R.I.P. Gerald Ford

Nation's 38th President passes away. Rest In Peace, Mr. President.

Will Bloggers be affected?

...that is the question many are asking with the publication of this story.

I believe the race for the White House is heating up even more.

Time Magazine Person of the Year

As it turns out, we are all familiar with the Person of the year.

Time did the right thing this year. I actually thought that they would do something like this back in 2004 with the huge amount of blogs created that year and all of the impact they were supposed to have and continue to have on the political process.

At this rate, 2007 is going to be an interesting year.

2,000 down

This past week, the Harrismobile rolled over on another 1,000 miles of holiday traveling. So far, the majority has been going back and forth picking up my wife during the weekends. Starting this week though, we will be entering the majority of our Christmas traveling as we visit various family members for the holidays. I will keep you posted.

R.I.P. Peter Boyle

Everybody Loves Raymond's famed patriarch died Tuesday evening from multiple myeloma and heart disease, according to his publicist. His former castmates shared some of there thoughts here. He will be missed.

Coming to terms

It has taken me several years to come to the fact that I am who I am. I can't change everything about myself. I work on those things that I can change about myself, such as my weight or being more organized. I cannot change the fact that I am not some super alpha male. I have to accept that.

Does this mean that I am not capapble of alpha behavior? Of course not. I can do what needs to be done when the situation calls for it. I just wanted to be the classic alpha male that you see in television and in the movies. I have written about my love of Magnum, P.I. on this blog before. Some part of me always wanted to be Magnum I guess. That is not me though, and I can accept that.

1,000 Down, How many more to go?

A couple of posts back, I commented that my wife and I were to do some heavy traveling between the weekend before Thanksgiving and New Years. I had thought at the time that we would end up with between 1,500 and 2,000 miles before 2006 had ended. The way things are going now, we will probably double that number easily.

You see, my wife has taken a temporary job for some extra money for the holiday season. This job is in another city. Since we have holiday parties and other commitments throughout December, I have been going back and forth to pick her up on the weekends. With only one car now, the miles have already started to add up.

When we arrived back in town earlier this evening, I looked at our odometer I had set to record our holiday miles and it said 1.9. Over a thousand miles in two weeks! At this rate we will easily do over 3,000 miles in the next 3 weeks. A heavy hit in the pocket with gas prices starting to creep back up.

Movers and Shakers

The word came down from the top today that O.J. Simpson's book and interview has been scrapped. The people have spoken and Mr. Murdoch listened. I personally am glad it is not going to be shown.

Michael Richards sure stepped into it this weekend, didn't he? In the middle of his comedy routine, the actor best known for playing Cosmo Kramer, shouted racial slurs to some hecklers. I believe that everyone is going to say or do something really stupid in their lives that they wish they could take back. In this era of videophones and You Tube, such actions could ruin you forever. According to this report, Richards is trying to stop this thing before it blows up any more.

My wife and I went away this weekend. I told her to reset our mileage counter to see how many miles we are going to put on our car between now and New Years. The way things are going, we are probably looking at traveling between 1500-2000 miles between now and the end of the year. I will keep you posted.

Wednesday will mark the two year anniversary for this blog. In the two years I have been doing this, I have learned a lot about writing and a lot about myself. I have not posted nearly as often as I have wanted to in that time; something I am trying to improve upon in the new year. This blog is going nowhere though. It's only up from here.

Isn't it funny how life turns out

Last week, I suddenly got the urge to read some Dominick Dunne. I went to the library to pick up Another City, Not My Own, the authors book about the O.J. Simpson trial. I own the book and had read the novel twice before. It is one of my favorite books. Dubbed "A Novel in the form of a Memoir" , Another City tells the story of Gus Bailey, Mr. Dunne's alter ego and all of his exploits during "The Trial Of The Century."
I finished the novel on Monday. Today both O.J. Simpson and Dominick Dunne are back in the news. O.J. by way of the new book that he has coming out. "If I Did It..." details how the former football star would have committed the murders of his ex-wife Nicole and her friend Ron Goldman. Simpson was acquitted of charges of murder in October of 1995.
On November 27 and 29, FOX will broadcast a sit-down interview that Simpson had with Judith Regan, who published his book. The two-part interview, titled "O.J. Simpson: If I Did It, Here's How It Happened," is being called "unrestricted".
Dunne, meanwhile, is being sued for defamation by former California congressman Gary Condit. This is the second time Condit has sued Dunne for defamation. The first case was settled for an undisclosed amount of money and an admission by Dunne that he did not intend to imply that Condit was "complicit in [Chandra Levy's] disappearance."
It is strange to have both figures pop up in the media just a couple of days after I finished reading the novel.

Ode to the wagon

My 1988 Chevy Celebrity Station Wagon seems to have finally given it up. I am going to be getting rid of it soon. I received my license driving that car. We went everywhere together. I am going to miss it.

Ode To The Wagon

We have been through a lot,

you and I.

The miles together, up and

down the road of life.

When I was starting out driving,

you were there.

Chasing love, chasing jobs, chasing dreams.

Leaking oil, drinking gasoline

Dusty, rusty, ragged as well

chewing up asphalt, and givin 'em hell.

Outlasing old, outlasting new.

My car, my office, felt like my home at times.

That shaggin' draggin' wagon.

Good Night Old Girl.

I'll see you down the line.

Respectfully Submitted,

Joseph Harris

WAY TO GO!!!

Congratulations to the Carolina Hurricanes, the 2006 Stanley Cup Champions!

Ah, Vacation!

I am going to be traveling the next few days. I am in my cousins wedding. He and his fiance have been together for 6 years. It is raining heavily here so travel will be slow. I will try to update if I can.

Tuesday Morning Blah

I am feeling sort of...I don't know, melancholy I guess here on a Tuesday Morning. I have a full day ahead of me. It is usually not that busy during the summer here, but today we are interviewing new people at my job. So I have to get motivated. I love my job. It isn't always the best or easiest job, but I would take it in a heartbeat over other jobs that I have had or no job at all.

For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these: "It might have been!" -- John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892)
I came across this quote a while ago. I had to look up who wrote it. It reminds me of one of my Harris Rules for Life: There is nothing wrong with having regrets.

Cut Off From The Rest Of The World

What did people do before they had the Internet? I experienced a sever from the rest of the world this week when my internet connection went down. Someone accidently cut through a wire somewhere and they didn't get it back up until yesterday afternoon. Technology has made us crazy in some ways though. We used to wait patiently all day for a stagecoach, now we go insane if the link that we click on doesn't come up immediately.

I love getting your comments

I thank all of you who are reading this. I would love comments. Even if you just write in and say Hi, that's fine with me. I installed the comment filter thing to keep the comment spam out of the site. So if you leave a message, you will have to type in a word to show that you are a real person and not a computer program.

Thanks

What a night!

The Orioles game the other night was fantastic. Getting away from the stresses of everyday was nice. I finally got to see a Major League Baseball game with my dad. My sister wasn't so bad on the trip either.
When we got to Baltimore, we found the stadium and parked. We had about three hours to kill before the game, so we decided to check out the Baltimore Sports Museum that is next to the ballpark. The museum was okay, only there was this rude guy who totally pissed me off in there. When we left, we went down the street a little ways and got something to eat from California Tortilla. As we were eating, a guy came through and went off on the cashier. I was thinking to myself, man are these people in Maryland rude. After we ate though and got back to the ballpark, man was that great. I saw Tuesday night perhaps one of the greatest games of baseball in my life. The star for the Orioles was Corey Patterson, who had a stolen base, two home runs and the game winning catch to help the Orioles beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays 7-5. His catch was featured as the play of the day on our local newscast when I got back home.
What a memory, and what a night!

Comments Welcomed

I don't know if anyone reads my posts or not. If so, would you mind leaving a comment. If nothing else, just say hi. I want to know I get more than just adult Viagra knockoffs and cheap land ads.

Respectfully Submitted

My Television Habits are being changed

I posted my television viewing habits just yesterday. Today NBC announces their new fall schedule, and wonder of wonders, Law & Order: Criminal Intent is being moved to Friday's at 10 because of Sunday Night Football. I usually watch Numb3rs on Friday nights. When Monk is on I usually tape that. I will now probably tape Criminal Intent while watching Numb3rs and save Monk for the replay.

Respectfully Submitted

Summer is almost here

This is a good time of the year for me. Things have slowed down at my job. I have some free time to pursue my interests. I am going to get a lot of reading done this summer. I am also going to do some writing, especially in this Blog.
I am also doing something at the end of this month that I have wanted to do for a long time. I am going to my first Major League Baseball game. My father, younger sister, and I are going up to Baltimore to see the Orioles play the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. This is so exciting to me. It is something that I never got to do growing up. I thought to myself earlier in the year, "What am I waiting for?" If I don't do this now I may never get the chance to do it. So I took the plunge and ordered the tickets. I am taking my notebook and writing notes throughout the game of the experience. Then I am going to come back and write about it here.
We all need challenges in life. I challenge myself to little things all of the time. As 2005 began I challenged myself to read a million pages in books. I have been keeping track ever since. I have hit every goal along the way that I have set for myself. I am looking forward to knocking quite a few pages off the list this summer. I have a backlog of about 20 books that I have to read so lack of reading material is not a problem.
I have been slowly getting back into my regular television watching habits. With my job, things can get out of hand quickly. A quick list of my favorites listed by night:
Sunday
Law & Order: Criminal Intent
Monday
Prison Break
24
CSI: Miami
Tuesday
NCIS
House
Boston Legal
Wednesday
Criminal Minds
CSI: New York
Thursday
My Name Is Earl
Friday
Numb3ers

Respectfully Submitted

How long has it been?

I'm Back!!! It has been too long since my last post. I am truly sorry for that. Life throws you into so many new and exciting directions. I have been enjoying life, trying to hang on and avoid drowning. I have been doing a little work on the site. Going back and editing some posts for clarity. Mistakes have a way of slipping by you when you are a third rate writer. I mean that sentence with complete honesty. I try to look at the bright side. I used to be a fifth rate writer.
Some things that make my blood pressure rise up:

1. People who say "I completely changed my attitude and thinking on a subject. I did a 360 on the subject." No you didn't. You did a 180 on the subject. A 360 would put you right back where you were. Learn some geometry.
2. When you say I'm Sorry to someone for something that has happened to them and they say "It's not your fault." I didn't say it was my fault. I did not apologize. I said that I was sorry that whatever happened to you happened.
3. This one really gets my goat. It has happened to me several times over the years. I am fat. I get that. I don't try to hide it because I couldn't even if I wanted to. With that being said, people will tend to think that if someone else doesn't want their food and does not want that food to go to waste, then I will eat it. This part of it doesn't really bother me. Usually I will eat it. I didn't get fat for no reason. The part that gets me is what they always say. They will point to me and say, "Give it to Mikey, he will eat anything!!". They are of course, comparing me to little Mikey from the old Life cereal commercial. The only problem is, they are all miss quoting the commercial! The commercial is like this; the other kids don't want to eat the cereal and one of them says, "Let's give it to Mikey." The other kid says, "He won't eat it, he hates everything." Then the kids are amazed because Mikey actually likes the cereal. Somehow in the last 30 years, people remember he hates everything to he eats everything.

I will try to post again soon.

Respectfully Submitted