General chit-chat

I thought it would be good to have a general chit-chat thread.

Yesterday I was in a town called Ubly, MI. It is in a part of Michigan called "the thumb." I was at the dragstrip there helping my dad with a photo shooting assignment of a hot-rod Dodge Challenger. Ads for guns are everywhere, and many gas stations in the Thumb sell guns. We heard several gunshots throughout the day.

The blue-and-white Challenger in the pic below is the one that was at the track. Its best run was a 10.01 ET/132 mph through the quarter mile. Fortunately, Dodge dealerships are taking extensive preventative measures to keep it in the hands of enthusiasts and out of the hands of investors who use it as nothing more than garage furniture, and it is available only under controlled special order.

Your dad does professional photography? Does he specialize in events like these?

How odd you would here gunshots through out the day, unless there were firing ranges nearby. With all the ads for guns and dealerships at gas stations, I wouldn't be surprised. The thumb sounds like a wild place.

Yeah, he's done mostly car shoots. He also does real estate, weddings, and other projects from time to time.

i been to sault ste. marie; it's in the backwoods of the upper peninsula (thumb)-great town, and you can run to canada after you rob a bank. they live there mostly like alaskans or texans who don't live in the so called 'cities'...the up is not wild at all, compared to gangs, cops chasing on the freeways, snarled up traffic......

AND, they have HOT RODS!!!! yeee haaaa! burnin' rubber, smokin' tires, loud exhaust and SPEEEEEEEDDDDD!

lol!

when i was in sault ste. marie, that was the time we had a white cadillac sedan deville for a rental car; 6 of us, and the airport only had 3 rental cars, so they gave us the big un. on the third day, 4 went home, and left me and tom havelow there (tom was qa)....it snowed every day. and we were staying at a 'privatized air base' (used to be active, then sold to public). we went out one morning at 6 to get our eggs and bacon, and there was this HUGE parking lot...covered in maybe 2" of snow....i started the caddy up. let 'er get warm, Tom's going 'where ya wanna eat? that place yesterday had good eggs...' and i'm goin' yeah, i spose...and i'm looking at maybe a half mile or more of concrete....and my mind went 'tilt', and i backed up, put the caddy in gear, and eased out onto the apron.....slow, slow...then at about 30 mph, i cut the wheel, hit the brakes...when she slid sideways, i left off the brakes, and then hit the gas easy.....she spun 360 about 4 times, and tom's yellin' 'stop it, stop it, goddam ya, yer gonna kill my sad ass!' and i'm laughing like a maniac...i have no idea how far we slid, but there were 4 distinct 'donuts' in the snow, like someone's loopy cursive writing practice...

after i finally got over my fit, i told tom, 'i allus wanted to do donuts in a caddy, and this seemed like the perfect time to do it....'

tom sez 'less go git them eggs, or i aint gonna be able to eat in awhile....asshole!' lol!

i loved the up...if it weren't for the snow, it'd be wunnerful...i kept tellin the girls 'looky there...see that black spot? it's a polar bear's nose!' and the first coupla times they went for it...frog legs in canada, drunk as a skunk...wunnerful, wunnerful....ah, to be young again....sigh...
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Well, we had an unscheduled chat in our wonky chatbox last night. It stared rather late (I think after 9pm gmt-7) and went for 5 hours. We had I think a total of 7 people find their way there.

Sure are a lot of night owls here .

I need to check the calander to schedule the next one, I know.....

Anyhow, it was fun as always. Each chat is turning out to be something quite unique and unpredictable.

I enjoyed last night's chat! I just wish I'd been able to get more involved in the conversation instead of having to get ready for work at the same time. Hope I can make it to the next one...

Ran into a stunt today worthy of the "traveling sisterhood/brotherhood of the sombrero".

I ducked into my local Trader Joes for a few things, in spite of knowing it would be insanely busy. While waiting in line to check out, I noticed one of the clerks had on this hat that looked like a roast turkey, complete with wings and drumsticks; the opening for the hat was the same opening you put the stuffing in.

When I got up to the front of my line, I noticed that most of the clerks were wearing that hat. Turns out that one of the clerks saw it online and they decided as a group to order these things and wear them Thanksgiving week. How silly and absurd! Just think of all those unexpected grins they generated.

It's rare that people working for a large retail company like that really enjoy their jobs the way they do at my local Trader Joes.

It must be a nationwide thing! All the Trader Joe's employees here seem unusually happy for people at work. All smiley and laughy and talkative. Maybe I should apply there when I look for jobs next semester. (or year) Find out what the happy is all about. Hmm . . .

One of the workers at the Trader Joe's closest to me was wearing a turkey hat when I stopped by on Sunday. It's one of these where the legs hang/dangle down around one's ears. Reminded me several years back when I belonged to the Racquet Club and was doing water aerobics. The one instructer was a real nut, but a nice one, and she would wear this turkey hat on Thanksgiving while leading us in our exercises. By the way, she stood on the deck while the rest of us were in the water. As she made the motions, those turkey lets would wobble all over the place. Yeah, it was pretty much fun.

So it would appear that Trader Joes is one of those coporations that promotes good employee morale. Makes me glad I shop there.