So, I’m finally out of Nebraska.
Finally!
Where am I now? Well, I’m going to surmise that you can guess by the title of this post. Yeah… now I’m in Iowa. Not exactly the huge cultural change I was hoping for, but thus far, it’s not too bad. Exchange the beef for pork and the corn for… uh… corn, and it’s pretty similar here in Iowa compared to what it was in Nebraska. Iowa does, however, have a few advantages.
I like the community here a bit better than the Nebraska community I was in. There are bike/walking paths EVERYWHERE! There was one path for biking/walking in the western Nebraskan community where I lived. Here, you can go almost anywhere on a designated bike/walking path. If I so desired, I could ride my bike all over the state of Iowa without having to worry even the slightest about getting hit by a car. I almost feel like I moved from a backwards, dying community to thriving, progressive community with outdoor amenities and hope for the future. It’s almost weird, seeing as how Iowa and Nebraska are similar in so many ways, yet how different the views are here in Iowa regarding bike/walking trails. It’s like Iowa has figured out that a good trail system leads to less vehicular traffic on the roads and better traffic flow (they use a lot of roundabouts here as well), more safety for cyclists and pedestrians, increased visitation to areas of natural beauty that every community has to some degree, and a healthier overall citizen population. Some communities actually want to attract active people, I guess. Advantage, Iowa.
One thing I have an issue with in Iowa (you knew there’d be at least one, right?) is the drivers. Iowa drivers are not fun to be on the road with. In Nebraska, people knew how to use cruise control. I don’t think people in Iowa know how to use cruise control, and they have a severe dislike of anyone passing them. A constant struggle here in Iowa is being able to peacefully pass someone.
So, on my morning commute, most of my time is spent on a four-lane highway. There are not a ton of cars on the highway at 6:30am, but there is some traffic. The speed limit is 65 mph on the highway I take, and I usually set my cruise control somewhere between 65 and 70 mph. Every morning there will be that one pick-up truck or SUV poking along at like 60 mph. So as I approach them, I signal into the passing lane and slowly start to go around them… and then they speed up. Now I’m in the passing lane but they are slowly pulling away from me. I let them get a couple of car lengths ahead of me, and I get out of the passing lane… only to be quickly on their butt again because they are once again going 60 mph. This entire process will happen two or three times before I get pissed off and gun it, passing them at like 90 mph. They still speed up as I’m passing, but they aren’t as willing to get a ticket as I am at that point and I can usually get by.
Now, I honestly don’t know if these other drivers are just clueless as to what they are doing or if they are just asshats. Given my beliefs about other people and my disposition, I’m leaning towards the asshat description. And speaking of asshats, we also have an abundance of the passing-lane-douche-patrol here in Iowa. You know the ones, they get over in the passing lane driving the speed limit and they refuse to move out of that lane. They see themselves as part of some kind of citizen police force whose sole purpose on the road is to prevent anyone from going over the speed limit. For these people, you have to pass them on the right, and every time I pass one of them, my mind hears them screaming at me in Gomer Pyle’s voice, “Citizen’s Arrest… Citizen’s Arrest!”
Look here, Gomer Pyle, your job is never to enforce your concepts of speeding law on others. If you want to enforce laws, quit your day job and go into law enforcement and then maybe you’ll realize the utter waste of time it is for real law enforcement to pull someone over for going five mph over the speed limit. You’ll quickly learn there are bigger fish to fry then the person going 60 in a 55. I know this is a tough concept for you, but the left lane is called the “passing” lane for a reason; it’s to be used for passing. If you are just hanging out in the passing lane and you’re not passing anyone, you are actually breaking the law just as much (if not more so) than someone going slightly over the posted speed. Scoot the hell over and let us by… or we’ll have to pull a Gomer Pyle on you!
“Citizen’s Arrest… Citizen’s Arrest!”
Other than the driving, everything here in Iowa is pretty peachy. Yep, peachy keen!
Well…
… except for the food. The food here in Iowa is slightly bland. I like things a little spicy, and I’m quickly coming to the realization that Iowa may be the state with the least spicy food of any state in the Union. But, alas, the lack of all things spicy is the topic for a future post, because I’m very passionate about all things spicy and I’m going to really want to dive into that bad boy. I’ve even ordered hot sauces from some Iowa hot sauce companies to see how they stack up to some of my favorite sauces. I’m excited (and slightly terrified at the prospect of being severely disappointed) to try some of these Iowa hot sauces… and I will definitely let you know if there are some sauces here that you need to be adding to your bucket list of hot sauces to try. And if you don’t have a bucket list of hot sauces you want to try, maybe you should be moving along to a different blog… I don’t need readers who hog the passing lane and don’t like spicy things!
Tag: nebraska
Covid… of Course I Got It…
So, if we’re going to have a worldwide pandemic, the guy who can’t stop bitching about everything is going to get it. And of course it’s not going to kill me, it’s just going to make my life slightly more difficult and considerably less enjoyable.
I work at a community college in rural Nebraska. There is no significant amount of importance associated with my job. I’m not shaping young minds. I’m not helping people decide on fulfilling career paths. I sell overpriced textbooks to poor community college students. One thing about working at an institute of higher learning during a pandemic is we are very careful. Masks are required by everyone on campus. Sanitizing is a constant, and we all take our responsibilities seriously. We have a campus full of students and we do not want to be responsible for any of those students getting sick, or worse yet, taking sickness home to families and loved ones. You can call us snowflakes or whatever makes you feel more like an American…
Anywho, so we were all very careful and we seemed to have our crap under control at the community college. My coworker in the bookstore and I were using caution with everything we did in the bookstore to keep our students, staff and faculty safe from the virus. The problem starts with my coworker’s second job.
On the weekends, my coworker tends bar in rural Nebraska. Now, yes, I’m already in rural Nebraska, but this bar is even more rural. Like, think Mayberry from the Andy Griffith show, full of Gomers and Barneys. These people aren’t going to take much of anything serious about a global pandemic, especially if it interferes with their boozing on the weekend… or on a weeknight… or on a Tuesday morning. Masks are unheard of in locations such as this, and sanitizing is something reserved for a young bull’s balls before turning him into a steer. So, around mid-October, my coworker caught the Covid on a weekend night, and a couple of days later, she gave it to me.
The first thing that clued both of us in to the fact that we had the virus was the loss taste and smell. My coworker let me know on a Monday that she had lost hers. We sent her home and sanitized the crap out of the bookstore. Three days later, I lost mine. They sent me home, where I proceeded to give it to the wife.
Now, all of the people who had our strain of the Covid lost smell and taste. Some had headaches, some had body aches, some had fatigue. None of us had serious respiratory issues. Everyone involved with our particular strain of the Covid regained the senses after a few days. For me, fatigue and brain fog were the worst part of it. I couldn’t think straight. I couldn’t remember how to log into my portal for work to check my work email. I got frustrated easily, and the more frustrated I got, the less clearly I could think, so I’d just end up sitting in my recliner and falling asleep. When I would try to wake up, it would take me five to ten minutes to come out of the fog of sleep and be able to somewhat function. But I didn’t die, and this thing is killing a lot of people, so some would say I’m pretty lucky.
I still get a bit brain foggy when I get stressed, and my ever-present anxieties seem to be noticeably more prevalent in my day-to-day thoughts, which kind of sucks. But other than that, I feel pretty much back to my negative old self. Oh, except I still can’t taste or smell things right. Every once in awhile, I get a whiff of something familiar, or I can momentarily taste the smokiness in a piece of bacon, but overall, yeah, nothing tastes or smells. Going on three months, and two of my five senses seem to be on sabbatical with no known return-to-work date. That made Thanksgiving and Christmas a little disappointing. One of the few pleasures I get out of life is enjoying good food.
You might think that my senses taking a vacation would make me a little bitter. You would be so wrong! Even if I never fully get my senses back, even if my anxieties reach a point of completely crippling me socially, I will feel that I have made a sacrifice for America! And I’d make this sacrifice again if it meant that a brave Nebraska patriot could go express his God-given right to get shit-faced at a bar with his buddies on a Friday night…
Adult Men Don’t Have Friends…
This is just speculative. I can’t say for a fact that all adult men don’t have friends. I just know that I don’t have friends. I mean, I have friends, just not close friends of the same sex who are close to my age.
Guys my age tend to be ass-hatty. If they are more than a couple of inches taller than me, they are jerks and I want nothing to do with them. If they are shorter than me, they are most likely in a circus sideshow somewhere and too busy cleaning up elephant poop for a friendship with me. If they are more successful or make more money than me, they are jerks and I want nothing to do with them. If they are less successful or have less money than me… even I don’t want that kind of loser in my life. So about 70% of the of available guys my age are automatically eliminated from the potential friend pool. And then there is politics… and I live in Nebraska… there goes another 29% (actually, political views and the desire to constantly spout those views eliminate 99% all by themselves). So, about 1% of the guys my age around me are potential friends… but these losers are so pathetic that no one would want to be their friend. This is my 1%.
Women seem to have an easier time surrounding themselves with friends. They go have coffee or they start book groups or they have movie nights. What do guys do? My 1% isn’t athletic or into sports, so we don’t “catch a game” or meet to “shoot some hoops.” My 1% views golf as the elitist sport that may have very well led to the formation of the Nazi party, so we don’t mess with that. A group of middle-aged ladies going to the movies together is cute. A group of middle-aged guys going to the movies together is queer – as in the old definition of “queer” that means “strange”, not the new definition… who am I kidding… middle-aged guys going to the movie together is gay.
I try to think of what I would do with friends if I actually had friends, and I can think of nothing. My 1% is probably into things like Dungeons & Dragons…
DUNGEONS & DRAGONS!!!
We are a pathetic little group who, due to our nature, probably shouldn’t congregate with our kind. Alone, we can slip around in the shadows mostly unnoticed. In groups, we could draw attention to ourselves… and I’m too old for a stinking wedgie…
I’m a Poor Sport Because Losing Sucks…
I am, I think, probably the poorest sport of a sore loser that I know. And it’s not just with stuff I lose at (which would entail a list far too long to list here). My sportsmanship sucks at all levels of losing. I’m a very gracious winner, but if I or my family or even people I don’t know but I have associated with on some level lose, I’m a pissed off cry baby waiting to cause a scene.
I mean, I was at the YMCA the other night and I was on an elliptical with a little TV attached. I was jamming to my MP3 player and I decided to put ESPN on the TV just to have something to watch other than my feet going round and round on the elliptical. There’s a college basketball game on, so I decide I’ll watch. Now, I couldn’t give two craps about most college or professional sports. A bunch of people with height and skills that I could never possess playing games that could lead to lucrative careers… playing games… while I struggle to make ends meet and try to face the fact that I will work a job making less in a year than most professional basketball players make in about half a week. And I will work a job until the day I die. And I start to hope for that day just so I won’t have to work a job anymore. And that is depressing. And I’m getting off topic…
So the teams playing are Florida and Tennessee. I could care less about either of those teams. I didn’t have a horse in that race. So, how did I decide who I was going to root for? Well, Tennessee is losing by about 14 points. And Tennessee isn’t ranked. Florida is ranked #6, so I decide I’m going to root for the underdog. And you see, this is how I usually end up on the losing side of stuff. When one is predisposed to root for the underdog, one is going to face a lot of disappointment. Underdogs are underdogs for a reason: they have less likelihood of winning because they aren’t as good as the favorite. So, Florida starts to pull away. Before you know it, Florida is ahead by over 20 points. And I’m starting to get pissed. I’m seeing smug looks on all of the Florida player’s faces. The Florida coach is starting to look like an arrogant jackass. I’m starting to see Florida getting away with fouls that aren’t getting called. And Florida is suddenly up by 30 points and the game is over and I’m completely pissed off. I hate the state of Florida and everyone associated with the state of Florida and I vow to do everything in my power, which is quite limited, to destroy everything associated with Florida… all because of a stupid college basketball game that I didn’t give two craps about before I started watching it…
I am a very poor sport.
My oldest kid played in an indoor soccer tournament a couple of weekends ago in Rapid City. The family and I went to watch. And for everyone of the three games that my kid’s team played and lost, I sat there acquiring a major disdain for Rapid City, South Dakota. As our team would get further and further down in the score, I would become increasingly annoyed with the parents of the winning teams. How dare they cheer for their kids! How dare they encourage their players! Whose bright idea was it for all of the parents for both teams to sit together?!? Is someone just trying to make my life miserable?!?
Now, I honestly am a rational adult. I know that those parents have every right to cheer for their teams. I know that good parents encourage their children whether they win or lose. I’m just not that good of a parent. I want my kid and his friends to win. Of course, they have to play better than the team they are playing against or that won’t happen, but when in the heat of the battle, I don’t think reasonably. When in the heat of battle, all I can think about is how I want my kid to win. If he can win at soccer, maybe he can win at life. If he wins at life, maybe he will end up with a good paying job that he actually enjoys in a place that he likes living. In other words, I don’t want my kid to end up like his old man. I’ve lost a lot in my life and I have learned from those losses. You know what I have learned from losing? I’ve learned that losing sucks. Period. Sure, you win some and you lose some, but losing still sucks. There is no redemption in losing. You lose and then you work hard to improve and if you still lose after working hard and improving, give up and do something else. Because losing sucks. There is absolutely nothing you can do to make losing not suck, so avoid losing. I know this isn’t possible, but it is a worthy pursuit.
My younger son plays in a kids basketball league at the YMCA. His team played this past weekend, and his team lost. These are 9 and 10-year-old kids. And as my kid’s team is losing, I’m looking at the 9 and 10-year-olds on the other team and I start to dislike them immensely. I dislike their smug little smiles and their cocky attitudes as they score more points. Of course, their smiles aren’t really smug and their attitudes aren’t cocky, but it sure seemed like they were as they were kicking my kid’s team’s butts! If my kid loses at 9 and 10-year-old basketball at the YMCA, he may be destined for a crappy existence in someplace like Scottsbluff, NE where he would have to work for over 100 years to make what the average professional basketball player makes in one year… and I want more for my kids than that…
See, I think of my current misery associated with life in the panhandle of Nebraska as being a direct result of the many loses and failures I have experienced over the course of my life. Because I am a loser, I am here. If I were a winner, I would be living elsewhere doing something else and being paid exceptionally well to do it. Currently, if I were to become fed up with my job and were to search for something else, what would I do? Maybe I could sell farm equipment; that sounds pretty rewarding, doesn’t it? I could work at the sugar factory; there’s a dream come true! I could maybe make slightly over minimum wage at Walmart; that would lead to my praying for God to strike me dead every working minute of every working day…
You see, winners don’t have to consider an entry-level job at Walmart as a real possibility for earning a living. Real winners don’t even have to shop at Walmart. So I’m a poor sport… I’m a sore loser… especially when it comes to my kids. I want my kids to have completely Walmart-free futures…
How Some People Don’t Realize They Are Making Your Point For You…
My purpose on this blog is never really to piss anyone off. Oh, I know I come across as bitter and cynical at times, mostly because I’m pretty bitter and cynical at times. Life is not fair, and life is less fair when one is short, fat, not overly bright, and ugly. I know we are all made in God’s image, but I think I may have been made in the image of His big toe. I know that God loves us for who we are and not what we look like or how smart we are, but I just have a feeling things would be a little easier if I looked more like Brad Pitt and less like God’s big toe. So, yeah, my outlook and attitude need to change and whatnot, but I really do not set out to piss anyone off… except for maybe a county commissioner or two… jokingly… on occasion.
I received an email almost 2 months ago from someone who was upset by one of my posts. She was upset about my attitude towards residents of Gering, NE. I actually like most residents in Gering that I have met. I feel that some of them may be a little closed-minded, but they are entitled to their opinions… and I am entitled to mine. The lady who sent me the email was upset about a post I had written on the night Teresa Scanlan (a local gal) won the Miss America Pageant.
On that night, I watched a number of disagreements develop online about where Ms Scanlan was actually from. Residents of Scottsbluff were claiming she was from Scottsbluff which infuriated residents of Gering. Instead of just being proud of a local young person achieving such a prestigious accomplishment, they were bickering about who should get to claim her. It was anal, so I wrote a post about it. I poked fun at both Scottsbluff and Gering residents. That post resulted, almost two years later, in me receiving the following in my inbox:
On Mon, 5 Aug 2013 13:54:22 -0600
Name…: Xxx Xxxxx
Email..: xxxxxx@xxxxx.com
Subject: Your attitude toward Gering
Wow, I was interested in reviewing Teresa Scanlon s reign as Miss
Nebraska and Miss America and pulled up your blog. You
put down Gering residents this way and wonder why Gering is not eager to
merge with Scottsbluff? You’ve bolstered the case for why it will never
happen with your snarky attitude. Gering has SO much going for it
compared to out-sized opinion of itself that Scottsbluff has.
Scottsbluff has serious issues both economically, socially and educationally that Gering
avoid by choosing to live here. As a former longtime teacher in Scottsbluff, I would
go into bankruptcy before sending any of my children and now grandchildren
to school there! The only reason Teresa transferred to Scottsbluff
High for her final year is that they could offer her more of the courses she
needed to graduate early…nothing more. She has grown up in Gering, attended
church and made friends there throughout her growing up years.
Finally, I like the fact that someone wishing to contact you has to identify
themselves, but we have no idea who you are.
>
> Browser: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 10.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64;
> Trident/6.0)
—–
No virus found in this message.
Checked by AVG – www.avg.com
Version: 10.0.1432 / Virus Database: 3211/6070 – Release Date: 08/11/13
Okay, so this former school teacher had a lot of points to make. I didn’t take anything she wrote too personally. She was, after all, apparently just venting at me. Venting is mostly what I do in my blog. I understand the need. However, after reading her rant over several times, I decided I needed to give her a response. I replied with the following:
Xxx,
Thank you for your email. I’m sorry you were offended by my blog. If you read the post about Teresa and where is she from and this is the post your email is referring to, you must have read it with blinders on. I made fun of both Scottsbluff and Gering residents. You seem to think I am from Scottsbluff. I am not. I am originally from another state. I have lived in both Scottsbluff and Gering in my almost 20 years in the panhandle. I currently live in Terrytown. I noticed several things in your email that didn’t seem quite right.
My snarky attitude is mine alone. To say that the reasons the two communities won’t merge are bolstered by my snarkiness seems, to be honest, snarky. You say that Scottsbluff has an outsized opinion of itself. The town? I didn’t know towns had opinions. Are you referring to the people of the town? You seem to feel that everyone in Scottsbluff is one in the same, but I don’t think that is probably true. You are entitled to your opinion, however, as am I. Apparently you don’t have any friends or family on the other side of the river.
You also say that “Scottsbluff has serious issues both economically, socially and educationally that Gering avoid by choosing to live here.” First of all, you list three issues, so your use of the word “both” is not correct. And you were a school teacher, correct? In Scottsbluff? And you no longer teach there? Well, I think that will probably help Scottsbluff with some of its “educational issues”. In addition to the incorrect use of the word “both”, the sentence doesn’t make any sense. Gering can’t choose to live anywhere. Gering is a municipality and has no free will… or thoughts… or anything. The residents of Gering can make choices, if that is what you meant. You really like to pit Gering and Scottsbluff against one another as if there really weren’t people involved, at least that is the tone I get from your email.
You honestly would go into bankruptcy before letting your children or grandchildren go to school in Scottsbluff? I would never say anything like that about our local schools… not in seriousness. Both Scottsbluff and Gering schools are staffed by local teachers who, for the most part, care about our children and our childrens’ futures. I wouldn’t hesitate to send my children to either school system. I mean, I understand the good-natured rivalry between Scottsbluff and Gering, but to say that you would declare bankruptcy before sending anyone from your family to one or the other…
this is exactly the kind of attitude that exists between certain members of both communities (and it does seem to be more prevalent in Gering) that drives me nuts.
The entire purpose of the blog post I wrote about Teresa winning Miss America was to show that, on a great occasion for the state of Nebraska, we should be proud of an outstanding accomplishment from a local young person.
Immediately after she won, I saw several huge arguments on Facebook about whether she is from Scottsbluff or Gering. I thought that was silly. I thought we could all be proud for her, not because of exactly which city she is from, but because she is from our state and, more specifically, our area. Thank you for taking the time to send me an email letting me know that she is actually from Gering and that Scottsbluff sucks. I had no idea anyone from Gering would have that attitude? What a surprise. You have opened my eyes…
Rich
I replied to Xxx’s email within a day or two of receiving hers back at the beginning of August. I have yet to receive a response…
Stupid Motivational Books…
I’m having a hard time blogging as of late. Nothing much is striking me as funny. I’ve got a post I’ve been working on about Castle Rock Construction out of Minnesota (that did some hail damage repair for us last year… and into this year), but there is nothing funny about the crappy experience Castle Rock provided. That post serves more as a warning. I’ve also got posts partially completed about soccer as a sport, defining a successful career, and great free things in a bad economy. I also took an awesome trip with the family to Mexico that I should probably blog about, but that holiday ended as most do… with going back to work… and there is nothing funny about going back to work.
I returned to work after almost two weeks off today. As anyone who reads this blog knows, I hate work. My attitude sucks when it comes to work. It’s not where I work or the job itself (at least not 100%), it’s just that working any job sucks. So, since my vacation was supposed to “revitalize” me, I thought I would try heading back to work with a new attitude. In an effort to make this happen, I spent Sunday evening before returning to work reading Fish! A Proven Way To Boost Morale and Improve Results… I mean, it’s proven, right?
Okay, I’m not going to do a book review here. The book was stupid. Much like Who Moved My Cheese, this crapfest was a silly little fictional story that makes it seem like adapting to change and changing your attitude is something easy that anyone can do… and your life will be much better for the effort. The numbskulls who write these books need to spend a few weeks working in the real world with real customers before they write this nonsense.
Anywho, I decide I’m going to have a positive attitude. Yep, just like that. That’s how easy it’s supposed to be. I’m going to look at the positive in every situation that comes up. And I go to work… on a Monday… after being away from the office for almost two weeks. I don’t know who is stupider: me or the authors of this insipid book.
Now, please realize that these books are not really written to help anyone. Motivational business books are written solely for the purpose of making the authors a lot of money. Since the advice found in most of these books is worthless, the only way the authors can make bank is to make the books attractive to managers and executives who are too lazy to really work with morale issues in their companies and are looking for an easy “fix”. The people in charge need to say:
“Hey, we need to implement changes for, or get more results out of, our drones and we really don’t want to pay them more to make that happen… so we need some cute little book that will make them want to work harder for us for the same money (or at times less than) they are currently making. Pick up a couple hundred copies of Fish! A Proven Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results and make it mandatory reading for the worker bees…
Then, the authors make bank and write supplemental books to their original book that are even cheesier than the original, like Fishing with Boys! A Proven Way To Make Your Preschool Boy Not Pee All Over the Toilet Seat. I knew all of this going into my new Monday morning positive attitude approach, but I figured it was still worth a shot. Something needs to change. My attitude may be the answer.
So, I get to work with my sparkling positive attitude. First thing, I get employees telling me about all of the stuff that went wrong while I was gone. I inform them that I am working on a new, positive attitude and have no need for their negative “facts”.
Then, the phone rings and a longtime customer that I have done many special things for to make their service work beyond what they paid for cancels service. They are going with a competitor that I don’t care for much at all. But that’s okay… right? I mean, I have this whole new positive attitude thing going on, right?
And then a customer calls in and asks for a “manager”… which I guess would be me. Anytime, as a manager, you have a coworker say, “Can you take this call? They want to speak to a manager,” you know it’s not going to be fun. So I take the call and the person is upset that they haven’t heard back from tech support and they left a message over two hours ago on a Monday where the techs are dealing with all of the messages from over the weekend and this wait time is unacceptable and their service isn’t working and they need something done right this minute and no they don’t want to talk to a tech that boat has sailed and I need to get someone out there right NOW! So, I book a service call… for Wednesday… which is the soonest I have someone available… and the positive attitude that I started the day with slit its wrists during the call. It’s about half way through the work day and my negative, pessimistic attitude is giving my positive attitude a really scathing eulogy before cremating it and scattering its ashes to the hostile, unrelenting panhandle wind.
Tomorrow is Tuesday. Maybe Tuesday is a better day to try a positive attitude…
Another Panhandle Disappointment…
The Union Bar in Gering Nebraska has its own little claim to fame: the Diet Burger. The Nebraska Beef Council holds a “Nebraska’s Best Burger” contest every year. The Diet Burger was one of five finalists for this year’s coveted top spot. Needless to say, it didn’t win, but still… a burger recognized as great in a state where cows are more populous than people has got to be good, right?
A tradition that my boys and I have is to go camping for a night somewhere local to give the wife a night with the house to herself. We haven’t been able to do this for the last couple of years, but this year we just made it happen. We planned on camping at a local campground on Friday night, cooking out that night. Then, our big plan was to go to The Union for lunch the following day to try us one of these Diet Burgers. I’m a big burger fan and am at a loss for anything other than chain and fast food burgers around these parts. I haven’t had any burgers locally that have made me say to myself, “Wow, beef really is better in Nebraska.”
At first, my boys were a little hesitant going to a “bar” for lunch, but I had them so psyched up to try one of these burgers that I think it could have been served in an alley on East Overland and they would have been willing to go. See, the Diet Burger is supposed to be a pound of beef and a pound of bacon mushed between two grilled cheese sandwiches. Sounds like a heart attack waiting to happen, right? Sounded like the perfect thing to split with the boys on the one “cheat day” I allow myself away from my stinking diet.
So, the boys and I camp Friday night. We have a good time. We do a little geocaching, we play with our new puppy (who joined us on our trip), we ate some campfire stuff, we played us a little UNO, and we talked about how cool eating that Diet Burger was going to be. The next day, we pack up camp and head to The Union to top-off our adventure.
Now I was especially excited. I have a lot of people who know me who complain that I never write about anything positive in this here blog. They say stuff like, “Why can’t you focus on the positive” and “There are lots of good things around here to write about.” So, I’m excited that I am finally going to be able to write about something in a positive light in the good old panhandle of Nebraska. I’ve never actually seen one of these Diet Burgers, but I was imagining a monstrosity of meat and cheese just oozing with goodness. I couldn’t wait to get a picture or two of the behemoth and attach them to my stellar review of the burger. I haven’t been this excited about much of anything in the panhandle of Nebraska since… well… ever.
The boys and I stroll into The Union and take a small table by the front window. Our waitress is a cute little blond gal with short shorts and a pleasant smile. “What can I get you guys?” she asks.
I don’t even hesitate. “We’ll take a Diet Burger,” I say, my mouth already starting to collect drool with which to help the feast of beef and pork that I am soon going to be devouring slide down my gullet.
The waitress got kind of a wrinkly look on her face and said “Oooh,” and I knew my dreams were about to come crashing down around me in small piles that somehow resembled mutilated unicorns.
“We don’t serve those on Saturdays.”
Suddenly, with her face all scrunched up, little blondie with the short shorts wasn’t so cute anymore.
She points to a little list of like 10 bar-food-type appetizer items. “This is our Saturday menu.”
“Well…” I start, looking at both of my boys who, like me, are visibly fighting the onslaught of tears on the verge of exploding from their eyes, “… we really wanted the Diet Burger.”
“Sorry,” says blondie.
“Okay,” I said as I started to get up from the table. “I guess we’ll go somewhere else.”
The boys and I got up and, stepping around the small piles of blood and unicorn guts, made our way out of The Union. “Gering sucks,” I said to the boys as we climbed back into our car. “You know, if Gering would merge with Scottsbluff, The stupid Union would serve Diet Burgers on Saturday.”
See, now I will never have a Diet Burger. The Union pissed me off, and the ability to forgive isn’t my strongest trait. It is completely within The Union’s rights as a small business in the USA to serve what they want when they want. Maybe the Saturday lunch crowd (which may not exist… there were like two drunk dudes sitting at the bar — and that’s it — while we were there at right after noon) doesn’t deserve this “famous” local treat. The Diet Burger is no longer “famous” to me… it’s dead. See, I also have rights… like the right to never set foot in there again.
We drove into Scottsbluff and went to the Original Submarine Sandwich Shop located in Route 66 Mart. We got some 4″ subs, which are served on Saturdays, and although they weren’t as flavorful as I’m sure the Diet Burger would have been, they were seasoned with the extra saltiness of our tears…
Raising Goats Would Suck… NOT!
Everyone has his or her own version of the “American Dream” tucked away somewhere in the nether-regions of her or his subconscious. Our personal versions of the “American Dream” are part of what motivates us to get out of bed every morning and live life.
Little Johnny wants to grow up and get married and have a family and own a home and be a fireman so he can spend his life saving the lives of others. Then Little Johnny wants to retire and travel and enjoy his final years.
.
.
. 
.
.
.
Little Suzie wants to grow up and get married and have a family and own a home and be a doctor so she can spend her life saving the lives of others. Then Little Suzie wants to retire and travel and enjoy her final years.
.
.
. 
.
.
.
Little Barack and Little George wanted to grow up to be politicians so they could meddle in people’s lives and screw over a country.
Everyone has a dream. Some people realize that dream, and the rest of us learn to settle.
Settling sucks.
Little Adventurer Rich wanted to grow up and get married and have a family and own a home and be a something-that-makes-a-lot-of-money-and-helps-a-lot-of-people-but-isn’t-dangerous-or-doesn’t-involve-sticking-his-hands-in-other-people’s-guts. Then Little Adventurer Rich wanted to retire and travel and enjoy his final years.
.
.
. 
.
.
.
Little Adventurer Rich got a cold slap across the face as a wake-up call. When you decide to grow roots in rural Nebraska, there is no such thing as a job where you can make a lot of money. If you don’t get the job that pays a lot of money, the retirement and travel associated with the retirement become pipe dreams.
I’m thankful for the marriage and the family and the house. The rest of my “American Dream” is things I will need to learn to live without. Well, I guess those things are already lacking, so I won’t need to learn to live without them… I need to learn that I will never have them. It’s called “settling”.
As I cruise through this ever-increasingly difficult mid-life crisis, things start to fall into perspective. I’m not the kind of guy who wants a fancy sports car or a token 20-something-year-old mistress to help realize unfulfilled dreams. I’m happy driving crappy used cars (even considering getting a minivan). My wife is my only link to sanity. If I lost her, I would lose all bearing on life. So, I’ll keep my 40-something-year-old model. Besides, the only 20-something-year-olds interested in old farts like me are after gold, and my veins are full of nothing but pyrite and cholesterol.
So, since I’m not looking for the typical remedies for my ills, I’ve been trying to figure out how to become less miserable. I look in the mirror and this old guy looks back at me, with his gray hairs and his frown lines, and I start to get pissed off at him. He looks so much older than I feel. Why didn’t he do something with his life? Why couldn’t he have been better looking or more self-confident? Why didn’t he take advantage of opportunities that I’m sure were available to him (yet, strangely enough, neither he nor I can think of any)? Why has he let me down? Ooh, sometimes I just want to throttle that loser in the mirror. He doesn’t look like the kind of guy who would ever be successful. He looks like a stupid goat farmer…
… goat farmer…
…GOAT FARMER!
.
.
. 
.
.
.
OH…EM…GEE! I look like a goat farmer! A stupid goat farmer! Being a goat farmer would be AWESOME! No stupid customer problems! No stupid technology! Just lots and lots of goats! You feed them, you breed them, you take care of them, maybe you milk them, then you kill them and you eat them. Maybe you sell them. Maybe you sell the milk or sell the meat. Maybe you hire them out to breed with someone else’s goats.
OH… EM… GEE! I could be a GOAT PIMP!
.
.
. 
.
.
.
If not goats, maybe ostrich, or rabbit, or some other semi-exotic meat that people are willing to buy. I wouldn’t make my riches being an exotic meat farmer, but being out on a farm, working with my hands, being responsible for only my own actions and relying only on my own efforts… I may not be able to retire, but I wouldn’t want to gouge my brains out through my ear holes before going to a “job” every day, so it is something I could see myself doing until I finally snap and they end up throwing me in a loony bin!
Maybe my family wouldn’t be able to have some of the things we have now, like satellite television or cell phones or Internet or new clothes or gas for the used cars or, you know, food to eat other than goat… but it would all be worth it! If you can’t make it to the top of the food chain doing something you hate, crawl to the bottom of the food chain raising goats!
Now, I just need some land and a shack to live in. I’m sure I can pick up some land on the cheap in Nebraska, right? And I’ll need some starter goats. Do they sell starter goat kits? Never mind, I’ll Google it later… while I still have Internet 🙂 And I just need to convince my family that we would be better off without all of the stupid “conveniences” or modern life. I’ll never be able to provide for my family in the ways I dreamed as a kid, so it’s time to change the dream!
Little Adventurer Rich wants to grow up and get married and have a family and own a home and sell that home and buy a goat farm and raise goats! Then Little Adventurer Rich wants to lose his mind and get locked up in a “facility” with lots of padded rooms where he will enjoy his final years dreaming of his goats…
.
.
. 
.
.
.
Finally, a dream I may be able to accomplish…
A Way To Make Tourism In Nebraska Work…
Since finding myself living in Nebraska, I’ve felt a touch of compassionate empathy for those poor folks involved in the tourism industry in Nebraska. I mean, we are a world in search of adventure. Nebraska is no grand adventure.
Life is actually usually pretty boring, if we sit back and think about it. I remember, after going to see the latest installment in the Spider-Man big screen adaptation behemoth, my teen-aged son saying to me, “Man, being Spider-Man would be cool, huh? I mean, after watching Spider-Man, real life seems kind of boring.” Yes, boy, I thought, real life seems kind of boring. And he is a teenager. Just wait until you are an adult, with bills and responsibilities and a job, which if you are like 70% (and I believe this percentage may be a little low) of the population, you will hate. That’s why people get lost in television series about zombies and movie franchises about vampires and book series about young wizards, that’s why people get all tied up in “a galaxy far, far away” — because real life is boring. That’s why grown men and women lose themselves in the utter ridiculousness of “sport fandom” — because our lives are pretty boring, so we need to live vicariously through people who we view as having “exciting lives.” So, when we go to spend our hard-earned and hard-saved vacation money (or rack up credit card bills we have no intention of actually paying off in our lifetimes), we are searching for some relaxation, some adventure, and getting away from our boring lives. Why would anyone in his or her right mind search out wind, allergens, the smell of feedlots, and the miles and miles of mind-numbing cornfields of Nebraska as a place to spend their vacation dollars? Nebraska is a place you pass through on your way to somewhere that has something to offer. No one in his or her right mind…
My thoughts are often with those poor folks who have jobs that require the promotion of Nebraska as a tourist destination. Talk about some of the hardest jobs in America. I’m actually surprised that Dirty Jobs hasn’t featured Nebraska Tourism in its spotlight…
Mike Rowe walks into the State Tourism office in Lincoln. He is immediately greeted by a weary young woman who welcomes him with a weak, sweaty handshake.
Mike: Well, this looks like an office job. It can’t be that bad.
Woman: Yeah, it’s an office job.
Mike: So, what do you guys and gals do here?
Woman: We try to convince people to spend their vacation dollars in Nebraska.
Mike (rolling up his sleeves): Well, Nebraska can’t be that bad. What are some of the things in the state that people would want to come see?
Woman: … Kool-Aid was invented here…
Mike: Okay, that’s a start. And we have a museum for that?
Woman: Well, no. There is a display for Kool-Aid in a museum in Hastings, but no stand-alone museum.
Mike: … okay… what else we got!
Woman: We have corn, and cows. Growing is big here. We grow corn and meat and beans and stuff.
Mike (hamming it up, winking at the camera): How about pot? Could we promote pot? Some states are legalizing it!
Woman: The state is about 99.7% Republican…
Mike (coughing): … okay… uh… celebrities? Any living celebrities people would want to visit the home towns of?
Woman: … Larry the Cable Guy…
Mike (tearing off his microphone and yelling at his producer): Nebraska? Who in the hells idea was this? They are FIRED! We are out of here…
Woman (weeping): … Oh please, God, don’t leave me! Are you hiring… anything… somebody has to wash the crap off your clothes after you crawl out of the sewers… I’ll do that…
Okay, Nebraska tourism might be too much for even Dirty Jobs.
Now, with Nebraska tourism being on my mind more than not, I am constantly looking for ways to help those poor folks involved in the industry. So, when I came across a small article in the local Star-Herald newspaper, my grand plan began to formulate. Nebraska might not be the logical choice for people in their right minds… but what about nutjobs and whackos? We might be the place for those folks, and there are a lot of those folks… and they have money too.
The article in the Star-Herald was about a vampire in Serbia. Now, you may be asking yourself why a small newspaper in Scottsbluff, Nebraska is carrying a story about a vampire in Serbia. Well, it’s Nebraska. Not much happens here, but there are pages to fill. Now, from what I could glean from the story, the locals don’t really believe there is a vampire on the loose in Serbia. The locals are just playing up the sensational story for — you guessed it — potential tourism dollars. The residents of Zarozje, Serbia, want the nutjobs and the whackos to come spend their hard-earned vacation money in search of the elusive vampire. This will probably work. People go to Transylvania because of Dracula. People visit the Loch Ness in hopes of spying the monster. Weirdos and psychos head to the Pacific Northwest with the intend of snapping a picture of Bigfoot. Now, if only the good folks of Nebraska had something freakish going for them… other than the freakishly boring everyday stuff…
Now, I’m thumbing through another edition of the Star-Herald and I see a piece on Stephen King giving a speech at the University of Massachusetts… and the Golden Tourism plan is devised for the great state of Nebraska!
Stephen King has used Nebraska in a few of his stories. Children of the Corn takes place in and around the fictitious town of Gatlin, which would be somewhere in the western part of the state near the real-life Hemingford. The real-life Hemingford is the namesake for Stephen King’s Hemingford Home, which was the residence of Abigail Freeman in The Stand. Hemingford Home is also where Wilfred James killed and was haunted by his wife in 1922. Stephen King doesn’t seem to have a problem imagining strange things transpiring in Nebraska. We should SELL THAT! Screw vampires! Screw hairy guys with big feet! We’re talking killer children in the cornfields! All of a sudden, those stupid cornfields seem to be more than a source for allergy issues. Guys murder their wifes and bury them in old wells around here, folks: come and SEE IT! Come to Nebraska and try not to get caught up in the ultimate battle between good and evil! Try to keep your SOUL!
Oh man, this is tourism gold. I mean, you walk into the local Walmart at an hour of any given day and about half of the dudes walking around look like they could have potentially buried their wives in wells. Nebraska could be the freak-out capital of the world. Farmers could have mazes going through their cornfields and hire some of the local illegals to chase tourist with machetes. There could be bloody body parts scattered along the trails. The whole state could become like the worlds largest haunted house! People would come from near and far to be freaked-out in Nebraska. Oh sure, the new breed of tourist this campaign would bring in might not be the most mentally sound of people, but money all burns the same, right?
And I even have the new state slogan. Screw “The Good Life”, because we don’t want to mislead people with false advertising. Our new slogan would be:
Nebraska: Something’s Just Not Quite Right…
You Might Be A Redneck If…
… you don’t see anything wrong with the following sign:
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Now, this isn’t a bar in some seedy part of town. This is a bar right on Main Street in downtown Gering, NE. The bar is driven past by many, many locals on a daily basis. This bar is only a block from the local convention center that hosts visitors from all over the region. This bar posts its daily lunch specials on the little sandwich board, and usually there is some stupid backwater play on words that usually is little more than misspelling, like “turkey sammich”. This one, which I snapped a picture of this past summer, in my opinion, doesn’t seem quite right.
Now, I am far from a prude. My mind is in the gutter more than I care to admit, and off-color humor has it’s place; however, I’m not so sure that place is a downtown business district.
You know, I think I am slowly establishing a knowledge base for what truly makes a redneck. Off-color humor can be (and usually is) funny. You don’t have to be a redneck to believe that. When a business owner has the same sense of humor as the typical 13-year-old boy, we’re getting into redneck territory. When 13-year-old humor is posted on main street for everyone to see, the redneck is running rampant…