Communication

Email between my brother-in-law (who turns 70 on the 28th) and me. He sent his email to everybody on the family and friends list. I, of course, replied to all. LOL

On Tue, Nov 23, 2010 at 6:26 AM, Adrian C. Havill wrote:

Please, do not mention my birthday to me, others, or the children. Do not send or give me presents. Do not have a waiter stick candle on a cupcake. Get the picture? Am very serious about this. There are consequences. ACH


to"Adrian C. Havill"

ccfamily@####.com

dateTue, Nov 23, 2010 at 8:16 AM
subjectRe: Fair warning
mailed-bygmail.com

No problem. Especially since I don't give a F*%&.

WDS

And this reply showed up from my nephew (ACH's son), ROFL

to"Adrian C. Havill"

ccfamily@####.com

dateTue, Nov 23, 2010 at 9:40 AM
subjectRe: Fair warning
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I guess we better cancel the Ann Coulter look-a-like stripper.

Head Cold, Windshield and Movies + Addendum

First, the head cold is just about over. Still have a lot of congestion but that’s mostly residual along with my ‘all my life’ sinus issues. When I turned 14, along with all the other changes, I started having full time sinus congestion. It was so continuous my parents eventually sent me to the Duke allergy center. Chronic sinusitis – no cure, no fix, just deal with it.

Windshield

Earlier this week I was contacted by SB from Wake Stone Corporation. SB took down what little information I had about the dump truck and offered to try and identify the trucker / company.

Friday, got an email from SB with the trucking company info and contact information. I’ll get in touch with them next week. Honestly, I doubt that the driver will own up to responsibility – but – it sure won’t hurt to call and ask. Heck, I may even be surprised.

I was surprised and very appreciative when I was contacted by Wake Stone (I had sent them an email with a link to my entry about the windshield). Wake Stone is the quarry - NOT the owner of the truck – so it wasn’t any of their responsibility. And frankly, I’m just one guy with a windshield so it would have been easy to ignore my email.

But – the folks at Wake Stone are stand up people and tracked down the trucking company info for me. Now that’s doing the right thing.

I’m very impressed - kudos to the folks at Wake Stone.

Movies

Watched A Serious Man and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead this week. The Cohen Brother make interesting movies. Serious Man is very very dry Jewish humor. I really enjoyed it – even though I didn’t understand some of the ‘inside’ jokes. Here’s a hint – if you rent this movie – after the end credits the film gives you humorous definitions of a lot of the Jewish idioms and words. Definitely worth going past the credits for.

Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead is an excellent movie. Very distressing to watch. But Seymour Hoffman is a tremendous actor and his role in this movie is outstanding.

Addendum

State 29 - UNC 25

Game was even closer than the score indicates. Carolina had the ball with 50 seconds left and down 2 points. A field goal would have won it. State made the plays that counted. Downing our punt to UNC at the 4 yard line and then sacking Carolina in the end zone for a safety.



State's defense had 7 sacks in the game.

Sunday Night Addendum

Just finished watching Winter's Bone. Incredible writing, story and direction. Unbelievably awesome acting performance by Jennifer Lawrence. Outstanding performances all around. Awful premise and terribly distressing to watch. Five out of five stars.

I Saw It Coming

 

Wake Stone Corporation has a quarry on Deep River Road at US 1.

Since I've lived here, about 11 years, I've had two windshields cracked by rocks from the dump trucks leaving the quarry. Today was number three.

The truck pulled out of the quarry behind me but then passed me going north on US 1. I was doing the speed limit, 65 mph; the truck was going a good bit faster. Maybe in the 75 mph range.

The truck started losing rocks as he went over the Haw River bridge. I suspect the rocks were dislodged from the bouncing caused by the joints in the concrete bridge deck. That and the high speed. Even though I was pretty far behind the truck, I'd estimate 400 or 500 feet, my car started getting pelted and I slowed down.

Anyway, I saw the big rock coming. I saw it bounce on the road and then pow - right smack in the middle of the windshield.

 

Modern safety glass is pretty amazing. It was a good sized rock but it didn't come through the windshield. Scared the silly putty out of me though.

In North Carolina, dump trucks do not have to have license tags on the back of the truck. I remember when the law was changed years ago to exempt dump trucks. The reason / argument was that dump trucks have difficulty keeping license tags on the back due to rough construction sites and the action of the dumping beds. That's complete bullshit. The real reason is so that people like me won't be able to get the tag numbers of the trucks when rocks smash our windshields.

Interesting, they can't keep license tags on the back but there's no problem keeping their rear lights and brake lights attached. Hmmmmmm . . . .

I called the Highway Patrol on my cell but they didn't have any cars in position to come and pull the guy over. The HP officer also checked with the Chatham County Sheriff and the Wake County Sheriff as well - no patrol cars nearby. By this time he was pretty far down the road anyway - due to his speeding.

I did see the truck take the New Hill exit but I kept on heading north to go to work. Besides, the driver would likely deny responsibility anyway.

So, I'm out the $100 deductible (again!) for my comprehensive insurance.

The dump truck was a white International and the name on the side was Mac Trucking.

That's working out to a smashed windshield about every 3 to 4 years.

I'm getting tired of it.

Weekend Update - November 14, 2010

Still have the head cold, but today I’m feeling somewhat better.

Saturday was the final home football game of the season. We beat Wake Forest pretty soundly. Wake was successful using quick shovel passes in the first half to defend against State’s blitz. But the coaches adjusted and State took over in the second half.

NC State has surprised everybody by exceeding expectations. Heck, preseason State was thought to be a bowl bubble team. Would we be able to manage a 6 and 6 season to become bowl eligible?

Instead, here we are near the end of the season with only 3 losses and a shot at the ACC Championship game. The best games were vs. Florida State and vs. Virginia Tech. Both came down to the final 3 minutes. VT was the slightly better team and won that game. We were the slightly better team and won the Florida State game.

We were the better team in the ECU loss but we dug ourselves way too deep a hole in the first quarter. Still, we overcame the 21 - zip first quarter. Ended up losing in overtime - interception.

The Clemson game? Geez, what to say. We just stunk it up. Lost by 1 point! Should have won by 2 touchdowns, if not more. We were clearly the better team - we just didn't get it done. Offensively we just kept shooting ourselves in the foot every time we had a scoring opportunity to put Clemson away.

Woulda, coulda, shoulda only have 1, maybe 2 losses instead of 3.

Still, we've done way better than anyone, myself included, thought. I'm a happy camper.

The Atlantic Division is tied up between NC State, Florida State and Maryland. FSU plays at Maryland this weekend. State plays at Maryland the following weekend. It's up for grabs and tie-breaker games will likely decide who goes to the ACC Championship game. Of course total ACC wins / loses count - so State needs to win over at Chapel Hill this Saturday.

It was a beautiful day for football. Thanks to FG who drove down from NoVa to go to the game and DB who drove over from Nashville. No, not that one - the one in NC. Nuke came up last weekend and went to the game of course.

Friday was the first basketball game of the season. Nuke and I went but left a little after halftime as I was feeling pretty bad. We have some serious talent. This could be a really fun season for NC State.

Nuke and I have just finished watching The Last Emperor. I’d never seen it. Nuke insisted. Excellent movie.

That’s about all for the update. Still feeling a little under the weather.

Weekend Update - November 7, 2010

Head cold. I'm really sick. Sore throat, completely stopped up sinuses, headache, joints and muscles aches - the works. Aspirin, orange juice and gargling with salt water to help ease the sore throat.

NC State Football

Lost by 1 point to Clemson. Should not have happened - in fact - State should have won by a lot. Three times we were inside Clemson's 20 and came away with Zero points. With three minutes left in the game TOB decided not to go for it on fourth down and one - totally gutless decision. Still, it never should have come down to that situation in the first place.

Clemson played a sloppy ineffective game, 5 fumbles and 1 interception. But thanks to State's inability to take advantage of scoring opportunities - Clemson won.

I'm really ticked off at this loss. It was totally inexcusable.

Basketball

Season Tickets arrived this week. Looking forward to the upcoming season. I hope we have a good year like we've had in football (Clemson game notwithstanding).