The Prince Of Swords

Can anyone say Phat Cock shoe fetish line?

Shoes of the Fisherman - DeerLake Christian Store

This weekend I decided to start brushing up on my web design skillz. Since my HTML is very dated, I’m one of those bastard designers who still writes it by hand and does quintuple nested tables for layout. The cool kids use CSS positioning so I began learning and converting while watching the game tonight. Here’s what I ended up with:

[NOTE: NOT SAFE FOR WORK]

PHAT COCK TEES - Rock Out with Your Cock Out

…no tables and absolute positioning for the page elments! Woo hoo! The code is much cleaner now even on this simple page. Except now its jacked up in IE! I hate browser incompatibilities! I’ll work more on it tomorrow and get FIE working, maybe. I also have a new version of the site done with Ruby on Rails that may appear soon.

If you are not using Firefox, you lose 5 style points.

So this morning I fill up with gas, buy a carton of smokes, and a “Works” carwash. Typical weekly ritual. It didn’t get interesting until I went through the carwash that I have used before. I creep into the wash to get the full advantage of the underbelly wash (which I kinda wish I had in my shower) and stop at the plate that activates the soapy brush monster. This is made a little more difficult because the indicator lights on the monster aren’t working so you have to guess the message on the partially obscured LED panel at the back right of the wash. I like that they put the LED panel on the right because if you put it on the left when your driver is on the left the viewing angle would be decreased. Had they extended the length of the wash building you would be able to see the panel even when the monster was in the starting position. It now partially obscures the panel which is only important when the indicator lights on the monster are inoperative.

I don’t know if something changed but this is the first time this has happened me with this wash. I creep on to the plate until the wash engages and I see the “ST” on the panel. The wash begins and I start looking for a hand towel to dust off the interior windshield and dash. While doing this for a few minutes I look out to see that the soap sprayed on part of the hood, but the monster appeared to have stopped and returned to the starting position. I can barely make out a potential “RESET” on the panel. I sit for a minute to see if the monster is resetting or if it is asking to be reset. After no action and no one showing up. I exit and head to the counter.

“Did you drive over the plate?” The cashier questions with that “you’re another dumbass” gleam in her eye. “I can’t give you a refund. We were doing that but she (pointing the manager who’s on the phone explaining to some that today has been a very emotional draining day and it is only 9am) won’t let us. You’ll have to talk to her.”

As I wait for her to get off the phone, I find myself kinda wanting to hear a little more behind the drama of her morning since we are all human and it is comforting to see everyone else has fucked up things too. She finally tells me I drove over the plate and that she has to go down to the wash building and reset it and I’d have to wait her so the cashier can print me a new code.

I know this something I can’t help but doing so I decided today I’d start writing it down.

Purple has always been my favorite color but one that is hard to wear or live with in mass. As a compromise, I bought a Hag Capisco for the office. The Capisco is a nicely designed task chair based on a saddle metaphor that besides its sexy curves, allows you to sit on it forward, sideways, or backwards depending on your need or mood. It is adjustable by height, back support height, seat depth, seat pitch (locked or full-tilt), and seat pitch resistance. You can add a foot ring, headrest, taller cylinder, polished aluminum base, and seat coverings (material, patterns, fire resistance). I may add another to my collection to put in my home office. I found this chair via our Izzy rep who was helping me select work surfaces for our new software development area (we went with mobile, height adjustable tables). She let me test ride a Capisco for a few weeks so I knew this was the chair.

It took five weeks to deliver, but the Purple One arrived today and the gap between my coolness and yours widens that much more.

To help fuel my insatiable word addiction and hopefully find a two syllable word beginning with a hard consonant to name my other dog that fits with “Kosmo”….I bring you:

Urban Dictionary: Define Your World

Some brick columns went up and now the cedar fencing is connecting them. I’m not sealing the fence so when it weathers it will match the grays of the bricks. Although the original bricks of the house were discontinued, the mason was able to come up with a close match. The new bricks are smaller but since the columns are away from the house it is not very noticeable. When the deck is in place and you are standing on it the fence will actually be drink rail height which brings up another issue. Dobermans can jump a 44″ fence. Pedestrians will not be very comfortable walking by with two Dobermans leaning on the fence looking at them. I’m still thinking about a solution. If I drop the height of the deck, the steps leading to the sliding door begin eat up the surface area of the deck so there are some physical constraints to consider. One hint for the solution is that most animals can jump high or far but usually not high and far. Since this really won’t be a pressing issue until I actually get puppies and they are about a year old, I’m not going to solve this yet.

Here’s another Tarot image (one I can totally relate to, winged naked with a big fucking sword) and some more description of my nature. There may be something to all this ancient knowledge.

tarot images

Makes me want to break out my cards and play with Tarot again.

Last Thursday afternoon I finally rejoined my alien friends and left this planet. One of our vendors was in town and the engineer happened to bring his plane with him, a Piper Comanche 250. I get this call about 1pm asking if I’d like to go flying. Well, there’s no real choice there! (I’d like to apologize to all the people I cancelled my meetings on that afternoon, but I have my priorities.) Soon I’m in their rental car on the way to the airport.

Having flown out of SAT many times commercially and even a few times on a private jet, I thought I was familiar with the setup. I’m used to the terminals and the private hangar is directly across from them so I have seen different perspectives of the airport. We rolled into an old building south of the commercial terminals and walked into a smoky, dank miniature terminal with three men lounging in folding chairs looking out across the runways.

Our plane wasn’t back yet so I walked down a hallway following a sign that said “Passengers Lounge” in case they had a bar or smoking area. I must have missed the lounge but hit a secured door looking into a hangar with some small, shiny private jets. Before I could continue my search for a bar, the plane was landing.

Once the plane stopped and the engine shutdown, we walked out onto the tarmac which was ten feet from the door. The first thing you notice is that this plane is small with just enough room for the three of us. To get in, you step up the right wing, pop the hatch and squeeze down into the seats. Since I was with vendors, the put me in the co-pilot seat “so I’d get a better view”. Our pilot quickly sinks into a rhythm of procedures.

“Clear!”, shouted the pilot out the window but the guy who’d un-chalked the wheels was already back to his folding chair gazing at us through the large windows.

He turns over the engine but we keep the hatch open so the propeller becomes a nice fan. The pilot begins explaining all the gauges, knobs, buttons and tests the intercom in our headsets. He contacts ground control and scribbles down a burst numbers on a notepad that sound like they’re coming from an auctioneer. He explains that he’s notified them that we intend to take-off soon, has gotten the radio frequency, the transponder number, and that we would be heading for runway three. He’s was happy with runway three since it’s approach was very close, otherwise we’d have to taxi around to the other side of the airport for ten minutes. We start heading toward the runway with the hatch still open.

Sometimes I’m a little slow in new situations. I’m fascinated by how much is going on in the tiny cockpit and imagining the complexity that “Ground Control” and the “Tower” are dealing with, although they sound surprising calm on the radio even though they are spitting numbers like a Quick Pick lotto machine. While we’re creeping along, the pilot begins explaining he’ll be controlling the left/right movement of the plane with the rudder controls at his feet and how to ease the throttle all the way in and that once the ground speed gauge hits 75, you begin to pull back gently and the plane will take off. I thought he said “you” as in the non-specific person who in general would be flying a plane. He meant “you” as in me. In denial, I still thought he was kidding. He wasn’t and asked me to secure the hatch while we paused at a three-way intersection.

He liked to stay off the runway until everything was cleared by the tower so he could see to the left and right in case somebody crosses communication and happens to be trying to land on the runway we are attempting to use. Planes are not very agile on the ground and how can they be when you turn with your feet.

Tower gives us the green and we started rolling down the runway, he repeats the 75 and throttle instructions, and I finally admit to myself that he wants me to fly this plane! Don’t you have to take classes? Don’t you need a license? 40…50…60 This is getting very unnerving. 65…70…75…

“Pull back!” pulses in my headset.

So I do, not sure how hard or where the runway ends, guessing this thing doesn’t handle grass very well. We lift off the ground and I’d apparently pulled a little hard so we popped of the runway like a vert ramp skater popping off the coping. My backseat pilot later said it was like I flying an F-16. They later mentioned that the “Stall” light also came on. How would I know what to do? I don’t even play flight simulator games! I had flown a few times with my uncle in a little Cessna but he’d done all the work to get us in the air. I only flew around in big circles.

“Small corrections. The Tower only likes to see small corrections this close to the airport,” the pilot crackled in my ear.

Like I know what he means, the pilot says “Keep your vertical acceleration under 10 but head to 2400.”

Look at the picture above. See all those dials? So watch all three of those, the horizon, and how you handle the steering wheel which simultaneously controls your pitch left and right and you ascent and descent. My brain was full. I was hoping to snap some aerial pictures of our new headquarters but having no idea where I was and not really having time to look down, I quickly gave up on that plan.

Besides from watching the horizon and dials, there is no feedback from the plane. As the pilot gave headings and altitudes, it was difficult to judge how much to turn or push the wheel. After 10 minutes of barely controlled chaos, I needed a break. When he asked what I wanted to do, I asked him to fly and show me how smooth it could be. He went into a pattern you learn in pilot training. The idea is to turn hard left keeping the wings pitched at 45 degrees, do a complete 360, so you end up heading the direction you started in while maintaining the altitude. Damn! I didn’t expect him to turn it into a lesson!

“Now you try it. You’re heading is 22, altitude 3750. Bank right 45,” the pilot instructed.

Again, I struggle trying to keep the altitude level with the wings pitched with the ever present gusts of wind pushing us in every direction. I can see how magical this could be if it wasn’t so mentally tiring. I complete my try at the maneuver and ended up doing OK, even though I did tip the wings to almost 60 degrees which was a little steep for their comfort since they weren’t holding on to the stick.

“So where is the airport?” the pilot inquires knowing the answer and knowing I don’t.

“It’s directly behind you. Make your heading 800 and keep your altitude. When we get closer I’ll contact the tower to clear your landing.”

Take off and flying in circles is one thing, but now sensitive to his use of “you”, I’m beginning to think he is crazy if he thinks I’m going to land! He contacts the tower and gets more auctioneer gibberish. We are cleared but there is a plane in front of us. Looking around trying to solve this “negative contact” I have no luck. The pilot has no luck. The backseat pilot has growing concerns like that if there is another plane, we should probably figure out where the hell it is! But we don’t until the white of it is contrasted against the runway.

“Small corrections. The Tower likes small corrections”, my pilot repeats.

From the air, the runway looks tiny and I do get confused to which one we are actually going to land and I have never seen the airport from this perspective. I didn’t know there were two runways. As you drop altitude, its like a lens zooming in and soon enough I’m getting more concerned how hesitant the pilot is to take the controls as I bob and weave falling towards the runway. Too late now, here’s the landing!

“I’ve got the rudder and am throttling down. You just keep us on the runway and right before we touch down, pull back so the wings flare. Get ready!”

Maybe my writing style isn’t quite conveying the tension I’m under and maybe everyone else already knows how to land a plane and so no more instruction that I was given was needed, but I’m thinking to myself that this is exciting, way better than sitting in meeting, and that I have long been ready to accept death at any moment, but THIS IS FUCKING CRAZY! He may have throttled down but we’re still going to hit the runway at a hundred miles an hour perched on landing gear wheels that look more at home on a tricycle on the sidewalk.

We’re over the highway, over the grass, and now over the black skid mark scarred concrete of the runway and not it feels like we’re speeding up!

“OK, flare!”

Flare like office space? I have ten pieces on the lanyard for my security badge. Flare? Like red streak of fire ripping through the sky begging for help? It sure feels like that. Can you flare so much that the plane will do a back flip? Can you flare too little and plant the nose in the ground sliding along spitting sparks and bending each propeller blade as it comes around?

“Flare now before we touch down!”

Fine! I pull back but how the hell am I supposed to sense how close to the ground we are or how much flare is flare? Through silence of the tension, kuh-thoomp would be the sound that the plane hitting the ground too hard indicator makes. But the tires don’t pop and we continue to roll and swoosh down the runway with the pilot now driving with his feet and twiddling knobs and the trim crank. We taxi past the commercial jets loading and unloading passengers in air-conditioned causeways and the pilot asks me to pop the hatch so we can get some air.

Within a few minutes we roll to a stop in front of our ground level terminal being directed by one of the folding chair men with pieces of 2×4s, not the usual orange nose-coned flashlights and not wearing a reflective vest. But he smiles like he knew how amazing it is we made it back. Once I get unbuckled, out of the plane, on the ground, and a cigarette lit, I smile too with the exact same thought.

PostSecret

This is the greatest card trick I’ve ever seen!

It is amazing how many of us are so alike but will never realize it. An incredibly timely site, considering I’ve been sharing my secrets and feel so much better every time I do. Is there something you want to know about me? Ask me! I’m practicing not having anything to hide or being afraid to talk about it.

Go get a bottle of wine, four glasses, and three friends and watch how fast you can change everything.