Heading off to Antietam for the weekend.......

We're going to stay at a bed and breakfast at Antietam this weekend (At left is a photo of the battlefield the day of the battle). Also, we'll be visiting some sites in Hagerstown and Frederick, MD and Harper's Ferry, WV. Should have some blogging material next week.

I've posted two other posts this morning below this one. Just wanted to make sure you didn't miss any posts. Blog entries sometimes come in bunches after a brief lull. I'm sure that every day of my life is exciting, but some days have events more fit for the blog than others. Evidently yesterday was one of those days.

European soccer fans are pretty high on their teams.....

I play a golf game online that is free to anyone who wants to play. It's called Shot Online (http://www.shot-online.com). It's a lot of fun to play there because the users of the game come from all over the world. One time, I played golf with a guy from Venezuela. I had to use the Spanish that I knew from middle school to talk with him, but we managed to communicate well enough.

He's a huge fan of their leader, Chavez, because the people in that nation believes that he supports the common man. I was surprised to find that he thought George Bush was a not a bad guy. Chaves and Bush have been arguing a lot, but as I have found with most people I talk with on this game, the political uproar that occurs amongst national leaders of different countries often does not carry over to the citizens of those countries. People in other parts of the world are just like you and I.

Last night, I played in a group consisting of a player from the UK, a player from Germany (who didn't know much English), and a female player from France. I immediately asked the French woman if she was one of the kids who had been rioting in the streets over the new job laws. She said she was college age, but that she lived in a country area where those things weren't prevalent. I tried to strike up a conversation with the German guy, but I could tell right away that he wasn't able to speak much English, so I didn't press it.

I asked the English guy (who was from Manchester) which soccer team he liked. He said that he was mainly a national team fan. We started discussing the upcoming World Cup a bit and I brought up the world rankings that were just released.

I said, "Isn't the U.S. currently ranked higher than England in the world rankings that were just released?"

My British friend responded, "Don't be silly."

"Let me check to make sure. I'm not a fanatic when it comes to soccer", I replied.

So I went out and checked the world rankings on the web in between golf shots and came back with my research results.

I said, "I went out and checked the world rankings and the USA is ranked 4th in the world right now. It appears that England is currently ranked 10th in the world."

Mr. England replied, "Oh, well that must have changed recently."

I told him that must be what it was while allowing my comment to drip with sarcasm.

My German friend suddenly came out of nowhere and typed, "Deutchland!"

I replied to my German friend that the the German national team was currently ranked 19th in the world. He responded, "Oh".

I respect my European friend for their team spirit, but they appear to let that spirit blind them to the fact that the USA is actually getting quite good at soccer now. Of course, if the USA goes to the World Cup in June and falls flat on their face, who am I to tell my European friends that they are wrong for doubting the abilities of the US squad?

One of us is crazy........

Mrs. Lime wakes me up at about 4:30 AM this morning. She asked me where I went. I told her nowhere. She said that she had just reached over to my side of the bed and said I wasn't there just a few minutes before. She evidently had got up from bed and walked downstairs to find me, only to come back up to our room and find me there in the bed.

I swear that I didn't get up from bed. I honestly don't have any clue what my wife is talking about. I think she's the crazy one, but until I have hard proof on that, I'm only able to tell you that one of us is crazy for sure.

OK, this gas stuff is just getting ridiculous......

My route to work usually takes me through a bad part of town. Not a really big deal at 6:30 in the morning because no one's around that time of the day except for a lot of commuters. As long as you're not in this part of Baltimore from dusk to dawn, you should be fine. I get to drive by the Pimlico racetrack every day on the way to work. For those that don't know, that's where the Preakness is held each year. It's also known as the second leg of the Triple Crown. It's actually pretty neat to drive by it in the morning. The horses and their riders are usually out very early in the morning getting some exercise on the track. I can only imagine how early they got up in order to get the horses saddled and out on the track by 6:30 in the morning. This year's Preakness is just around the corner (May 20th). You won't believe the photos I get from that day.

After I pass the race track, I head down into a commercial area that has 3 gas stations at the same intersection. Great place to buy gasoline for two main reasons. The first is obviously that there are three gas stations right there, so they all are constantly trying to get a pricing edge on the other two stations. Second, the gas stations are located in a poorer part of town. For those that don't know, gas companies often alter the prices at gas stations in certain areas based on the median income of that area. So a neighborhood that has a median income of $150,000 would have to pay 10-15 cents more per gallon for the same gas that would be sold for cheaper in a neighborhood with a median income of $50,000. Basically, it's set up similar to the U.S. tax system in that they charge a higher price for those who can afford the extra few pennies per gallon and then pass on the savings to the neighborhoods who can't afford to part with those extra pennies. It's an accepted practice that none of the gasoline/oil companies will ever admit they are actually doing.

So I drive by the intersection this morning looking to see what the three gas stations are charging for gasoline.

$3.05
$3.05
$3.06

WHAT?!?!?!?!

This has got way out of control. I'm even willing to side with ***gasp*** the Democrats on this issue that the gas prices are simply insane. The obvious problem is that the Democrats can promise the sun, moon, and the stars as far as lower gas prices go, but until drastic changes are made, nothing will change. We could have a Democratic president and Democratic majority in the House and Senate and nothing would be different.

It doesn't matter who's in charge. 3 things have to be done to make a difference:

1. Drastic increase in hybrid vehicle production. The technology is there, but the U.S. auto makers are too dumb to follow Honda and Toyota's lead. Also, the hybrid vehicles that are produced are not manufactured in high enough quantity. The leadership of the U.S. auto industries is ridiculously slow to act to any changes in demand, mainly because they are so entrenched in certain production based on union contracts that they cannot adapt quickly enough.

2. The government officials get far too many kickbacks to admit it, but there is a restriction on the oil market that basically makes it a form of monopoly or oligopoly. A few companies have the entire market under wraps. There's no way that anyone can start up a new company and compete with the companies already in place. With those kinds of restriction to entry into the market, it's tough to get a fair market established with any form of competition. The companies that are there find a nice price point where everyone can get along and all make a tidy (or enormous) profit.

3. Drilling in Alaska must be allowed. The eco-friendly groups have gotten way out of control on this issue. They are taking such an extreme stance at this point that no progress can be made at all. A drilling site in the Alaskan wilderness would take up roughly 1/3 of a mile square. The technology is now in place where that site can be totally dismantled, the well can be capped and all equipment can be removed leaving no trace of the well when drilling is complete. Yet the eco groups will tell you that the habitat of thousands of wildlife species will suffer irreperable harm. Seriously, can a polar bear not walk 1/3 of a mile out of the way? Will a bird die by flying over a well site? Can these animals not find a home in the millions of square miles of undisturbed habitat in the Alaskan wilderness? Listen, I've been to Canada before. Outside of the city limits of the few large towns, I find it tough to believe that an animal couldn't find a home amongst all of that wealth of space. Also, assuming the government and auto makers do their job, the drilling in Alaska would mainly be a bridge of resources to allow the U.S. to get to the point 10-15 years from now when more fuel-efficient cars are common-place.

As I said, this isn't a party issue. I just find it amusing that both sides seem to find the other side is at fault. The solutions are quite easy. The reality is that both sides receive large kickbacks from oil companies and are slow to do anything other than keep the status quo. Everyone wins in that situation........except the general citizens of the country. Honestly makes me want to run for government office. At least I'd have some opportunity to try to break the status quo.

Additional info on our cliff-diving guide.......

Blondie found an information page about the cliff-diving guide that took us to the various waterfalls while we were in Maui. His name is Kahi. I've put his picture into this post to the left. Here's the information about him from the website.....

Famous for his huge “dive bomb” splash, Kahi claims he’s a guide so he can jump off waterfalls every day. “It’s the adrenaline rush of rushes,” he says. “People ask me what I love about my job. I say: ‘Look around -- this is my job!’ I love it. Visitors seem intrigued that I’m a local boy and I also know geology, botany and history.”

Kahi was born on Maui in a taxi cab on the way to the hospital. He’s number six of ten kids and he grew up old style Hawaiian. His mom’s house was “24 hours a day full of kids--all the neighborhood kids.” His 360-pound, 6’ 2” grandmother also raised him. “She was one of the best hula dancers on Maui,” he says. “She taught me to fish and surf at age four, to hula at age six and to chant at age 13. My grandparents lived Hawaiian--plantation house, no TV, kukui nut lamps, chanting when someone came to the door, growing lei flowers, singing Hawaiian songs.”

Kahi is the father of four and is a phenomenal self-taught artist and a professional hula dancer.

The largest museum in the world.......

I took my parents and my grandpa over to wander through the Smithsonian Institute. We drove down the 30 or so miles to the edge of Washington D.C. and then took the subway from the beltway down to the Smithsonian Institute. Grandpa had never been on a subway before. In addition, we were heading down to DC on a Saturday, so it would be very difficult to find a parking spot anywhere in the city, so the train is always a great alternative in that case.

We exited the subway and headed over to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. Found some really cool stuff over there. Upon entering the museum's main entrance, you immediately see a large flag in front of you. After reading the information, we figured out that the flag was the same flag that was hung from the Pentagon for several months following the 9/11 attack. Large flags with some obvious black marks from when it hung over damaged portions of the Pentagon.



Next, we moved on and saw a few more exhibits related to the 9/11 attacks. They had a couple of large steel girders from the World Trade Center.......





Also, there was a box where an actual airphone from Flight 93 (the flight that crashed in Pennslyvania) was displayed. In addition, there was a photo ID from someone at the Pentagon that was found in the clean-up afterwards......



The museum also had a lot of presidential exhibits. Some really neat stuff from all of the presidents. Here's a picture of an outfit actually worn by George Washington.....



My personal favorite was an exhibit of some Lincoln artifacts. In the picture below, you can see the top hat that Abraham Lincoln was wearing the night he went to Ford Theater in 1865. He was assassinated that night. Next to the hat, you can see the actual death mask of Abraham Lincoln that was made following his death. It's amazing to see exactly what he looked like upon his death......



They also have some exhibits from the modern era. Below is a familiar face.....



After we finished up at the American History museum, we walked over to the Air & Space museum. Lots of things to see there. In the next picture, you can see Spaceship One. It was the first commercial aircraft to reach space. It did that early last year.



Next is a couple of the old rockets used by early Russian cosmonauts.......



Finally, what many consider the crown jewel of the Air and Space Museum, the Spirit of St. Louis. It's the airplane that Charles Lindbergh used for many of his historic, record-setting flights.



The sad part of this whole situation? We only saw roughly 15-20% of the museums at the Smithsonian Institute. For those that decide to come out, you could take an entire week just to tour all of the museums. Amazing stuff.

A reason to go to the Lake of the Ozarks.......

It appears that my sister and her hubby have decided to make a small investment in the lake area. Here's a hint......

"Powered by twin 502 Crusader engines (390 hp each) with 650 hours. (3) separate sleeping areas in this midcabin layout. Boat is built on a 13'6" beam which offers a tremendous amount of room. Fully loaded with extras including generator, reverse cycle heat & a/c, electric windlass, spotlight, trim tabs, and much more."

Yeah, that's no ordinary aluminum fishing boat we're talking about here. It's a 37 foot boat with a full living quarters under the front end of the boat. That's just insane. I believe my sister should just sell the house and move onto the boat. Cheap living with instant transportation to any boat dock that the Lake of the Ozarks offers.

In case the description doesn't help you out, here's some photos to bring it all into focus.

Here's a picture of the exterior of the boat......




A couple of views of the captain's seat (likely to be occupied by my favorite brother-in-law)........





Here's 3 pictures of the kitchen area. Seriously, if I had a dime for every time I was out on the lake and thought "Man, I could really use a microwave oven right now!", I'd be a rich man by now! Thank God that I won't have that unfulfilled dream anymore when I boat with my sister!







A couple of shots of the engines (as you saw before, enough horsepower on just one of these engines to run most boats).......



And of course, everyone needs a nice couch to sit on when hanging out on the lake.....



A couple of benches outside for general sunbathing and public displays of affection.........





It also appears that in an effort to slow the lake from turning any more yellow than it already is (especially in the 'Party Cove' area), they are now installing toilets on boats. How environmentally friendly of them!!!!



Also, everyone needs a boat with a good shower on it to wash off after swimming in 'Party Cove'........



And for those who need to relax a bit, we have the master bedroom in the front of the bow.........

Never fear. I'm sure we'll find a fault with this boat at some point in time. Right now, I can't seem to find any faults.

The great underwear mystery.....

I'm the one that does the laundry in this relationship. I had a few rough spots early in the marriage where I shrunk a few of Mrs. Lime's clothes down to a kid's size, but we've worked out the kinks in the system now to the point where I haven't ruined clothes for quite some time now. Seems to work out well for both of us.

My usually thing is to save up the dirty laundry until I have at least 4-5 loads of dirty clothes. I wash and dry the clothes in the machines and then take the clothes and dump them on the bed for eventual folding. We start working our way through the piles, folding our own clothes and tossing the other person's clothes to the other side of the bed. The other night, we were folding up clothes before going to bed. At one point, Mrs. Lime got this puzzled look on her face.

"That's weird", she said.

"What's weird?", I asked her, hoping to get involved with this great mystery that was unfolding (pun intended).

"These aren't my underwear", she stated and held up a black women's underwear. I could see the tag and could easily see the size.

I said, "Don't you wear that size?".

She replied, "Yes, but these aren't my underwear. I don't buy this style of panties".

Well, alarm bells immediately go off in my head. She's giving me a one-time chance to bail the water out of my boat in a big hurry before she puts three more holes in the boat. I obviously would never cheat on my wife ever, but I can certainly understand why a pair of women's underwear that shows up in our laundry that doesn't belong to her might make here at least inquire as to where they came from.

Never fear, I had an excellent response to quell any fears she might have. I quickly replied, "Well, honey. I don't wear that kind of underwear either!".

Thank God I was able to think of a such an airtight response. Alas, she has no fears concerning any relationship issues, but we still didn't figure out where the underwear came from.

If anyone is missing black women's underwear, please let us know. We threw it away but are still trying to connect the dots. Thanks.

The happiest dessert joint you'll ever visit.......

Mrs. Lime and I headed out to Little Italy in Baltimore. It's just like any other Little 'insert country here' in every town across the U.S.A. It's an area about 4 blocks square where there are a ton of Italian restaurants. I'm sure there is some basis regarding immigration as to why this area is 'Little Italy', but I don't know the full story.

Anyway, there's a place called Vaccarro's that serves desserts that are very well known. Every form of dessert you could think of is served in this place. Obviously, they also serve enormous portions of the dessert, so it's not a good idea to go to this place on a full stomach. I had some lemon Italian ice and Mrs. Lime had some form of Italian pastry (I'm not real good at remember what shape of bread is called what) which she obviously enjoyed as it disappeared quite quickly.

There were approximately 30 people in the upstairs dining room with us. Everything was relatively quiet other than the occasional noise from a kid when a new group of 6 people showed up. I believe they were 3 couples out for a night together. Very quickly, we started hearing this noise that was evidently a laugh of some sort. It started like a siren sound going upward in tone, then followed by a few hiccup or 'ha' sounds and then another siren sound going down in tone. I started chuckling because it sounded so goofy. Mrs. Lime chastised me for laughing, saying she thought that the woman may be mentally disabled and that I shouldn't laugh at that. After a couple more minutes of the same sound except increasing in volume and tone, it was pretty evident to both of us that it was a drunk rather than a disabled person. She had evidently got some form of the giggles while being drunk resulting in a crazy sounding laugh that ended up more like a tornado siren with several "ha's" stuck in between.

The funniest part of the situation was that as you looked around, it became quite evident that all the other tables were having the same conversations and revalations concerning the laughing. Lots of confusions as to what was happening followed by chuckles when they realized that she was simply drunk with the giggles. At some point, she couldn't control her laughter and was making her siren sound in full effect. Everyone in the room began to laugh hysterically. I saw two waitresses who were literally bent over at the waist laughing. Mrs. Lime and I were looking at each other and both of us were crying heavily because we were laughing so hard. Another family with two parents and several kids were all laughing and a couple of the kids had their head buried in their hands trying to cover their laughter. The guy who was seating people came over to ask the lady if everything was OK. This only started a new round of 'tornado siren' laughter. Everyone in the room literally laughed out loud for 2+ minutes without stopping. The people in the downstairs room I'm sure must have wondered what in the hell was going on upstairs.

We managed to calm ourselves to the point where we could finish our desserts. As we left, the man who was seating people apologized to us for the laughter situation. Mrs. Lime simply replied that she didn't mind and actually enjoyed it. We laughed one more time over her comment and headed home.

Temporary home.......

As I was driving back from Washington D.C. after attending a basketball all-star game, I headed down Martin Luther King, Jr. Parkway in Baltimore. The streets were still relatively busy.

I pulled up to a stop light and stopped to wait for the light to change. I must admit that I have a general personal rule that I don't look at other people in cars around me. Not sure why that is, but I just never get anything out of gawking at other people around me. If anything, you end up getting a stare back from someone you don't know wondering why in the world you're staring at them.

For some reason, I looked over at the car to my left while sitting at the stop light. The people in the car were not looking back, so they didn't notice my brief look. When I looked over, I saw the passenger in the car holding a .44 Magnum. He was clicking the trigger over and over, so it obviously wasn't loaded. He was pointing it out of his front windshield at the car in front of him. I didn't bother to look for more than a split second for quite obvious reasons. I also left in a big hurry as soon as the light turned green. No need to wait to see if he knew how to load it.

A few thoughts:

1) That will most definitely be the last time I violate my personal rule of not looking at people in the cars around me at a stop light.

2) I'm really glad that the people in the car in front of him didn't look in their rear-view mirror at the time he was pointing the empty gun at them. It could have got messy in a real hurry.

3) The vast majority of people living in that area and Baltimore in general are good people. It's a shame that a few idiots make it such a tough town.

4) While there are certainly some bad apples in Kansas City, I believe that I'll take my chances back in Missouri or Kansas over Maryland any day. There are some wonderful people in this area and some wonderful things to see, but high levels of drug use and poverty are a recipe for disaster.

Off to see the Cherry Blossoms......

I drove down with my parents and my grandfather to see the cherry blossom trees down in Washington D.C. I decided to add in a brief history link for those that might be interested in the origins of the Cherry Blossom Trees.

http://www.nps.gov/nacc/cherry/history.htm

We parked near the Jefferson monument and walked over towards some of the cherry blossom trees. Here's a sample of some of the trees that we saw........





We walked around the tidal pool and checked out lots of cherry blossom trees (and the tourists that were viewing the trees. I caught a funny moment in this picture. These parents were doing everything they could to get their kid to pay attention to the camera. Notice mom with the ball in her hand trying to get the kid's attention.



Next, we headed down the edge of the tidal pool to see some of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial. It was just opened within the past few years. The memorial is actually divided into 4 separate sections, one section for each of his terms in office. There's some really neat bronze sculptures in the memorial.










After we finished up at the FDR memorial, we continued around the tidal pool to the Jefferson Memorial. I've been there before. It's a really well done memorial. It has 4 different writings of Jefferson on each of the 4 walls. In between each of the walls are openings to the outside that are bordered by white columns. In the middle, a large statue of Jefferson stands holding a manuscript. The roof is a large, white domed ceiling.








From the Jefferson Memorial area, there's an excellent view of the Washington Monument across the tidal pool. The tidal pool becomes a reflecting pool from this viewpoint.




As we were headed back to the car, I noticed a memorial off to the side. We looked down to see that it was a memorial to George Mason! Here's a picture of the memorial.....



Oh, wait. It appears I've made a mistake. It wasn't a memorial commemorating George Mason University and their 2006 run to the Final Four. It appears that George Mason was an important leader in the development of our country. Here's a brief write-up of his contributions (George Mason) and here's a picture of his statue in the garden.





A nice sunset to finish the day just as we headed off to the car. Note that the waterway in the foreground of these pictures is the Potomic River.