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Name: Bob
Country: United States
State: Florida
Metro: Vero Beach
Birthday: 2/17/1940
Gender: Male
Interests: No time for hobbies. I take them too seriously. Everything becomes an avocation or I drop it after about five years. Usually.
Expertise: Pretty good to very good at a lot of things: world-class in Scrabble, used to be w-c in bridge, former classical music DJ (particularly big fan of Amy Beach, but nobody comes close to Beethoven, tho Shostakovich and Dvorak are not to be snubbed, and Bartok's great, and of course, a day without Mozart is like a day without sunshine), proud former owner of the world's most awesome dog, Sabrina, who was put to sleep at the ripe old age of 16 and who was a golden retriever/German Shepherd/Sonoran wolf mixture and the winner of four blue ribbons in obedience but they didn't really count because the American Kennel Club, snobs that they are, only allow mutts to compete at practice matches, and ask me if I care, and what else am I good at? Well, I was a croupier in Las Vegas for 20 years, had the same job for 16 yrs in a line of work where the average longevity was one year and I survived three outright purges ("fire everybody" but let Lipton stay), which I'm very proud of.
Occupation: Security Guard
Industry: Hospital
Message: message meEmail: email me
Member Since:
1/14/2003
 True  Lifetime
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| Now It's TEN Dogs! A call came in around 4 p.m. yesterday, right after Ben Roethlisberger got his throwing arm mauled but he stayed in the game to make sure my Dolphins stayed out of the playoffs. Spring and Skipper, the two goldens, would be arriving in 40 minutes, and staying indefinitely. The owner's having two knee replacements. Uh, we weren't expecting them at all. We'd been warned on Thanksgiving that the knee operations were being contemplated, but were supposed to get confirmation later. Because nothing was said, Barbara assumed they'd made other plans for the dogs, or for the surgery. Anyway, I missed most of the Steelers' final field goal drive, and all of the first quarter of the Eagles-Cowboys game, introducing Spring and Skipper to the four boarders and My Little Margie, as well as our other three whom they already knew. I just finished feeding them and am spending a blissful 45 minutes on my computer behind a closed door while the 10 doggies digest their breakfast. Which was a chore to serve. Had to feed Luke in the bathroom, while Spring/Skipper were in the garage and the rest were in the house. It will be a relief to go to work at the hospital and get a little rest. I hope the rest of you peeps are having as much fun as we're going to have here for an indefinite number of days (or weeks?). The two schnauzers, Max and Fritz, are going home Wednesday, Jan. 6. Four or five days later, Luke and Kobe go home. That'll make it a little easier, but Spring is still a handful. Very affectionate dog, and very big, and very insistent. Still, it's better than the last time she was here -- back in April -- when I was in-between two surgeries my own self and in mortal fear of her, due to my delicate condition. At least now I'm in full health. Blasts From the Past Jan. 4, 2004 Some Quotations, and Why They're Here -- self-explanatory Jan. 4, 2008 Speaking of dogs ... I don't know how it happened, but I managed to post a couple of pictures of my dear, departed, and very beautiful Sabrina, but left the post private accidentally. No wonder it didn't get any comments. Anybody wanna comment? Pretty please? (Sorry the pictures are so small.) | | |
| Biorhythms
Never could understand them, but I know they exist. Friday's NY Times crossword puzzle was a bear. I got one corner of it, then had to go to the Times website for help. Saturday's puzzle was solved with no help at all. Was it biorhythms, or was the Friday puzzle that much harder this week? The other day, my brain was full of topics I wanted to write about. Today, zilcho. Biorhythms? Or is that Times puzzle really worth blogging about? Blasts From the Past Jan. 3, 2006 On this date in 2006, I put up links to the best posts of 2005. To be consistent, I ought now to put up links to the best posts of 2009. Hmm. I don't feel like being consistent. How can I be consistent on a bad biorhythm day? Besides, I'm not sure I wrote any good blogs in 2009. So click on the Jan. 3, 2006 link to see the best posts of 2005. There's enough reading material there to last you for a while. Meanwhile, I JUST found out that two more dogs are arriving in five minutes. Big dogs. That makes 10, until Wednesday, when two small ones go home. | | |
| An Interesting
Scrabble Article It's from the Times of London, and this is just my way of bookmarking it for myself, in case I want to refer back to it, ever. We did play some Scrabble yesterday, my friends and I. I won two, lost two, but the competition was stellar, so I don't feel terrible that I didn't win all or even most of my games. ******* We saw "Up in the Air" this afternoon. It was interesting and well-made, but fell short of exciting me much. I'll give it 3 stars out of 5. George Clooney's character's job was to be a hatchet man for companies wanting to lay a worker off. Kind of grim. He spent his life BS'ing people, telling them to look at their loss of job as opportunity rather than a devastation. Then, when he tasted some of the medicine he'd been dishing out, he had trouble taking it well. The movie has a good plot twist near the end, and is well-acted. Also, the writing was first-rate. Blasts From the Past Dec. 24, 2003 "Excuses, Excuses" I THINK this was from 2003. Dec. 26, 2003 "Fondness Unleashed" A love poem. Yes, it's 2003. Jan. 2004 and Dec. 2003 are really not very far apart. I'm trying to do a little catching up. But I might never get caught up. Dec. 29, 2003 Ah, where have all those people gone? I miss them all. | | |
| Tina Fabrique
as Ella Fitzgerald Jillions of words I want to write this morning, and on quite a few different topics, but I think we'll be going out to breakfast soon and there's the day to spend with Harmony and Mike, Angela and Steve, and Nancy and Alan. I can save writing about the dogs for another day, and also postpone discussing the latest book added to my wish list -- "The Lexicographer's Dilemma," by Jack Lynch. There. At least I recorded the title here so I don't forget it. Last night (New Year's Eve) we were highly entertained at opening night for "Ella," a Fitzgerald tribute show starring Tina Fabrique, who, according to what I heard casually from another member of the audience, pronounces her name FAB-REE-KAY rather than FAB-REEK. No matter. Tell you the truth, I couldn't tell you whether Tina does scat better than the legendary Ella, or whether it's impossible for Tina or anyone else to match Ella's expertise at scat singing. For the uninitiated, scat singing is where you sing nonsense syllables instead of the lyrics as written. All I can say is, Tina made me tingle as much as Ella did. The scat was great (Tina said she couldn't do it unless she was feeling the proper "scattitude"), and Tina also thrilled us with Ella-style mixing of high and low notes that were always surprising, yet perfect. The only place Tina might have fallen a little short was the silky smoothness Ella was known for when singing ballads. Otherwise, it was as if we were watching Ella herself. I had been unaware of Ella's personal story -- how her sister Frances gave to Ella one of Frances's babies (Ella couldn't give birth), how that baby was raised as Ella's own in a short-lived marriage to jazz bassist Ray Brown, and the story of a concert given in Nice, France, shortly after Frances's untimely death, how the grown-up baby Ray Jr. was in the audience, and how touching her performance must have been that night. ********* Barbara has arisen. I think we'll be going to breakfast soon. See "Ella" if you get a chance. Tina Fabrique is fantastic. | | |
| Can't Think of a Heading This Morning I think my regular newspaper delivery person is on vacation this week. I hope so, anyway. Used to be, the local paper and my daily New York Times would be waiting for me in the driveway at 4 a.m. or even earlier. That's when I get up. And I LOVE those two hours of quiet time, waking up my brain with Sudoku and crossword and KenKen puzzles and the sports news and the columns on the Op-Ed page. Now, I'm lucky if the papers get here for Barbara to have them when I wake her up at 6. The eight dogs are settling in fairly well. First couple of days were nerve-wracking. But I'm learning how to get them all pilled and fed without Luke stealing everyone's food and so forth and so forth. Blasts From the Past Dec. 29, 2006 "Laughter" Dec. 29, 2008 No heading (almost like today), but I can pat myself on the back for my ever so brief but ever so glowing review of "Slumdog Millionaire," which later received the Oscar for best picture. Dec. 31, 2004 Have to cut these short. It's time for work. Someday I'll catch up with all of these. Someday ... | | |
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