Tag: trips

U-pick, U-shoot and then U-sleep

On By Luther M. SilerIn lifeLeave a comment

Today’s Fun Family Time included a two-hour drive to an apple orchard up in Michigan; my wife’s side of the family has apparently been doing it as a yearly thing for forever and just decided to invite the out-of-towners this year.

I don’t know if you’ve ever used an apple cannon. I can tell you that after firing $10 worth of apples out of one, I’m going to find a way to build one in our back yard. The apple cannons were absolutely the highlight of the trip; I discovered to my consternation that despite apples generally being among my favorite fruits, when rotting apples is the only thing I can smell in a given location, it’s going to leave me feeling a bit ill, so I was fighting off a shitty mood for most of the afternoon and just mostly trying to keep a smile plastered on my face. The apple cannons totally fixed that problem.

(Also, Christ, there’s nothing that can reduce people to ‘splosion- and cannon-loving Americans faster than seeing someone hit a target with an apple at 50 yards. Wow.)

There was also a large corn maze. Despite having grown up in and spending most of my life living in Indiana, I have never been in a corn maze, and I still haven’t, because the three of us figured we were going to get lost and decided not to make the time investment. I figure you want to do a corn maze when you have time to get hopelessly lost and not when you want to be home before it’s dark.

Then once we got home, in accordance with our most ancient traditions, all three of us retired to separate rooms to recharge and not speak to each other any more, and I fell asleep under a pile of cats, which is why this post is just going up at 9:00 PM.

Tomorrow is not a day off officially, but I took one anyway. I’ve been pretty good about attendance this year and upon realizing that the wife and child would both be home, had a “fuck it” moment and called in a personal day. Hail Columbia, or whatever.

Sure, that’ll be easy

On By Luther M. SilerIn lifeLeave a comment

Another postlet tonight, as I had a meeting this evening regarding a literally once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for my son and I. Only thing is I have to talk my wife into it and then find $12,000.

No problem.

One more try

On By Luther M. SilerIn Cooking5 Comments

I’ve tried this move several times on Twitter, to no effect, and figure I may as well post this here before I live: any Nashville folks reading this?  Anywhere I should make sure to go while I’m in town?  In particular, I want to eat things I can’t eat here.

Daily Prompt: An Ounce of Home

On By Luther M. SilerIn Uncategorized13 Comments

(Doing the Daily Post today.  Why?  Because a part of my Writing Process that I didn’t talk about a couple of days ago is that occasionally I get blocked out of my damn mind and spend four hours staring at a computer screen like a jackass.  Which is what I’ve been doing this morning in between half-assed attempts to figure out a way to market my book/blog/Twitter feed/entire life.  Screw it; YOU tell ME what to write about.

Of course, now that I’ve typed that, I gotta go wander around my house until I can figure out what the answer is.  BAH.)

You’re embarking on a yearlong round-the-world adventure, and can take only one small object with you to remind you of home. What do you bring along for the trip?

(Seriously, walks around the house for ten minutes.)

…

Wait.

Going about this shit all wrong.  Small object?  Cool, I’m bringing a cell phone.  Loaded to the gills with pictures and videos and oh, wait, you can call people with that too?  Awesome.

Oh, that’s cheating?  Okay.

(There’s no rules!  It’s not cheating!  Shut up!)

Fine.  This:

photoThat?  Is my thinkin’ rock, and chances are I should have gone and gotten it out of my desk before now, because my brain’s all screwed up and useless today and I kinda need it.  It’s a rock, with a depression in it to rub your thumb on.  It is a singularly useless object.

Except.

Here’s what you’re really doing when you’re bringing something to “remind you of home.”  You’re bringing something with you to stimulate thinking.  The thinkin’ rock (I swear WordPress you correct thinkin’ to thinking’ one more time and I’ll kill you) is surprisingly calming, actually, for something that literally only exists to provide you a surface to rub your thumb on.  You’d think you could rub your thumb on just about anything, provided it wasn’t, like, sharp or something:  no!  The thinkin’ rock is literally specifically designed for thumb-rubbing.  It’s better!

(It’s also not as… wet?… as it looks in the picture, which makes it look kinda creepy.)

Thinkin’ rock reminds me to think.  Thinking, in this case, is the same as reminiscing, which a good way to kick back and think about your family.

Better, mind you, to bring them with you.  Or at least the damn phone.  But I’ll take the rock too.  I got big pockets.

On venturing into public

On By Luther M. SilerIn idiocy, TeachingLeave a comment

My belly is full of pizza and my brain is full of nonsense. At the moment I prefer the contents of my belly; ultimately the pizza will cost me less. That said, it’s been a very long time since I was getting any kind of exercise regularly– and, despite my near-permanent status as a professional fat dude, I actually enjoy exercise. I got a weird little thrill when my wife pointed out that the current bathroom mirror (which is six feet wide and about four high, with no borders– just a big piece of mirrored glass) ought to go down into the basement as part of our as-yet nonexistent home gym. I was actually angry with myself that I hadn’t thought of it on my own.

I ran into three different families’ worth of students during the ten minutes that I was buying pizza, by the way, which makes me think maybe living in more or less the same neighborhood as my school isn’t that much of an advantage.

One of them asked me what I was doing there, which tells you the caliber of kids I’m dealing with. (Yes, this is an unfair thing to say. No student anywhere thinks his teachers are real people, and running into us in public, thus confirming the unwelcome truth that we exist outside of our classrooms, is always an occasion for wonder and mystery. But it’s still funny.)

“I’m here for pizza,” I told her.

“Really?” she asked.

I leaned forward.

“I actually live here,” I whispered, and pointed under one of the chairs by the door. “I slept there last night. Don’t tell anybody.”

Her eyes tripled in size. Her mother got their pizza (I was waiting for a Deep Dish pizza, which takes longer even though it’s more of a Deep Ish pizza) and shot me a weird look as they left.

By the time the third family said hello and left, I think the employees thought I was some sort of rock star.

The pudgy, bald, talentless kind, of course.

I tried to spend part of last night applying for a field trip grant through Target. Have I mentioned the DC trip yet? I take a group of seventh and eighth graders to Washington, D.C. every two years, and this year is a travel year. The trip is hella expensive so we’re trying to find a good way to pay for it that doesn’t involve me having to run a fundraiser. First it took twenty minutes and two changes of my password to log into the site, which is justweird, and then after taking three thousand or so characters to say I want to take my kids to DC so they can lern history gud, it lost my entire application except for the biographical part at the beginning. Frustrated, I tried to flip to the last section of the application, which asks me to break the trip cost down in ways that are frankly impossible (it costs, roughly, $800 per kid, but that’s a flat fee– they don’t break it down by transportation or food or lodging or whatever. It’s just $800. Target wants everything broken down specifically– I can’t even realistically estimate those numbers– and I doubt they’ll like it very much if I just put $32,000 HOLY FUCKING HELL ARE WE SERIOUSLY PAYING THEM THIRTY-TWO GRAND into one of the boxes.

Holy shit. How the hell are they making thirty-two thousand dollars off of us? That’s fucking insane. Mental note: redouble plans to become a DC tour guide once I decide I can’t teach any longer.

Jesus.