-five dollar tickets on the aisle. She said she could do row R, on the aisle up in one corner... or "wait, how about 211 row L?" I said, yes that would be great. We headed inside....

We made our way to 211 row L. Anybody that has been to Arco knows that is pretty high up but you have a nice overview of the game. Plus the fans can be good up there. Oh ya, we stopped at one souvenir stand and the main King's store on the way to our seats. We got to the seats and my dude asked when we could get some ice cream. Game hadn't even started yet! Oh ya, our seats were NOT on the aisle but instead dead center (seats 8, 9 and 10). Thanks ticket office lady for LYING to me about where the seats were. Luckily only a few people were in our row so I didn't feel cramped.

The game got going and the boys were into it for a few minutes. My nephew was great about yelling "Defense, defense...." My dude was good about asking for ice cream. Then we saw the cotton candy guy so we were good for the minute. The boys gobbled that down pretty quick.

As the first quarter ended I had something happen that had never happened to me ever at a sporting event. In my 40 years of life I have probably been to 1,000+ pro or college sporting events. Not to mention I have been to about 150 King's game since moving to SacTown in 1991. We were in row L. Nobody was in any row between about D and L. I suspect those were the $45 seats and nobody felt it worthwhile to pay for. Thus there were people in the first few rows of the upper deck and then nobody until our row. The usher came up and asked me for my ticket. I thought we must have sat in the wrong seats but no we didn't. He then asked the nice family behind us for their tickets. They said, "you already checked our tickets." He said, "let me see them again." I said, loudly, "ya, we are all sneaking into row L in section 211!" Seriously, the lower bowl is about half empty so if I was going to sneak anywhere it wouldn't be to 211 would it!? I found this ticket thing offensive. Had he asked again I would have asked for his supervisor and his supervisor would have gotten an ear full!

The game was uneventful but luckily the ice cream guy came around mid-second quarter. We got a pack of the Dibs which the boys consumed in about 24 seconds! I was allowed ONE Dib and only after many threats by me!

The boys told me they were tired. The King's were down 25 or 30. Then it was halftime. Oh I forgot about the misunderstanding at the ticket office. Ok, as the lady was processing the credit card a nicely dressed man, about 30 years old, comes up behind me. He was a little too friendly but asked if they still had tickets. I assured him they had plenty! He asked "are you here for the cheerleaders?" I replied, "no, I am here for the basketball." Sure, I am a guy and I am happy to look at attractive women but I don't like ogling and the cheerleaders at Arco are pretty trashy looking to me. After a split second of thought, I then added something like, "I'll look at the cheerleaders when they perform...." I wanted to validate my man card. I am not some prude or something. Ok, well it turns out the halftime show was a group of YOUNG cheerleaders. At least 100 of them. I would say junior high and high school. The misunderstanding could have been taken as I was only talking about LOOKING at the King's cheerleaders and I was NOT going to be ogling a bunch of kid cheerleaders. I just didn't know what cheerleaders he was talking about. It wasn't as bad a misunderstanding as it could have been....

The boys were bored, and didn't want to look at the girls at halftime, so we headed for the King's store. We spent a half hour there. I went in thinking $8 head bands or mini basketballs. I mean really I still have the $2 mini bat my gramps bought me at Dodger Stadium back about 1975. However, as we went through the store we found a rack of close out jersey's; mostly Brad Miller's... hmmmmm, I wonder if he is almost gone!? $18 for the gold jersey and that's what my dude wanted so I let him have it. What the heck!? You figure with $10 for dinner, $10 to park, $75 for tickets, $10 for junk food, we were easily over $100 already so what's another $18 for something my dude might actually wear!? Plus, when he wears something he wears it EVERY DAY for 6 months straight! My nephew didn't want a jersey and finally settled on a pack of old King's basketball cards. Ten bucks for about 50 cards. Mostly 1990's and 2000's but also an '88, or so, Hoop's Rory Sparrow. You know the same cards I have given to Goodwill 100 times over because I have too many of them! Instead I paid ten bucks to buy them. Oh well!

We headed to the car. It was now 3rd quarter. The parking lot at Arco was dark and there was no security to be seen. I would say they need to fund a little more money toward security. I paid ten bucks to park my rig. The last thing I want to do is get mugged on the way to my car. Just my two cents on that.

We headed home. I thought about a post game ice cream but opted out. I don't know about you but I still remember stopping at Apple Pan, on Pico, with my dad after a UCLA football game... back when they played at night at the Colisieum! Oh ya, the slumber party was still going full bore so NOBODY under age 11 wanted to sleep. Long night and early morning. However, the good news is my dude woke up with his Brad Miller jersey on and is still wearing it right now. I bet he wears it to school tomorrow too! I already got eighteen dollars of value out of it!

peace out.

Whose the Teacher?

I was driving home from work yesterday, on the freeway, and noticed a driver's training car passing me. It was hard to tell what the name of the school was as he had more stuff on his car than a NASCAR racer! However, I remember it said "Referral Driving School" and his license plate was something about football with a heart, like FUTBOL but the "O" was a heart!? I would have taken a photo with my camera phone but dude was driving way too fast for me to catch him and my off ramp was coming up. Anyway, the guy driving was 50 or 60 years old and there was no student in the car... luckily. Why do I say luckily? The guy had his Iphone on the steering wheel and I saw him typing a message into the thing. You know, looking up and then looking down to type, looking up, and then back down.... I am not a driver's training instructor so what the hell do I know? I am just guessing that it's not a good idea to type messages on your Iphone while you are driving. Maybe I am wrong though. Maybe that's what they teach the kids these days!? Shoot, we know all the kids are doing that while driving so maybe the driver's training guy needs to be able to teach it so he was just practicing yesterday, on the 80, doing about 60 MPH!? Hmmmmmmm....

Peace out.

It's ON...

Yesterday was December 1st and I had the feeling it was the "holidays." Why? Did someone send me a holiday card? No. Did someone wish my happy holidays? No. Did I even see holiday decorations at the coffee shop in my office building? No. However, I DID get a BIG box of See's Candy... nuts and chews. Nothing says the holidays like a box of See's.

See's are not the best, are not the most expensive, are not anything other than ordinary... but to me they are the epitome of holiday times. Plus, I love those dark chocolate caramels! I ripped that box open and pulled that sucker off the top deck (oh ya, it was a double decker box) fast! I should have gone down to the lower level... you know, push the candy's to the side, life the divider and sneak down into the bottom to get that second dark chocolate caramel. However, I resisted. By lunch time it looked like a Cambodian village had raided the box with just a few scraps of candy mixed in with lots of empty paper candy holders. By the way, what the heck do you call those things the candy sits in?

I don't know about your office but in my office the "good ones" are gone quick and then there are a couple of stragglers that sit there for a day or two after the rest of the box is gone. Not sure if it's people being polite or people just not wanting whatever is left. To me it's the white nougat ones. If I accidentally bite into one of those I threw that away and FAST! Not sure why Mrs. See even inventing that one!?

By the time that box is gone (today or tomorrow?) I am sure another will arrive... or at least I hope so!

peace out.