Simple America

Memorial Day means the last Monday in May is a holiday in which we remember those who died for freedom and liberty in America. Though it is hard to remember that as barbecuing and retail sales seem more prevalent than the honoring of  our dead warriors. At my house it also means that someone is having a birthday, though that certain someone’s birthday did not land on Memorial Day this year. But it is always close to the holiday.

Friday I got off from work at noon as always. Went home where both my girls were home. The girl had her last final exam the day before. They had prepared me a salad, but I was dead tired and took a nap. Got up and dropped the girl off for a campout. She went to the LBJ ranch in central Texas. They were going to do some Memorial Day activities. This included going to the Nimitz Musem in Fredericksberg. They also saw a WWII reinactment of US Marines attacking a Japanese pillbox. This included the use of a flamethrower in the attack. Wish I could have seen that.

I returned home and my missus arrived a few minutes later with the lad. We made it a home movie night. We watched Cinderalla Man and Pride and Prejudice, which I had just purchased. None of us had seen Cinderella Man before. I’m kind of surprised Hollywood did this movie. It showed the strong traditional family values that America once had. Integrity and self sufficiency were also promoted. Can you imagine a welfare recipient repaying the system after they found work today? I tried to point out all of these values to my son as we watched the movie. Hope he remembers them and lives them.

Saturday I had to do a lot of work. Wanted to go to the movies, but I could not go in good faith without finishing my work. This primarily consisted of finishing the April books for 12 to Midnight. Once completed I had to prepare a share issuance for Trey and entered May cash transactions so I could look at the company’s cash position. Got most of it done.

Could not finish it all as we had a dinner with my wife’s friends. We tried a new restaurant in West Houston called Golden Phoenix. The food there tasted great. Would highly recommend. We had a large party show up. Three tables divided by bulls, heffers, and calves as there were ten families. Smart crowd too. The men’s table had three PHDs and everyone else had a Masters degree. I must be the stupidest person at the table as I only have a Masters in Accounting and the rest of them are engineers, chemists, and computer professionals. And we had Chinese from all over with two from Korea, one from Hong Kong, and everyone else from Taiwan. Glad the Hong Kong chap was there too as that forced them to speak more English, so I only missed half the conversation for a change.

Why such a big party. Two girls graduated from High School and I beleive both of them have been accepted at University of Texas. Also my wife’s best friend is moving to Japan where her husband has been working for more than a year now. She might have moved sooner, but her daughter wanted to graduate with her friends and they waited for her to finish school.

After dinner the party moved to a home. Originally, I planned on going home and clearing some more work. But I had not seen the Hong Kong chap and his wife in at least three years. They have three kids, two that have already graduted from university and a seven year old. She was so cute. When I greeted her mom, she made sure I shook her little hand and she told me her name and that she was glad to meet me. Could not help but smile at her.

The house party was filled with good conversation. The deserts people bought were excellent too. They had watermelon that was as red as a strawberry and very sweet. I had the opportunity to eat some Japanese dried figs too. That was different but nice.

Went home and tried to catch up on my blogging. Think I nodded off more than anything. So I hit the hay.

Sunday I woke up and I stuffed the World of Warcraft (WoW) software in the back of pants. My son wanted this game for his birthday and I told him I would let him have it this morning. The boy waited for me to exit my bedroom. He came to me and gave me a big hug. But the hug was so high he did not notice the box just below his arms. I told him to hug lower and he looked at me like I was some kind of a purvert. I told him not that low, just a couple of inches. He found the box and dashed upstairs.

Meanwhile my missus looked outsides at our garden. She immediately went outside to get some cuttings from our daylillies which are blooming like crazy. Want a look at her cuttings?

WoW is a huge program. It had five discs. I helped him load it, allowing him to interupt my work. Figured I owed him, since I made him wait so long to load the game. Plus work had kept me from spending time with him. Once it loaded he went on the internet and signed up as this game has a subscription for playing online. All of that set he finally hits the play button  and we get an error message. Our computer’s graphics card is inadequate. Two hours of set up for this result. Why can’t the disk test your system in the beginning? Really pissed me off and the boy’s disappointment was apparent.

So I got dressed and the boy accompanied me to CompUSA. I told the people there my specs and that I wanted a graphics board that would let my machine run WoW. They told me I would be better off getting a new machine. My CPU is too old and really that does not surprise me. I think we had this computer 3 or 4 years.

We went next door to Circuit City. I wanted to get Half Life 2 for X-Box. They had sold out already, but they had a copy of Ghost Recon 2 which lets you go fight in Kazachstan. At $10 bucks I had no problem to pick it up. I really like these Tom Clancy games.

When we returned it was back to my office. Time to attack the family bills. I went through the mail. Bills, junk mail, and what’s this? A parcel. The return address is one of 12 to Midnight’s freelance writers, Neal5X5. Opened the parcel and this is what I found:

From reading his dedication, I learned that he sent it so I could get past the funk I experienced last week. Being a writer he knows how frustrating the creative process is, especially when it is juggled in between work and family. Very thoughtul gift. Thanks Neal!

Carried on with paying the bills. Finished that and I still had things to do. But I have not played a video game since January. Ghost Recon 2 beckoned and I did answer. Me and the boy were shooting, blowing up, and breaking everything in sight. Death and destruction just feels good every now and then. But we never could make it passed Mission 1. And we could not convince the missus and daughter (who had returned) to play with us.

Daughter had a great time. She came back with a Japanese aircraft chart from WWII. The girl also had a .50 caliber round. That brought back more than a few memories of the army and the weapons range. I told her that .50 caliber rounds were only supposed to target equipment and vehicles. Because of the Geneva Convention we could not aim at the enemy’s body. Just their equipment, like their helmets, equipment belts, canteens, and ammo pouches.

Monday I woke up and I had one thing on my mind. Movies. I wanted to catch some of the summer blockbusters. Then my daughter told me she had a party that afternoon. Geting tired of waiting on this kid. But we did. So I spent the day doing more adminstrative chores for 12 to Midnight. It seems like it never ends. I also need to write a Modern Dispatch, not to mention the introduction for Fire in the Hole. Should get on them later this week.

Finally, Ghost Recon2 called me again. So again I simulated killed Cossack with prejudice. But they killed me and the boy more. Will we ever get passed this first mission?

Finally, evening arrived and so did my girls. We had a quick supper and drove to the store for some candy. Then off to see X-Men 3. Not going to talk about it. Just go see it. And do not leave until after all of the credits have run.

Now today, the 30th of May I officially become an old fart. Now I have two teenagers. Thats right this varmint below turned 13 at high noon Texas time.

Thats right. He came kicking and screaming in the world at exactly noon. I thought about naming him Clint and the missus said no way. The Indianapolis 500 ran the day he of his birth and I thought about naming him Emmerson Fitipaldi after the race’s winner. Momma said no way. Though we did call him Indy as a nickname. But it never really stuck.

Here are some pics I took of him last night. Haiz…

He was a cute baby. Though he never smiled a lot. Always had a very serious look on his face.

Cute but so serious.

And tonight we had a little party. This is what we ate.

Here is some cake.

And my sister-in-law joined us.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 30th, 2006 at 5:47 pm and is filed under Family, Personal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.