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A year in the life of Lighthouse...

Started by lighthouse,

43 posts in this topic

lighthouse

lighthouse

Posted
Posted

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.

 

That has been my custom title here for some time now. I honestly don't know when it changed from "Brickless Wonder" since I was without internet access at the time, but I have to admit I felt a surge of emotion when I saw my new title. Of course that could have just been some bad tacos...

 

I figured my custom title made the best choice for this thread... a little background and history of the man known only as "lighthouse". At least 60% of all the information in this thread is true. And most of the items that are not true did actually happen, just not to me. Or I thought they happened but they didn't. Or I was worried they might happen. Or it would have made for a better story if they happened...

 

So without (much) further adoo...

 

"It was the best of times... it was the worst of times"

 

Please be warned. This post will be long and rambling. There will be more than enough comic information to keep it legitimately in the Comics General section (especially considering how low the bar has been set for this forum). Heck, if I am not mistaken, any post about the University of Michigan would be on-topic for this forum as long as it mentioned "Wolverines" at least once...

 

We'll set the wayback machine for about a year ago... A simpler time... A time before Desperate Housewives... A time before Michael Jackson was innocent... A time when the Red Sox were still cursed... A time before the Tsunami... A time before that guy from Love Story lost the election... A time before... well you get the idea...

 

Things I Have Learned In The Last Year

 

[*] If you have multiple eBay accounts, and one of them is really important to you, don't ever let the credit card expire on one of your other accounts.

 

[*] Meg Whitman cares a lot more about the 20,000 new users signing up in China every day than she does about the users she already has in North America.

 

[*] Offering to drive down to eBay headquarters with a ski mask and a machete is unlikely to accelerate the poor response time from the SafeHarbor staff.

 

[*] If you have multiple eBay accounts, and eBay simultaneously NARUs all of them, be prepared to clean the Augean Stables as part of the process of being reinstated.

 

[*] Do not be surprised at the lack of compassion expressed by an eBayer you did business with 3 years earlier, when eBay expects you to contact them and make good on a deal.

 

[*] Expect even less compassion if you have proof that you made good on the deal three years earlier and just need the eBayer in question to file a form admitting that fact.

 

[*] If your cable connection goes out due to a "blown tap port", do not allow your cable repairman to simply connect you to a different port on the same tap.

 

[*] When the second tap port blows three days later, do not be surprised if it takes over a week to schedule your cable repairman's return visit.

 

[*] When he finally does arrive, under no circumstances should you allow him to again connect you to a different port on the same tap.

 

[*] It is perfectly acceptable to schedule his third visit even before the third tap port blows, given that it will in less than 5 days and he cannot return for a week anyway.

 

[*] Sometimes, no matter how complicated your life may seem, a family member will need you, and you will suddenly realize that all those complications were nothing more than minor inconveniences in comparison.

 

[*] Good karma, even earned, can take six months to arrive.

 

[*] Cancelling an appearance at a comic show 3000 miles away sucks.

 

[*] Cancelling one where you planned to meet six friends for the first time in person sucks even more.

 

[*] When leaving a spouse to move 2000 miles away on less than a week's notice, it's not a good idea to joke that she looks fat right before you get in your car.

 

[*] One fat joke can easily be forgiven if you pull a bouquet of flowers from the back seat of the car while she is yelling at you.

 

[*] Telling her she looks fat again when you actually get in the car to drive away is slightly more amusing than it was the first time. Just make sure to make a silly face when you say it.

 

[*] The Umpqua Ice Cream at the diner in Rice Hill, Oregon just off I-5 tastes just as good today as it did when I first had it on the way back from a cross country meet 20 years ago.

 

[*] The Motel 6 in Buttonwillow, California is quite possibly the cheapest in the entire chain. And they have an extremely odd selection of snacks in the vending machines.

 

[*] You can listen to San Francisco talk radio stations for over 600 miles while on I-5, closer to 800 on a clear night.

 

[*] The sports talk stations in Sacramento care a little too much about what happens with the Kings.

 

[*] You would not believe the smile that comes to a homeless boy's face when you give him an Ultimate Spider-Man Vol 1 TP at a rest stop on an interstate. I suspect his dad was even happier when the boy got halfway through the book and found the $10 bill I left inside, but I was miles down the road by then.

 

[*] Kern County, California is one of the four biggest oil producing counties in the US and one of the four biggest agricultural counties in the US. My aunt and uncle live there. But that doesn't change the fact that the whole county smells like old socks.

 

[*] Greg Buls (of Bulldog Collectibles) lives in a place that is almost literally hotter than hell. I can't imagine how his books stay in decent shape given the heat there, but they do. If you ever visit, expect to be introduced to more bulldogs than you have ever seen in person.

 

[*] An awful lot of comics fit in an ocean-going cargo container.

 

[*] A cargo container full of Crossgen comics is both incredibly impressive and incredibly depressing at the same time.

 

[*] The Compass Bank just down the road from Greg Buls' house has the best giveaway pens you have ever seen in a bank.

 

[*] Southern New Mexico isn't nearly as boring at 2am.

 

[*] West Texas is boring no matter what time it is. But at least you can drive 80 the whole way to Kerrville.

 

[*] Upon arriving in your new (old) hometown, don't be surprised if all of the interstates go in different directions from how they used to go. A formerly simple cloverleaf can be suddenly turned into a giant origami puzzle in just a couple years.

 

[*] When attempting to secure a new domicile it helps to have a job to provide income.

 

[*] Do not expect a labor union to abide by its own contract when determining your status with that union.

 

[*] Even if you know the contract by chapter and paragraph, do not expect a labor union to follow its own contract when determining your status with that union.

 

[*] Even if you wrote the contract, including the relevant chapters and paragraphs, do not expect a labor union to follow its own contract when determining your status with that union.

 

[*] Do not expect the National Labor Relations Board to get excited about a former member's issues with his local, even if that member is the former president of the local.

 

[*] Do not expect Board-Certified Labor Lawyers to accept your case against the union, even when you wrote the contract and the language plainly indicates your side is correct.

 

[*] Sometimes accepting a 53% pay cut and a drop from #23 on a labor call list to #431 on that labor call list can turn out to be a good thing. Really. It can.

 

[*] Being on very good terms with the local union's long-time secretary can make life a little smoother when securing a domicile. Having her tell the apartment complex that you make over $3,000 a month (when you will likely make well under half that) is even better. Most people don't forget favors you did for them, even years and years later.

 

[*] It helps to have a stockpile of favors built up. Even if the only job available is cleaning plastic chairs with a rag and 409 for 8 hours a day, it's still a job. Having someone at the company with the power and willingness to ensure you get 25-30 hours of work a week is nothing to sneeze at.

 

[*] Two months of cleaning chairs with a rag for 8 hours a day is a great upper body workout, but it's awfully boring.

 

[*] "Boring" is a whole lot better than having your vehicle broken into while selling at a comic convention.

 

[*] The Arlington, Texas Police Dept has no interest whatsoever in solving property crimes. "Unless they accidentally left their driver's license in your van, we won't be coming out to inspect it, sir" "Well they left blood all over the driver's armrest, do you want to take a sample of that?" "We don't really have any place to store stuff like that, sir. It would just get thrown away."

 

[*] Somewhere in Arlington, a thief has my kangaroo scrotum dice bag. Having his blood on my armrest is little consolation, at least until I find a shaman who can use the blood to curse him for me.

 

[*] Stronguy is a useful friend to have. In addition to his winning personality, ample supply of firearms, connections with local mechanic shops, ability to squat a small car, and willingness to help a friend in need, he's also a mighty good kisser.

 

[*] Did I mention he can take a joke, too?

 

[*] Thanksgiving is a rough holiday when the biggest things you can come up with to be thankful for are things that did not happen. At least no one died recently. At least my apartment hasn't caught fire. At least that stripper wasn't pregnant after all. At least I still have my good looks...

 

[*] Cleaning chairs with a rag and 409 is even more boring the third month. But it's still a good workout.

 

[*] Sheep are among the dumbest animals in existence. But they can still be extremely annoying. And when 60 of them suddenly decide they don't want to pay attention any more, it's a pain in greggy's short shorts to get them to come back to the stupid pen.

 

[*] Having to explain to your work that you are late, again, because the stupid sheep acted like stupid sheep is a sure-fire way to feel stupid yourself.

 

[*] Trying to survive for four months with your rent totalling nearly half your gross wages is challenging.

 

[*] Double Cheeseburgers are a bargain for a dollar at McDonalds. But tap water gets real old after a while.

 

[*] Ignoring friends who call you and leave voice mail messages is rarely a good choice. But it's easy.

 

[*] The holidays are best spent with family. And they make for a powerful reminder of what Frost meant when he said, "In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life— It goes on."

 

[*] Sheep are even dumber in winter than they are in summer.

 

[*] The fourth month of cleaning chairs with a rag and 409 is strangely less boring than the first three. The sameness itself becomes interesting, in the same way that a moment's pause at the mirror can shed light one has never seen before.

 

[*] A union that drops its former President two pay grades and 400 seniority places is likely to make additional poor choices.

 

[*] A local union that goes out on strike in an attempt to maintain a working condition that 26 of 27 branches have already wrested from their respective locals is a union that is doomed to lose. The fact that said union is in a "right to work" state is further proof of the incompetence of its leadership.

 

[*] A local union that goes out on strike in an attempt to maintain anything in its current expired contract is run by fools. If the present expired contract is acceptable to the union, it should always continue working under the terms of the old agreement until the company locks them out. Then they at least get the benefit of public opinion (and $390 a week in unemployment benefits).

 

[*] A local union that goes out on strike without a strike fund to support its picketing members is run by even bigger fools.

 

[*] A local union that goes out on strike without properly notifying the AFL-CIO and requesting that fellow unions honor its picket line is run by even bigger incompetent fools.

 

[*] After five months of cleaning chairs, the decision to side against my former union members in their labor dispute was easier than I would have ever expected.

 

[*] The very first day of a labor dispute is quite telling. Between the death threats, assaults on my vehicle, damage to the company van I drove to bring in temporary laborers, and new curse words I learned, the membership of my former union made plain that my choice was permanent, and that they were not the kind of workers who deserved to work in a customer service oriented job.

 

[*] You may be able to beat the hell out of one cop. But you can't beat the hell out of everyone he can reach on the radio. And if you go on strike against a company with 27 branches to draw additional personnel from, you better have the support of your fellow unions in honoring your picket.

 

[*] The day before the strike started was the last day I ever cleaned a plastic chair with a rag and 409.

 

[*] It's very easy to ask your 3-up for a raise after two weeks of 83 hours each supervising 20-40 employees at a time and training replacement workers for hours on end.

 

[*] Paychecks are a whole lot nicer with a 47% raise and twice as many hours available each week.

 

[*] Five months of cleaning chairs caused me to drop 7% of my body fat and 21 pounds overall.

 

[*] The gym just down the road from my apartment is chock full of college volleyball teams, high school girls soccer teams, trophy wives maintaining their value, and me. Well, at least me three days a week for an hour or so anyway.

 

[*] Five months of cleaning chairs took some fat off me, but it did nothing for my bench press results. My first workout at my new gym I managed just 5 reps at 95 pounds. It's a wonder I could get out of bed in the morning.

 

[*] Three weeks is plenty of time for a weak labor union to pack their things and go home.

 

[*] There are a lot of people in San Antonio willing to work for $10 an hour. We put two ads in the local newpaper and had 640 job applicants in less than two weeks. Including nearly 200 certified forklift drivers, who were willing to start at barely half what the fired union workers had been making.

 

[*] One month into my workouts at the gym I managed 12 reps at 105 pounds.

 

[*] Six months with no internet access and no cable television is more than enough time to completely forget what it is like to be connected to the world. Strangely freeing, and scary as hell all at the same time.

 

[*] Two months into my workouts at the gym I managed 12 reps at 125 pounds.

 

[*] Little girls, like butterflies, need no excuse... Okay, so I didn't actually learn that this year, it's from a Heinlein book after all, but I was reminded of it when I spent two hours with a friend's 2 year old daughter one day last spring. Tick, tick, tick goes the biological clock.

 

[*] Living 2000 miles away from a spouse of 13 years is hard. But it's not as hard as being shot at in Iraq while 7000 miles away. I found this blog entry shortly after it appeared, while I was at a friend's house. While I certainly found the Captain's blog to be amusing, it reminded me that my situation was hardly worth dwelling on.

 

[*] Three months into my workouts at the gym I managed 12 reps at 135 pounds. And my weight was down to 201 lbs. When I went to the Forum Dinner in San Diego in 2003, I tipped the scales at 260lbs, the heaviest of my life, after spending nearly the entire decade of the 90s at around 205 and most of the 2000s at around 220. When I stepped on the scale and saw I was the lightest I had been in 15 years I just stared, and stared, and stared some more. Especially since at no time in the past could I have benched 135 pounds 12 times...

 

[*] It's pretty darn cool to get CGC books in the mail. Even if one of them is " #1".

 

[*] It was worth it just to hear the CGC guys passing the book back and forth between them asking "So what do you think of this ?" "I don't know, let's ask Harshen what he thinks about the ".

 

[*] Having the wife make the top 3 candidates of four different jobs without getting one is frustrating. But at least the frequent flier miles add up.

 

[*] Four months into my workouts at the gym I managed 12 reps at 140 lbs on the bench press. It was worth it just to hear one of my co-workers tell me I didn't have pipecleaners for arms any more.

 

[*] Less than three weeks after I found his blog, and barely a week after he was interviewed by the Boston Herald for a piece in that paper, I recheck his blog to find "Chuck has been injured, but is stable". The last six weeks I have followed his blog daily, and his progress at Walter Reed. He picked an expensive way to get to meet the President, but he and his family are just remarkable...

 

[*] Scheduling the wife for a vacation visit to Texas and having her tack on an impromptu job interview can make a weekend a little more eventful.

 

[*] Having her actually get the job is darn near priceless.

 

[*] Having her get the job on the exact same day her parents close on the sale of the 153-year homestead is kismet.

 

[*] Knowing you never, ever, ever again have to help your mother in law chase around stupid sheep is some good.

 

[*] Trying to find a house to buy in less than two weeks with no notice whatsoever is far more interesting than cleaning chairs with a rag and 409. I should know. I have done both.

 

[*] It is more than possible to drive 980 miles in eight days without leaving a loop that is 16 miles across.

 

[*] It is also possible to see every single house that is for sale in a zip code, even if there are 47,000 people living in that zip code.

 

[*] Sometimes it doesn't make sense to see every single house in a single zip code, because there might be a better house available in a zip code a couple miles down the road.

 

[*] Dragging along a large-breasted twenty-two-year-old former assistant comic shop manager as a wife replacement while house shopping can result in some strange questions from sellers.

 

[*] Smiling and nodding is a pretty good response to most of these questions.

 

[*] It definitely helps to have a female along when house shopping. All breasted Americans are capable of noticing things about houses that those of us with outdoor plumbing never will.

 

[*] You can fairly easily rule out any house that has a toilet sitting next to the For Sale sign.

 

[*] No really. You can...

 

[*] You can also rule out any house that has kids drawing on the front windows with mud clods when you pull up to the curb. Doesn't really matter if the kids are from that house or not, you can rule it out.

 

[*] You can also rule out any house on Harmon in San Antonio. All of them.

 

[*] When you finally find the right house. You just know.

 

[*] The time between when you decide on the amount of your offer and when you finish signing the 53 forms to turn that offer in to the seller's agent feels much longer than it should.

 

[*] The fact that your buyer's agent is paying for the dinner while you sign those forms is small consolation, and doesn't speed up the process at all.

 

[*] Mentally doing the math and determining that he spent 0.17% of his commission on the dinner doesn't speed up the process either.

 

[*] Having to not talk to anyone about the house, or the offer, or how much you love the house, or how much you hope they accept the offer, for fear that someone random will happen to pass along that info to the seller is nervewracking.

 

[*] Placing an offer on a Friday evening makes for a very long weekend.

 

[*] Five months into my workouts at the gym I managed 12 reps at 155lbs on the bench press, but still all I could think about was whether they were going to take the offer or not.

 

[*] Setting up at a comic show the day after making an offer on a house does little to take your mind off the wondering. Selling a Tomb of Dracula 1, Werewolf By Night 1, Daredevil 16, and Western Roundup #1 helped a little.

 

[*] The latest art book from Wizard... "How to Draw" or something to that effect is absolutely positively worth buying. I can't recommend it enough. Anyone with any artistic motivation at all will get something out of this book. And even those who can't draw a straight line will appreciate the contributions from many of the best artists working in comics today. I rarely pimp a Wizard product, and I have none to sell (sold my only 3 copies at the show on Saturday) but it is definitely worth checking out.

 

[*] Dumbledore isn't dead.

 

[*] Team America: World Police was funnier in the theater than it is on DVD.

 

[*] Mysterious Skin is one of the hardest movies to watch I have ever seen, but it almost redeems Michelle Trachtenberg as an actress in my eyes.

 

[*] Batman Begins was perhaps the worst depiction of the modern Batman I have ever seen. A fantastic movie with a great -script, compelling characters, solid acting, and beautiful set design. But it wasn't Batman. No Batman would ever recklessly endanger the lives of police officers by releasing explosives into the path of their vehicles. Even the Golden Age Batman who shot criminals in the face and snapped their necks with his jackboots would never have done that. And the modern Batman who places the entire city of Gotham under his personal shroud of protection would never senselessly drop explosives into a roadway sending police vehicles flying into the air in a death roll. "Begins" or not. End of his career, beginning of his career. That's not Batman. And to have him act in such a reckless manner after demonstrating his careful precision in incapacitating a dozen gangsters without killing any of them, after demonstrating that he would not take the life of a guilty man in Ra's' house... Having him act that recklessly on the roadway amounts to criminally inconsistent writing. They can try to explain how important she was to him, and that he was blinded by his love for her, and the need to protect her. Poppycock. Batman would never do that. Period.

 

[*] If Bad News Bears was supposed to be the sequel to Bad Santa, I don't know if I want to see the third movie in the trilogy. Perhaps a remake of the Peter Jackson classic "Bad Taste"...

 

[*] Must Love Dogs was sappy and sweet and everything a date movie should be. But if you see it with a thick-necked guy named Bruno I recommend keeping the arm rest down.

 

[*] Finding a random copy of Defenders 10 stuck in a box of assorted Vertigo books is pretty cool. Having it come back from CGC a 9.4 is even cooler.

 

[*] March of the Penguins was definitely worth watching... although I understand the original version has voice actors doing lines for the individual penguins (in lieu of the Morgan Freeman narration)... I can even imagine how sick and twisted that would be...

 

[*] Sky High was silly, but enjoyable. I was surprised to hear they are contracted for sequels and a tv show. I can't imagine there is that much mileage available given the stereotypes used as characters.

 

[*] There's nothing quite like having the phone ring and finding out the offer on the house was accepted. Even knowing that I will be flying to Oregon tomorrow to arrange a huge moving sale, load a truck and drive back to Texas, it's all good. Most of my store inventory will remain in Oregon for at least a couple more months. I plan to have a giant presence at the next Portland Comic Book Show on October 9th, selling off as much as I can to lighten the load for the move. I'll be back in Texas in two weeks, will be in Houston on the 1st to watch my Ducks play against the Cougars, and we close on the house sometime around the 12th of September.

 

[*] It really is possible for me to make it through this long of a post without mentioning the Goth Princess. Oh, [embarrasing lack of self control]... Too late... foreheadslap.gif

 

[*] The day the union went out on strike wound up a huge turning point for me. Not just in terms of the money I make at my old job. But nearly everything else in my life that had been going badly for a year turned the corner and started back forward again. Hopefully once this "good stress" is done with the move, I can return to a more active role on the boards, and with more of the first half of my custom title, less of the second half. Thanks again to all my friends here. You know who you are. And more importantly I know who you are. Thanks as well to the people who drug my name through the mud while I was offline for several months. It probably needed to happen. And any retailer will tell you that the customer who complains is one to value, because so many will just turn their backs and walk away, never telling you what you need to do to improve. That's why it's so important to have greggy constantly sending me PMs telling me how to improve myself. Messages like "You suck" and "Blow me " are exactly the motivation necessary to be all I can be. Although the ones where he asks if he should become me beeyotch are a little disturbing.

 

[*] Comic customers will buy anything with a new number 1.

 

[*] No matter how bad things get, at least I haven't been eating at the Applebee's in Salt Lake City smile.gif

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greggy

greggy

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confused.gif

 

Okay, now tell the truth...

 

You clicked on the post and immediately replied with that graemlin... without even starting to read... right? poke2.gif

Yup...but I did read it afterwards! But...you do suck! hail.gifyeahok.gif
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Norrin_Radd

Norrin_Radd

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The Umpqua Ice Cream at the diner in Rice Hill, Oregon just off I-5 tastes just as good today as it did when I first had it on the way back from a cross country meet 20 years ago.

 

Well, I guess there's ONE good thing about Oregon. smirk.gif

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lighthouse

lighthouse

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...Windex works better on plastic chairs,.....

 

Simple Green is even better... thumbsup2.gif

 

The product we actually use isn't even 409. It's some proprietary formula that we buy in huge quantity. But for the purposes of the story it was easier to call it 409... confused-smiley-013.gif

 

After I was plucked from the Quality Control department, I was asked to assist in overseeing the way it was run. Within two weeks I found one of my replacements cleaning the same plastic chairs with a product called "Sleek". Now Sleek is a very good cleaning product, and it's more expensive than the 409 stuff that we use on those chairs. But it contains mineral oil. And you wouldn't believe how hard it is to explain to some people why it is a bad idea to use mineral oil on the seat of a plastic chair. The concept that oil never dries and someone will ruin their clothes on that seat just refused to stick.

 

So when I wrote the training manual for the QC dept a few months back, I included a long paragraph about the appropriate uses of Sleek.

 

Then I had all the Sleek moved to another dept's lockup box, so the QC guys couldn't grab it by mistake.

 

And for the record, I actually had some other duties besides cleaning chairs. The most mundane of them was pulling staples out of tables. One by one. The same tables used at San Diego (which is a show run by Freeman, the company I work for). The skirts and plastic top are stapled to the table, roughly 14 staples are used each time a table is rented. After a while the buildup of staples increases the risk of customer injury, as well as making attaching a new skirt more difficult. So about twice a year we go through and pull all the staples out. By hand, with pliers and a screwdriver. The average number of staples in a table before cleaning is around 250. Tables are in stacks of 25. After a few months I got to where I could clear an entire stack in about 2 and a half hours. And I got to the point where I could stack all 25 tables by myself. The 8-footers weigh about 65lbs each and the top one in the stack is about 6 feet in the air. That was probably a better workout than the chair cleaning. tongue.gif

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sborock

sborock

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Welcome back!

 

Glad you did not eat at THE Applebee's.

 

On a side note, my daughter dragged me to a Steak N Shake this weekend. Stay far away from that garbage, I got sick as a dog. My fault though, I know better than to eat fast "food".

 

Oh well............

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lighthouse

lighthouse

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Welcome back!

 

Glad you did not eat at THE Applebee's.

 

On a side note, my daughter dragged me to a Steak N Shake this weekend. Stay far away from that garbage, I got sick as a dog. My fault though, I know better than to eat fast "food".

 

Oh well............

 

I enjoyed the chocolate shake I had at the one in Cleveland last year, but I didn't get a burger, just the shake... confused-smiley-013.gif

 

I'm still wondering who made the final decision on how good that was... 893scratchchin-thumb.gif

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