Here I am, at the end of alphabet month, and only half way through the alphabet. Now, at letter N, I got Nothing, just like my buddies over at SWT.

Nada. Ništa. Niets. Wala. Rien. Nichts. Niente. Nic. 无.

Early in the month, I was churning posts out at a fairly good clip, with 10 posts completed by mid month. My record month was 15 posts, back in September and October of 2006. I had my best chance to beat that this month. Oh, well. There’s always May. May will be Finish-The-Backwards-Alphabet Month. My goal will be 16 posts, just to beat the record.

In the meantime, click the picture on the right for a web site about nothing.

While waiting in line at Tim Hortons for a coffee a couple of weeks ago, I happened to witness this interesting sight. There has been a display of prefabricated homes in the lot next door and they were dismantling one of the houses. We had noticed some activity over the previous couple of days and were trying to guess what they were doing. I got my answer one Saturday morning as I went down to pick up coffee.

Pretty cool to see.

Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers

Y’all know that I often suffer from anxiety caused by my inability to come up with ideas to write about on my blog. I figured that if I started this whole alphabet thingy it would motivate me to write my posts in advance. Well, it kinda worked. Titles are easy, but free flowing text is a little bit of a struggle sometimes. But this time, I’m not without ideas. I have lots of ideas for the letter “P”, but the timing, or the content, or the letter is a little bit off.

For instance… right now I’m in the process of Pimping My Ride. My four-wheeler is getting a little bit of a cosmetic functional update. I have already installed new front and rear bumpers to make it look mean protect it in the event of an unfortunate bump by or into another four wheeler or tree or ditch or… As well, I’ve ordered (they arrived today!) four new tires and aluminum rims to make it look meaner enhance it’s capability in traversing the occasional mudhole that we intentionally drive into happen to need to cross to reach our destination. But I can’t write about this, at least not yet. I don’t have it all assembled and I don’t have any pictures. I’d have to have pictures for that post. (Update: Pimping complete. I picked up the tires later in the day and mounted them. Click the thumbnail for a slightly better view.)

Also, I’ve started Popping Pills and have a referral to Physical Therapy to fix my tennis elbow. I haven’t started the Physio yet, but the pills are doing a wonderful job on my elbow. The havoc they are playing with my digestive system is evidenced by the stimulation to the senses it is causing; smell and sound in particular. Never before did I wake in the middle of the night thinking there was a thunderstorm only to discover the sound was coming from the contents of my digestive tract trying to find the nearest emergency exit. Speaking of Physical Ailments, I also have chronic Tinnitus (ringing in the ears). My buddy Paul tells me that he read somewhere that one cause of Tinnitus is excessive masturbation. Needless to say, my recent diagnosis of Tennis Elbow did nothing to convince him otherwise.

And now I discover that the Newfoundland and Labrador Blogroll has chosen my blog as the Blog of the Week! Now, I know that nothing here begins with a P, but if I had not Procrastinated, I would have had P and O done by now and I could have used N for Newfoundland and Labrador Blogroll Blog of the Week. Couldn’t I? So, in a roundabout kinda way, I could have used this as a blog post title. Not for P, but for N, if I wasn’t stuck on P. But I’m stuck on P.

The problem is picking which P to post.

Oh well. You’ll have to excuse me now. I have to go pee.

We bought a new four-wheeler last year, and so began my hard-learned lessons about how not to ride them.

We took the quad to Newfoundland last year when we went there for vacation. One one of our trips into the wilderness, we crossed a very watery bog. There were three machines, two adults, one teenager, and three kids. Each machine took its turn getting stuck which was promptly resolved by one of the other machines hooking up and quickly towing it out. At one such incident, I was riding my new machine, which had less than 500 kms on the odometer, behind the other two. The first one went through a particularly water-soaked section of bog, but got through. The second machine went through in the same track, digging the ruts a little deeper. I decided that I wouldn’t follow in the same track. I figured that it I straddled a little to the side, I’d have an easier time of it. Boy, was I wrong! My right hand side stayed on solid bog but… what I thought was marshy moss under my left wheels was simply moss floating on top of a fairly deep water gully. The quad promptly sunk and sunk good. I had to remain leaning off the right side of the machine so it wouldn’t roll right over. Check out the short video below showing how deep I was.

Did you notice that the exhaust was bubbling out from under water at the back of the bike?

Well… it took us a fairly long time getting my machine out of this mess. We were about 45 minutes ride from the nearest help, so I was pretty anxious to get it out on our own. We tried all the conventional methods, but we eventually achieved success by letting the winches out on all three machines and hooking them to each other. Then, we all drew the winches back in. At the same time, the other two machines had their machines in reverse while I used four-wheel, locked-in-low to drive forward. The video below is edited down to shorten the duration, but it does give you an idea of the struggle we had getting out. It still makes me nervous watching it!

You feel lucky, punk?

Ever come by for a visit and there’s nothing new posted? Tired of dropping by everyday looking for your daily dose of insomnia-cure only to discover that I’m suffering from writer’s block again? Well… there’s a solution to this dilemma. Take a look to the right hand side of the screen… go ahead, look over there–> WAAAYYY over there—–>> See the words “Random Post” with a hyperlink below it? Click on that link to see a random re-run of a past post. Why not, eh? It works when they do it on TV. Consider it your own special Oh Me Nerves post syndication. As of this writing, there are 361 past posts over the last three and a half years. To put things in perspective, Seinfeld had a grand total of 180 episodes over its nine year history. Here at OhMeNerves.com you have twice the variety!

I tried it out… here’s a sampling of the fun and frolic you can enjoy:

• Oct 13, 2005: God had trouble with his kids too
• Apr 18, 2008: Sshhh! Don’t Tell My Wife…
• Jan 29, 2008: In The News Today
• Apr 1, 2008: Using The N-Word
• Dec 9, 2005: Good advice…
• Sep 13, 2005: Billiards Instruction
• Oct 13, 2006: In the news today
• May 4, 2007: Huntington’s Disease
• Jun 10, 2007: Sopranos Swansong
• May 20, 2008: Plastic Purgery
• Apr 16, 2008: How Shit Happens
• Oct 19, 2007: Cowcarts and Indians
• Oct 5, 2007: Orange Armpits
• Dec 17, 2006: Phishin’ for a Newphie
• Nov 16, 2006: The Perils of Cross-Border Travel
• Jun 21, 2007: He’s Not 40, He’s 39.95 (plus tax)

There. Wasn’t that more fun than Seinfeld? Try it for yourself. While you are at it, check out the random pic and random tagline in the title section at the top of the page. All for your viewing and reading pleasure!

Anyone who has perused my site in the past whould have come across a post or two where I have stated that spring is my favourite season. I don’t know if it’s simply my distaste for winter, but I dearly look forward to the longer days, stronger sun, budding life and snow storms that this time of year has to offer. I mean it’s truly wonderful to see the miracle of li…. what?! Wait a minute! Did I say snow storms?

Yes. I guess I did.

Two days ago, I took a picture that was eerily similar to another one that I took and posted about last year. The snow was melting, the tulips were poking their pretty little sprouts through the newly thawed topsoil, and the stench of last fall’s rotting leaves filled the air. It was wonderful. We had taken the winter tires off the cars, removed the ice scrapers and shoved the shovels back in the shed.

But Mother Nature is a cruel and sadistic bitch. She flirts with you, winking at you as she slowly saunters seductively in your direction. She steps right up to you, running her fingers up and down the lapels of your coat, glares into your eyes, and then grabs those lapels tight, pulling you forward as she comes up with a swift knee directly into your crotch. Then she laughs at you as you crumble to the ground, her laughter sounding like a shovel scraping across an asphalt driveway, her cackles just like the rumbling of a weary snowblower. We woke up Easter morning to the wintry scene you see here. It continued, and continues, to snow into this morning. I didn’t have the strength to take an updated picture this morning, but suffice to say it was about twice as bad as the picture on the left.

I am sooooo heartbroken! Spring, please come back! PLEEAASSE!!!!