A Safari, sort of.

We went to Jungle Jim's in Cincinnati, actually it is in Fairfield, a suburb. Since geography is so painful we will just call it Cincinnati, and since Cincinnati is so hard to type we will just say "We went to Jungle Jim's."  Though it doesn't matter, at all.

Jungle Jim's is a super market, a really super market. You can find almost anything.

In the section where they sell candy there is an automaton of a dog standing behind a fence, holding a guitar and singing "You Ain't Nothin' But a Hound Dog" by Elvis Presley. For some reason that makes me happy. Elvis is still cool, even after all these years.

And, they have a big canned soup guy, kind of a guy, kind of a big soup can, on a swing over the
canned soup aisle. And it talks, of course, almost everything talks at Jungle Jim's. Sometimes, though, it starts feeling its oats, and it starts talking trash. "Hey, you in the hat, the Red's hat, how would you like me to come down there and kick your ass?"*

"I'd like to see you try." No guy, no matter how mature, no matter how comfortable he is with himself, no matter how at peace he is, is going to take that from a talking soup can.

The soup can jumped down from his swing and swaggered over to the Reds (I should point out he was a baseball Reds fan, not a fan of the movie Reds movie starring Warren Beatty, though he might have liked the movie, I'm not sure, and it doesn't really matter) fan and shoved him into the olive bar.

No guy, no matter how peace loving, no matter how centered, no matter how spiritual, is going to take that. He jumped up and grabbed the Soup Can guy and tried to wrestle him to the ground. He probably thought punching a soup can the size of a barrel, a soup barrel if you will, was a bad idea.

Soon they were rolling around in the oil from thousands of olives. The counter person was screaming and jumped on top of both of them, cursing, and trying to gouge their eyes. It was an awful mess, and I decided to bust a move on out of there, I didn't want to have to explain that to my wife.

We love going to Jungle Jim's. You never know what you will see.




*Not really, I have never witnessed the Jungle Jim's soup can guy behave in an aggressive or hostile manner. He is always respectful and polite. I just made this up for the sake of a blog post, and I apologize to Jungle Jim's, the Cincinnati Reds, Warren Beatty and soup loving pacifists all over the world.

Saving Jeff hits a regulatory entanglement. Or Part 8 of the struggle.

In what is rapidly becoming an excuse to not have an idea for a new post I have added Part 8. So, read 'em and weep, or sob, cry tears of anguish, and pain, I will leave the decision to you, the poor, long suffering readers of my blog. I would like to say a special thanks to +Mike Raven  for adding the delightful Part 7. It was wonderful, but, Jeff is going to be a little unhappy about the hole in his elbow

(If you haven't read all of the epic Saving Jeff series, don't delay, read now so you don't spoil this episode - part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, Part 6, and Part 7)

Bob started dozing softly. His head nodding to the left, and a slight whistle coming from his nose.  Using his right hand he scratched at his ear, and his eye. We all stared, we didn't know what to expect, but it wasn't that.

"Should we wake him?" I asked, nobody answered.

Bob stirred, opened his eyes, and asked, "did you hear that?"

Lionel, the technician operating the video/audio feed, slid a knob on an impossibly complicated looking piece of equipment. Out of the hundreds of little slider knobs he picked the correct one, and slid it all the way to the top. Secretly, we were impressed, though, we felt, at least some of us, that either Lionel was lucky, or all of the little knobs did the exact same thing and we had spent way too much on that little contraption.

Starting softly, gently, building quickly, crashing off the equipment, and bouncing off the walls in the small, cramped, crowded room were the sounds of Little Richard singing "Long Tall Sally."

Lionel acted quickly and turned down the volume, and I am pretty certain he used a different little knob. Note to self, Fire Lionel, that little showoff.

William stood up and asked "are we in the wrong movie?"

He pulled out his script and said, "crap, I'm in the wrong scene." and hustled Stage Left.

In walked Delores. Delores was the most attractive woman in the whole company. Tall, blond flowing hair, statuesque, she was gorgeous. But, beauty is only skin deep, and inside she was as mean as a high school math teacher on a Red Bull binge.

Here is a gratuitous picture of the only mower
I have that is still running, as a reminder how
angry I am at Sears for turning their back on
a loyal customer.

One time, at a company holiday party, Donnie from accounting had tried to kiss her. He had a little mistletoe on a stick, and when he put it over her head and leaned in to give her one on the lips she hit him right in the mouth. The force of the punch knocked two of his teeth loose, and made him so loopy he fell in the punch bowl. If Delores hadn't picked him up and threw him through a wall he probably would have drowned.

Anyway, when Delores walked in with her "illegal body and a dress that is too tight,"* we all looked away. And nobody said anything.

Until Bob said. "I see trouble brewing." And on the monitor was a line of boats stretched out as far as vision allowed.

And a haunting voice came over the monitor. "Please take off your shoes, and belts. and leave your bags in the little bins provided." Jeff had developed a serious case of TSA.





*Thank you, Michael Stanley band.

Life Explains Makes a Movie

Doctor Dawg and I have decided to raise a little extra coin. It is amazing how much cash he pulled in running for president in 2008 and 2012. It is like a license to print money. If you can put together a sentence that makes even a little sense people will line up to write a check. Then there is the food, and drinks, and tickets to sporting events, all gone in a puff of logic. That kind of windfall is hard to replace.

Movies can pull in some serious moolah, though, and we have some experience with explosives, and cameras. At least explosives, most of our experience wasn't good, but, we don't make mistakes, here at Life Explained, Ohio Office, we learn how not to do something.

We were shooting scene one of the Life Explained mega hit, Join The Choir Invisible Hard. Things were going well and somebody ordered real ordnance. Good help is so hard to find. Here is the result.

Now we can either wait until Doctor Dawg is out of the hospital or find a new star. Hey, are you busy, look at those cheekbones, and those eyes, you are a natural.

Good news, and bad news, and some news that is neither.

Thanks to the genius of +Rahul Singh* we here have decided to document the birth, nurturing, and eventual superstar success of Life Explained. A biographical account of the meteoric rise of a man, who was reeling from the unfair excesses of the post tech boom recession, and his dog. Technically, not his dog, more like a dog and his human sidekick.

The world needs to know, and it might sell enough to pay for some beer and frozen burritos, and a microwave because nobody likes to eat a frozen burrito until it is not frozen. Take our word for that.

There is a lot of excitement about the project, everybody is choosing the actor to portray them in the eventual blockbuster movie. Bob, from accounting wants Robert Redford, or Billy Dee Williams, Bob, from Sales wants Brad Pitt, and Bob from Marketing wants Brad Pitt, and so does Bob from Building Services, and Bob from Transportation, and Brenda from Legal. Brad Pitt is going to be pretty busy. We are hoping he will have time to direct, as well.

If any of you know Mr. Pitt you might want to make sure he clears his schedule, and makes a little extra room in his bank account, he might be very wealthy after this.

We will miss you, Micro SD card.

There is some sadness as well. Today we say goodbye to the original Life Explained camera. It was a sturdy little trooper, and we did a lot of things and had a lot of fun together. But, friend of the blog, Brian loaned us the Micro SD card. Since he just got a new phone he wants it back. The bastard. What kind of man loans you something and then wants it back?

Of course, mostly we used our iPhone for pictures, and recently we got a new camera, so Life Explains carries on. And Micro SD cards aren't really that expensive, we might do a crowd funding drive to buy a new one, so keep your eyes, and wallets open. Especially you, Mr. Pitt. You have a lot to gain.

For today's video we will say hello to our new camera.

*We have to wonder how someone so young ever got so smart. We need to increase the budget for Life Explained India Office (LEIO). Maybe from nothing to something, we will talk about it at the next board meeting.

Monday, time to get serious.

Monday, the day that starts the week. It is time to roll up the sleeves, and get to work. Shoulder to the wheel, nose to the grindstone, and all.  Though, most of us no longer have to put our shoulder to a wheel, wheel turning is probably almost completely automated these days. What kind of job requires an associate to put his nose to a grindstone, though? That sounds awful! There must be an amazing compensation package for anybody to accept that position. It has to be a very short career.

Anyway, the work week is here, and it is time to start getting serious, no more messing around.  In the words of David Byrne of the Talking Heads;

"This ain't no party, this ain't no disco,
This ain't no fooling around,
No time for dancin' or lovey dovey,
I ain't got time for that now."

Now is the time to start planning for next weekend.  There are only five days left, and you can't waste a minute. Before you know it Saturday will be here, and you will be adrift in a weekend without an itinerary, or as we, here at Life Explained, like to say, "up relaxation creek without a paddle, like an idiot," or something like that.

Time is wasting, man, (here, I am using the term "man" as a neutral, all inclusive designation that encompassing all people, men, women, aliens, supernatural beings, anybody who needs to start thinking about the coming weekend) you don't want to get left behind. Put down the phone, drop the pen, let go of the mouse, or keyboard, or pen like stylus, and start thinking about the glory that awaits in only 4 days 4 hours, 17 minutes, and 29 seconds, approximately.

One thing on which most relaxation experts, and we have a whole staff of them, agree, "don't try to take on too much on the weekend," Try to keep it simple, something achievable, something that will allow the building of self esteem, like watching a movie on television.  Plan a little break in there, so you are not overwhelmed, you're not superman, after all.  Safety first, that is our motto.

Life Explained, the movie.

Good news, for all of you who wondered what it was like to work at a top secret research and development facility.  We have brought in a film crew, (actually it is a guy who works here and owns an iPhone), a big time director (the same guy, allowing him to be the director was the only way he would agree to stay awake for the whole day) and a top flight, big budget special effects lab (ok, it is just an iPhone app, but it is pretty amazing, and it did cost $6.00 or $7.00 dollars (honestly, we were all so excited nobody really remembers how much it cost) which is at least a dozen donuts) to put it all together.

It is kind of exciting, we have the storyboard laid out, using two of our favorite pens.  Casting is going to be a little unconventional, with the expense of the new app, and the donuts, money is a little tight.  But, art is not contingent on,or tied to capitol outlay.

Good news is, there is a rumor, unsubstantiated so far, that Samuel L. Jackson is considering looking into the possibility of taking a bit part, as "scientist 3" or "unnamed engineer" just to say he had a part.  It is against the Screen Actors Guild guidelines to work of donuts, even the tasty ones we prefer.  But, everybody is keen to have their name associated with this project.

In fact, several presidential hopefuls are handing out cabinet appointments, and ambassadorships just to have a spot in the parking scene, a beautiful exchange between two lonely workers, both wanting the same ideal spot, close to the sidewalk, and far from the dumpsters.  Really touching, really emotional, filled with drama, almost guaranteed to get some votes.

There is a lot of excitement, and a little tension, and some bickering over who gets to operate the little clapper thing between scenes.  Those things are pretty cool.  Oh, by the way do any of you have one of those little clapper things they use between scenes we can borrow?  It might get you a shot in the movie.

Well, that was not too bad, we hope.

Last week I got this new app, it is a photo manipulation app, and it is pretty cool.  The excitement was almost overpowering, and the potential seemed limitless, as i dove in.  Co-workers, family members, strangers in line at the grocery store photographed surreptiously, they were all fair game.  However, it fell just a little short, it needed something, but for $2.00 it was a powerful little time killer.   Inspiration, a bolt from the heavens,  "you know, what would be great, if I could take them and make them move around a little."  Nothing elaborate, or complicated, just from one place to another.  Back to the App Store.

There was an animation app that looked pretty fun, easy, and robust, for the price, so I grabbed it.  And it was great.  Taking pictures with my phone, manipulating friends, and family, or strangers into awkward, or humorous situations.  Then saving them to the photo albums to import them into an animation app, and set the whole thing in motion.  Man, this was so cool!  But, then something said "you know what would be really fun, some music, maybe something from a song in the library, right there on the phone.  Man, that would be great."

Here is where it gets really good.  I already have an app that will let me make videos with text, banners, titles, and several transitional effects, and it allows for the addition of a background track using one of the songs in the music collection.  

"WOW, this is fantastic, I can take pictures with my phone, alter them in many ways, using this photo manipulation app, putting my friend or family member on the business end of a bad situation, then using my animation app, rocket them through terrible, and trying circumstances, while being chased by an army of uncomfortable, and unfortunate, situations, only to and add some inspirational music in my video compilation app!  This is great!"

I was so excited, anticipation almost killed me.  And then it hit me, "I have become such a geek."  Without all of the potential profit, of course, or the technical prowess.  But, there is little to be done about it now, and since all of the apps have been paid for, installed, and are screaming for attention, here is my newest movie.  I hope it doesn't make anybody ill.