Boo

Little Debbie used to be right in my backyard. Before I moved, I lived in Collegedale, TN. Lived close to one of the McKee Foods plants that makes Little Debbie products. When the wind blew just right, the air smelled of baked goods and chocolate. Nice!

We had Nutty Buddy ice cream cones. Little Debbie also made a Nutty Buddy chocolate-wafer treat. It was all just so confusing...

Good work Denali. Congratulations.

But I'm all better now!

Top-shelf quit. First Class lady. Congratulations Nancy. If I remember correctly, I dedicated a little sing-along of "Rocky Top" to you last year. I'll go with another one of our official state songs this year. Sending this one out to Nancy...

Push-Ups done to exhaustion got me through the heaviest bouts in the early days of my quit. Any kind of physical activity is good for alleviating stress and resetting the mind and body. It may be intense exercise or something as simple as a quick walk-around. Other times, I would simply put on headphones and listen to music I like. You can never have too many tools in your toolbox.

Reflecting on my time on the Quit Train. I was notified when I signed in that my new rank is "Veteran." I think back on the numbers game battles. We took a few losses along the way, but the victories were sweet. Hanging out in Sonic's Man Cave polishing our trophies while attractive young women poured drink after drink...the spoils of victory! There was the battle for "Babe of the Day." The chicks no longer content to keep the battle within the confines of the numbers game made an incursion into our most sacred thread. Started posting beefcake pics in grounds reserved for Babes...It was a day that will live in infamy. I was here when the SPAM army launched a blitzkrieg on our little corner of the internet. No threads were safe from "Free MILF porn" and boner pill ads. The moderators took the lead in that battle, but we all remember where we were when the shelling started. In a minor skirmish, a vaping advocate called me an "asshole." I vanquished that silly person and farted in her general direction. I'm not one to call myself a hero, but I would understand if you wanted to call me one.

Still hanging around.

Welcome aboard Overcome. Congratulations on quitting smoking. Once you realize that the monster has as much or as little power as you give him, he looks far less scary...more pest than monster. Face him down. See the monster for what he actually is. Then, give him a swift kick in the ass and send him on his way. Ride on! You only pick up more wins along the way.

Starting a four-day weekend. That's even better than a three-day weekend! Happy Fourth of July!

I'm surprised there haven't been more movies made about Elvis. There are some great stories about that man. Like that time he and a group of his friends flew from Memphis to Denver in the middle of the night because Elvis was hungry for a particular sandwich he had out there. There was that one time in New York when he broke up a fight outside of a bar. Elvis had been deputized by President Nixon and was taking karate classes. Elvis the crime stopper had his limo driver stop so he could break up the fight. That one night when Elvis met Led Zeppelin but he didn't want to talk about music. Elvis had recently bought a Triumph Motorcycle and assumed that since the guys from Led Zeppelin were English they would be able to answer his questions about British motorcycles. Still the King!

If gut issues related to smoking are becoming more prevalent, that leads me to one question: What are the tobacco companies putting in cigarettes now? A cigarette is already a cocktail of chemicals that will screw up your system six-ways-to-Sunday. Have they found a way to make them even worse?

Seems like a good time for a follow up post. Jerry the Cat is doing great. The vet put him on a diet, he was getting too fat for his own good, but beyond that Jerry is living the dream. Even bigger news for Wade: he found out yesterday that he is going to be a daddy. I was congratulating him and in a candid moment he looked at me and said: "I don't know anything about raising a baby!" I'm only two years removed from having the exact same thoughts. I assured him they'll figure it all out and things will be fine. I don't think anybody really knows exactly what they're doing when that first baby is born, but we learn on the fly. The fact that I'm being asked for parenting advice feels like a real change of seasons. Congratulations to Wade and Sarah. They will be great parents, they just don't know it yet.

I was talking to a guy I've done business with for several years now. He's been a smoker for over thirty years. One of those guys who would say "yeah, I should quit but..." He's been off the smokes completely for a couple of weeks now. For the last two/three months, smoking a cigarette would cause him to feel nauseous. He said practically every cigarette left him feeling like he either needed to vomit or sometimes he would feel the urgent need to use the bathroom but nothing came out. When he abstained from smoking, his stomach felt fine. Then, he would light another one up and get all kinds of uneasiness in his gut again. If he smoked before he ate, he had no appetite and would feel sick while eating. Now that he's quit, his appetite is back where it should be. Did anybody else have gut issues while smoking?

Good job Yoda. Congratulations.

Cool. Some people complained about hitting the wall with the Columbia House Record Club. They said they had all the tapes they wanted and started receiving records they didn't want. Those people were not thinking about the big picture. I not only got records for my collection but also gave out cassette tapes as gifts. I was a kid so I didn't have a lot of disposable income. I could give folks the gift of music without spending much money; that's a win-win. And continuing our trip down memory lane...Was there a more awesome toy than the Big Wheel? No...this is not debatable.

Here in the States those were called mimeographs. We had one at my elementary school. In spite of the fact that during my schooldays we did get a dot matrix printer, my fifth grade teacher was a mimeograph loyalist. He was not a fan of all those new-fangled technologies of the mid-eighties. Right around the time my school invested in a state-of-the-art printer, I was just starting my collection of cassette tapes. The collection grew to an impressive number and I didn't have to spend a fortune...Thanks Columbia House!

Randy at work has a son that just graduated from high school. He's working here over the summer until he starts college in the Fall. The boy is good with computers. I wasted 20 minutes trying to print a file that was sent via E-mail. Cursing and calling the computer a "son of a motherless goat" wasn't helping. Randy's boy looked at it for about two minutes and printed it right out. I don't have a clue what we're going to do when the boy leaves for college. We'll be back to a bunch of dinosaurs and luddites trying to figure out how the interwebs work.

Summertime's here babe need something to keep you cool...

Anything worth having is worth working for. You've put in the work and hopefully will celebrate your accomplishment. Congratulations Kris. Welcome to the Lido Deck.

You'll have that fresh as a breeze new non-smoker smell going for you as well. I was in a machine shop this morning where a few of the guys still smoke. It amazes me that I went nose-blind to the smell of smoke for so long.

You can never go wrong with more Allman Brothers...

Some folks would pay good money for a toilet like that. Perverts!

I'm troubled by the fact that my crapper has taken up smoking...