The Lousy Tourist Strikes Again

I remain, as always, a lousy tourist, so I didn't take a lot of pictures while I was home.
Below are the pictures I did take on our trip to Fort Wilkins and up Brockway Mountain.

UPdate (Get It? UP As In U.P., For Upper Peninsula? Oh, Forget It.)

After taking the heat as long as I could, I broke down and bought my mom a window unit A/C (which my brother-in-law installed; that her windows open sideways made it more of a challenge than it might otherwise have been), just in time for the cold front to move in and the temperature and humidity to drop.
Oh well; it's not yet August, and that tends to be the worst month of the summer around here, so she'll definitely get some use out of it.
This evening I took my nephew Jeremy to see The Simpsons Movie.
Short review: very funny.
I'll likely see it again, as my niece Jourdan had to work today for a period that precluded her from seeing any showing. We were going to hold off and see it tomorrow afternoon, as she would be free then, but then she got called in to work tomorrow as well. So if she's free Sunday, I'll probably take her.
On the topic of work, I got an e-mail from my boss telling me that I've been volunteered for something or other that he didn't get a chance to talk to me about before I left because it just came up this week, and that he'll explain to me when I get back.
I suspect I was selected simply because he knows I'm the only person who would be likely to actually show up for whatever meetings are involved.
I'm just hoping it will involve getting some regular OT.
I actually applied for another job a while back, but because I am qualified for it and am pretty much the perfect candidate I have naturally not been contacted about it, as that would make too much sense. Seriously, this is a job that has my name tattooed on it, and not with that new, easily removable ink that was just developed either.
You'd really have to be lacking some critical faculties to not at least consider me for the job.
But I'm not bitter.
I mean, it's not like I'm the only person of the people I started working with who hasn't gone on to something better, or like I've had to sit and watch other people with no discernible skills get promotions while I'm stuck in the same place I've been for nearly five years.
Oh, wait.
Still, I'm not bitter.
Tomorrow is the family reunion at which, apart from my immediate family, I will probably know a maximum of three people. Should be a blast.
I've actually got a very nice view out my window of the moon reflecting on the Portage Canal. I tried to take a picture, but I just can't get anything decent in the low light.
Not being quite as close to the middle of nowhere as I'd be if I were staying where I grew up rather than where my mom lives now, I'm not in a totally light pollution-free area, but it is possible to see at least some stars if I look up, which isn't really possible back in Leesburg.
I have to say that it's rather nice.
A Northern Lights sighting would be even better, but sadly it's not the right time of year for that.
In any case, that's about all that there is of note for right now.

Greetings From Michigan's Upper Peninsula

For anyone wondering, I arrived in Michigan safely and without incident.
It felt strange to arrive at the airport knowing that there wouldn't be anyone there to greet me.
Because my mom doesn't drive, she no longer owns a vehicle (she sold the van after my dad died), so if I wanted to get around while I'm here I had to rent a car.
Since I was picking up said car at the airport, there was no point in having anyone come to get me at the airport.
So yeah; no one greeting me at the airport. The only other time I've had that happen was when I moved to VA from Tucson.
However, I did randomly encounter an old friend from my drinking days who was at the airport to pick up her sister. Given how long it's been since we'd had any meaningful contact, it was kind 0f an awkward endcounter, though, and not exactly the sort of "Welcome home" greeting that I'm accustomed to.
At least I got a fairly nice car from the rental place, a Hyundai Tucson, which I'd never heard of before.
When I left VA, it was about a thousand degrees with three hundred percent humidity. I arrived in MI to find that it was a thousand and one degrees with four hundred percent humidity. The heat wave is, apparently, due to break soon.
So far things have been pretty uneventful, but that's generally how things are in my life whether I'm here or in VA.
The only real development is that I spoke to my realtor and my offer on the house has been accepted, so I will soon be the proud owner of a monumentally huge amount of debt.
Oh, and an end unit townhome in a cul-de-sac with four bedrooms, two and a half baths, and a huge back yard.
I will, of course, keep you posted on anything of note that happens here, and, of course, provide some sexy vacation pictures somewhere along the line.
In the meantime, I give you this hilariously adorable video clip. Enjoy!

Well, Okay, Maybe A Couple Sexy Vacation Pictures

Yesterday Brian asked me to come over to the fire station tonight to be the videographer for his duty crew.
Even though I had a big night of sitting around watching TV planned, I agreed.
I hung out for a little over 3 and a half hours and my presence served as, depending upon your perspective, either a good luck charm or a bad luck charm, in that their 36+ hour streak of not getting any calls continued the whole time I was there.
The pulse-pounding ride over to a nearby restaurant for dinner and the white-knuckled ride over to the old station to put together a sign for the upcoming spine-tingling pancake breakfast didn't quite warrant video coverage, but I did take a few (sexy) pictures to immortalize the evening.
Enjoy the sexiness!


Check out this sexy bald beast. Does the carpet match the drapes? Only his stylist knows for sure.


Look out, ladies; I'm too hot for even the fire department to handle!


Here we see an example of their high-tech, state-of-the-art firefighting equipment.


Upstairs at the old station Brian took me through a time warp and we travelled back to a simpler time, a time of neon, big hair, and workout outfits. A time when there probably weren't any chicks in the fire company. This seriously seemed like making a visit to my brother's dorm room in the mid-80s.

All snarky, smart-ass comments aside, despite the lack of action it was interesting to have an inside look at this aspect of Brian's life and the inner workings of a volunteer fire company. With any luck, half the city burst into flames shortly after I left and the crew got plenty of excitement. Here's hoping!

Sexy Vacation Pics

No, there aren't actually any sexy vacation pics - or pics of any sort - in this entry.
The title actually refers to a search string that brought someone to Threshold earlier today.
All the way from France, in fact.
I remain sort of baffled by the things that people search for and especially baffled by how those searches lead them here.
I mean, just because Google brings up a site that doesn't mean it's related to what you're looking for. Don't people read any of the excerpted text before they go clicking on links all willy nilly?
When the words you're looking for don't appear together contiguously, that should be a clue that you haven't found what you're looking for.
I suppose I shouldn't complain about people coming here as the result of oddball searches, though, as those poor search skills do increase my hit count.
Unfortunately those random searches seldom lead to repeat visitors so they don't do much for me other than provide fodder for pointless entries that nobody's going to read anyway because once they get here they'll see that there are no sexy vacation pics to be found, just the boring ramblings of some guy who doesn't even go on real vacations, sexy or otherwise.