July 2001

Shall I tell you the secret of the true scholar? It is this; 

every man I meet is my master in some point, and in that I learn of him. 

Ralph Waldo Emerson, (1803-1882)

writer and philosopher 

Sunday                                   July 1, 1999  

Today was pretty much a waste... got virtually nothing accomplished. I wanted to clean up in the off chance my cousin Martha would want to come up here... God Forbid!!! This place makes Calcutta look spiffy... I do a lot of whining about this dump but to be honest it is my fault it looks this bad... it has held up remarkably well considering the level of maintenance it has received... it is sound, it just looks like hell. I did two loads of dishes today, Christy did another... and the sink is full again... the logistics of managing this asylum are too surreal to explain... Nobody who hasn't been through it would believe it... maybe I am just not equipped for the job...

I had a long (for us) conversation with my sister Susan... today. She told me that her father-in-law passed away on the 15th. Ross Dean, same name as her husband, I had met him four or five times over the last twenty some odd years... he was a "What You See Is What You Get" man. He was little intimidating to me for a long time... I sat and talked to him while I was staying at his house for my mother's funeral... he was not in the best of health then but he was the most gracious man I have ever met. I am told he was a shrewd and tough business man. I think that even I could detect that he was not a man you would want to cross. He lived a full life and raised a strong family that he was proud of... not everyone is that blessed.

In retrospect it becomes clear that hindsight is definitely overrated.

(?)

Monday                                  July 2, 2000  

Christy, Calie and I cleaned the house after I got Mike and Autumn to school... I made it to Don Cuco's 12:50 and Martha was waiting... she had been here and driving around town for an hour. 

Meeting Martha for the first time was a real treat for me.. (I'm experiencing a vocabulary malfunction, Can't think of the word that I should be using.) We sat in Don Cuco's and talked for about an hour... she was easy to talk to and very candid explaining her life to me... very refreshing. 

She has an 18 year old daughter (Bailey) at home... I don't have a picture yet. I think Martha looks very much like her mother. (Don't you?) 

I will do my very best to connect up with her back in Maulden, Massachusetts... I want to spin by Leigh's then see Martha again and drive up to see Uncle Bob and cousin Tom with her (Only an hour's drive she says)

I want to leave here on the 19th and stop in Iowa and Pennsylvania in the way to Atlantic City... I will be in AC from the 26th to the 28th then try to get up to Ashland. I want to see my cousin's Dick and Bill in Massachusetts and Connecticut and too... I am not sure if I will stop in on my Aunt and Uncle, Cecil and Emily, I will wait to talk to Bill... and see if they are up to having visitors.  I hope to be able stop and see my cousins JoAnne, Jeanie and John on the way back... damn this is incoherent... I will edit this tomorrow... I am to tired to do it now....

Tuesday                                  July 3, 2000  

The man who is denied the opportunity of taking decisions of importance begins to regard as important the decisions he is allowed to take. 

C. Northcote Parkinson, (1909-1993)

author and historian 

..Took Calie and Da Moke Calie said... "look at the Lighteling" and DaMoke said, "it looks like a Tomato" I asked if she meant "Tornado" she said "What-ever"... So today was hot and muggy with Lighteling and Tomatoes... there was actually some rain over toward Palmdale. 

Looks like the alternator is kaput on the Bucking Fuick... another $300.00... 

The trip is shaping up... I will leave here about the 19th and head north to Salt Lake then Denver... I should arrive in Des Moines

FOURTH OF JULY

We got up at 0700 and started getting ready to go to the parade... I wanted to leave at 0800 but it was 20 after before we hit the road... we were invited to park at Jeff's house, accross the alley from Actron School.. we blasted down Crown Valley Road and got to the freeway and crawled the rest of the way... we arrived on time but it was an exasperating ride...There were a 94 entries this year... the procession took longer than the Rose Parade. No Stealth fly-by this year... but they had an old F14 owned and flown by a fella in Agua Dulce. More old cars and a couple more bands on floats... It is the high point of the year for the town I really enjoy it... People are nice to each other, they talk and smile a lot... I wish it was the Fourth Of July every Wednesday. This town could learn to lighten up a little... 

I decided that we would watch the fireworks from up in the hills... glad I did... it was beautiful... If Ben Franklin could have been there he would have guessed that Palmdale was under attack... it was beautiful... I could see three professional fireworks displays and I guess there must have been 200 block parties, I don't know where they get the sky rockets... seems pretty dangerous... shooting of fireworks here in Acton will get you lynched... the prospect of fire scares me. There is always some one new to the town who thinks he's got the right to blow off some pyrotechnics like he did back in the City. 

I didn't get much Patriotic E-Mail this year... wonder why. I'm not feeling as patriotic this year either... I just have a sinking feeling we aren't in control of the direction the country is going... it seems a bit like that train that was chugging across the Midwest without an engineer. The Economy is in the hands of a bunch of opportunists, ... this is not a happy thought... I will drop it... 

Thursday                                July 5, 2001  

It is as hard for the good to suspect evil, as it is for the bad to suspect good. 

-Marcus Tullius Cicero,(106-43 BCE)

 statesman, orator, writer 

The closer I get to leaving on the trip the more anxious I am to go...  I have lingering doubts about the ability of the Cadillac to complete the trip but even if it completely dies I don't think it will be much of a problem. in 1962 I may have been anxious but in 2001 it isn't a big concern, Cell phones & AAA alleviate a lot of anxiety... I think that I will replace the battery and get it serviced before I go though... 

I will be stopping in Fort Collins and Colfax Iowa either on the way to or from Atlantic City. I will stop in Daggett and Lebanon, PA  on the way there and hit Granby, Connecticut, Leicester, Arlington and Wakefield, Mass, Concord, New Hampshire, Presque Isle and Ashland Maine Baileyville Ill and Waterloo Iowa on the way back... writing this all out the trip sounds a bit Quixotic but I don't know that I will be able to do it again in the near future or ever for that matter... 

The Radiator is cracked... needs to be replaced... along with the battery and the alternator ---  $790.00 the Bucking Fuick has been a thorn in our side since we got it. We have never been in able to convince ourselves that we should replace it... it's paid for... when you get right down to it $790 isn't too bad when you compare what we would have to pay to get a new car... but... still... bad timing for an unexpected bill... 

I got a notice from Bill telling me all the neat things he's done with Office XP. Each CD can be loaded once, you can boot up 50 times but if you haven't registered by the 50th boot it will revert to a diminished functionality (Lord knows what that means), Since you have to register to get the unlocking code, trying to load your XP program on more than one PC will not work...If your hard drive crashes you will have to call up and get the code again.

I sent this off to Microsoft:

Dear Bill

I think that your paranoid licensing practices are going to virtually destroy your home user market... I am retired on a fixed income... I bought and paid (retail) for Windows ME and Office Pro 2000 and loaded it on my home PCs... I have a laptop and two more older PC's that the wife and kids use... there is no way I can pay for Office XP on all of my PCs... Looks like I will have to look into Linux... Good Bye Microsoft... been fun but you folks have enough of my Money.

Pete Daggett

Friday                                     July 6, 2001  

I took the kids to school and went to pick up "B"... it rained all the way over there and all the way back... this is "Monsoon Season" here, usually means nothing except it gets a little muggy but we have actually been getting some rain... the Monsoons usually clobber Arizona every year but so far no...

I called Leigh I planned to take a few days and do some visiting… second stop being my sisters place in Arlington, Mass. My propensity for procrastination dictated that I not contact her till the last minute only to find out that while I am on the East Coast she will be in Ojai, California … they are going to have a family reunion/Birthday Party on Catalina.... Bummer. I need to make some phone calls and see if any of the other people I plan to visit will actually be home. It's vacation time... I'm taking a vacation... it's natural to presume that I am not the only one... they will probably all be in the Bahamas. (Expect the worst, you'll never be disappointed)

The Bucking Fuick cost $801... that is an significant bite out of my vacation budget... I should be OK but it doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room if things go wrong.

Autumn had a seizure tonight... it didn't seem bad, I have seen her have much more impressive events. But when this one was over it was like she had had a stroke... she was so weak she couldn't move... only her left arm and she was angry. usually she just smiles like someone had played a funny joke on her but this time see seemed very angry... she woke up Saturday morning and seemed fine... a little weak but otherwise she was fine. 

Saturday                                 July 7, 2001  

We have had Bonnie's kids every day but the 4th... poor little Eric has a shunt that is not working properly... she had to take him to the hospital Monday, so we had them Monday and Tuesday. She took Eric home and then had to take him in again on Thursday she picked the kids up Friday but Eric needed to go back to the hospital so Christy drove up to get the kids at 0230 so Bonnie could leave... Eric will spend the night... we are keeping the kids here so she can get some sleep. 

Christy didn't go to church, mostly because we were concerned about Autumn... Yesterday Bonnie had left her van at the AV Hospital and ridden down to Kaiser Sunset in the ambulance with Eric... so Chris drove down to get her so she could go home and get some rest. 

 The belt came off the washer again... it's easy to fix but it takes about an hour... first I have to remove the clothes, then empty the Shop-Vac, then suck the water out of the washer so I can move it out of it's slot... this means I have to disconnect the hoses, the hot water shut of... doesn't so I have to take of the washer hose and quick put on a garden hose so it won't spray water all over everything... it didn't matter because I dropped the drain hose and dumped about a gallon of water on the floor... I got the water out, reinstalled the belt... vacuumed up the water I spilled... I guess it really isn't so easy to fix...

I need to set up an Earthlink account or something so that I can get online while I'm on the trip... I don't expect to be updating this till I get back but I would like to send back some e-mail... hell of a lot cheaper than calling... I hate AOL, can't bring myself to use it... perhaps I can use Christy's Prodigy, I will give it a try... all I need is an access number... I think I can access my e-mail account remotely... not sure what the process will be, I have never done it before. 

I got a peek at Tiger Woods today... he can't win this thing but he is coming on strong... he seems to be having fun playing golf too, I can't imagine what it would be like to be him. He is so poised and articulate, he has a talent for golf that is bordering on extraterrestrial. I have never had any talent ( I am a pretty good whistler...and have a talent for procrastination that is legendary) and I have no poise at all and I freeze up in public. Tiger may as well be an alien for all the similarity I have with him 

Sunday                                   July 8, 2001

My tooth is really giving me fits, I have an appointment on the 16th but I don't think I can wait... 

We pulled up the carpet in the Dining room... I will sand the floor tomorrow and put some of that fast drying synthetic varnish on it... then I will tile it... finally... maybe I can get the dry wall up too... need to put up a ceiling also... I am tired of looking at this mess. Bonnie came and picked up jer kids about 1500... I took "B" back to Devereux at 1730... got back at 2330... I am beginning to dislike the drive. 

Mike pressured me to take him to the Skate Park in Saugus. I was not going to leave him there but I took him anyway... it was closed... it has apparently been vandalized too many times... cracks me up... Mike slept all the way to Golita but we talked on the way back. It is simply bewildering to me how self-centered and ignorant of the real world a 13 year old can be... I was 13 once... I was a jerk too... every 13 year old thinks they have all the answers... and every 13 year old is so wrong.