Crybabies

It seems that Rebecca and I have being crying a lot lately. And it is okay. After Andi's death we both have walked around on the verge of tears but this is different. It seemed that with Andi gone we both did not want to cry in front of each other because we did not want to upset each other. I know it sounds silly but it is true. Over the past few weeks we have gotten closer than we have ever been. The other night we were watching the movies "World Trade Center" and cried like babies. It struck us right in the heart and hit upon on how we feel about each other. Especially the relationship of Nicholas Cage's character and his wife. How they fought for each other. It was a very powerful tribute to everybody that survived and died that day. Then we have been watching the series "Band of Brothers." (she got it for me for Christmas) We see these young men, we know that they are actors, making history. We have realalized that this was our grandfathers. My pappy was a tank operator in France. I can just see him now. A short, stockey, Oklahoma farm boy driving around France in a tank. I can only imagine what the hell was going through his mind. On a lighter note, I am have one of my articles featured on Fire Engineerings web site soon. I will put the link on this here blog. In Oklahoma we pronounce it "blawg."

Above Average at Walmart.

Did you know that the average person spends $100.00 each time they go to Walmart? So with that said I am an above average Walmart shopper. It used to be I hated to break a $20.00 bill, now it seems like I am breaking $100.00 bills like crazy. Even a Reuben sandwich costs almost $7.00 at the deli.

Well, enough griping about money. Merry Christmas to everybody.

Don't you wish that the truth in advertising clause pertained to other avenues of our lives. Wouldn't it be cool if we all had a Surgeon General warning across our backs like a pack of cigarettes? The little weasel at work would have one that said "I like the tip of my nose to stay brown and would sell my own mother up the river for a promotion." Or the the cute lady at the end of the bar, hers would say " I am very superficial, this is not my real eye color, hair color, boobs, or thighs. I am crazy and still obsessing over my boyfriend three boyfriends ago." Of course the guy at the end of the bar would have one that said "jerk, jerk, jerk,." What would yours say?

MERRY CHRISTMAS YA'LL

Forgiveness

I have had to plan my dad's funeral today. This one thing that I felt that I would never had to do. He and I were not close. I had not seen him in almost 20 years. I had only spoken with him only once during this time. He died early Wednesday morning after having a major heart attack the night before. He was an organ donor and his kidneys are now inside two other people. I hope that they take this opportunity to live their life to the fullest, love their families, and hug their children.

I felt it strange to stand along side his body as the ventilators made his chest rise and fall. The doctors stated that his EEG indicated that only his brain stem was working and that all higher function was nonexistent. Across from me was a woman that I never met that had become his wife 18 years ago. I did not know what to say. Would could you say? I met my 8 year old half-sister. I introduced myself as "Hi, I'm Kris, I think that I am your big brother." My daughter has an aunt that is 5 years younger than her.

I stated earlier that it was a heart attack. Nobody really knows. I think he had a massive stroke. His EKG was great (I know how to read them). His wife said that his neck and head were hurting before he died. Historically us DeMauros have strong hearts, it is our brains that have always been a bit suspect. As most of you can attest that know me. They left me alone with him for a while. The tears fell pretty hard. I could not figure it out if I was grieving what I had lost or what I had never had. Sometimes it is hard to tell the two apart. I bent down to his ear and asked him to forgive me and I told him that I forgave him. We are going to have a simple memorial service next Saturday. He wanted to be cremated.

Thanks to Rebecca for all of her love and support and to my beautiful children. Poppy loves you.

What is it, male or female?

The India Olympic committee has a sticky situation on thier hands. It appears that their best female runner may be male. After a recent complaint the committee had the athlete examined and the result came back male. I don't know if this was some kind of genetic abnormality or if he was just tucking the boys back. I know several "athletes" and have talked with them in tha past about the pressure they feel to perform. Several of the younger guys on the job with me are really into personal fitness. I wish that I had been earlier in my career. These guys buy and use all types of poweders, mixes, juiced, and potions. Eat raw eggs and tons of tuna. These guys also have practically no sick leave left. You can almost bet that at least one of them will call in sick every shift. Those of us that have been around a while get what we like to call the "turkey flu". It affects your eyes and you butt. After you get it you just can't see your ass going to work. I know it is an old joke but it is still damn funny. Have a good day. I got a standard operating procedures review and rewrite committee meeting to attend to this morning. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

It's the death penalty for goodness sakes.

California and Florida have placed a moritorium on the lethal injection/death penalty due to the fact that it may cause pain and mental anguish for the condemned inmate. In the Florida case the person that established the IV on the inmate missed the vein causing the drugs to go into the surrounding tissue. The inmate was alive for around 30 minutes after the injection. A normal lethal drug injection should render the inmate unconscious in around 2-3 minutes and the bastard should be dead in no later than 15 minutes. Some limp-wristed pussy doctor who probably is a proctologist stated that the inmate suffered. You think? Let me vent on this one folks. For all of you that feel that the death penalty is wrong, you are going to get an ear full. All human life is precious regardless how useless any one human may be. The death penalty is the ultimate deterrent. All of those men and women who have paid for their crimes with their life will never commit another crime again. No repeat offenses after that. Did you know that the last bastard to be executed in Florida was on death row since 1979? He was on death row longer than his victim was alive. Horrible travesty of justice. Now here comes my redneck DNA flaring up. I have spent most of my adult life trying to save people. But, I would have no problem working in a prison starting IVs and killing those people. I could sleep well at night and all would be right with my soul. I am very good at starting IVs in strange and odd places. What about the victims, the families, the children..............what about us?

Here come da bus, here come da bu

Though we drove it to the station, it had to be hauled away on a tow truck. Below are some of the pictures of the bus. The picture of the fire engine is a good one also. It is engine two. The engine that I work out of. It is a 2003 ALF rescue - pumper. We call it the Anna Nicole as in Anna Nicole Smith. She is big, slow, full of junk, and have had about a dozen men in here at one time or another.

12 firemen, 2 junk cars, I old YMCA bus, and a bunch of tools.

I have the best job in the world. For the last two days the "City" has paid me my overtime rate to tear up cars and a bus with a backhoe. WOW. I just finished teaching a two-day auto extrication class that focused on mass transit. I had 10 students from our department, most of them soon to be officers. It was one of the best classes that I have ever taught. I used a process called self directed work teams. It pairs experienced firefighters together with less experienced firefighters to work as a team and figure out complex problems. The instructors act as guides, safety officers, and coaches.

The first picture is of me looking into the back of a car that the students were practicing a technique called "tunneling". Using hydraulic rescue tools they cut through the car body to get to the victims. Every one at home is fine, including my sweety. Have a great evening.

11 questions about men.

As usual I was reading the morning web news and came across an article about men. Of course I made it more relevant. Q. Why do men say they will call you but don't? A. He got tired of listening to you complain about your ex for two hours on your last date. Q. Why do men talk about their jobs during dates? A. Quite simple, men often find their identity in their careers Q. Why do men want to hump everything in a skirt? A. If it bugs you quit wearing skirts. Q. Why do men lie about the littlest things? A. Because when he told you the truth you nagged his ass for weeks and would not shut the hell up. Q. Why doesn't he talk to me? A. This is a two-part question: first you will not shut up. Second a man has a different type of hearing system. You may have said the following: I was at Jenny's house and just wanted a cup of hot coffee with sugar and all she could talk about how much sex her sister Susan has. What he heard was : I want hot sex. Q. Do these pants make my ass look big? A. No. ......................................................................................................................................................................... Have a good day.........Take a moment to say hello to somebody today.

Dance like nobody is watching.

I have finished a leadership class that has to be one of the best that I have ever attended. This last session was on developing a personal life style that allows you to succeed in your career. It focused on health and wellness, stress relief, and personal development. The key item was to "dance like nobody is watching." Over the next week I am teaching a school bus rescue class. I will be posting pictures over the next few days. I will have to admit I do enjoy teaching. I have never wanted to be a school teacher, but the thought of having a captive audience for all of my jokes and ideas is intriguing. In this school bus class I am going to introduce some new skills to our department and hopefully have an article published in Fire Engineering Magazine on innovative training opportunities. The picture posted with this blog entry is during a training session I developed this past summer. We used a soon to be demolished public swimming pool locker room for live fire training. For those that study management theory I feel that I have reach the top of Maslow hierarchy of needs' pyramid. I have also notice that my bunker coat is too big. It is the one used to wear a few years ago.

Along with that all is good, the wife and kids are beautiful and I got most of my shopping done. Until next time......

Its too danged cold

Why do we put a scarf on a snowman? Isn't that like giving the wicked witch from the wizard of oz a bubble bath. This morning it is 7 degrees here in our little slice of paradise. I don't think that the heater has shut off any. I watch the morning news while I blogg. Typical stuff this morning, power outages due to ice, car wrecks, politics, blah, blah. OH, Barak Obama versus Hillary Clinton? I am excited about the republican ticket of Giuliani and Condi "hot pants" Rice. Well I am off to the Casa de bomberos, keep warm, keep safe, keep it real yo.

Why Men Cheat...For really

This morning I read a blog (here is the link http://health.yahoo.com/experts/menlovesex/2/why-men-cheat ) regarding why men cheat. This point of view was the traditional man cheating on his female partner with another female. The author gave four reasons: Biologically we (men) are wired to wander, to get the attention we need or may not be getting from home, in order to get out of a relationship, and finally because the sex is getting boring. The author of the blog knows his stuff, hell he even used a lot of big words. BUT, I think his editor (probaly a woman) may have sanitized it a bit. So, I gonna keep it real for all of us. Some men cheat because they are still little boys. Spoiled little boys want what they want when they want it. Some men cheat because the can see no further in life than the head of their own peckers. God gave us enough blood to run a brain and a dick, but not at the same time. Some men cheat because they are opportunistic. They have no intentions of ever cheating and then along comes Condi Rice, a few drinks, and Bam! We are knocking boots. That was the easy stuff, let's dig a little deeper shall we? Before we married you we were the most brilliant person you ever met. Now the we are married we (men) are the dumbest bastards God ever created. The wife often takes on the role of a mother. Most men do not want a mother. Actually what most men want is Mrs. Cleaver, mixed with the young Elizabeth Taylor (seen Cleopatra?), throw in some Marilyn Monroe, add Rebecca DeMornay in Risky Business, and top it off with any female porn star. Simple huh? Now that I have added sex in the mix, let me explain it. God most assuredly has His "A" game on when he came up with the female body. You can find something beautiful in any woman. Now men have different tastes in women. Some like butts, some like boobs, some like legs, some like certain hair color or race. Most of this stems from early influences in a mans life or first experiences. I wonder how many men married women that look like their school teachers when they themselves were in the 6th or 7th grade? For a man every sexual encounter with his wife is not going to be an epic love scene. Sometimes it is just sex. Nothing bad, but just sex. A man needs to borrow a part of your anatomy, not your brain, and have sex with it. It does not mean he doesn't love you, or that he thinks less of you. It is just sex. It will be the roughess-toughess 15 - 35 seconds you ever had. Now I am not going to talk about the sex act itself. If you and your wife are having issues with different sex, uh, things. Ya'll should have figure that shit out before you got married. It is kind of too late after she has got half of your pension, your truck, and the house to learn that Miss Freak-a-deaky has turned into Mrs Squeaky-squeaky. I am not saying that you should have had sex before you married her, but, maybe you should have at least talked about it before you sprang the old "bobbin' for apples" routine on her during your honeymoon. And finally, a man washes his truck every weekend because he likes nice things. He wants people to think when he drives by "that man likes nice things." So in the spirit of a washed truck, ladies get your ass out of those sweat pants and into a pair of 501s. Do women know that a pair of sweatpants can make even a size 0 ass look like two bear cubs fighting in a gunny sack? Don't give me that bullshit about "I should feel comfortable about our relationship that I can relax and be myself." I can almost assure you that he did not marry you for your backside, but it was a bargaining chip that got him to the table............. Ah shit my wife is up....Better go before she sees me writing this....Yes dear!.......

Why, Why, Why?

This morning while I was reading the Sunday editorials I began to feel my self getting very angry. Not just piss and vinegar angry, but gas at $2.99 a gallon angry. I was reading an editorial by a Mr. Stanley Crouch. In his editorial he commented about police violence and police killings. Primarily the recent New York police shooting involved an unarmed black man. After reading the entire editorial I finally calmed down and was able to see his view on the matter. I do agree that the vast majority of police related shootings are white officers shooting black men. My question is "why is this so?" Are all black men, all black people, criminals? I will say no. Most of the good male influences in my younger life were black men. (For those of you reading from afar, I'm a white-guy, I mean if Italian-Irish-Cherokee is considered "white".) Mr. Crouch relates some of these troubles to the disparity and the rapid growth of drugs in the black community. I would agree but these are results of an underlying situation that I am still having trouble grasping. Is it from the lack of a strong male role model in the black community. Is it from the growing trend of grandparents raising their grandchildren. What is it? And how has the media shaped this image? The scene from a Jerry Springer episode where a black women with several children confronts her boyfriend about cheating on her with her sister. Here is the boyfriend with gold teeth and a doo-rag speaking fluent ebonics yelling at his girlfriend while she is busy taking off giant golden hoop earrings with fingernails so long that she can barely use her fingers. Then they begin to fight and hair extensions begin to fly!. Finally somebody will say something about her parenting abilities and her only reply is "I feed my kids." Like feeding her kids is something most parents do not do, but she does and it makes her special. For those of us in the "real" world we question ourselves. First; "Why am I watching this?". Second; "If she can afford 200 dollar hair extensions, 75 dollar fingernails, 1,000 dollars worth of jewelry, then why is she living in public housing on government assistance?" Third; "If he can afford gold teeth why does he not pay child support?" I understand that some of this is "cultural differences" but what is going on? Have we as a society failed the black community by trying to compensate for a great injustice? Every community with a large black population has some kind of "Project This" or "Operation That." These groups promote reading, safe sex, drug resistance, and a host of others issues, all important, but there seems to be no change. Why are there so many issues of negativity affecting the black community? Why does this section of black society dwell on a self-destructive lifestyle. Every race, creed, religion, group, or culture has had a history of tyranny and slavery. Show me a culture or society that has not had slavery as parts of it's foundation. The Egyptians enslaved the Israelites. The Inca had slaves, the Mayans had slaves. Heck even many of the Irish immigrants that came to America in the era around 1900 where brought here as a type of slave. Is the reason for white - black racial tension do to the violence between the two groups. I will agree that the violence early on was mostly white on black. But, aren't most black men in prison for homocide there for killing other black men. It has been 42 years since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. Have things gotten any better? Maybe we should quit blaming the present state of our lives on things that have happened to us or our people in the past. It is so easy to develop a victim mentality and that leads to bitterness. ...... Why is there no white color on the logo to the Rainbow Coalition?

Kasim was a family man, with a AK-47 and an IED

The picture you see here is of Barry and me using one of our new automatic nozzles earlier this summer. I believe that this was his first or second shift with us. It was a neat picture and appeared in the local paper. We all have seen the television news stories that showcase our soldiers as family men and women serving their country. Most are young, just starting families. What you never see, despite the attempts by the media, is an Iraqi or Iranian insurgent playing with his family in a park or walking hand in hand with his wife. Could it be that sociological differences in our societies are that vast. Does Kasim not value his family? Is this the result of a male dominated culture? I just don't know. Are we witnessing an example of fighting a war with politics and polls? It like James Woods' (the actor) idea: He stated that if the 9/11 attacks happened in Russia, Iraq and Afghanistan would be a giant piece of nuclear glass. Where has America gone? We are losing ourselves in a vast pit of liberal political correctness. The ACLU wants to protect the rights of a muslim or islamic (which one do they want to be called?)women to cover her face with her burka on her DL picture. What the hell? The longer that I live the more I feel that the US should develop an Isolationist mentality......... And for those dumbasses that still are in denial......O.J. did it!