Category Archives: Just Plain Fun

It’s Been a Flat Year

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First I tried “Old McDonald Had a Farm”. It was OK. Then I tried “The 1812 Overture”. That didn’t go so well. As my son, Caleb was threading the rubber plug material into the tire repair tool, I was playing songs on the tire with the air leaking out of the hole. It was his second repair in the last 10 minutes. And it’s only 7:30 am. We need to leave for work in a few minutes.

Yesterday, we had a flat out in front of Walmart on the main road. I mean, where you couldn’t pull off unless you parked on the sidewalk like they do in Ankara, Turkey. I changed out the tire to the spare while the kids were in the store buying birthday presents and other necessities. ( Did you know that at Walmart a pair of pliers costs less than a box of Cheese Crackers?) It was 99 degrees out. Why did we come down out of the cool mountains, anyway?

I’ve had so many flat tires this summer, that my wife and I can’t recount them all..

One memorable flat involved Big-O tires. To be fair, they have repaired about 10 of the flats- 9 of them for free. Nonetheless, I had a leak on the Suburban tire. The manager at Big-O said “It’s too big of a hole. We can’t fix it.”

“Can’t you put a patch or boot on the inside?” I asked.

“No good. Eez too small,” I was assured by the repairman, as he held up a tiny round rubber disc.

“Put it on, anyway,” I demanded.

While the guy was starting the process, I ran next door to the auto parts store, grabbed a Tire Patch Kit with larger patches in it, waited patiently/impatiently/patiently/impatiently in line, “Thanks for your patience” said the cashier, (also, see “Egyptian Jazz” to see how patient I really can be), ran back to Big-O, and handed the largest patch to the tire repair guy. Heez eyes got real big, and he said “Where you git deeze?”

“Next door, at the auto parts store” I replied.

He ripped the small patch off, and put the bigger one on.

Flat tires wouldn’t be such a problem if I didn’t live in such a remote area. 30 miles to town can be a problem, and why is it that you notice 50 percent of your flat tires in the evening, just as the repair places are shutting down for the night?

My son and I can change a flat tire on a Subaru in under 3 minutes. I wish we were on an Indy pit crew, or racing in Dakar, or Baja. I’d also like to meet Iron Man Stewart. He’s cool.

So, I’m back at the 1812 Overture, and it’s sounding more like a party balloon in a Fraternity House member’s armpit. I think it would sound better if we pumped the tire up to about 50 lbs. pressure.

Now we’ve got something going! Hey what’s that sound? Are those the cannons going off in the “1812”, or my other 3 tires exploding?…

The 1551 GluLam Jig

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 Yesterday, the Big Kahuna beam in our new house slid down into place and was nailed off. My son Caleb, daughter Heidi, and son Joshua, all helped put that beast into its pocket and nail it down. We lowered it gently down to its resting place using a HiLift jack from my Jeep, Festus. That GluLam beam is 6 3/4” x 24” x 28 feet long.

After we get done with a big milestone when building on our house, those present do a jig. We’ve done the First Floor Jig, Loft Jig, Stairsteps Jig, East Deck Jig, West Deck Jig, Quackaback Jig, and a host of other jigs. It’s all part of being part Irish, I guess. I’m half Irish, and half Swiss. I don’t know wether to fight, or just sit back and watch ’em go to it.

Anyway, Caleb and I nailed the beam off so it wouldn’t wobble, and we got up on top of it from opposite ends. After a while, we walked out to the middle of the ridgbeam, like Sir Robin Hood, and Friar Tuck , where we did the 1551 GluLam Jig. Why 1551? Caleb is 15 yrs. Old, and I am 51. What a cool age for me to be able to build my house with my son who is more of a man than a lot of guys I know who are twice his age.

1551 is a pretty perfect age combo for a father and son to build a chalet high in the mountains and do a jig on a ridge beam. Try some other combos and it might get a little scarey. Like 1661, 1771, or 1881. How about 1221? Now that freaks me out a bit.

So Caleb and I are doing the 1551 GluLam Jig on a beautiful sunny Colorado day, with high mountains surrounding us. Heidi is taking pictures, and so is a friend who just happened to stop by. (When you build a house like this one, people stop by all the time because its so cool and they want to see what new thing has happened since last time. Besides, my family has a lot of friends, and we all love each other. Loving people is one of the most incredible things we will experience here on earth.)

Caleb and I laugh about falling off of the ridge beam. “You only need enough space for the size of your footprint!” is Caleb’s favorite saying. At 6 ¾ inches wide, there isn’t even enough space for all of your footprint. Some of your toes are flapping in the breeze. It goes without saying that the 1551 GluLam Jig is more subdued than say, the Art Studio Jig, which went on so long that people were dropping out. Yep, that was an endurance contest.

Now that the roof is headed for being covered, we’ve got a lot of work to do before winter sets in. The house needs insulation, shingles, plumbing, electrical work, and drywall; we have to cut about 6 cords of firewood, and we need to find a new high groundclearance, fuel efficient, fourwheel drive, guided missle for our family car. I can’t wait to do the High Groundclearance Jig with my family on top of a new used Suburban…

I’m Too Tired, To Go To Bed

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Several years ago, my wife and I were watching a W.C. Fields movie. W.C. Was lying on the couch and his wife walked by. “Honey, it’s time to come to bed” she said. W.C. Answered in his raspy voice “I’m to tired to go to bed!”

In the last few days, that has been me. Of the 5 or 6 jobs I was “on call” for, I was suddenly immersed in heavy duty part time work. I shoveled gravel for a local guy for 5 and a half hours, only to come home, get a drink of water and go to another guy’s job site and shovel gravel. When I went to bed, my arms felt like they were going to fall off.

The next day, I went to a 3rd guy’s place of business, and delivered bed mattresses. ”Now this one here has a motor and metalwork in the foundation, so it’s pretty heavy,” was the admonition. Sure enough, he was right. I was encouraged by my my co-worker to be careful, because there was some very expensive artwork in the house which we wouldn’t want to take out with a bed mattress.

That reminds me of a painter’s story in Aspen: A painter spilled a bucket of paint on a very expensive rug while doing some touch up work in multi-million dollar house in an exclusive part of Aspen.. Knowing that the wife was at home, the painter did some quick thinking, and saved his skin. He grabbed the little house dog, and rolled the dog in the paint and began yelling “BAD FIFI! BAD DOG!” The wife came running to find that her little dog had knocked over the paint bucket, and was covered in paint. “Oh, my poor little Fifi!” She cried as she scooped up the scapegoat. She never questioned the painter, but instead thanked him for keeping the dog from running all over with paint on him.

After delivering the mattresses, I went home and fell into bed. I think I dreamed about my arms falling off.

Today, I went to another job site where I shoveled gravel, threw rocks, and hung on to a bucking mule for 6 hours. If I don’t fall face first into my soup tonight, it will be a miracle. Did I mention that I need to finish installing the big glulam beam on my house tonight? It’s true.

How to Spank a Mountain Lion

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Get up at 5am while it’s still dark out.  Put on your work pants and climb into your Subaru. Drive down a dirt road high in the Colorado Rockies and turn right onto the blacktop county road. 

Watch for rocks rolling down off of the hillside, deer standing on the road, geese at the edge of the road, ice on the curves, and Marble quarry workers driving upvalley on the wrong side of the road.

When you get to Bogan Flats campground, group site, notice something running up the steep embankment at high speed on a collision course with your car. Step firmly, and without panic on your brakes, hoping that it won’t be a big splat. 

As your car deaccelerates to about 3 m.p.h. notice that the animal directly in front of your grill is an adult mountain lion, running for his life. 

Because you had not been able to come to a complete stop yet, bump the mountain lion on his keister and watch him stumble, like a football player who almost got tackled, but didn’t quite fall to the ground.

As the lion regains his balance and jets up the hill side into the dark timber, roll your window down and look at the tracks he left in the snow at the edge of the road.

When your heartrate goes back down below 190, put the car in gear and continue your morning commute to work. You just spanked a mountain lion with your Subaru. Good morning from Marble, Colorado.

Phantom Chicken Vibrations

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It’s hard to know exactly when the phantom chicken vibrations began. Perhaps it was on a Monday during a particularly low air pressure system. In any event, they have only grown stronger…

When I was a Wilderness Ranger in Wyoming, I would travel through “the largest road-less area in the lower 48 states” for 10 days at a time. Although I had brushes with raging rivers, grizzlies, and poachers, I didn’t have a radio or a cell phone. They were worthless. And I loved it.

Teaching skiing in the 90s I guided clients and students down some of the most amazing ski runs in North America. Sometimes we found waist deep powder, steep tree runs, chutes, cliffs, and all kinds of snowy challenges. And I didn’t carry a cell phone. Fantastic.

When cell phones became fairly popular I poo poohed them. They were unnecessary. My ski clients almost universally carry them; friends and family live with them; and it’s almost assumed that you DO have a cell phone.

“What’s your cell number?” they ask as they hold up their phone, ready to add me to their address book.

“What makes you think I have a cell number?” I sometimes reply. They usually don’t know what to say.

Now my summer job requires me to carry a company cell phone. I’m a heavy equipment operator for a prestigious excavation company in the Aspen area. Which leads me to the phantom chicken vibrations.

As an equipment operator, it’s difficult to hear a phone ringing over the din of the machinery, the construction site, earplugs, and a radio set on volume number “30”. So a wise coworker helped me set my cell phone to “vibrate”.

Scrolling down the preset ring tones, I picked out a rooster crowing. Boy, is that rooster crowing popular with the temp laborers. When I go into the temp agency to pick up some help for the day, sometimes the phone goes off on maximum volume. There I am, standing in my black Carhartt pants with a rooster crowing loudly. 30 or 40 guys from not the US are all staring at me, smiling. I look at them and say “Wake up! It’s time to go to work!”

Elvin began to call my cell phone “Cheekin Leedle” and the name stuck with the other workers.

Now, whenever someone calls me, the phone vibrates against my right thigh muscle (the phone slides neatly into my Carhartt leg tool pouch) and crows. This brings me to the medical problem known as phantom chicken vibrations.

Sometimes, I go to answer the phone, only to find that there is no one there. I’m sure that I felt the phone vibrate over the bouncing of the machine. And didn’t I hear the rooster crowing? Maybe that was just a soundbite of Hillary Clinton on the radio. Similar pitch and tone.

Now I feel phantom chicken vibrations while driving my car, shopping for cheap milk, and laying in bed. Are they real? Am I just paranoid that I’ll miss a call? Who knows.

I know of a guy who was a professional trucker his entire life. His wife once told me that he used to shift gears in his sleep. Maybe I’m in good company. I’m just glad that I don’t throw knives for a living.