Left or right?

No, not speaking politically here, just about what predominant side are we, left or right handed.

I'm working shutdown and working with the bricklayers as I did last year. We were out on a job today, and my job was to smear mortar with a trowel onto cracks in the furnaces we were were working on. There were six of us getting in the way of each other. Normally, only two guys work on a furnace and we were bumping into each other and with four other guys around, we were having fun and commenting on each other's work. As I was patching away, I was doing my best to make things look good and it apparently was doing better than I had to. All I was doing was to make things look smooth and one guy jokingly commented that I must have had cake decorating experience down at Giant at their bakery...lol. Then as I was working, I was switching the trowel between both my right and left hands. I unconsciously do this as it is easier than turning my whole body from left to right and a lot less awkward for me and don't realize I am doing it. The boss showed up and as I must have had the trowel in my left hand at the time and I heard him say, "Did I just see that guy hold a trowel in his left hand?" As it was back in my right hand, I still knew he was referring to me and I just said my usual line when I here a comment like that, "My brain just can't make up it's mind."...lol. They all got a good laugh, but it got me to think about all this. They must have some kind of inside joke about this left hand trowels stuff and I have to ask to see what he meant sometime later.

So what makes a lefty or a righty, anyway? What causes a young kid to pick up a pencil or crayon for the first time with the left hand, like I did when I was a wee little lad? I remember Nana asking the experts (whoever they were at that time) and she was told to just let me go. What causes a kid to grab a fork or spoon for the first time with the left hand? She got the same response. Now what gets me, why do I do almost everything else with my right hand, just a few with my left and others with both. Is it true that my brain really can't make up it's mind?

With sports, I was never really was much as far a participant, but have made some interesting observations. Whenever I played baseball as a kid, I was the standard right handed player. I batted right handed and threw a ball right handed, with the catching glove on the left hand. Here's the "catch", yes the pun is truly intended...lol. Whenever I messed around in street hockey, I liked to be the goal tender. The goalie holds a goal stick in one hand and a catching glove in the other. I found it somehow comfortable to hold the goal stick with my left hand and the catching glove on the right, opposite of wearing a catching glove when playing baseball. I noticed this oddity way back when I was a goalie in high school gym classes when we played lacrosse. I always liked playing goal and I held the stick on my left hand and glove on my right. Either way, I found I with both using the left and right hand while catching with both those sports, my reflexes were equal on both sides with my catching hand.

I find that I can do many other things with either hand and we all know that that term for this is ambidextrous, but if you put a pencil in my hand and tell me to sign my name, it would look like someone as out of first grade. As far as eating with a fork in my right hand, I can do it, but will still get the same stains on my t-shirts as I do with my left....lol. Got many stained shirts to prove that. I sometimes think I'm the guy who made the manufactures come up with the idea for the product, Tide-To-Go....lol.

Now about musical instruments. I mess with the drums and tried them both ways. Me? right handed for sure. You can set up a drum kit either way and right handed is me. They make right and left hand guitars for those who need it and Never played one much, but feel I'd be right handed. Always wondered how a leftie would ever play a keyboard. Ever hear of a a left handed keyboard?....lol. I always picture a person planing a keyboard with croseed arms....lol.

Sighned, truly crossed up....lol.

East come, easy go.

The Reading Phillies have their "Crazy Hot Dog Vendor". A guy who looks like he is riding an ostrich and throws hot dogs up into the stands. It's funny when one of the wieners unwraps on it's flight and pieces of hot dog and roll fall down all over the crowd. The Reading Royals have "Slapshot", who comes out on the ice on this little buggy equipped with and air cannon and launches T-shirts into the crowd. On Friday night, I was at the Velodrome in Trexlertown and a normal looking guy throws T-shirts from track side, up to those in the seats or other spectators standing around the perimeter of the track.

I was standing along the track just past the finish line and the PA announcer told us to all yell if any wanted a free t-shirt. I looked down and the guy was straight in front of me at the bottom of the track. I yelled, "Up here". He made eye contact and threw it right to me. It was in my hand and suddenly another guy who was reaching for it, accidentally knocked it out of my hand and we all watched it roll down the steep bank of the track. You could hear the oohs and aahs from the crowd and it was sort of a bummer, but no big deal. The guy picked it up and threw it to another set of spectators off to our left.

There was a guy standing to my right between me and the guy who attempted to get the shirt and while I was fiddling around with my camera, I heard a voice saying that he was sorry. I looked over and we were laughing about the whole thing. He kept apologizing and I said, "No problem. It's just a shirt." Ahh, but the little devil inside me was in action and I couldn't resist and I added, "Besides, it probably wouldn't fit anyway." He got a kick out of the comment and was laughing but the guy didn't realize that I wasn't referring to me.....lol. If there was an avatar on here for it you would be seeing a little smiley devil inserted at that last lol. Nasty, aren't I? Hee, hee, hee.

All was not lost. After each race night, the fans are invited to go into the infield and meet the racers. It just so happened that Friday was a night where the "legends of the track" were racing. I got to see all the old guys who used to race there 25 years ago when I used to go out a lot on Friday nights. I went into the infield and met up with a few. I was talking to one, Gibby "the bear" Hatton. I told him that for years, I had a 16 by 20 photo of him that I took with another popular guy there (who was also present, Art McHugh who now works in the press box), hanging up on on the third floor wall. It was a picture of the two of them sprinting around the turn before the finish line. Maybe all you family members remember seeing the picture. He thought it was kind of cool. I said if I only knew he was going to be there, I would have brought it along for him to autograph. He told me to keep an eye on the schedule for future "legends" nights and he is always there. He said Art would probably enjoy seeing the picture and putting his name on it, also. I remember taking the picture the first time I was ever there with mom in 1978 and never thought anyone would be interested in a photo that old.

I told him this is the first year I have been here since Nelson Vails used to ride here, just after he won the silver in the Olympics. He commented, "Yeah, 1984, you have been gone for a long time. Good to have you back." Made me feel so welcome.

There aren't many sports where the spectators and pros get to interact. How else would I have gotten an autograph from a silver cycling medalist back in 1984 a week after he got it? And we can't forget good old Maple Grove and the drag races. You don't have to go far for entertainment and even with the cost of gas, we have plenty around here without having to spend more than a gallon or two. I guess it all depends what one is interested in. I had a good night and what I thought would be a simple night at the local velodrome, gave me some memories I will never forget.

Photos

No. No photos tonight, but hopefully I will have some on here in the future. I don't mess around on the blog very much other than just to write, but soon will attempt adding photos....again. I know to some it is probably fool proof and as I'm no ordinary fool, you may see an entry (or entries) with captions or titles referring to photos, but with no photos.

Almost happened when I did try to upload one about a month ago, and it was taking forever to load (I imagine because it was a picture at 10 mega pixels), got impatient and clicked the whole thing off. I thought the short entry (minus one photo) would show up on the blog, but it didn't. It was a short entry that would have had no meaning without the picture anyway, so all was well. I'll attempt it again soon. Just didn't feel like messing with it since then. I know I can make things a little more glitzy on here and will have to give it a try later.

Off to bed.

Nite

This post at Elliot's request.

Elliot asked me to post this, as he said something very funny last weekend. It's fun when kids can poke a little fun at themselves and I guess he liked the reaction he got from me an his mommy from what he said. But first, things all started five days earlier.

As all of you know, I have a common condition known as paroxymal, supraventricular tachycardia (excuse any spelling with all this). A common arythmia that causes the heart rate to elevate up over 180 beats per minute and in my case, even faster at times. It is important to get the heart rate back to normal as soon as possible, so when this happens, I must get to the emergency room as soon as I can. Sounds scary, but not really (unless not dealt with at the time). Had it since I was 22 years old. Anyway, I had to go over to the emergency room again two Sundays ago. It's not the first time I had to do this, but this time Elliot had to come with me and things worked out fine after the docs injected the usual medicine into me to slow the heart rate down and was back home in less than three hours. I was told to make an appointment with my cardiologist to discuss a procedure (called an ablation) were they can burn off the nerve or electrical area on the heart, to eliminate this condition for good. Made the appointment, went in that Thursday and afterwards went down to pick Elliot up for the weekend.

As when I can get away to pick up Elliot early enough, sometimes we meet with mom and we sneak off to a fast food place and hopefully get her back in time so she won't get in trouble for being away at work. We ended up at Arby's on Thursday near where she works. As we were eating, I was explaining all of this to mom and in chimes good old Elliot, knowing I have stents and seriously said, "But dad, you already have "stencils". Me and mom busted up laughing and I think Elliot knew why. He simply said the wrong word, but caught it too late. It's like Adrienne's mushroom and marshmallow thing or even a better one.

Once mom and I were watching "The Right Stuff". In one part of the movie, Chuck Yeager, who was not chosen to become an astronaut, went out one morning and seemed obsessed with taking a new jet for a flight. Soon he took off and flew straight up, hitting over 100,000 feet and just after seeing a glimpse of space, the engine cut out and he was heading back to earth. He hit the parachutes and fell safely back. Mom sort of missed that part, and soon the scene "came" up with him walking toward the rescue people, plane all in flames in the background, then mom says, "Look, he is safe. He ejaculated." She caught it in seconds and we both busted up laughing. Just had to share. We all do it as far as mixing up words and always is a riot when one is on the listening end.

So Elliot told me he didn't make the stent mistake on purpose and he laughed about it later that he called them stencils. It was his request to put this on the blog all last weekend and finally got around it tonight.

Come back again...lol ;-)

Juty 4 and the evil the plastic wrap

Everything started out so good. Elliot and I got out of bed and we ran to Redners. I told him the place should be empty as it is a holiday and there probably wouldn't be a lot of people there. We pulled into the parking lot and the place looked like the weather forecast was calling for a snowstorm. We got inside and the place was mobbed. It almost looked like a free for all, people scrambling all over the place. My first though was, what kind of goofs do their shopping on July 4th, then realizing I was one of the goofs, too...lol. They were running a lot of specials on meat and cookout items, so I could see why. I got to take advantage, too and have no complaints. The registers were fully manned and we waited at the checkout line no longer than any other time.

After we got home, we played a bit and I decided I'd better get the chicken thighs and hamburger into the freezer. I thought I had some small freezer bags, but all I had was plastic wrap. I started wrapping the chicken and you you have to remember you are reading from someone who can't open anything from any cardboard container without damaging it somehow. The plastic wrap was no different. Once you bend or damage that little cutting edge when you open it for the first time, you will know how every time you try to tear the plastic off, the thing will become a tangle mess for the life of the entire roll. Well, I did it a few weeks ago and paid for it today. That stuff no matter what I ever did, no damaged metal cutter on the edge or what, that stuff always somehow ends up sticking together and pretty much hate the stuff. I found that tearing off about three feet, is enough to wrap almost anything.

Elliot came out into the kitchen while I was wrapping the chicken thighs. He looked at them and said they looked really good. I asked if he was hungry and he said he was. I told him I have a chicken breast in the freezer and will make him a late lunch. Lo and behold, I went to the freezer and realized I made him the last chicken breast last weekend. He and I are breast men all the way in the chick department, but I like the thighs more from the feathered chick variety, but he still like his chicken breasts. I managed to make him a thigh man for this afternoon.

So all is well and I'm waiting to wrap the hamburger after I get a supply of small freezer bags tomorrow. Would be to overwhelming to use the plastic wrap. Probably would use like a half a mile of it for just 6 pounds of hamburger.

Happy fourth of July everyone.