Week number 5 in Florida will begin on Monday. This trip will be a bit different as my laptop is in the repair shop. Traveling without my laptop will make this trip somewhat difficult. No way to access work or home e-mail, no way to surf the net in the off hours, and no way to post. So you may not hear from me until next Friday. The shop said that if they can fix it on Monday, then they might be able to ship it to me for Tuesday or Wednesday.

Now today is the tired post. Last night I ran another prediction run with the running club. I was waaay off in my prediction, so no prizes this time. When I run later in the evening like last night, I'm usually too pumped afterwards to fall asleep at a decent time, and I'm restless all night. So today I'm sleepy.

Next week I'm back in Florida for another week of work. I've found at least one shoe store and a few clothing stores in the area, so I may go on a small shopping spree to keep me busy during the week. And my cell phone provider replaced my cell phone this week so I'll be able to post some pictures. Suggestions for either clothes or photos are appreciated!

Yesterday was the "Complaining" post. Today is the "Bragging" post. I finally received the judges' score sheets from the homebrew competition a few weeks ago. The bourbon barrel porter I brewed won 2nd Place in its category with an average score of 42 out of 50. This is the highest score I've earned so far of the three awards I've managed to win.

One judge said "I could drink this all night - not a daytime beer. A sipper - one to enjoy with a desert of chocolate or creme brulea (sp)...".

Another judge wrote "An excellent example of the base style and of the sub category. I wouldn't change a thing. Save some to enjoy a few years from now. You can also send me some if you like :) "

All these complements and a big red ribbon to boot! What more could I ask...

The medical establishment system in the United States is crap! No, I don't mean the quality of care - that's A-1. I'm talking about the billing side. In January I had inguinal hernia surgery. Prior to it, I called both my insurance provider and the surgery center to get a cost estimate. Neither could provide that info. Both said that can't foretell the specific costs until it occurs. They couldn't even give a ball-park estimate (~$2,000 to ~$7,000, or ~$10,000 to ~15,000, etc.).

Now that it's been eight weeks since the surgery and my insurance provider has paid the bill, neither party can give me an itemized bill. The insurer said that they don't have the itemized bill. Are they kidding me? Do they routinely just pay any bill that comes to them without reviewing it for appropriate charges? Are they overpaying or underpaying? Were there mistakes on it? I would think that these are important questions to raise when paying out large sums of money. Apparently not.

So I called the surgery center. Same story. "We sent the bill to the insurer and they paid it. What more do you want?" they said. I asked if there was any way to get a copy of the itemized bill. "Nope, we don't have it," they said. I said that they must have some detail around the bill they sent to the insurer. They said their corporate office should have it. I asked for a contact at their corporate office. Nope, they wouldn't give me that info either.

So I'm concluding that there is no oversight in medical insurance. And not even the patient is allowed to know what's going on.

Its hard to be bad. I started off my evening after work with a run of about 4-1/2 miles, all the while thinking about what to eat for dinner. When I arrived back to my hotel room dripping with sweat, I logged on to the Internet to surf while cooling down. Looking at some Flickr porn, naughty thoughts entered my mind. What if, instead of just dinner after showering, I put on some stockings and shorts and find a nice adult bookstore to shop at. That certainly got the blood rushing to the nether regions. I pulled out the local directory, found a nearby 'novelty' store, and Googled the directions. After showering I went to find my tan stockings, and then remembered that I left them at home for this trip. I did, however, have a pair of white short-shorts and a navy-blue striped string bikini, perfect for showing off. And I also left the bras home. Oh well, I can make this work.

After driving for 15 minutes, either the directions were wrong, or the place went out of business. No fun for me tonight. I then drove around to find some fast food and came back to the hotel to eat. No fun tonight. If I had left earlier, I could have made it to a shoe store to try on heels. Or to a clothing store to shop for panties or something else. Even the Starbucks were closing. So no showing off tonight. I'm somewhat of an exhibitionist. It would have been fun if some female noticed my striped panties under those short-shorts - a laugh or giggle, anything. It would have been more brazen to have worn the stockings, even heels. A bra would have shown up nicely under the white polo shirt I wore. Next trip.

Who writes your blog? Apparently a woman writes mine... but does she love shoes?

Just arrived back to the hotel after watching "Watchmen" at the theater. Spectacular! Amazing film! I wish I could say more, be more descriptive, but the writing muse is just not sitting next to me tonight. Loved the soundtrack. And I could have done without the circular saw in the jail - that just made me too squeamish. Not for the kids.

This is now the fourth week in paradise! I'm sitting here in my hotel room (in an orange-stripped string bikini panty) eating sushi and fish soup. Some how they gave me the handicapped room. I flew in this morning, went to work, went for a four mile run, and then order sushi to go. This fish soup is very spicy. I saw Sinbad at the Ft. Lauderdale airport. I did take a picture, and I'll be damned if I can get it off of my phone. And speaking of the cell phone, all the pictures I took of the hotel and the Philly Craft Beer Fest are gone, can't find 'em, lost to the great devil of technology. Oh well.

I think tomorrow night I may go see "Watchman" at a theater if I can find one here. And maybe go to a shoe store to buy a new pair of heels. One can never have too many pairs!

For the third week in a row I find myself in sunny, warm Miami Lakes, FL, for work. Its a pretty neat little community. GoogleEarth it (or use whatever map program). From high above, the streets are laid out in a Nautilus shell pattern. That's good for me in that I can run the outer ring and get a good workout. And its pancake flat. I don't think I've ever run anywhere as flat as this place, not even in Indiana. And that's where I was just at. With DST now in effect, I ran in the sun and it wasn't hot.

I think I'm cursed with the worst travel companion ever (I wrote that in my whinny voice). I like to be left alone when I travel. I mean, if I'm reading or working on my laptop, don't bother me, please. (That is unless you're a hot female, then talk as much as you want.)

This past weekend was the Philly Craft Beer Fest down at the Naval Yards. Its part of Philly Beer Week. If you have the opportunity, I highly recommend that you get to one of the 150 events in the region. Good stuff if you're into beer! I was going to load some pictures for your entertainment, but I can't seem to get them off of my phone right now.

Wednesday Weirdness #45

1. What is one thing one of your closest friends does that drives you batshit crazy? I'll use my travel partner for this since I'm on a business trip this week. He tends to say inappropriate things. Not nasty or foul things, but things that just aren't appropriate to the situation. For instance, there was this time a woman we work with just came back from maternity leave. We saw her and her eyes were a bit teary, not crying, but like she had something in her eye. As we were talking to her, I could tell that it wasn't anything significant. He asked her if she was experiencing post-partum depression and was trying to console her. No matter how many times she said that it was just her allergies and that everything was okay, he just ignored her and kept talking about post-partum depression and how she should talk to someone about it. And he's just over polite - almost running to every door so he can open it for everyone, even if he's the one carrying stuff and no one else is. Argh! Maybe I'm just too much of a crab.


2. When buying a new sex toy, what are the features you look for that you absolutely have to have? Haven't bought one in a while, so it would have to be relatively inexpensive, no gaudy colors, flexible, cleanable. I'd love to get a Fleshlight in the Ice color.


3. If you woke up the opposite gender for one day, what would be the biggest downside to that for you? That it would only last for one day. I mean, I had a woman's body, I'd need more than a day to go shopping to buy some really nice clothes, and then I'd need a few more days to really give the body a sexual workout.


4. Do you use curse words in front of children? No, they should hear or use them until they are mature enough to really know what they mean and how to used them.


5. If you were zapped with a laser and turned into an animated character, what Disney movie would you hate to play a part in? Buzz Lightyear. Cool suit and he can fly. What more do I need?


6. How would you react to your partner answering a phone call or text message during foreplay or intercourse? Well, after seeing this video, I don't think I'd mind!!


7. What are three things you want to try doing but haven't yet? (They can be sexual or non-sexual, doesn't matter.) 1. Threesome (MFF, but doesn't every guy? lol); 2. Run another 1/2-marathon, and maybe a full marathon; 3. Brew beer in a microbrewery.

Its 5PM on Monday and once again I’m penning this blog entry from 32,000 ft in the air on my way back to Miami for another week at the company’s plant there. Last week we weren’t sure that we’d be going back, but word came down late on Friday. Most people I spoke with over the weekend laughed at the trip’s timing - a Nor’ester hit the East Coast last night and into today, blanketing Philadelphia with several inches of snow. Other than the plane taking off about an hour late, it really didn’t cause too much trouble. The kid’s in the neighborhood didn’t seem to mind a day off of school.

I hope this week goes better than last week. Last week I spent way too much time after work in my hotel room edging while looking at on-line porn and trying to find a good chat site and then chatting. I slept about 3-4 hours per night. By the end of the week I was exhausted. This week I hope to be more productive and restful. Sure, there will be some “me” time each night, but not to last week’s excess.

I have the “Iron Man” DVD to watch, and I also want to catch up on watching the rest of the episodes of “Neon Genesis Evangelion” on Veoh that I haven’t seen. I started watching the series way back in the mid-90’s when it was only available by rental at a local anime/game shop. Then they stopped renting videos, and I couldn’t find it elsewhere until now that it’s on the web.

I did bring some girl-clothes with me – khaki pants and a white blouse, along with an assortment of panties, stockings, and a couple of bras. I’ll try to post some pictures in my Flickr.com account. You’ll need to be a “Friend & Family” to see the naughtier ones, so either send me a Flickr mail, or let me know your account name and I’ll set you up. I want to buy a new pair of heels for one of these trips, either back at home or in Miami. I saw a cute pair at Target the week before last and I should have picked them up. This week I’m traveling with a co-worker, and we’re sharing a car. I’d hate for him to either see me leave the hotel at night or see me come back and ask where I’m going/have been and ask “What’s in the bag?” Last week they put us in next door rooms; I’m hoping for some more breathing room this week. It looks like I’ll be spending quite a bit of time in Miami over the next 3-6 months.

Last post I mentioned the current issue of “Leg Show” magazine. I brought it with me last week to help pass the time. I hadn’t bought an issue in at least a year. Production quality has really gone down - the pages are thinner, the picture reproduction has suffered, and even the model selection seems to have gone down a few notches. Page thickness is important as photos can be reproduced better on thicker, glossier paper. The photos were not as crisp, some even a bit blurry, as they used to be, and a few pages had ink blotches running down them. Photos used to be glossy and pop right out when I looked at them. Not this time. And then there’s the quality of the photo shoot itself. I don’t mean to sound like I’m objectifying women, and I truly don’t want to do so. However, a men’s adult magazine is supposed to have beautiful models and the combination of the clothes, styling, poses, and photography should accentuate them. In my opinion this issue didn’t seem to do so for the majority of the models. After a long look through the magazine, and really reading the articles, I didn’t use it as I intended. It just sat on the hotel room’s desk for the rest of the week unopened, and I threw it in the trash when I left. One thing that I did notice while reading it is that one can now subscribe to a digital edition. I may have to try this out as hopefully it does not suffer the same problems as the print edition.

What else is going on? Last week I didn’t get a chance to run at all until Sunday. During the week we were at work until late in the evening, then out for dinner. By the time I arrived back at the hotel I was too full for a run, and my attention was elsewhere (see above). This week I hope to get at least two runs in. Philadelphia’s Broad Street 10-Miler is the first Sunday in May, and I’d like to be happy with my run. No personal records this year – after the 8-month recovery of the stress fracture, and the more-recent hernia surgery, I’m nowhere near being in the same shape I was in in 2007 when I set my PR.

From way up here in the plane, the clouds down below look a lot like swirls of mashed potatoes or whipped cream, or even over-frosted cinnamon rolls. No, really, they do. Individual swirls