Leaf me alone

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 14 Comments
Right, off you go. …

An overly spicy pasta dinner led to a restless night, and by the time I dragged ass out of the sack this morning temps in the teens plus a biting wind out of the north had done a Pythonesque “Meaning of Life” number on our trees.

A veritable blur of activity was Your Humble Narrator back in his days as a cyclocross promoter..

Herself’s mantra is “We can do anything for 30 minutes.” But she wasn’t here, so I gave myself a day off from the usual outdoorsy pasatiempos. Took some pix, downloaded some software, entertained the cat, fed the birds (no, not to the cat), collected the mail (all bullshit), perused the news (likewise), drank tea.

In short, stayed warm.

There’s something deep in the heart of me that remembers those bitter wintry mornings of yesteryear, which saw me hammering barrier stakes into frozen turf at stupid-thirty and wondering if this would finally be the day when nobody but me turned up to race cyclocross.

Help (still) wanted

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 14 Comments
The next step in Bashar al-Assad’s career remains uncertain.

There is no truth to the rumor that Bashar al-Assad resigned as president of Syria to become CEO of UnitedHealthcare.

Please continue to hold. Your call is important to us. (Cue Paul McCartney’s “Wonderful Christmastime.”)

Bringing the heat

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 12 Comments
Peekaboo.

Sun’s gonna shine in my back door some day.

Actually, it shows up there almost every day, around 9 a.m. lately.

Which, frankly, is not early enough. Not in December. The mountains and trees that shade us in summer keep things cool in winter, too.

Not as chilly as the breath of vengeance on the back of a CEO’s neck these days. But those dudes can afford to hire some heat.

And by heat, I mean a cool quarter-mil’ for round-the-clock protection. Says The New York Times:

Leaders at Allied Universal, which provides security services for 80 percent of Fortune 500 companies, said their phones were “ringing off the hook” on Wednesday with potential clients. Allied covers a wide spectrum of services — including stationing guards outside offices, chauffeuring executives, surveilling their homes and tracking their families.

Protecting a chief executive full time costs roughly $250,000 a year, said Glen Kucera, who runs Allied’s enhanced protection services.

I don’t suppose all this executive armoring-up will have any effect on the cost of products and services we use. Nah. Y’think? Nahhhhh.

Time

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 5 Comments

Happy 75th birthday to Tom Waits. The gravel swirling round in his pan always has a trace of gold in it.

Oh and the things you can’t remember 
Tell the things you can’t forget
That history puts a saint 
In every dream