The Daily Diversion Archive For January, 2002

Thursday January 31, 2002

I had a job interview yesterday. It wasn't for a position that was open, it was for a position they were expecting to add in the near future. The company is local and based in a Minneapolis suburb. It's a 30 minute drive from our house. I can handle that. The people I interviewed with were nice and definitely had an idea of what I was going to do if they hired me. I felt comfortable with their expectations, and would hope they would consider me.

I finally got the external floppy drive for my new-used laptop. I was reformatting and reinstalling Win98 as soon as the new floppy drive had warmed up from being outside. I had been having some trouble with Office throwing an OLE error when in Outlook. Since I really only use Outlook and FrontPage, it was a big problem. No amount of reinstalling, deleting and re-reinstalling of Office fixed the problem. Reinstalling the OS did. Go figure.

I've said for quite some time that if you use Win9x as a "Power User" for any period of time, you'll end up reinstalling the OS every 6 months or so. Some folks would argue with me here saying that I didn't have to install everything under the sun and that installing crap in Win9x will cause it to become unstable. My retort is that I should be able to install anything under the sun that will run on my machine and the OS should allow me to do exactly that. If it doesn't, then it isn't much good as an OS, now izzit?

The reason I don't use some other OS like NT or 2000 or XP is that the processor in this laptop isn't up to it. Yes, it would run NT just fine with it's Pentium 133MHz processor and 64Mb of RAM, but I will eventually be needing USB support and that just isn't happening in NT.

Sorry, geek session over.

Now if only my battery would come.

Tuesday January 29, 2002

I had some work done on my truck yesterday. I don't have any problem with the quality of the work, the particular business I had do the work, nor the products I bought. What I do have a problem with is the seeming inability of service writers to tell time.

I brought the truck in for a couple of tires and a front-end alignment. It sorely needed it. It wasn't pulling either way, but the steering wheel was 90 degrees out of true. This isn't a big deal until it comes to turning left. 90 degrees is right where the left turn signal cancels on my truck. Every left turn was spent fighting the truck trying to prevent it from canceling my signal. It was tiring.

When I brought the truck in mid-morning, I asked them how long the process might take. The service writer said, 2 hours tops, unless we need parts or something. I told him it would definitely need parts and he said it wouldn't be that much longer. Fine. I sat down for the long haul. 2 hours passed and the truck was still waiting for parts. The new tires were on and the alignment guy had come back with the "I have bad news for you" look on his face. He was quite surprised when I said, I knew it needed parts and that whatever he needed to do, fine. That had been at about an hour and a half into the process. He must have ordered the parts and gone on to do other things.

I had gotten there about 9:30 or so. The parts runner came in about 12:30 with the parts needed to finish the alignment. Three hours and counting. The alignment guy installed the parts and then called me back to look at the truck. It needed new shims. That would cost a huge amount in labor due to the trial-and-error nature of finding the right shim to take care of the castor and camber. Not wanting to have a four-figure bill, I told him to get the thing to track straight and I'll worry about shims later. Much later. The time? About 1:15.

Alignment guy finished up about 2:15 and brought the truck out. I paid and left. The time I got out of there was just before 2:30. I spent 5 hours of my day in a waiting room. I could have left and gone and done something else, but there were two things preventing me from doing this. The first thing was that it was bitter cold outside. I was dressed for it, but I had no intention of walking around the Midway in St. Paul without transportation. Second, I would have been at the mercy of the hateful "T." I don't like riding public transportation for reasons I've already gone into. The third reason is something I picked up on from working in an auto repair shop. If you're not physically there, you will not get a timely call that something's gone wrong and they need your permission to do something else. They will take care of the people that are there first. Seeing that I didn't want to leave the truck overnight, and since I didn't trust the service writer to call my cell phone in a timely manner, I stuck around. The only way I've found to guarantee the repairs on your vehicle are completed in the most timely of manners is to be there in the waiting room, shooting expectant glances at everyone who walks through the door to from the shop. Yes, I'm being a pain in the ass that way, but that's fine. The bigger a pain I am, the faster they'll try to get me out of there. It's not like pissing off a waiter who could spit in your food, the auto repair guys pretty much have to make sure it's right, or you get to come back and shoot more expecting glances at them.

I've found, to my never-ending chagrin, that my cassette deck has developed a bad motor. Not good. I finally got a tape deck working in my truck and I've also been using it a lot because of all the errands and job hunting I've been doing. I need more tapes. I record them on my stereo's cassette deck at home and take the tapes in the truck. Not having a functioning tape deck at home is not good. I have to find out if Sony even services this model anymore. I've had it in for service once before, and their service department was pretty reasonable. I'm hoping they will still be able to service it.

Monday January 28, 2002

It's time for America to rethink how we deal with corporations. To anyone paying attention, it should be obvious that the government isn't really listening to its citizens anymore. It's listening to money. Sure, people have money, but corporations have more. Much more. Enough to do really nasty things and manipulate the Government that's there to protect you and I from threats internal and external. It's time to end treating corporations legally like people and it's time to start valuing the people of this country. It's also time to clean house in Washington. The current batch of cronies just isn't interested in listening to anyone with a viewpoint that's different from Big Business.

What's brought this screed on is, of course, Enron. This fetid stew of greed mongers and cooked books make the dot com guys blush with the lengths they went to make themselves look good on paper, when the whole organization was rotten. I'm not talking about the Johnny Paycheck types actually doing work, I'm talking about the Accounting Department, their advisors and the Board of Directors.

What's making me mad is this: They paid their workers in wages and in 401K plans. The 401K plans are tax-free. Enron's 401K plan was heavily invested in Enron stock. So much so, that when Enron went into the toilet, many of their regular employees got the royal shaft and lost nearly all the value in their 401K account. The people higher up in the company saw the crash coming and bailed out of their Enron stock which they happened to have in private accounts. They pocketed millions while the employees with 401K plans took it up the ass. But here's the real hanger. It was largely because of the big 401K plan that the stock was riding as high as it was. The executives at this company used that large investor base to pump the stock up, and when it was going to crash, they divested.

The auditing firm, Arthur Andersen was also in cahoots with Enron. Apparently, Enron was by far and away their biggest and most complicated account. AA billed them for some 40 million in consulting fees last year. 40 million. Losing an account like that was sure going to hurt AA's bottom line. So much so that they allegedly started covering Enron's cooked books. Nothing says accounting law reform than auditors helping to cook the books.

So now, the corrupt management of Enron are quitting and resigning left and right. Someone's committed suicide. Someone else is taking the 5th. There's various sources that are starting to link Enron, Lay and our President. There's even a fellow out there that's alleging that Bush allowed Enron to interview the candidates for a cabinet-level post to see if they were acceptable. Does this sound like Treason? It does to me. Sure, I've been reading all the lefty blogs around, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that something not quite right's been going on.

And now a few words about the main players. Mr. Lay had to have know all about this stuff. He. Had. To. I propose that not only should he not be allowed to keep his ill gotten gains, but he should have to return the money to the Enron stockholders personally. After that, he should go to prison for a very long time. Not a Michael Milliken 5 years. No, I think hard time in a hot place. 20 years to life would be just fine. Think of it this way: If a petty street criminal robbed a bank of that much money, do you think they would ever see the light of day again? Now, as a deterrent to future scamsters such as him, his family should be turned out on the street. They should all be taken from their house, driven down to the local Salvation Army, clothed in what's there and then be given room and board in the nearest homeless shelter. Their bank accounts should be seized, their homes, cars, jewelry and possessions should be liquidated, and his children should not be eligible for any kind of tuition assistance for private school or college.

Let's investigate that guy who committed suicide. Was it really suicide? If it was, did he profit from this mess? If he did, should his survivors be allowed to keep that money? It would be sad to have to take money from widows and orphans, but if the money was ill-gotten in the first place, is it really theirs?

The guy who worked for AA who took the 5th on the stand in front of congress should be thoroughly investigated. Given he took the 5th, his assets should be frozen until we get a who done what from this guy. He's probably guilty as sin itself, but how does a society deal with a guy like that. He's probably the king of the shredder, the one who ordered his people to keep on shreddin' even though the whole house was falling in on them. He should be allowed to not self-incriminate. However, he should not be allowed to deal himself out of punishment for shredding evidence. No way.

There's a big problem with the way we treat white collar criminals in the U.S. If a guy deals a certain amount of drugs or if a guy is a repeat offender, society locks them away for a long time. I think the punishments for white collar crime should be commensurate. The impact on society is similar. Drug dealers foist addicts on our society. These addicts take public resources to treat, to incarcerate for crimes committed in the course of their addiction, to prosecute these crimes and to support the people who they've harmed by their addiction. I would argue that the societal impact of thousands of people losing the bulk of the money in their retirement accounts is probably going to end up costing the Government more than to treat a bunch of drug addicts. We're going to have to chip in more to support the retirement of these bilked investors than we would have to spend to treat drug addicts.

Think of all the people who got bilked who had loans against their 401K. Think of loans that are in default because the account that backed the loan is suddenly not worth bupkus. Think of all the bank liens on property. These people may be now out of work. Think of all the defaults on mortgages. Think of who picks up the tab for defaulted mortgages, mortgage insurance and the other costs affiliated with bankruptcies. That's right, it's you and me. Add this all up and I think we'll find that guys like Lay are a much larger insult to society than some drug dealer. Therefore, I think the penalties for crimes such as this should be far more harsh.

Whatever the fact, this whole mess should be investigated until everyone is well and truly sick of the case, the people involved and the laws that let it happen. Sure, this is a partisan fight. The Republicans threw their lot in with big business a long, long time ago. They have reaped the benefits of name calling, mean-spirited associations and playing on race and classism. Sure there are faults with the traditional Lefty outlook, but here is a problem all Liberals can get behind. A big business that has demonstrably run amok and has hurt not only union members, but society at large. Here is the thing that will nearly guarantee a Republican loss in the next election. With a popular war going on or not, I think it's time to ask questions about the President's involvement in this whole mess. I think it's time to change election laws to prevent companies from even trying to influence the election process. I think it's time to start holding companies responsible for their actions beyond pollution and labor relations. Where are the press? Where are the investigative reporters? Where are the Democrat leaders? This scandal and it's prosecution will probably give the Democrats the next election and it's not a minute too soon.

Tuesday, January 22, 2002

The job search has begun in earnest. I hadn't done much last week because of technical problems and being sick. The technical problems are solved. I'm still feeling less than super, but I'll deal.

I have a line on a couple of things. I've not met with anyone, but the first meetings will happen within the next 4 days.

Tonight I'm just sitting here on the couch, getting ready to test something that's a big deal for me, but really inconsequential to anyone else. It's mostly a test to see if Windows Briefcase will work on my suddenly not so stable laptop. I'm hoping it will work. That way I can just synchronize it, and not have to worry if any work that hasn't been presented to the outside world will be lost. Sometimes technology is cool.

We had friends and family over on Sunday. All were impressed by the new house and how we've modified it to fit our personal needs. Boy, that sentence sounded odd. How about this: All were impressed by the new house and the way our stuff looks in it. Better. Anyway, we still need to hang some art and get some more stuff unpacked. Beyond all that, I also need to work on the garage if only to pull my motorcycles inside. That's important.

I went to the dog park with Brutus on Sunday and boy did he have fun. The other dogs ran him until he shook. When we had had enough, we left. He's been pretty much exhausted ever since. He really loves going to the park.

We also indulged a favorite guilty pleasure. We read a good review of chocolates in one of our magazines and thought we'd try this particular manufacturer out. Boy howdy. Best chocolates ever. The place is called Candinas and they're located just outside of Madison, Wisconsin. You could do much worse than to surprise your chocolate-loving spouse/S.O./pal with a box of these heavenly treats. I've heard it said that the key to good taste in things such as booze, coffee, tea, chocolates and wine is merely the absence of bad tastes. There were no bad tastes in these chocolates. Splendid.

Saturday January 19, 2002

Three days into our new DSL experience. The phone line is still way noisy and sometimes it's impossible to use. Beyond this, this DSL connection seems faster than the old one. Go figure.

The new refrigerator came today. The delivery guys were here early, but they were pros. They had the new one in and the old one out in less than 20 minutes. Most of this time was taken by us to empty the old fridge and turn off the water line to the ice maker. What a complicated house we live in.

So that pretty much fixes all that was kinda wrong with the house. We're done with the urgent things. Now we have to start tackling the stuff that will require a bit more maneuvering. We have at least 3 ceiling fans in the house that have to go. We went shopping yesterday for appropriate fixtures, but were pretty much shut out. Everything we saw at the Despot was either too big, too small, or just too crappy. That said, we did find a couple of things that would work, they just wouldn't be so nice to look at. We also have the central air issue to deal with. I'll be calling a couple of places to give us estimates on Monday. We have a good recommendation, so they'll be the ones we call first.

The job hunt has been going slowly. Having too much of a headache to even post to this silly thing has made it somewhat difficult to scan ads and put the finishing touches on my resume. Monday will be the start of the 40 hour week of looking for a job. I still have yet to buy the clothes I need to do interviews, so I gotta get that done as well. So much to do, and so much to figure out.

Sometime within the next week or so, I'm going to have to find a way to get Apache installed on my BSD box. Wish me luck.

Wednesday January 16, 2002

The DSL kit came in the mail today. I rushed to set it up and was rewarded with a day full of technical glitches on the phone company's side. Grrr...

This isn't saying that my DSL connection isn't working. It is. However, whatever glitch the phoneco is having is totally wiping out the voice part of the line.

Phones are over-rated, right?

In other news, I traded in my old 486/100 laptop for a newer Pentium powered job. It's not all that much of an upgrade in processing power, but this one has a nice active matrix screen and a CDROM drive. These are two things the old one didn't have. It also has cardbus slots that make modern PCMCIA stuff work. Cool.

With all this stuff going on, it's almost easy to forget I'm sicker than all get out. I've got one of those sick-guy-in-the-elevator coughs. You know the type. The type that sounds as if you're trying to blow beef stew through a garden hose. The croakaling, croupy, crackly, greenish-yellow gobs of goo rising up from your lungs that when it does get up, you're simultaneously relieved that you can now breathe again and completely nauseated that you have this pile of chunky slime in your mouth. Swallow or no? Anyway, this is the type of cough that the aforementioned guy on the elevator has and you hate that bastard for trying to pass it around. You hope he drops dead and if he does, you really hope you don't drop dead as well.

It's ibuprofen that's keeping me in good spirits. I can feel it wear off every 4 hours or so. The slight queasiness, the sorta dizzies, and the general apathy encroach. You know it's time to have a snack and snarf up a couple more of those round and brown pills.

We (because my wife is sick as well) are driving our dog nuts with our sniffling. He thinks we're sad and so he does his happy dog thing to get us to cheer up. Happy dog thing when you're not sad is no less impressive, it's just far more entertaining.

My thanks to all of you who are pulling strings and polling your HR departments on my behalf. I'm very grateful. The résumé's done, and I got a haircut. Tomorrow I'll be buying some interview clothes. I'll keep score right here regarding the number of interviews and the chances I think I have in each.

Monday January 14, 2002

Day one of not having a job started in a most relaxing way. I took the dog to the off-leash dog park for a run, and then we came home. I shoveled a bunch of snow and then went out and procured some things we needed. I came back home and worked on my resume for about four hours. I sent a bunch of emails off and pretty much called it a day at 5.

Friday January 10, 2002

Yesterday sucked. I got laid off.

I work in the class action claims administration business. I thought class action suits were a growth business in this economy. They probably are, but our company isn't doing that hot, and I got laid off. I'm being let down easy, with lots of help looking for a new post, but I must say that I'm very disappointed right now. I really didn't need this kind of challenge at this time in my life.

Still, it seems provident that it happened now rather than 3 months ago. That would have changed pretty much everything. We wouldn't be in a new house, we wouldn't have our bills paid and we wouldn't be sitting as pretty as we are now. I sure as hell hope this unemployment thing doesn't go on for very long.

The problem I have is that I'm lousy at selling myself. I know tons of stuff about my field, yet I don't have any certifications and I don't have much experience in any other IT setting. I'm not an expert at any one thing, and that really gives me chills when I look at the want ads. I see lots of ads for specific application positions, but nobody seems to want a general practitioner.

Also giving me the creeps is the nearly daily announcements in our local media of companies laying off hundreds of other people. I don't think this little recession is as bad as the one in the early '90s, but I can think of lots of other times when being out of work was an almost guaranteed temporary position.

I chalk this all up to bad karma. I must have been selected by the powers that be to work in the transportation field. When I changed my address and renewed my driver's license, I dropped my commercial license. Commercial driving was always my safety net during college and through the bad years just out of school. I could always drive bus. I even went into management to get some different experience. All the while, I knew that I could always get a job driving bus and/or training drivers. Now that I've ditched my commercial license, I've shut that door more or less permanently. True, I hadn't used my commercial since 2 days before Halloween, 1999, but it was always there and always something I knew I could fall back on. I know I could just go out and get another commercial endorsement, but I do not want to. The timing of my losing my job one week after dropping my commercial license safety net is downright creepy.

So, if any of you out there know of a good IT job, let me know. I'm a good Help Desk technician, I know tons about PC hardware, I know a lot about Linux/Unix and terminal servers, I run my own website--not currently, but I'll be back up as soon as my DSL line is reconnected-- and know a bunch about Apache, HTML and DNS. I wouldn't say that my knowledge of anything except PC hardware is encyclopedic, but I am a fast learner and I'm willing to travel and work the odd hour or two. Thanks for your thoughts.

I suspect that I'm going to have a bit more time on my hands that I have in the past few months, so updates may start to become daily again. Here's hoping I get a new job quickly.

Thursday January 10, 2001

Last night was a good night. Very productive. On our way home, we stopped to check out 'fridges at Sears. They just happened to have one of the ones we wanted at a price we were willing to pay. Since we don't just buy big stuff without getting some distance first, we went home to eat and let the dog out. After dinner, we hashed it out and decided that the one available at Sears was the one we wanted. We packed up our gear, I took the measurements I made for our bed frame, and grabbed the coupon the repair person left us when he pronounced our old 'fridge stinky. Off we went.

My wife said once we'd bought our refrigerator that there was a tempest going on back in Sears. I'd noticed something was sorta wrong, but I just dismissed it. I used to work at Sears long ago, and I realize what a drag working retail sales is. It turns out that a saleswoman had approached us when we walked in the door. She had asked us if she could be of any help, but we said we were just looking. After about 10 minutes of looking, we buttonhooked a different salesman and started grilling him about our soon to be ours 'fridge. He gave the presentation, he knew what he was talking about, and he was a nice fellow. We got his card and that was that. When we returned, we searched him out, for it was he who had helped us, and bought the 'fridge from him.

Apparently the original saleswoman was pissed. I didn't even realize we had been approached, so when we started talking to the salesman, I thought nothing of it. I started to detect some friction when the saleswoman was churlish when our salesman asked a few "wheresda" questions. She even ignored a question from him, causing him to re-ask it. He obviously felt terrible about it, but she was really laying it on thick. Sure, he got a commission she was probably supposed to get, but, frankly, if I saw what a complete fucking BITCH she was to him before we started the process, I would have avoided her like the bubonic plague. I hope it was a big, fat commission. Needless to say, I felt really sorry for the salesman when I figured the situation out because I just know she lit into him when we were out of earshot. The whole thing just left a bad taste in my mouth. This is not a good thing when a grand is at stake. Dueling sales staff may have tipped my hand against Sears for future purchases. This, after we've purchased both a portable dishwasher and a 'fridge from them within the past two weeks. So, to the sales bitch: May your shit rise up and kiss you full on the lips. To our salesman: Thanks for your time and I hope you don't have to work with the ice queen ever again.

Not having spent enough money that evening, we made another stop at Menards. Menards is a chain lumber/hardware/building materials store and a local institution. Menards is a lumber yard for people who don't work with wood. Anyway, we had a laundry list of items to buy, including the hardware for holding our bed together. After flailing around for a while, I collared a floor drone and asked where the nuts and bolts were. My answer was correct and soon I was divining just exactly what I needed from my measurements.

With each successive find, I was certain that the next thing would be the thing that places like this are usually out of. Carriage bolts. Check. Nuts. Check. "T" brackets. Hmm, smaller than I wanted, but yes, Check. Washers. Check. Lock washers. Check. Wood screws. Check and Check-- two different sizes, you see. Stunned, I made it to the end of my list having found everything. Ho-lee cow!

We walked around until the floors started eating my knees up. I was amazed at how smoothly our visit had gone. Of course, the fly was about to do an ungraceful belly-flop into the ointment.

I have the worst check-out line luck. I have great parking space luck, but this lucky streak ends completely when check-out registers are to be found. I didn't pick the line this evening because I usually pick the one where the person in front of us is buying 1,500 nuts all of a different size requiring a different SKU number to be looked up and scanned with a intermittently failing scan gun. My wife led us to a line with just one person in it who looked to not be buying the entire contents of the Hermitage.

This man's check out went well. To pay, he pulled out a single check from his front pocket. It had already been folded into quarters. Fighting the folds, he proceeded to fill it out. He then gave it to Billy-my-first-job at the cash register who proceeded to take the information off of it. After only goofing twice on the number, he placed it upside down in the printer to try to get it to frank. Remember now, this check had already been folded in quarters and was still quite stiff. I think he tried about 15 times to get it to frank. It took 10 minutes.

All the while, the Ass-Man on duty (a woman) sat gabbing away with another busy cashier. Not only did that slow her down, but she wasn't doing any overridey thing to Johnny Lunch Pail's check to help Billy-my-first-job finish his transaction.

Feet screaming, we finally cashed out smoothly and got the hell out of there.

We returned to the house and I got busy on the bed. After bolting the posts together, I reinforced the center section so that it wouldn't collapse. That's what the "T" brackets were for. I finished up at about 10:30 and we put the bed back together. Sheets, blankets, pillows and that was that. Our bed, returned to service. The first lie down was an ecstasy. I slept well for the first time since the move last night.

Yet another thing to yell about today. I have been waiting for my DSL line to be connected since we moved in. We changed our address on December 10 and moved on December 20th. On the 21st, I called them up like I was told to order DSL. They couldn't test to see if the line was DSL-abled until the connection was physically made. Whatever.

I ordered the same service and added a couple other features and sat back and waited for my new DSL kit to arrive. I could no longer use my Cisco 675 unit as Qwest had changed formats. I had to buy the Cisco 678, but they were giving a good price on it, and that's just fine.

Well now it's the 10th of January and there's no kit. I'm getting a little cheesed off and this morning, something happens to just send me off. A telemarketer calls to offer us a service I'd added on the 21st. Okay... What's going on? Fearing I'd been Qworsted, I called them up. I didn't even remotely like what I found out.

The way it worked out was that when we'd changed addresses, we must have just missed their address update. The nice caller person informed me that the database had just been updated January 7th and that our order could not have been processed prior to that date. Let me get this straight. A telecommunications company that urges us to "Ride the Light" takes a full month to update their address and account databases? The nice caller person then informs me that it will be another 2 weeks until the DSL service is hooked up. So. It takes us a month to get DSL? It takes them a month to change our address? What's this all about? They just about made me a cable broadband customer. I asked them what would happen if I had a business that needed to move? She informed me that the same deal would apply. Holy shit! A month of downtime to move? I suppose a business could set up a second site concurrently with the first, but what happens if you don't have the assets to do this? It's amazing. I'm just amazed that it takes so long for a telecommunications company, a TECHNOLOGY company to process an order. Wow. At least I don't have to worry if I'd been Qworsted. I now have proof.

Wednesday January 9, 2001

Well it finally feels like we're settling in. The buffet, the diningroom table, the library table and the plants are in their final position. Final, that it, until we decide to move them again.

It's another big week this week. We'll be taking delivery of our new couch. We'll be buying a new refrigerator. We'll be getting our DSL service, I hope. The clutter of moving is receding somewhat. I must have cut up a dozen boxes yesterday. A dozen boxes take up a lot of space, don't ya know. Anyway, life is getting better again.

Tonight is the latest battle in the "we gotta get this stuff done now" war. I'm going to try to get our bed back together. Our moving company did a good job except for a couple of things. They followed my orders too closely, and they lost the nuts and bolts that hold our bed together. Not good. We are now 20+ days without the bed and I must say that I'm rather sick of sleeping on the guest beds. They're comfy, but it's just not practical to sleep in a twin bed after 5 years in a king. There's just not enough bed.

I find myself with not a lot to say, so that's it for today.

Tuesday January 8, 2001

Once upon a time, way back a long, long time ago, there was a kid named Tim. Tim was a handful and the all the teachers knew it. That Tim was me.

One day out on the playground we were playing the usual playground games. We were unsupervised as usual, and the game of the day was whack the next guy. Much whacking was being done. Most of the whacking was being done around the slide and, of course, the purpose of this game was to whack as many kids as you could without whacking someone who would actually beat you up. Whack the next guy could be suspended when you were on the slide. Everyone knew what happened when you whacked someone on the side. They fell off or you got in trouble. So it was that this particular day I forgot that bylaw and whacked someone on the slide. They didn't fall off, but I still got in trouble. Oops.

I can't remember if this was a common occurrence or not--me getting in trouble. I suspect it was. I seem to remember spending a lot of time out in the hallway. That was the early '70s version of "Time Out." Anyhow, for my troubles on the playground, I was assigned to see Mr. Knipe.

In hindsight, this must have been the school district's child psychiatrist. I didn't know that at the time. I just had to go see this fellow for an hour about once a week or so. I really didn't like the time I spent with Mr. Knipe. He asked me silly questions that I had no answers for. I didn't like that much. He also had me draw. I couldn't draw very well and I'm sad to say that age hasn't cured me of this inability. I knew I couldn't draw and I usually said I didn't want to, or that I didn't know what to draw. Was I difficult? Yep.

One day, during my little chat with Mr. Knipe, he seemed to get tired of asking me questions I didn't know the answers to. I was, as usual, bored out of my skull. Mr. Knipe then asked me if I wanted to draw. I said, "sure" and out came the tablet. I started drawing the only thing I wanted to draw at the time. A picture of my Dad's car. My Dad's car was coool. I knew it to be a 1969 Ford Torino GT and that, friends, was a BIG DEAL. To me, anyway. I was starting to draw Dad's car, when Mr. Knipe asked me if there was anything else I wanted to draw. "No." was my answer. Mr. Knipe then asked me in a funny sort of way if I wouldn't rather draw a flower. "Why?" I asked. He told me that sometimes it's good to draw other things.

I went back to drawing my Dad's car.

Mr. Knipe let me finish and then asked me to draw a flower. Once again I asked, "Why?" He said that he wanted to see if I could do it. I said I didn't know how. He insisted I draw the flower. So I did.

I remember drawing two lines for a stalk, some kinda round leaves, and a flower that looked like a bunch of circles. In the middle of the flower I drew a frowny face. I then gave my drawing to Mr. Knipe.

"Good flower," he bullshitted, "But why does the flower have a frowny face?"

I replied, "It's because he didn't want me to draw him."

That was our last visit.

Later on that year, I began to see Mr, Cremens. He was way cooler than Mr, Knipe and he let me draw what I wanted. He'd talk about the war, and I'd just sit and listen. Mr. Cremens was so cool.