a. Somebody’s knocking. Who can it be now?

b. Hello again.

a. Hello. What’s on your mind?

b. I love you.

a. Don’t do me like that.

b. Why can’t this be love?

a. What’s love got to do with it?

b. I’ve loved you for a long time.

a. I don’t want your love. Your love is driving me crazy.

b. Don’t let it end.

a. I don’t need you.

b. Don’t be cruel.

a. I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.

b. Let me be the one. Let’s get serious.

a. Don’t stand so close to me.

b. Listen to your heart.

a. My heart can’t tell you no.

b. Open your heart. Let my love open the door.

a. All out of love.

b. More love.

a. You may be right.

b. Fall in love with me.

a. How can I fall?

b. Baby, come to me.

a. Lost in your eyes.

b. Let me love you tonight.

a. Can’t fight this feeling.

b. Give me the night.

a. Here I go again.

b. Say you will.

a. Catch me, I’m falling.

b. Here I am.

a. Hold me. Hold me now.

b. Open arms.

a. I remember holding you.

b. Do you believe in love?

a. I still believe.

b. Don’t stop believin’.

a. Never.

b. Take my heart.

a. Yes, I’m ready.

b. I pledge my love.

a. Shower me with your love.

b. I’ll always love you.

a. Don’t let it end.

b. Endless love.

a. The way you love me.

b. You got it all.

a. Think I’m in love.

b. Love is in control.

a. Hard to say I’m sorry.

b. Don’t cry. Don’t shed a tear.

Bullgrit

A friend of mine got me hooked on a hilarious Web site: failblog.org

It’s just a bunch of very funny photographs, mostly of some form of failure. I just sent in two pictures that I’ve taken over the past few weeks.

I don’t know when or if they will post these pics over there, but you can go by and see all of the other laugh-out-loud funny photos.

Bullgrit

A few years ago I learned that the top of UPS trucks are white. I was standing at a 4th-floor window of my office building looking down on the loading docks at the back. I saw the brown UPS truck below and thought, “Oh, well that makes sense.”

I imagine the trucks can get mighty hot, especially in the summer, with all that dark paint. Having the top of the trucks a bright white can reflect off the direct sunlight and help keep the interiors cooler than if the top was also dark brown. That’s smart.

Though I learned something new that day (which I’ve confirmed with other sightings), it didn’t really strike me as surprising. I mean, UPS trucks are not common to me — I see them occasionally on the streets, but I’ve never had any personal dealings with them — so learning something that makes perfect and immediate sense isn’t worth noting (unless you’re grasping for something to post about on your boring blog).

Last week I was in an afternoon meeting on the 6th floor of my office, and I could see a main city street out the window. I saw a yellow school bus go by below. The top of the bus showed the vehicle’s number. “Whoa,” I thought. A few minutes later I saw another bus with its number on top. In the couple of hours I was in the meeting, I saw four or five buses go by, all with their numbers painted large on their tops.

Now that was something that surprised me. I spent, what, 12 years riding buses? I see buses on the road every day of the week, right in front of me, beside me, and behind me. I pass schools and see a dozen buses in the parking lot. My oldest child has occasionally ridden on a school bus, at which I have taken him to board and been there to see him come off. But I’ve never seen the top of a school bus.

To double the surprise, the only reason I can think of for there to be the number on top is for situations like having a [police] helicopter following the bus.

[For those of you wondering: until this new job (started late last year), no, I’ve never worked in a tall (more than 2 stories) building inside a city.]

This discovery of something so large but hidden on such a ubiquitous object really amazed me. I thought, by virtue of having personally experienced them for so many years, I had intimate knowledge of school buses.

It makes me think of the time I was going to lunch with my visiting Swedish counterpart (from my previous job) and she saw a yellow school bus for the first time. She commented that she had seen them many times in American movies, but she’d never actually seen one in real life.

Funny how the mundane to one person can still surprise that person, and it can be exotic to someone else.

Bullgrit

Every night before bed, I (or Cowgrit) read books to our boys. Each boy picks out what they want me to read, and we settle down in my and Cowgrit’s bed, with me in the middle and a boy on either side. The choices of what to read range from a comic book to a kids encyclopedia — whatever they want. Often I also get Calfgrit8 to read to us.

A couple weeks ago, I offered to read J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit (or There And Back Again). It’s been a couple and a half of decades since I read this book — back in early high school — so although I remember the story pretty well, I had forgotten the actual text.

I remembered that The Lord of the Rings was dense with archaic language, (as I’ve read bits and pieces of those books in the last ten years), but The Hobbit is supposed to be a children’s book. Although I don’t remember having trouble reading it as a teenager, and I can read it in my head easily enough, reading it aloud is very different. I think I sound like Mushmouth of Fat Albert’s gang. Maybe it’s my Southern accent; reading Old English with a Southern drawl.

The story is a lot of fun, and Calfgrit8 is enjoying it immensely, despite my mangling of the language. Before starting it, to get his interest, I told him the book was about a hobbit, a group of dwarves, and a wizard — I had to explain what a hobbit is — on a journey to recover the dwarves’ home and gold from an evil dragon. I told him they would encounter trolls, elves, goblins, giant spiders, and a strange creature called Gollum.

So far we’re only up to the group’s arrival in Rivendell. I have a bookmark that folds out to show a map of Middle-Earth, and we keep checking it to track their journey through the lands.

When I suggested I read this book to him, I didn’t realize just how difficult it would be to read aloud. Had I remembered, or had I checked before mentioning it, I don’t know if I would have agreed to read it each night. I might have just waited till he was older and could read it on his own. Even if I’m not ruining the story with my reading aloud, there’re lots of words I’m sure he doesn’t understand yet.

But he’s still showing interest, and he said tonight he wants us to read it every night until we finish it. So I guess I’m doing something right.

Bullgrit