I called home earlier today when I got off work. Julie was asleep when the phone rang and she tried to answer the reading lamp on the side table. In THAT respect, my life is still strange. But it's a GOOD kind of strange and one that I can accept as I've done some pretty strange things upon waking up myself.
We had rain yesterday in The Valley of the Sun aka Phoenix. It rained all day and into last night. Up to the north at Flagstaff they got almost 3 feet of snow and all we got was a good shower...followed by some hellacious wind. I know 50 mph gusts are not uncommon to those of us who grew up in the Midwest. Heck, that's "kite flying weather" where I'm from. But HERE it's different. Since there's nothing to slow the wind down it tends to get itself worked up pretty good pretty fast. We'll have rain followed by wind and blowing dust...and then it's over. Just gets dusty enough to make you wish you had waited a day to wash your car.
Getting back to the wind...several trees got blown down by the wind. Now, before you get excited about that, let me explain. Here in the desert, there's not a lot of topsoil before you hit bedrock. Consequently, palm trees and pine trees have rather "shallow" root systems, even though the tree itself may be 20 to 30 feet tall or better. On my way to work this morning, had it not been for the car in front of me suddenly swerving to the left lane, I would have cruised right into a rather large pine tree that had fallen into the street and was blocking two lanes of traffic. Apparently it happened sometime between sunrise and 8:30 local time since there were no hazard cones on the street or anything else to warn you about said fallen pine tree. I didn't have an accident so in THAT respect, life is good.
Got a call from a friend tonight who was telling me about a call he had received from someone wanting his help on installing a Golden Goodie Blast From the Past..IBM OS2 Warp. For you non-techie folks, this was Big Blue's answer to Microsoft Windows circa 1990 or so. My friend and I are both at a loss as to WHY anyone would WANT this particular program since it was about as popular as a fart in church at the time of its release. To satisfy my own curiosity, I Googled OS2 Warp and discovered, much to my surprise, that IBM has been quietly upgrading OS2. The last upgrade was to Version 4.52 that was released in 2005.
The guy making the call to my friend was building a computer for someone (apparently a time traveler of some sort) and they wanted...actually WANTED...OS2Warp on a brand new machine. There was also some discussion of "Flux Capacitors" and whether the machine would be able to reach the necessary speed of 88 mph with such an outdated operating system. My friend and I are both awaiting a report as to the outcome and have also given some money to pass on to the Time Traveler to put down on the outcome of the 1990 World Series. In THIS respect, my life is exceedingly strange. However, unless some sort of Temporal Time Displacement happens and changes the outcome of the 1990 World Series, my friend and I will soon become wealthy beyond all belief. And THAT would make life VERY good!
So, for the most part my life is good...but still strange. And I wouldn't have it any other way.
