Search Results for: Rocket dog

Found 38 search results for Rocket dog (this is page 4 of 4).

You name it, we did it this weekend

Whoa, where to start? Quiet evening at home Friday evening due to the rain. Saturday morning took the dog for a walk and had a nice chat with a neighbor before returning home to finish up preparations for Hallie’s birthday party. Got done right before the first guests arrived.

Had a great party for Hallie. I was in charge of kid festivities and had some playing soccer while others played on the playset or drew with the sidewalk chalk. Then my parents, my sister-in-law, and niece joined us for lunch at Moe’s. We got home and went bike riding and Rollerblading in the neighborhood before the kids went over to play with their Italian friends down the street, leaving Kelly and I an opportunity for a Saturday afternoon nap. Ah, what a luxury!
Continue reading →

Inauguration Parade

This morning K and I split up the things needing doing. She took the kids on errands and I was given the task of wearing out our dog. After seeing F/A-18s fly over our home this morning, I got the idea of taking the dog with me to see the Governor Perdue’s Inauguration Parade. As I remembered that local amateur radio operators would be assisting in the parade, I grabbed my dual-band HT and Rocket and I began walking.

The walk from here to Fayetteville Street takes a little over 30 minutes. We got there just as the parade was beginning. I must have made the security teams nervous with my backpack and a radio on my belt, but also having a big, dumb Labrador kind of evened that out.
Continue reading →

Good start to a good day

I walked out of the house with Hallie and Rocket on our way to Hallie’s school. Behind us came a gaggle of neighborhood kids – three brothers and a sister also on their way to school. Hallie, Rocket, and I waited for them to catch up before stopping by Hallie’s friend Oscar’s house to add him to the group.

There I was, marching down the street with six kids and a dog. It was a wonderful, happy scene! I got to know the neighborhood kids (who are really nice and polite) as we walked and then watched as they, Hallie, and Oscar gleefully raced up to school.

I had a smile on my face the whole walk home. Still do!

Weekend? What weekend?

Every day is a weekend day when you’re between jobs.

Woke up delightfully late after a good night’s sleep. After breakfast I took Rocket out for a run. With no bicycle, I might add. It was a shock to me as I haven’t been running for years, but it did feel good. When I stopped. Rocket was a hard-charger for the first half of the run but opted to slow to my pace after a while.

I got back from the run in time to shower before heading out to a birthday party for my friend Matt Pressley’s son, Conner. I enjoyed catching up with Matt and talking more to the parents’ of the kids there. In fact, some interesting things could come from this talk. So that was good.
Continue reading →

Jailbreak

Tuesday afternoon Travis had gone outside to sweep the driveway, with me about a minute behind him. The dog had been with me, and as I rounded the kitchen corner I saw the outside door had been left wide open. Rocket was galloping gleefully down the street.

After calling him a few times with no effect at all, Travis and I hopped into the car and followed him. I parked Travis and ran through neighbors’ backyards while our grinning dog happily raced ahead. Very Bad Words were forming in my head as I stormed back to the car. If he wound up at the troubled apartment complex a few blocks away I would have to abandon the search.
Continue reading →

Home, but not quite alone

Kelly took the kids up to visit her parents this weekend. I stayed around to get a few things done and take care of our new dog, Rocket .. er, Rocky. He’s been keeping me company and snores below me at this moment as I sit on the couch. Rocky’s been getting lots of exercise this weekend, and by extension so have I.

I took him on his first visit to a Raleigh greenway yesterday, though he opted to drag me along for most of it. I then let him hang out in the backyard while I spread some mulch around in our front flowerbeds (it was a picture-perfect fall day). I felt like rewarding Rocky for his patience so we hopped into the car again for a trip to the dog park. He and I were both ready for bed around 9 PM, though I had to change almost 600 clocks to standard time before going to bed.
Continue reading →

What’s Chinese for “Cease Fire!?”

I had a great day at the Great Wall of China. I’ll post about that in a moment.

On the way back, I took our tour guide’s advice and gave up a ride back to my hotel in favor of walking around the local markets. I had an enjoyable time browsing the stores, bookstores, and malls. I ate some decent pizza at the food court before hopping on to the subway for a trip back to my hotel.

The subway was easy to navigate. Soon I was at my stop, one block from my hotel. At that point, however, I was stymied. I had no idea which direction to go and could not find anyone near the subway stop who spoke English.

What’s more, there were fireworks going off everywhere, celebrating the end of Spring Festival. And I’m not talking little bottle rockets or sparklers here, either. I’m talking huge, commercial-grade rockets and firecrackers. It was like frickin’ downtown Baghdad! Dark sidewalks would explode in a flash of light as another meter-long package of firecrackers went off. Bottle rockets screamed above my head. A gale-force wind is also blowing: perfect for sweeping out the Year of the Dog and ushering in the Year of the Pig, but not conducive to navigating an urban fireworks battlefield.

I walked as many blocks as I dared before deciding I was hopelessly lost and in danger of losing a limb or eye. The next stop was to flag down a taxi to shepherd me back to my hotel. I got a card from the hotel with a rudimentary map of the city and some Chinese phrases. I’ve been keeping it with me, thinking the Chinese characters on it was enough to get me back.

I was wrong. The first cabbie shook his head and kicked me out of his taxi. The second was more accomodating but equally clueless about which direction to go. After stopping his cab three times to ask directions of passersby I finally pointed in a direction and said “go.” I pointed right a the next street and lo and behold the Holiday Inn Central Plaza appeared on the horizon. I’ve never been so happy to see a Holiday Inn!

I’m back in my hotel and the war is still going on outside. The wind is gusting so strongly it is making my window whistle louder than the din outside, if you can believe it. I can see now I took the wrong card: there is a taxi card the recptionist gave me for my trip to dinner last night which has detailed hotel directions in Chinese. I’ll know now to take that one with me on my journeys.

I’ll also remember not to choose to wander around on the last night of the Chinese Spring Festival!

Convoy – C.W. McCall

Blame Greg for planting this in my head today. It was the first record I ever owned.
—
LEGEND: spoken on CB Radio in background

Ah, breaker one-nine, this here’s the Rubber Duck. You got a copy on me. Pigpen? C’mon.
Ah, yeah, ten-four, Pigpen, for sure, for sure. By golly, it’s clean clear to Flagtown. C’mon.
Yeah, that’s a big ten-four there, Pigpen. Yeah, we definitely got the front door,
good buddy. Mercy’s sakes alive, looks like we got us a convoy

It was the dark of the moon on the sixth of June
And a Kenworth pullin’ logs
Cab-over Pete with a reefer on
And a Jimmy haulin’ hogs
We’s headin’ for bear on Eye-one-oh
’bout a mile outta Shakeytown
I says “Pigpen, this here’s Rubber Duck”
“And I’m about to put the hammer down”

CHORUS:
‘Cause we got a little ole convoy rockin’ thru the night
Yeah, we got a little ole convoy, ain’t she a beautiful sight?
Come on and join our convoy, ain’t nothin’ gonna get in our way
We gonna roll this truckin’ convoy ‘cross the USA
Convoy

Ah, breaker, Pigpen, this here’s Duck ‘n’ you wanna back off them hogs?
Ah, ten-four
About 5 mile or so
Ten roger
Them hogs is gettin’ INtense up here.

By the time we got into Tulsa-town we had 85 trucks in all
But they’s a roadblock up on the cloverleaf
And them bears ‘s wall-to-wall
Yeah, them smokeys ‘s thick as bugs on a bumper
They even had a bear in the air
I says “Callin’ all trucks, this here’s the Duck”
“We about to go a-huntin’ bear”

CHORUS

Ah, you wanna give me a ten-nine on that, Pigpen? Negatory, Pigpen, you’re still
too close. Yeah, them hogs is startin’ to close up my sinuses. Mercy’s sake, you
better back off another ten

Well, we rolled up Interstate Forty-Four
Like a rocket-sled on rails
We tore up all of our swindle sheets
And left ’em settin’ on the scales
By the time we hit that “Chi-town”
Them bears was a-gettin smart
They brought up some reinforcements
>From the “Illinoise” National Guard

There’s armored cars and tanks and jeeps
‘n’ rigs of ev’ry size
Yeah, them chicken coops was full of bears
And choppers filled the skies
Well, we shot the line, we went for broke
With a thousand screamin’ trucks
And eleven long-haired friends of Jesus
In a chartreuse microbus

Ah, Rubber Duck, this ‘s Sodbuster. C’mon here
Yeah, ten-four, Sodbuster. Listen, ya wanna put that microbus in behind that suicide-jockey?
Yeah, he’s haulin’ dynamite and he needs all the help he can get

Well, we laid a strip for the Jersey Shore
Prepared to cross the line
I could see the bridge was lined with bears
But I didn’t have a doggone dime
I says “Pigpen, this here’s the Rubber Duck”
“We just ain’t a-gonna pay no toll”
So we crashed the gate doin’ ninety-eight
I says “let them truckers roll, ten-four”

CHORUS

Ah, ten-four, Pigpen. What’s your twenty? OMAHA? Well, they oughta know
what to do with them hogs out there, for sure. Well, mercy’s sakes, good buddy,
we gonna back on outta here, so keep your thumbs off your glass and the bears
off your……..tail. We’ll catch you on the flip-flop. This here’s the Rubber Duck on
the side. We gone. ‘bye, ‘bye

—
-Artist:: C. W. McCall as sung on “Country Memories”: MCA MSD2-35429
-peak Billboard position # 1 for 1 week in 1975-76
-Words and Music by C. W. McCall, Bill Fries, and Chip Davis