And then there was this...

Well, It has been a year ago yesterday that my wife's grandfather passed away. He was 76 years old, and had Alzheimer's pretty bad. He also had a diffibulator that would shock him any time his heart rate was irregular. He was shocked by it several times in about the 6 years he had it. He was going to have to undergo surgery so that they could go in and change the batteries in it, but the doctors didn't think he could handle being put under again.
It's hard to believe that it has been that long. He had been going down hill for a few years. It really wasn't a surprise to us, but that didn't make it any easier. I think the hardest thing for me was playing TAPS at his funeral. I didn't think it was going to be hard to do, until I started. I almost got choked up. I just thought of what a dishonor it would be (to me at least) to mess that up. I had only played it once before. I mean at a funeral. The whole family fell apart, when I started playing it, especially my wife.
After that, I would have to say it is hard when I see Casey, my 9 year old son, still thinking about Papa. You can tell by the look on his face that he is bothered by something. If you ask him what's wrong, he will shake his head and say "nothing". Within minutes he will ask a question or talk about a time when Papa was here. Camille doesn't take it all that well either. She has always been an emotional person, but anything about Papa makes her eyes water. What can you say? All I can do is listen. So, I guess that's what I'll do.
Another loss I experienced was my own Grandmother. Both of these happened at about the same time. The main difference was that I didn't get to see my Grandmother that often. In fact, I hadn't seen her in about 10 years. She lived in Panama, with the rest of my family on my mom's side. My mom was there when she passed away. I guess you could almost call that a blessing. My grandmother was 94 years old. I think she knew time was coming. And I feel that she was not going to give up until she could see her daughter one more time. That's the way I Look at it anyway. Some people may think that is silly, but oh well. Well, I guess I will close for now. Though they won't read this, I'm sure they know...Abuelita and Papa...We miss you both...

I have just read the minutes from the last EMA meeting at my work. I can tell you I am thouroughly disgusted. Of course, these minutes only pertain to my department, Quality Control (which troubles me even more). I mean we are supposed to "REVIEW THE FOLLOWING NOTES AND BE READY WITH ANY QUESTIONS AND/OR SUGGESTIONS FOR OUR NEXT MEETING". The EMA is the Employee Management Association. You would think there main concern was helping the employees, and it is. However, people seem to push that way too far. I mean the company I work for already provides several things for us that are not required or necessary. Let's see. They have fruit brought in for us to enjoy...FREE. They have vending machines for us to purchase snacks from. There is a small restaurant that sets up in our breakroom for us to buy our lunch. There is FREE coffee and tea. There is also a freezer of Ice Cream that they provide. The Ice Cream costs 50 cents, and they trust you to pay for the ice cream in a box beside the freezer. Yet, some of the request that were made to the EMA were ridiculous. We even had a request for the Company to provide snacks during the EMA meeting (which usually only lasted 15 - 20 minutes). Someone requested the the Company provide More fruit. As if they weren't already getting enough free fruit. they even asked to have a phone placed in the breakroom with outside capabilities. Now that might sound like a decent request, but there is already a phone on almost every desk on the production floor. If you need a phone in the breakroom, it is because you are using it during break, right? Why not just go to one of the desks and use it. It's not that complicated. And the number one ridiculous request is referring to the Ice Cream that I mentioned earlier. Do you remember it? It is provided by the Company to be purchased for 50 cent each. Has anyone tried to buy ice cream at a store? I'm talking about the individually wrapped ice creams. The last time I checked it was around 69 cents for the cheaper stuff. granted,, there are a few good sales that go down to 33 cents a piece. Anyhow, the request was made to sell the Ice Cream for 25 cents or even FREE! All of these requests were declined. I just can't imagine why. Some people just can't be satisfied. Any thoughts?

Well, this past Monday I received a phone call from my wife telling me about a guy we went to school with. SHe asked me if I remembered him. I told her that I did. SHe then informed me that he had killed himself over the weekend. I was shocked. I never understood how someone can even think about doing that, much less following through with it. I know it happens all the time. I just don't understand. Anyhow, we went to his visitation last night. My wife and I had mix feelings about going. You see we were not to thrilled about seeing old high school people. I know. I know. That sounds terrible. We weren't even looking forward to our 10 year reunion (next year). Let's just say that we had a different group of kids we hung out with during high school. She really didn't get along with my friends at the time as most of them were females. That was an obstacle we worked on for years to overcome, but that is another story. She didn't think we would see that many people from school. She didn't give a reason for her thoughts. It was just a feeling she had. We went in, and lo and behold, there they were...high school friends. Now I am at an advantage, because when we graduated from high school, I had hair down to the middle of my back. I was actually known for my hair. If you have seen me recently, or looked at my picture blogs (there's one picture of me in there) you would know that the hair is a little bit different. I mean. There's only a little bit left. I could have gone through there by myself, and only gotten noticed by 1 maybe 2 people. One girl remembered me, but I was with my wife, and she remembered her. Another old friend of mine (since 1987) remembered me right off. You wouldn't believe how much people change. I mentioned we hung out with different groups of kids, and that is exactly right. We were all kids. I thnk we were worried we would meet those same kids. WRONG!!! Just about everyone we spoke with was very kind. I think we all grew up a little bit. Some of us grew up and out, myself included. We really enjoyed talking about the lost time. Where did it all go?
The guy that I said remembered me right off said that he was thinking about me just a few days before. He had been moving some things around, and found something that I had given him one day, when he had stayed the night at my house. That was probably around 1989 or so. I want you to know the feeling that gave me was great. It brought back so many memories. Where does it all go? It amazes to look back at my childhood and say "yeah that happened 20 years ago..." I guess I have a lot of road to go. One thing is for sure. It's been a great ride. And I hope it stays that way. After seeing one of my fellow classmates in a casket, it really opened my eyes. You just never know. You look at things a bit differently. Well, I guess I will close now. Hope to hear from you soon...Oh By the way, my wife and I are now excitedand are looking forward to our 10 year reunion.

Wow! It seems like it's been a while since my last post. It's good to be back. I promise I thought about writing a lot, but that's as far as it went. I was wondering. Is it just me or has the imagination just disappeared off of the face of the Earth? I mean, have you watched TV lately. We have so much Reality TV shows, it's almost depressing. I admit, there a few that I can tolerate. Survivor was good the first season, but then it seemed, at least to me, to just repeat itself every season. One show that I really can't get in to is Fear Factor. I have watched it a couple of times, just to see how desperate people are, and the gross things they do make me turn it. The bachelor was okay, but it never seems to end. Now they have the bachelorette, they had who wants to marry my dad, and others. I mean you got to draw the line somewhere. Joe Millionaire was entertaining, that is until they talked about doing it again in another country. I never did hear how that turned out. Then American Idol came out. I have to admit, this is the first season I have kept up with it at all. I liked it. However, they recently finished another show called Nashville Star. It too was enjoyable, but it was pretty much the same thing as Idol. No imagination was really needed. Now they have a show that is all the same, except there is no singing, it is dancing. Before you know it, they will have a show like that about knitting. I just don't see where the originality went. You can also watch The Scholar and Fire Me. These are a bit different in the fact that one is students trying to get a scholarship, and the other is where people just try to get fired.
One thing I noticed on the shows I have watch troubles me. That is that the contestants get so wrapped up in the role. For example, American Idol, you have contestants that haven't even gotten far in the competition, and make statements like, "I don't know what I'll do, if I don't make it here." Or something like, "If I don't win this, I guess I'll never sing." Things like this really bother me. Where was American Idol years ago, when all of these Musicians were making it big. No where, that's where. What's worse is that these people hadn't even made it to the finals.
But you know, it's not just TV shows. Originality has been lost in the movie industry as well. I think this has been going on for a while, but seems to have exploded in the past couple of years. Let's see, Fat Albert just came back. This was not so bad, because it went from a cartoon to a movie. We've also seen a lot of Comic Book Character movies. Again, from a cartoon to movie, kinda. Now, we have all of these old TV shows/Movies being remade. Let's see Herbie is coming back, and so is Bewitched. I guess I Dream of Jeanie will follow shortly. I guess the good side to this is that they remaking movies that for the most part were good. Hopefully, they will continue to only remake the good ones, since it doesn't look like they are going to come up with anything new anytime soon. I don't know. Maybe it's just me. What are your thoughts?