Five

moiI didn’t note the day or the month, or even the year, for that matter. We say “when we were twelve” because that’s our best guess (though she probably remembers better than I).

It doesn’t really matter, the specific date, or even the year. What matters is that we met, and talked for a while one random, long-forgotten night. And then again another night, and another.

It was lost for a while, changes in life, adjustments in time zone, we didn’t connect at all and eventually lost touch completely. Until another random, long-forgotten night, when I decided to clean out my contacts list. She happened to be online, so I asked who she was. We talked some more, and eventually made a connection to an event we both remembered (something about underwear and pyromania).

Even for this, it doesn’t really matter, the specific date or time that we found each other again. What matters is that we did, and that we talked again, and again, and again, and then some more.

312570_10150300651507539_1218378609_nTime went by, and the story evolved in the way so many do. Boy meets girl, boy decides he likes girl and girl decides she likes boy, they get together and make the best of it. But that’s where we are a little different, because we are so far separated. Not in a Romeo/Juliet kind of way, our families didn’t hate each other – they didn’t even know each other. We faced a different challenge: isolation. I lived in Wellington, New Zealand, she lived in a small town somewhere in Virginia.

Somehow, though, we made it work. Through plane tickets and immigration paperwork and moving and money and more immigration paperwork, we made it work. And so here we are. Today marks five years since we committed to what we had in front of friends and family, what we had essentially committed to a few months before that by beginning the application process to USCIS, what we had almost committed to just by stepping foot on the planes the very first time, flying to meet the other, meeting the friends and family, seeing the home towns and environs.

Kelly, I love you. Here is to another five years, and then another five, and another five after that, until how long it has been doesn’t really matter anymore, until what matters is that we met that random, long forgotten night, so many years ago. You were, are, and maybe always will be the best decision I ever made – to ask who you were, and not to just hit “Delete.”

556623_551722792429_474591033_n

Trains from Broadway

2013-05-16_0141

Last night I happened upon a large number of old train documents that have been added to Google Books recently. I haven’t scanned for more recent dates, I just looked at 1906 and found three trains in each direction served the small town of Broadway, VA. That’s six a day, and four of those went to or came from Washington DC!

What’s more interesting is that I know where all of those locations are. And that the trip took upwards of five hours! Five! Today, we drive most of that in two hours, maybe three if you skip the interstates!

For more old train timetables, for anyone who is interested in the history or other parts of the country in that era, here is some more information on how to find the books in Google’s archives: http://www.naotc.org/oldguides/index.html

Changing Timezones

Changing timezone without moving anywhere. It’s a tough assignment, but I’ve been able to do it.

Since September 2010 I’ve been working for Rosetta Stone’s test lab on the second shift, generally working somewhere in the vicinity of 5pm-midnight. In the last few days I was asked if I would be interested in swapping positions with a member of the day shift team who needed to move for personal/family reasons.

I elected to think about it, and later accepted. As of yesterday (and everyone I work with is now aware of this, so I can tell the world in full), I am a member of day shift working “normal people” hours! I’m still officially part time, so there is no change in my 35 hour limit. The only change in pay has been a result of my regular company raise (also received that notice today!) so really all that changes for me is starting in the morning and finishing in the evening, and not the other way around..

New Home

Since the inception of this blog, it’s been hosted at WordPress.com. It was a logical choice for several reasons, predominantly because at the time I didn’t have a reliable web host and also because I wasn’t sure I would be able to commit to making regular updates.

As it turns out I’ve made a number of posts over the last four years and things I wanted to be able to do were being restricted by using a hosting service.

And so we have this new home: http://blog.i-al.net/. Much like the old one, but hosted by me. If it’s broken, blame me.

Where I’ve Been


visited 18 states (36%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or another interesting project

I thought this was kind of cool, I stumbled on it on a blog and thought I’d make my own. California hardly counts because it was only LAX, but it’s been three times so I put it in. Some of the others are just passing-through, but why not?

Photo Friday: Lonely

 

This was one of the last things I photographed in New Zealand, taken just a couple of weeks before I moved. I don’t know if it’s supposed to be a duck or a chicken, but it was sitting out in the rain close to the Wellington Airport.

I had decided to take a couple of days and just drive around, driving in no particular planned direction, just to see where I ended up and discover new things, as well as remembering old things.

The Drive Around the Bays is one I have done many times with my friends Sue and Amber, usually after church on a Sunday evening. We’d drive into Wellington and then do the loop around the bays (if you find a map of Wellington, it was basically a road that went all the way around the knob bit to the east of the airport). We’d stop somewhere and eat dinner – usually McDonalds or KFC, and then drive home. It was also a great time to talk about all kinds of things.

It’s certainly a downside here, not having the people to go with (it’d be fun to just drive somewhere with Kelly, but that was part of the fun of Sunday nights, being with friends I didn’t live with), and not really having the same kind of places to go.

 

Photo Friday: Wildlife [in Public Places]

These are a pair of photos taken in none-other than the capital of the nation – Washington D.C.

Both taken in/around the national mall, in fact.

It was on one of my early trips to DC that we visited the mall, and I was intrigued by the wildlife present in the city.

Coming from Wellington I was used to birds, but not so much other ground creatures. Maybe I just didn’t notice (and no, pigeons on the ground don’t count).

 

Photo Friday: Something Gold

What else could it be? This is Crash, my golden retriever. He weighs 115lb (not overweight, either, he’s just that big!), he will beat you to death with his excited tail, and is generally a furball of happy.

You may have noticed the last four posts resemble an old adage.. It wasn’t intentional, at least, it wasn’t when I posted the first one. Something new, something old, something moo, something gold. Cheesy, yes. I just hope that someone enjoyed it!

Photo Friday: Something New

I try really hard to take photos of things that aren’t trains, and most of the time this endeavor fails. Most Fridays I can be found somewhere close to a railroad track, holding a camera, listening to a scanner, and probably watching ATCS to find the next one. Last week I tried something new, I tried to break out of my regular photographic style a little. It kind of worked, though it is certainly in need of practice.

Typically I go for shots taken from close to the tracks, whenever possible. I have a few spots that I know well and use regularly. On Friday I tried to break out of that, and try firstly a different method of composition, and a couple of different places that I’ve never used, or never used in the same way before.

Such as the siding at Lynnwood (just south of Elkton, north of Grottoes). Usually I take up position on the east side of the tracks and get a nice tight view of the northbound train. This time I took the west-side, way back from the tracks and went for a wide view. The composition was good, but on reviewing the shots later, the camera didn’t cooperate with focus at all.

I did get this one, however, a little later in the day, at La Grange, just west of Staunton. Amtrak train #51, the westbound Cardinal between New York and Chicago is running a few minutes late on a Friday afternoon. If you look closely, you’ll see a full-length dome at the end. That is Amtrak’s last, and is placed on the Cardinal for a couple of trips during fall every year.

John William Polidori

… was a man who lived in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, and was the personal physician to Lord Byron. As well as a doctor, he was also a writer.

In June of 1816, after being a part of a group who all read aloud from a particular collection of horror stories, it was suggested that they should each write a ghost story.

It is because of this, primarily, that we were invited to visit with friends in Charlotte, North Carolina this weekend. Every 6 months or so there is a group who meet and share their creative written works, completed or otherwise, for the rest of the group. The general rules are an unwritten limit on time (ie, 10 page readings are generally frowned upon), an expectation that it is a new work (the idea being that it was written that day, or in the day or two beforehand), and a general air of support and positivity. It isn’t so much a place to critique works (although that can be performed later), as to simply share ideas with each other.

Before reading your piece, you have the opportunity to make a disclaimer. In my case, I am not a fiction writer. I’m not good at making up stories. Typically, my best opportunity is to take a real event and either try to adjust it or totally change it so that it works but is not the same. In this specific story, I have to concede that neither the original story, nor the idea utilized in it are totally mine: I’ve read three similar stories in a book several years ago, and decided to try my hand at the idea. I also apologize to anyone who understands banking a lot better than I do.

This is the story I wrote and shared on Saturday:

For the kingdom of heaven is as a man travelling into a far country, who called his own servants, and delivered unto them his wealth.

And unto one he gave five talents, to another two talents, and to another one talent; to every man according to his previous performance; and straightway joined the great queue that was for airport security, where he did wait upwards of forty five minutes.

Then he that had received the five talents went and traded on the stock market with the same, and made them other five talents.

And likewise he that had received two talents, he also gained other two talents.

But he that had received but one talent went and deposited in a local savings bank, with a minimal interest return, and hid his lord’s money.

After a long time the lord of those servants cometh, and reckoneth with them.

And so he that had received five talents came, saying, “Lord, thou deliveredst unto me five talents: behold, I have gained beside them five more.”

His lord said unto him, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.”

He also that had received two talents came, and said, “Lord, thou deliveredst unto me two talents: behold, I have gained two talents other beside them.”

His lord said unto him, “Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.”

Then he which had received one talent came and said, “My master, how was thine flight? I trust the staff did treat you well and granted unto thee many blessings of food and wine.”

His lord interjected his blathering and said unto him, “The flight was fine, the food, I have had worse. Now, where is that which I entrusted unto thee? I wish to see what thou hast done with mine wealth.”

“Lord, I knew thee that thou art an hard man, reaping where thou hast not sown, and I was uncertain of the stock market and how it doth worketh, and went and hid thy talent in the local savings bank, with minimal interest return: lo, there thou hast that is thine.”

His lord answered and said unto him, “Thou wicked and slothful servant, thou knewest that I reap where I sowed not: Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to bonds with a good history, or gold, or perhaps put it unto reliable enterprises who grant dividends, and then at my coming-”

And he did stop speaking, for he was distracted by the sudden weeping and gnashing of teeth from those who had doubled their moneys, and asked of them what was wrong.

And they did look up from their intelligent telephones, with looks of great horror, for they had just seen the news.

And they did share the news with their master, for he was looking at them expectantly.

And they said “It has just been reported that the companies in which we had bought stock are failing, and the value of our shares has dropped unprecedentedly.”

Their lord opened the drawer of his desk and withdrew a bottle and four small glasses.

And he said unto them, “Well, I suppose we can ask the government for an bail out..”