Cleveland Swing Flash Mob

I've been practicing with my friends for several weeks for this event.  It occurred last Saturday, November 20th at Great Northern Mall, and again at Southpark Mall, in Strongsville.



My dance partner is Lauren.  We met at classes, became friends, and now have great fun dancing together.  In the background are some of my other friends, Danelle is dancing with Ed.  Laura is dancing with Gil.  Deb is dancing with Dave.  Val (my instructor) is started the dance off with her partner, Alex, as well as Jenn and Matt. 

Something I don't want to lose

KELLY PATRICK:  I know it's been years now...but I miss you. You crack me up =) I can't recall a single bad memory from our time playing together. It was always a pleasure. I just thought you should know that.

A better dancing video

Here's a much better video of Lauren and I dancing last Saturday night. We were practicing a part of a dance move that Karen and I had learned earlier that week. The cross kicks looked cool, and fun, so the girls wanted me to teach them how to do it. We never actually did the whole move, but we had a blast anyway!

My niece took a picture of us too:

Swing Dancing

If you read my blog, then you know that I've been taking swing dance lessons.  Cheri, Lori, Bill, and a few others, here's a few pics and videos for your entertainment.

These are a few of the ladies I dance with regularly.  Occasionally, we'll go out after class for ice cream, or after a dance for other refreshment.  The women are, from left to right, Laura, Lauren, Valerie, and Danelle.  The lovely redhead in the center, right, is our dance instructor. She owns and operates Get Hep Swing. 

Just to prove that I didn't steal these pics off some website...here's me in the picture. :-)

Last night, we went to Quaker Steak and Lube for wings and just to talk, because we don't usually have time to chat at the dances.  Karen came with us last night, she's the one in back, on the right with the Mona Lisa smile.  Makes you wonder just what she's thinking....  I found out that Karen and I share the same dream job, that of being a fighter pilot.  Lauren would love to find a cure for cancer, and save all the children (she's studying to be a nurse).  Shoot!  I forgot what Laura and Danelle's dream jobs are.

Here, Lauren and I are dancing. My niece took the video, and turned the camera sideways halfway through. It seemed like a good idea at the time, to match the framing, but I haven't found a way to rotate the video back to normal yet.... We're going out dancing again tonight, so we can record a new video.

Danelle's friends from Missouri came out for the week.  Friday night they stopped by my house for cards.  Their daughter wanted me to teach her to dance, so here we are:

So, what I'm trying to say is that I'm having fun swing dancing.

Two more fine gentlemen retire

I haven't posted in awhile, but I want to congratulate two more Local 38 wiremen who I've had the pleasure to, well, not work with directly, but work in the same crew with:

Jeff

and Jay, who is in the middle here:

Those flags were flown on the NASA Glenn Research Center's flagpole for a day, before being folded up and presented to these men in recognition of their service.

Now I want to say something about these two guys, because not everyone liked them.  They didn't like everyone either.  That's what I admired about them.  These two guys are both old school electricians, from a time when you spoke your mind, and that was that, and if the other guy didn't like it, too fucking bad.  These guys would call a spade a spade, would let you know what they thought of you, and even if they liked you, they wouldn't hesitate to set your ass straight if they felt it was necessary.  A few times they needed to have their asses set straight too.

See, in this day of political correctness, and "everyone is equal and important, and wonderful as they are" lovey-dovey bullshit, we are being taught to be afraid of confrontation.  Confrontation can be a good thing.  Learning to deal with confrontation is definitely a declining skill.  Learning how to work with a guy who thinks you are an asshole, and who you think is an asshole is an interpersonal skill that few people have anymore, and fewer are learning as they grow up.  All right, I don't want to stay on my soapbox here.  These two weren't afraid to say what they thought.  'nuff said.

Congratulations to you, Jeff, and Jay.  I hope you have a long, enjoyable retirement.

Did I mention that I really enjoy going to these retirement parties?

Labor Day Weekend

I spent Labor Day weekend at my brother's house again this year. His son turned 8 on Friday.  Here they are, watching TV.

It didn't take long before David and I were engaged in a battle of mixed martial arts.

Even Uncle Morgan got a turn in the "cage"

Taking the tree down

On Father's Day, we decided to take the burned out tree down.  I started cutting through on the right side, to slice to the existing holes, thinking that would be enough.  It wasn't.  Then Anthonie drove a wedge in the slot there, but that just got the wedge stuck.  I went in and cut on the left side until I got to the real meaty part of the tree.  The entire time, if we'd hear a crack or a pop, we would back out quickly, not unlike scared little girls.  That old tree hung on pretty well, though.  Tom suggested we cut a slice on the front of the tree, opposite of the burnt out side.  I worked on that for a bit, but didn't really like the idea because I thought the saw would get stuck when the tree buckled.  So Tom cut the slice.  He cut in until we heard one real loud crack, then we bounced right back out.

Anthonie and I went in to check it out, and saw that the cut on the back was spread out pretty well.  I didn't think it would take much to topple the tree now, so I held the splitting maul in the crack and Anthonie beat on it with the sledge:

We won!

For the last couple of weekends I've been going out to work on the tree.  I don't know what Dad is gonna do with all that firewood, since Mom won't let him keep the wood-burning stove in the house any longer.


When I look at this post on Firefox, I can't see either of the two videos that come before the final picture of the tree.  Post a comment if you can or can't see them.  This is my first video post, so it might not be perfect.

Another great xkcd comic

Ok, check this one out.  It's hard to pick out the subtle discrepancy, but if you hover over the comic, you'll get a text box that gives you a clue.

I thought it was fun.  I tried it with a few other numbers, and I found that it's true for n and n squared: n x (n^2) = x

My old treehouse tree got struck by lightning

I built this treehouse when I was 12 or 13, maybe even younger. I remember two kids could fit in it back then. I climbed inside when I got out of the Navy and I could barely fit by myself.

A couple of weeks ago, the tree took a lightning bolt and caught fire.  Mom and Dad said it smouldered for 3 days before the embers finally went out.

I offered Dad to cut the tree down for him, but he thought the tree would fall over on it's own, due to the amount of damage to it....

Heck, you can see right through it!

Here's a picture my sister Kerry took on Father's Day.  If you download the picture, or open it in a new window, it's much larger.

5 Men Retire

Last Friday, I went to a retirement party for five Local 38 wiremen.  I hadn't seen these guys in several years, and it was great to see them all in good health, great spirits, and retiring with hopefully years and years of enjoyment. 

Bobby Tomsik, the guy on the far right in the orange shirt, is doing what I've always seen him do:  smiling, laughing, and he's probably busting someone's balls.  He's one of the best men I've ever worked with.  My favorite story of working with him was on a job where he was the foreman, and I was there for a few days to help with a hot job.  We had some rooftop work to do on a large building.  Bobby instructed me to stay in the electrical room, and that he'd go on the roof.  Unbeknown to me, while he was on the roof, and I was in the warm, dry electrical room, it started to rain.  When he came down, he was soaking wet!  Every guy in the place gave me shit for making the old man go up on the roof while I stayed inside, nice and dry.  Finally, since we had to get that part of the job done that day, we both went up top.  We brought an umbrella....we wore rain suits....it didn't matter.  The rain wasn't coming down, it was coming sideways!  We got the job done, laughing and joking the entire time.  Bobby Tomsik is one class act, and I hope I've learned a few things from him.

Next to him is Mike Pilange.  Though you can't tell by the picture, Mike CAN actually smile when he wants to.  I only worked for Mike for a few months, and there was another level of management between us, so I'm sorry Mike, I don't have any cool stories about you.


In the middle is Dave Stretar.  Dave was my first partner down at the tandem mill.  Our first job together was under the mill, in a maze of electrical, hydraulic, and water pipes.  Everything was covered in either grease, or oil.  We had to weld a bracket onto the structure to support a conduit we were running.  After I got in there, got covered with oil, wiped all the grease off the steel I could and welded the bracket on, I asked Dave, "This was a test, wasn't it?  A test to see if I'd climb in here and do the job or not, right?"  He just smiled a big shit-eating grin and nodded.  Well, Dave, it took some digging, but I finally found it, in a hall closet at my parents' house:

Remember that day?

Next guy in is Brian Stadtler.  He's one of my favorite guys to work for.  He was always laid back, in control, never yelled or got angry.  He was always smiling and laughing.  He had a knack for being able to needle you when you made a mistake, which was good-natured, but let you know you needed to fix it.  When the job needed to get done, he expected you to bust your ass to get it done, which happened often for the customer he took care of.  After that he'd take care of you. 


The fifth retiree is Nick Sivik.  I've worked with Nicky time and time again over the years.  He's one of those solid electricians who could do anything, whether it was terminate a panel, like he's doing here, or run banks of 4" pipe.  He's a true mechanic. 

The local is going to miss these guys, and their centuries of combined experience. Good luck to you all.

Oh, I need to mention Turtle too! He retired from Local 38 a few weeks ago, but I haven't gotten any pictures from Bruce yet. Some people call him Earl Coe, but I don't know any of them.

I got my Turtle pic.  He's the guy on the left, while his best friend, Lenny, is on the right.  Over the years, I can't count the times I've heard Turtle say "Me and Lenny....."  It used to be a running joke to see how early in the day it would be before we heard a story from Turtle about him and Lenny.  Rick and I would laugh and say "We have a 'Lenny'!"

Galaska and Son, Splicers-r-Us

As Union Electricians, you never know who you will run in to on the job.  This is a father (Dr. Bob) and son (Junior) picture.  Dr. Bob works for Lake Erie Electric, while Junior works for the same contractor that I do, Call Henry.  Dr. Bob came out to do some splices and terminations on a contract job that Lake Erie won.  Since he may retire sometime in the next few years, Junior wanted to get a few pictures with his old man on the job. 

This is an Instructor/Student picture.  A little over a decade ago, Junior and I took the NJATC course in Medium Voltage Cable Splicing and Terminating.  Dr. Bob was the lead instructor and the bohunk on the far right, Bruce Marek, was the other instructor.  Bruce is now the shop steward for Call Henry.  It's a sad state of affairs that Junior and I will be taking the reigns over when these two men retire, especially since we never listen....

I even got to see my old buddy and splicing partner, Casey again.  He was assisting Dr. Bob with the splices and terminations.  Casey has been splicing for about 8 years now and will probably take over as lead splicer for Lake Erie when Dr. Bob retires.  I know, the sunglasses make me look like, well, a total dork.

One more picture to round out the post.  (Emphasis on "round"!)  Here are the Galaska family splicers.  On the left is Dr. Bob's brother, Kenny.  We call him "Unc" since he's Juniors uncle.  Well, to his face we call him "Sir" because he's also our foreman.  I'm probably gonna be cleaning out manholes for a year for my "round" ballbust, but it was worth it.  Crap, I gotta work with Junior tomorrow too!

Memorial Weekend

I had such a fun time last weekend! On Saturday, I went hiking with S. in the afternoon, then went to the dance that evening. On Sunday I went to my parents' house for a graduation party/ Memorial Day cookout.


We started with 4 on 4 volleyball. My niece took the pictures. Nice action shots, Shellyo! Anthonie goes up for the spike!



We sometimes pretend that we are real volleyball players, you know: bump, set, spike. It never really works out that way though. I ended up with a lot of sand in my butt crack before the day was over.


We took a break from V-ball to play some corn hole. Why it's called "corn hole" is beyond me. We had horseshoes, but never got the stakes driven in the ground. I guess corn hole is a suitable substitute. Bean bags don't clang though.


Anthonie is the young fella my niece had the graduation party for. He's a good looking kid. Pretty damn strong too. He's helped me around the house before. I just realized that I maybe should have kept my t-shirt untucked.... My dunlop disease is showing.


Dad couldn't sit still for too long before he had to get out in the garden to plant something. This is a great picture, Morg! Behind that stand of trees is where the quonset hut used to be.


That is one awesome row of prickers there Dad! Good thing you used that twine to make straight rows. I guess you'll be hoeing any sweet corn, tomatoes, or beans that accidentally pop up nearby. Well, good luck at the fair this year, maybe you'll get a blue ribbon for Best Weed. At least they are bigger than your watermelons....


Morgan and I have to play frisbee every summer. It's so much fun! Yes, I caught it.


Anyone else notice Morg's legs? I think he shaves his ankles. Nice catch, bro!


Remember that sand from earlier....

Bohemian Dance Night

I went swing-dancing Saturday night at the same place I went the first time. This time, I wasn't nervous at all! I had a really good time. I only danced with S. once, because there were so many guys asking her to dance, and I didn't really want to spoil her fun since I don't know what I'm doing. I shot home after the first lesson to get some ear-plugs, because the band seemed too loud. Maybe because I was right next to the speakers. Anyway, when I got home, my neighbor, Patty, expressed an interest in going, so I waited for her to get ready and we went. She had a lot of fun dancing too. I ended up dancing with 4 or 5 women, for about 10 dances, which isn't bad for me. I still don't feel like I know what I'm doing, though. There's another class starting up at the end of June with the folks who sponsored Saturday's dance. I'm planning on checking that out too. Everyone keeps telling me that I have to go out on the floor and "just do it", but if I don't feel that I've got a rudimentary understanding of what to do, I won't have as much fun. I think I'll ask S. to work with me while I wait for the next classes to begin. I am determined to learn how to do this, even if it takes forever!

Cedar Point

I went to Cedar Point yesterday with my friend, S. We had an incredible time! We rode all the cool rides that have come along since the last time I was there, 20 years ago, and a few of them twice. We jogged from ride to ride and only stopped long enough to eat a sandwich and for me to get a season pass. She already has one. I can't wait to go again!

Alpaca shearing time again!

Last Sunday was time for the annual haircut for the alpacas. This is a story that is best told in pictures. Let's start with a few from a month ago, when I was out cruising on my bike and stopped by Rick's farm.

Here are the ladies. Maggie and Lily are the two white ones. Don't ask me which is which. Felicia is the brown one.


And the gentlemen: Auggie and Dragster.


Auggie and Lily are Maggie's babies. Right now, Maggie is pregnant, I think by Dragster, but Lily is too young still. Look at those thick, heavy coats! You know that as summer comes and the temperatures rise, those animals are gonna cook. It kinda makes them look heavy too, doesn't it? From the picture, I'd put Auggie at 150 lbs, and Dragster close to 200 lbs....


Here, Lily is stretched out for her haircut. The ropes keep her from kicking, and it makes it easier to roll her as the shearer takes off the "fleece", which is the swath of fur around her torso. Oh, alpaca fur is referred to as "fiber".


My job was to get the animals ready for shearing. We had two mats set up. We wanted to have one ready to go when the shearer was ready, but didn't want them to be tied down for too long, especially the pregnant ones. I like this job because I don't have to worry about knowing which fiber is important and which is trash. The women decide that.

At first, I was trying to lay the animal down with a wrestling move. I'd grab the far front leg and pull it to me while leaning into it's shoulder, which would roll the animal over. I was depending on the guy behind me to do the same with the back feet. Once the animal was laying down, it became docile and it was easy to put the ropes on it's feet. Sometimes, the animal would spread it's hind legs when I went to roll it, which became a pain in the ass. So they told me how the Australians did it.

The Australians would lean over the top of the alpaca and, with two hands, grab the thick fur just in front of the hind legs and in front of the front legs. Then they'd lift the animal up in the air and set her down on her side.

Well, I tried that too... With the first alpaca I lifted that way, I nearly threw her through the ceiling! I must have lifted her to shoulder height, at least. All that thick fleece is misleading making the animal appear much heavier. Then, because I wasn't really sure of what I was doing, I sorta body-slammed the poor animal down on the mat. She was docile, all right.... That got me nervous looks from the alpaca farmers. Rick suggested that I be a little more gentle next time, and I was. It took a few animals before I was able to judge the weight well, but I didn't injure any of them.

The next one was a big male, and he ended up on top of me. When I went to flip him, I lost my balance and fell underneath. One of the pregnant females wasn't very happy about being on her side, and I ended up with a fat lip when she slammed her shoulder into the side of my face. I got spit on half a dozen times, and I tell you alpaca spit is some nasty smelling stuff. It's mostly grass, but grass that's been in their bellies for an hour, fermenting. Rick got kicked in the shins a number of times too. So, to make a long story short, we had a lot of fun!

So here is the lovely Lily with her new 'do. Isn't she loooovely.... I know she'll be cool at least.


Auggie must have lost 100 lbs! That poor guy. How's he going to impress the ladies without his mane? I guess he'll have to rely on his conversational skills.


You can see why I misjudged the first animal's weight when I flipped her.

Once more, for effect

Before:



After:



Man, does that crack me up!

Today we had a young visitor to the job

A friend's grand-niece joined us on the job this week to check out the type of work an electrician does. It's part of her senior project at a local high school. Next week she'll be watching and helping teachers who work with disabled and handicapped children.


We were able to get her the necessary training needed so she could join us in the manhole while we spliced some high voltage cables together. She looks really happy, doesn't she?



Of course, we put her to work. Nothing dangerous or too complicated. She just had to press the button on the hydraulic crimper. It's an easy job, but she had to pay attention to when I needed her to crimp, and listen to the pump when it had completed the compression so she could let off the button.



We took a minute for some Q & A for her project. She had taken journalism, and was prepared with good questions regarding my personal history and interests in the electrical industry.


The next step was to put the tubes on, and she got right in there, helping out


She only stayed with us on our particular job for a few hours before she moved on with two other men on another facet of our daily grind. This young lady had an excellent attitude, and I know she'll do well at whatever occupation she chooses.