Just a place to get away….along with the occasional rant.
Twas The Night Before Christmas
Twas the night before Christmas and all through the town,
Everyone seemed happy, not even a frown.
The stores were all busy, making sales by the minute,
Last minute shopping, maxing out the credit card limit.
He watches them all as he sits all alone, Continue reading ‘Twas The Night Before Christmas’
The year 2002 has some memories of mine that I have pushed back to the farthest part of my mind, trying to forget them, trying to hide them forever. I did a search for the year 2002 and for the most part, this was a tragic year. A wall street journal reporter is murdered in Pakistan, a woman is found guilty of drowning her 5 children (from the previous year), numerous car bombs kill hundreds all over the world, Snipers go on a tirade killing several from Alabama to DC. These are just a few of the hundreds of tragic headlines from that year. One of the only happy headlines I found was about the Pennsylvania Miners who were rescued after spending 77 hours in a flooded mine shaft. But of all the headlines I found, one sticks out to me the most, only one can make my stomach turn knots, only one can ruin my whole day.
Continue reading ‘Everyday A Memory. RIP Brent’
Happy 27th Anniversary to my mom and dad!
In celebration of their 27 years together, I thought I would remind them of a few things (ha).
27 Years Ago…
Ronald Reagan is President. George Bush is Vice President.
The worlds most popular word processing program is launched. Microsoft Word.
Average cost of a new house: $82,600.00
Average income per year: $21,070.00
Average monthly rent: $335.00
Price for a Dodge Ram 50 Truck: $5,665.00
The world population was estimated at 4.72 billion (today it is almost 7 billion)
In Lebanon: A terrorist attack by a suicide bomber destroys the United States Embassy in Beirut, killing 63.
The first mobile phones are introduced to the public by the Motorola Company in Chicago. The grandson of Alexander Graham Bell answered the first commercial mobile phone call.
Camcorders and CD’s are first introduced.
Sally Ride became the first American woman in space, on the Space Shuttle Challenger (June 18th).
Lotus 1-2-3 is released.
The final episode of M*A*S*H airs, record 125 million watch.
TV Shows that were airing includes: Dallas, The A-Team, Magnum P.I., The Jeffersons, The Love Boat, Knots Landing, and Simon & Simon.
Movies Released: Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, Smokey and the Bandit III, Mr. Mom, Trading Places, and Terms of Endearment.
Music: Michael Jackson won Grammy Awards for “Thriller”, “Beat It”, and “Billie Jean”. Song of the year was “Every Breath You Take” written by Sting. Lee Greenwood and Anne Murray each won a Grammy for the male and female country music vocalists of the year.
Milk is $1.89 a gallon, bread is $.66, a stamp is $.20, and gas is $1.84 a gallon.
Baltimore Orioles were the World Series Champions and the Washington Redskins were the Super Bowl Champions (man a lot has changed ha)
Rubik’s Cube, Boob Boxes, Cabbage Patch Kids, and “Baby on Board” signs were taking off.
Ocean Spray introduced the very first “juice box” to America.
Ray-Bans were popular.
Dennis Wilson of The Beach Boys died from a drowning accident.
Crack cocaine is developed in the Bahamas and soon makes its way to the US.
The “Just Say No” anti-drug campaign debuts.
Travis and Betty Day are married.
To the girl of my dreams. Emily Day, I love you.
If I lost you, the world would have no color
If I lost you, the sun would no longer shine
If I lost you, I wouldn’t be worth a dollar
If I lost you, I could call nothing mine
If I lost you, there would be no tomorrow
If I lost you, there would be no one to turn to
If I lost you, my life would be full of sorrow
If I lost you, I’d always be sad and blue
Just something on my mind today. Someone that many of us miss day to day.
The Site
For Brent
I visited the site today
Where you went with Jesus to stay
The pain cut through me like a knife
Its not fair you lost your life
Just days into your senior year
Your friends and family shed a tear
We all gathered around one night
We mourned for you with candle light
Inside the gym where you played ball
On the very court where you gave it your all
It has been several years since you left
But at that spot has been no more death
God loaned you to us for a special price
You had to pay the ultimate sacrifice
Now no one else will die there
No other family will feel that pain
No one else will lose someone
With nothing else left to gain
Now still to this day I ask God why when I pray
But I guess the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away
I miss you so much and think of you every day
When I see the white cross on the side of the highway
RIP My Cousin
Happy birthday my dear.
You get this special day, once a year.
Today is your day, it’s all about you.
I’ll buy you a card, and some brand new shoes.
Me and Nathan will take care of all you need,
Pick up toys, wash dishes, and the dogs we will feed.
Today you get to relax and sit back,
We’ll bring you breakfast and a nice tasty snack.
So enjoy this day, cause it won’t last,
Tomorrow will be normal, crazy and fast.
Before you know it, next year it’ll be,
Maybe then we can go out, just you and me.
But until then I just wanted to say,
I love you, and Happy Birthday!
While standing in my garage talking to my brother about manly things, he made a comment about how he was happy our wives were chatting it up about our flower garden and some tree that beetle’s like to eat. After his comment we turned to each other and almost simultaneously said, “Wow, we have wives”. We talked about how crazy it is that seems like just yesterday we were rolling around in the front yard of mom’s house wrestling and carrying on, wait maybe it was yesterday? Anyways, he made the comment how I was getting old since I just turned 26 recently. Downhill to 30. We continued talking about our lives and how we both have houses, cars, working full time, and how he is in school. Time sure does fly. Which brings me to partly what this is about. Time files. Time is precious. I’ve always known this but I learned a lesson lately, when this slapped me in the face. The lesson? It wasn’t a death, a birth, a wedding, or anything like that. This may sound crazy, but my lesson of time flies was when my son had his first haircut. As he sat in the airplane seat, watched “Finding Nemo” on the TV hanging on the wall, and tried to eat the ladies spray bottle at “Spoiled Rockin Kidz“ (a GREAT place if you have kids, the people there were awesome!), I realized that my baby boy is growing up. Yes he is only a year old, but I now realize what I have been told so many years by my parents and others with children. Turning a year old is quite the big deal, I think more for the parents than for the baby. I’m sorry, the toddler. Anyways, watching my little man fly that airplane while getting his haircut made me stand with pride and just wanting to yell at everyone in the business and tell them my baby boy is growing up.
Now if you don’t have kids, you may be reading this wondering what the big deal is. As my son gets older, it makes me realize that he is going to be heading off to preschool soon. After that it is kindergarten. On to middle school, then high school, and hopefully I pray one day he will go to college (so he can be scouted by the Atlanta Braves and play Major League Baseball so daddy can have a big house and nice cars and not have to work!). When I think about him growing up, these are the things I think about, and to be honest, it scares the life out of me (except the part about him playing for the Braves, then I just get excited and imagine what it’s like to live in a huge house, drive a vette, and have season tickets to the Braves games to watch my son play ha). It does scare me, but at the same time it is so fun watching him grow up. I tell my wife all the time how much fun I have watching him play with his toys. Just the little things like him learning how to roll a car across the living room floor brings me joy. Then if you add in the other things like him learning to wave, point at things he wants, clap, and trying to mimic what you say, I feel like I will explode with “dad pride”. Of course his first words had to be “mama”, but when I heard him say “dada” I believe my life stood still for a few minutes. Nothing in this world can compare to having your baby look at you and call you by name (my name is officially dada ha).
So for him to grow up he has to have birthday parties. Wow, one down and a ton more to go. I’m glad these things only come once a year. While I was so happy and enjoyed watching him having fun and opening gifts, it wore me out. I need a year to recuperate, at least. Now if you are familiar with 1st birthday parties then you know that the birthday boy/girl is supposed to have their own cake. Well, my son has this cake in front of him and as he starts to stick his hand in it to grab a big chunk to eat, he stops, looks around, then sticks his finger in the icing and barely eats a small piece. He keeps looking around waiting for someone to take the cake from him. When he finally realized that the cake was for him and he could dig in, well, he dug in. Cake and icing everywhere. All over his face and body. But he had fun. And so did I. He has now started to walk. Wow. My baby is, uh excuse me, my toddler is walking! He started taking a few steps before his birthday but now, on his birthday, he is standing up and walking all the way across the living room by himself. Again the whole “dad pride” thing just about exploded out of me again.
Time is so precious. Before we know it he will be off to school and moved out. Then we will look back on his first birthday and agree that time was indeed precious. I’m going to make the best of it. Not only for my son but for others in my life. This is something we all need to do. Stop our hectic lives and take a step back, look around, and just enjoy the moments we have now. Whether you want to play a round of golf, catch a baseball game, go fishing, or spend it with family, these are precious times and we should treat it as that. You never know when these precious moments will no longer be here. So I say to myself as much or more than to anyone else, spend your time wisely, and enjoy it. Bring joy to someone else’s life, it will rub off on you. So to my brother, yes, you are right, I’m getting old. But I’m gonna have fun all the way there, thanks to my son!
Dad Life. This is too funny. A few days after Father’s Day but still deserves to be put up. All the dads will love this one. I did.
Thanks to Church on the Move
So the other day I started talking about how soccer was a boring sport, how it should be in the same category with ping pong and golf, I made mention that it is just a “kick the ball in the net” sport and how the referees penalty cards reminded me of the cards you had to pull in kindergarten when you were in trouble. I think I even figured out this whole points deal, at least in the World Cup playoffs. If you even call it playoffs. There are still some things that get me annoyed though. I don’t understand why everyone has to blow those stupid horns the entire time that the game is being played. Now I definitely understand about making noise. I’m a huge football fan. College football. In the SEC. In Alabama. We know how to make noise. But we make the noise during the big plays of the games. When your opponent has 4th down and they are deep in their own territory, when you see the quarterback running for his life when a 300lb lineman is ripping through the line trying to smash every bone in his body. We get loud, very loud. The more difficult we can make it for that player to hear the snap the more likely there is going to be a penalty for false start or something of that nature. Then that throws out all chances of going for it so the opponent punts the ball to our team. Success. The fans helped out by making noise. See I understand all about making noise during a sporting event but this constant buzzing noise, man doesn’t that get annoying? I do have to say it keeps you on the edge of your seat though. Kind of like the music in a horror film. You never know when the killer is going to jump from behind the corner. You never know when the USA is going to score. But when they do, it is pretty cool.
So like I said, here I was talking about soccer saying how boring and annoying it was, how they needed their own category….all while I’m watching it. So here it is. The USA vs. Algeria. Down to the wire. If the USA doesn’t score then they go home. England is beating Slovenia and USA is tied with Algeria at nothing a piece. If it ends here USA goes home and England advances with Slovenia. I’m watching the USA/Slovenia game and sitting on the edge of my seat, thanks in part to those stupid horns. There is an update that England wins, USA now HAS GOT TO WIN. They have come so far to go home now is what the commentator is saying. And there it is, time is up. Game over. So I thought, and then another soccer rule that I don’t understand. Someone holds up a sign that says these two teams get to play for another four minutes. I think someone was penalized at the end which caused the time to run out, since the clock NEVER stops in soccer. At least I don’t think it does. So here we go, I’m thinking to myself that USA has got to score here. You can feel it in the air, yes they are going to score. Why am I saying this? I hate soccer. Soccer is a stupid sport right? I push that thought aside and say I will deal with it later, right now I’m mentally willing the United States to kick that stupid ball through the goaltender and score. What a play at the end, the USA scores a goal, the fans go absolutely crazy, the players are running around like maniacs, the guy that scored the goal slides through the grass as his teammates pile on top of him celebrating, and I almost knocked my drink off the table because I jumped up so fast yelling in excitement. But wait, I’m yelling at the TV telling the guys to stop celebrating! I just know the ref is going to throw a flag…or a card…for excessive celebration, but he doesn’t. I’m used to football. By the way this is one rule that I think football should look at because I had so much fun watching this team celebrate that one goal. They knew they just had to keep Algeria from scoring in the next two or so minutes and they would advance. The minutes tick of the clock and final score is USA 1 Algeria 0. USA advances and wins their division, or group, whatever it’s called. Wow what a game. My heart is racing, I’m cheering on the USA while the team celebrates. Wow, I just got all excited over soccer. A boring sport.
So today I want to tell you all, if you have never watched a soccer game then you should. I would love to attend one in person one day. Of course now I just want to go watch team USA play. I’m not sure if any other soccer games are as exciting or not, but the World Cup is definitely a sport that will be on my list from now on to watch whenever I get the chance. To everyone that has been soccer fans or players and have taken the heat by others, like me, saying soccer is a boring sport…man were we wrong. I can’t wait till the next time I get to watch the USA play soccer and hopefully go on to win the World Cup. I think I might actually like a little soccer every now and then. You know, if it wasn’t such a boring sport. GO USA!
It seems that every time I look at my Facebook main page there is an update telling me there has been another Police Officer killed in the line of duty. According to The Officer Down Memorial Page, as of June 24th, 2010 there have been 82 Police Officers killed in the line of duty. 28 of which were killed by gunfire. 82 deaths already. It is a sickening and stomach turning thought. So whenever you think about this, whenever you have some down time, whenever you see that Police Officer on the side of the road or just riding down the street, try to remember the ones that gave their life for you and me. Sometimes we need to stick together and Shield a Badge with Prayer. Well this has been on my mind lately so I figured why not share my thoughts with everyone.
Here is something I wrote for a good friend after he was killed in the line of duty:
The Thin Blue Line
In Memory of Eric
The Thin Blue Line just got thinner tonight.
With one Officer less the stars don’t shine as bright.
When the call goes out for Officer needs assistance
You race to the scene, lights flashing in the distance
As your brother in blue stares back up at you.
The blank look in his eyes, the tears on your face.
The heart sinking feeling, the emptiness inside.
You scream over the mic, Officer Down!
Can they hear me? Where are the medics?
Why is it taking so long? He can’t die!
As the emotions drown out the surroundings
As you choke on your own tears
Now you begin to realize
The Thin Blue Line just got thinner tonight.
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RIP Offc. Eric Freeman
EOW 12/15/07
By
Joseph Adam Day
Copyright © December 15, 2007 – All Rights Reserved
and may not be duplicated without permission
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