BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

So… Just got back from a family vacation. E K and I haven’t taken too many of those in recent years… Well… In sorta recent years. You see, it goes like this – After the o-spring was born, vacations weren’t terribly feasible, what with us being “old parents” and not wanting to drag an infant, then toddler around on long trips. Besides, have you ever seen how much crap you have to carry around for an infant/toddler?

Then after that, I was spending tons of time away from home on tour, so the last thing I wanted to do was get on the road, or an airplane, to go somewhere. I just wanted to be HOME.

However, as the o-spring has grown older, the economy and changes in the book industry have reduced the amount of touring I do, and other silliness has occurred, over the last few years we have started to take family vacations.

Ahhhh… Nice… Relaxing… Well, not always. There’s a lot of hurry up, rush, rush, rush involved in vacationing. However, we definitely try to make it as relaxing as possible.

At any rate, this year we used some vouchers I had picked up from being bumped from flights while on tour, and turned them into a 6 day getaway in The Grand Tetons and Yellowstone National Park. In the coming weeks I’ll be posting pics and detailing some of the more interesting – and sometimes funny – moments of our adventure. However, for now I am going to relate to you a few links of places we visited, and my “Twitter Travelogue” for those of you who might not follow me there or on Facebook (also because some of the texted tweets never made it to the web due to cell phone issues)… At any rate, the following is captured from my cell phone (note – the embedded links will take you to info or websites about specific locations, etc):

At cattle yard waiting for jet-propelled, wing-ed semi. Skipped breakfast. Dunkin’ Donuts in my very near future. 😀 6:53 AM  6/12

Dead pig croissant installed. Mmm good… Coffee being installed NOW… 7:16 AM  6/12

In airplane, everybody can hear you sneeze… 10:07 AM  6/12

On ground Salt Lake City. 3 hour layover. Was going to shop for an extra wife, but E K said NO.  10:12 AM  6/12

Squatters “Captain Bastard’s” Oatmeal Stout… A. Loots should be JEALOUS! 10:50 AM  6/12

Squatters Pub at Salt Lake City Airport… Mentos would love this place… 11:38 AM  6/12

Longest leg of flight, small airplane. Shortest leg (under 1 hour), big
airplane. E’splain that one, Rucy… O_o  12:35 PM  6/12

There’s a bookstore next to my gate. I wonder if they have anything by that Sellars guy? 12:51  6/12

Onboard cattle car. The “Loud” FAMILY seated behind me. :-< 1:25 PM 6/12

 

Beefalumps and mountains EVERYWHERE! I don’t think I’m in Missouri anymore.  12:01 PM  6/13

Sorry for the lack of updates. They took me up into the mountains last night, but this morning I es-cop-ayed! 12:15 6/13

I’m like wayyy closer to the clouds than normal… It’s kinda spooky… 12:21 PM 6/13

Whooa! I think I just saw a whole mess of those airplane eating cloud monsters from the Shatner Twilight Zone episode… 12:25 PM  6/13

Fellow authors, research note: a chase scene inside Jackson Hole airport in Wyoming probably won’t work. Too small. 12:43 6/13

Mucho excellent lunch at Snake River Brewing Pub. www.snakeriverbrewing.com. Killer fish & chips and an excellent black & tan! 2:26 PM  6/13

In Wyoming lookin’ for a liquor store… 2:39 PM 6/13

Shades of an adventure movie, Batman! I’m riding a funicular tram! 3:02 PM  6/13

On tram. Trapped at top in thunder-sleet storm because of lightning. No sh*t. How cool is this! 3:19 PM 6/13

Back down off the mountain. Hammered a Red Bull. Heading for Moose… Town or mammal, not sure which… 4:23 PM  6/13

What happens when two unstable air masses collide in the mountains? Pretty much the same thing that happens at sea level, only way colder 6:23 AM 6/14

“The Mask” 2011 – A vacationing author’s CPAP mask disassembles itself in the middle of the night. Hilarity ensues. (R) Language  6:40 AM  6/14

Rafted the Snake River with a philosopher named Steve. His advice: It’s all about the unknowns. Embrace yours… 1:05 PM  6/14

Following the advice of the great Snake River Philosopher Steve, I am now ascending Signal Mountain. In a car. I’m not crazy ya’know… 4:46 PM 6/14

Made pretty pictures of mountains. Played hide ‘n seek with ground “skwirlz.” Now having a Starbucks DS from the Gen Store. 7:36 PM 6/14

Ate Elk. Drank Scotch & Irish coffee. Visited with rather large Grizzly bear & took his picture. AMAZING sunset over Tetons. Pics taken. Bed 10:00 PM 6/14

Blue sky over the Tetons this morning. AWESOME view! On tap – Breakfast, hike, lunch, then North into Yellowstone… 7:26 AM  6/15

Please excuse the odd timing of updates. Cell service has been dicey, and my phone just empties the outbox whenever it gets a signal… 😐 7:31 AM 6/15

At Jenny Lake. Forest is here too… JEH-NAYYY! 10:59 AM 6/15

Yes. Bears DO poop in the woods. 11:00 AM 6/15

Yellow-bellied Marmot, ain’t askeered. Moose on path, no “skwirl” though… 12:56 PM 6/15

Gal in miniskirt & heels (not E K) on mountain hike. That’s dedication… 1:46 PM 6/15 (FYI – this was NOT a joke tweet…)

I forgot. Here in the valley, curvature of the Great Divide prevents my text signal from reaching you. You’ll have to entertain yourselves 10:00 PM  6/15

Running Bear Pancake House, West Yellowstone, MT – Too much food, even for a fat guy like me. Tell ’em Missouri Merp sent you… 7:32 AM  6/16

In a big country, la la la la-la. Montana… If your sky is missing, they probably have it… 12:00 6/16

Contrary to rumor, I have NOT been eaten by a bear. Bison, however, could be a different story… 12:00 6/16

 

Egg beater into Salt Lake all good. Now flight home overbooked. Not this time,  Delta. No effin’ way… 7:35 PM  6/17

On ground STL… 12:13 AM  6/18

So there you go… Vacation via Twitter. Details and pics coming soon…

More to come…

Murv

As kids – and even as adults – we develop fascinations with things. Among the romanticized things for which folks develop an attachment – Pirates.

I mean, look at the facts. We could go back to all of the old Errol Flynn movies… Skip forward to the movie Yellow Beard… Skip into the here and now with the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise… And I’m not even going to mention the romance novels involving one-eyed, cutlass waving, buff scalawags. Why? Because I haven’t read any of them – the cover art was more than enough to scare me away.

However, in this day and age, even with the PotC franchise and the like, there are a different breed of pirates out there, and I’m not talking about the Somalis. I’m talking about the chuckleheads who steal from others and then profit from it. This is a big thing with music, movies, and even books. Take, for instance, a recent facebook status update from my wife, The Evil Redhead herself:

But you know what? As angry as that makes me, there are other pirates out there. The kind that steal from folks who have websites. I’m not talking necessarily about the folks who borrow a picture or two. I think we’ve all done that, and I am the first to admit that I might have a generic photo embedded in my blog to which I don’t own the rights because I found it somewhere and couldn’t figure out to whom said rights actually belonged. That’s why I have a disclaimer saying that if you see a pic on my site that belongs to you and you don’t want me using it, just say the word. I’ll make it go away. Or give you credit and a link if that’s what you prefer.

However, that’s not the Internet thievery I mean. I’m talking about when someone HOTLINKS to an image on your site to embed it in their blog, or website. Basically, they are just too damned lazy to download it themselves, or they don’t want to waste their own bandwidth. Nope… They’d rather link off to your site and run your meter, because that way it comes out of YOUR pocket, not theirs.

And after all, the Internet isn’t just “public domain” it’s out and out free, right? Yeah… I think we all saw how well that worked for Little Miss “Honestly Monica” now didn’t we?

So, whenever I fall victim to this bandwidth theft, and I find out, I do something about it. Now, mind you, I COULD do something incredibly crass and obnoxious, like bitch at the person in their comments section, or replace the hotlinked item with some really wicked, bad, nasty porn, but that’s just not my style. I’d rather replace the item with something that will make the offender think – hopefully. It doesn’t always work, but hey, why not pose an ethical question so that a lesson can be learned… (Can you spot the picture I swapped out on my server? Bet you can…)

Click Photo To Enlarge

Note – I went ahead and blurred out the name, content, and picture of the offender, primarily because after about 6 hours someone finally pointed out to him that he’d been caught and he removed the hotlink. However, please don’t get the impression that I think he is now a fine, upstanding Internet citizen – There was no apology forthcoming, either on his blog, or even in a private email.

Of course, having studied a boatload of different religions, and knowing his from the bio on his blog, as I understand it I’m not the one due the apology. God is.

Hopefully he will address this at his next confession. I’d sure hate for him to end up in Hell all because he kyped bandwidth to display a picture of a coffee cup…

However, just in case God is reading my blog – I mean even the Supreme Being needs a chuckle every now and then, doesn’t she? –  Anywho, if God is reading, maybe she could go ahead and put a bug in the Priest’s ear – since it was a coffee cup picture and all, don’t be too hard on the guy. I’m thinking two Hail Caffeineas and an Our Peaberry oughta cover it…

More to come…

Murv