36 Years!

36  36  36  36  36  36  36

Lyn and I leave tomorrow for a 3-day trip to Palm Desert, in celebration of our 36th anniversary on Monday! Yep, THIRTY-SIX years!  Three dozen!!! It's hard to fathom that we're reaching this milestone--but very cool at the same time.  I remember a time when someone's BEING 36 seemed like they were in the throes of old age!  I'm happy to report that they have been 36 great years!

I love numbers (even though I hate math), and the number 36 is an especially cool number...so here's a little trivia I discovered:

1. 36 is a square number:  6 x 6 = 36

2. 36 is a triangular number:  1+2+3+4+5+6+7+8= 36

3. A beer barrel is 36 gallons

4. William Shakespeare wrote 36 plays

5. The probability of throwing double six on two dice is one in 36

6. The American flag had 36 stars from 1865 to 1876 - Nevada was the 36th state

7. 36 is evenly divided by 2, 3, 4, 6, 9, 12, and 18

8. 36 is the number of degrees in the angle of all 5 tips in a perfect star

9. 36 multiplied by any other number ALWAYS produces a quotient whose individual digits add up to NINE.  

    i.e.  36 x 2 = 72 (7+2 = 9)

    or   36 x 36 = 1296 (1+2+9+6 = 18) (1+8 = 9)

Neat, huh?

Anyway, I've loved my great wife for 36 years, and there's nothing "trivial" about that!  Happy anniversary, Lyn!

Dr. WHO??????

Driving home today, I nearly wrecked the car from laughing so much! (Not really even close to wrecking the car--but I WAS laughing pretty darn hard!)

I was listening to KRLA and this commercial about a "prostate specialist" came on.  The gist of the commercial was funny enough until they announced the name of the sponsoring doctor--an L.A. specialist named DR. POOGASH!!!! I don't know why, but I felt like a 5th grader laughing at a possibly "off-color" joke.  But a prostate doctor named "Poogash" is seriously funny in my sick little old-guy mind.  

It consequently spawned a bunch of "what-if" doctor names in my head:

Proctologist - Dr. Krack (he would share offices with Dr. Poogash)

Internist - Dr. Gutman

Anesthesiologist - Dr. Dozer

Dentist - Dr. Moeller

Pediatrician - Dr. Kidman or Dr. Childe

Podiatrist - Dr. Foote or Dr. Bunyan

Obstetrician - Dr. Storke

Ophthalmologist - Dr. Iris

As you might expect, I have a great one for another speciality,  but I'll keep that one to myself.

My girls!

Jennifer posted this today, but it bears repeating!!!  L 2 R - Lexi, Emily, and Haley.  Can't wait for them to experience Walt Disney World together, even if Emily won't remember it.

Vacation Countdown

Only 21 days til we fly to FLORIDA!  Heat, Humidity, and MICKEY    MOUSE . . . Can't wait!

Neither can Lexi.  She walks around the house with her Tinkerbell suitcase saying "Dinney Worl."  Just a few more days, Sweetie!

Kids' Cute Words

This morning was the men's breakfast at church.  (Which was really good, by the way.) I had some work to do in the office afterward, but when I came out of the elevator upstairs, I heard Lexi calling out, "Pa-Pa!" in her deep-toned Brooklyn accent.  So I looked in the auditorium and saw that she and Haley were there with Curtis--who was helping Billy and Shane set up things onstage for the weekend. They both came running over to me and Haley proceeded to rattle on about knowing that granddad (Bruce) wasn't going to be "teaching tonight."  I wasn't exactly sure what her point was, but her final comment was, "I knew that he wasn't teaching, because I have a very good remembery."  I thought that was so cute.

It reminded me of the funny little phrases that have stuck in our memories of Kristi and Jennifer's growing up days.  

Kristi used to love spaghetti more than anything.  She called it SPED-ih-dy.  She also loved bananas (poor child).  She said the word almost right--it was the accent that was wrong.  She called them BAH-nuh-nuhs.  When Jennifer was born, Kristi (who was 3 at the time) loved to watch her sleeping.  Once, seeing her wake up, Kristi excitedly said "She open she eyes!"

My favorite word was Jennifer's take on air-conditioning.  She referred to it as "AIRK-shuh-nar-ey."  Lyn and I still say that when referring to a.c. at home.  It's  much more interesting than "air conditioner."  Both Jennifer and Kristi were pretty big kids before they understood that "afternoon" was a word.  They thought it was "safternoon," having heard "this afternoon" thousands of times.  (e.g., "We're going to a birthday party tomorrow safternoon.")

To this day, it's a treat to hear Kristi say "Cracker Barrel" (the restaurant).  And speaking of more current word mix-ups (as heard, not spoken), if you want to hear a REALLY funny story, have Jennifer tell about her short-lived quest for "castor oil"  toward the end of her pregnancy.  It's a riot.

Anyway, I'm sure you parents (or grandparents) have some fun kid-sayings that are precious to your family's history.  Why don't you share one or two?!  Surely you have a very good remembery too!

Have a great weekend!

[SUNDAY MORNING EXTRA:  Lyn told me last night that when she was driving Lexi to church yesterday, the car radio was turned on a news show while Lexi quietly did her own thing in her car seat.  When the news reporter mentioned the name Barak Obama, Lexi--staccato Brooklyn accent intact--parroted, "Buh-rocka-BAM-uh!  Buh-rocka-BAM-uh!  Buh-rocka-BAM-uh!"  She's quite the playback machine!]

New Phone Possibility

I'm shopping around for a new phone.  We're stuck with Sprint for a couple more years, so the options are limited.  (I say "stuck," because I know many folks hate Sprint almost as much as other folks hate George Dubya.)  Actually, we've never had any real problems with Sprint--even with customer service, which seems to be their nemesis.

Well, the phone I'm really looking at is the Samsung INSTINCT which doesn't release at Sprint until the middle of June.  It's supposed to be a decent "rival" to the iPhone.  The specs on it look pretty good to my non-techie analysis.  You can read about it on the link above.

One of the things I really need is the good old QWERTY keyboard.  I'd be a lot more open to texting if I didn't have to do the whole alpha-numerical conversion mumbo-jumbo. Of course, "QWERTY" is an American term, based on our traditional typewriter keyboard arrangement.  Lyn and I learned the hard way that keyboards around the world are all different.  (When we were in France the first time, our e-mailing on French keyboards was unbelievably frustrating and very entertaining.)  So, I thought I'd show you some of the keyboards you'll find if you travel abroad without your laptop!

BTW, if you've heard any good or bad stuff on the Instinct, I'd love to hear.  

Good Ole USA QWERTY

The French Keyboard

(there are different layouts for almost

every country in continental Europe)

The Arabic 

The Mandarin Chinese

(which corresponds to ours!!)

My Laptop Is Sick (Wamp! Wamp!)

Spent part of the day in the bar.  The "Genius Bar" at the Apple Store, that is.  Bottom line, due to someone's tripping on my power cord (not one of the magnetic attachment kind) a few months back (causing a dent on the side of the computer among other thines), the internal power board has crashed.

The "genius" told me I really didn't want Apple to fix it.  It would be nearly $1300 if they did! They gave me the name of somebody local they refer all their menial repairs to.  Guess we'll be going to the "clinic" for a laptop labotomy tomorrow.  Should be a fraction of what Apple would cost.  Sure hope so.  I'd like to get another year out of it at least.