“Oh, it’s terrible! The King has been transformed! Please find the Magic Wand so we can change him back.”
November 27, 2010, 4:31 PM
First of all, I admit – the title doesn’t mean much in relation to this entry, except that it perhaps reflects that I’ve been playing too much Super Mario Bros. 3 on my Super Nintendo lately. Regardless, this Journal entry has been a long time in coming, since this is about a trip I took to Stuarts Draft two weeks ago. All I have to say is, hey, I’ve been busy. But it’s also somewhat fitting that I post this entry this weekend, since this was “Thanksgiving” with the parents a couple of weeks ahead of the holiday. Traffic is a real pain, you see, and this obviates the need to mess with it. Have you ever driven US 29 in Virginia on Thanksgiving weekend? It’s no walk in the park.
On Friday the 12th, after driving perhaps a shade too fast the whole way down, I arrived at Stuarts Draft Middle School. After all, Mom was there, and I hadn’t seen her new classroom yet. Mom was recently switched from sixth to eighth grade, and so she moved rooms as a result, from Room 24 to Room 1. And here it is:
Continue reading…Categories: Katie, Language, Middle school, Security, Shopping, Staunton, Staunton Mall, Stuarts Draft, Video games, Walmart
This time, I am saying something substantive while on camera…
August 21, 2010, 11:54 PM
So I gave the “Schumin Web Video Journal” (a name I came up with after I filmed this) a spin once again:
Categories: Companies, Products, Project Chanology, Schumin Web meta, Video Journal
So I tried my hand at video blogging today…
June 23, 2010, 10:36 PM
So I tried my hand at video blogging on the way home from work today. I used my phone, setting it up it in the holder clipped on my air vent that I usually use for the GPS while I was stopped at a red light. Then I started it recording and just started discussing things:
And there you go, I suppose. It’s a first try, and so I kind of want to know what you think. Did I plan out what I wanted to say? No. I just kind of discussed it as I thought of it. And I managed to go on for just about ten minutes. So what do you think? Like it? Hate it? Think it’s got potential but needs to be refined? I want to know.
Categories: Driving, Shopping, Video Journal
Epic wind!
April 20, 2010, 9:23 PM
On April 17, Anonymous DC raided the Founding Church of Scientology’s “Ideal Org”. This was to be a fun raid, once we figured out how to deal with the weather conditions. It was windy. Really windy. If it gives you any idea about how windy it was, the wind was blowing so hard that we couldn’t wear our Guy Fawkes masks. Anyman tried to wear his Guy Fawkes mask, but actually lost it to the wind. Seriously. It blew right off his face, and blew down the street and out of sight before anyone could recover it. And it was a pretty cool take on the Guy Fawkes mask, too, with half of it colored black, seen here in this June 2009 file photo:
Categories: Gas prices, Project Chanology
One would think it wouldn’t be that hard to find aqua socks in the middle of July, but if you thought that, you would be wrong.
July 19, 2009, 8:29 PM
One would think – July is the middle of the summer. Summer is a time when people spend a lot of time in the water. One would think that one would be able to find water-type shoes in the middle of the summer. But no. I went to seven different stores, and found no aqua socks that fit at a price that I was willing to pay.
The reason, of course, is because of the way retail works. “Spring” starts December 26, and runs to roughly Easter. Then “summer” runs from around Easter to the Fourth of July. Then “fall” goes until around Labor Day or so. Then “winter” runs from Labor Day to Christmas. Thus now, on July 19, the aqua socks are mostly gone, and the stock of sandals is dwindling.
So why am I so worked up about finding a pair of aqua socks? Well, I’m going tubing on the Shenandoah River in Luray next weekend with a bunch of my coworkers, and the Web site for Shenandoah River Outfitters, the company we’re going through for this tube trip, recommends that shoes be worn on the river for safety purposes. Makes perfect sense to me – there could be rough bottom terrain, sharp rocks, or other kinds of hazardous debris, and I don’t want to get hurt on the river. Even more so when you consider that I’m one of the drivers for this outing, and thus my feet will be doing a bit of work beyond the river, and injured feet on the pedals is a Bad Thing.
Categories: Shoes, Shopping, Video games
Okay, I’m calling it – Staunton Mall is toast.
May 2, 2009, 1:36 PM
Okay, I’m calling it. Staunton Mall is a dying mall, if not already basically a dead mall. I was in there on Friday with Katie, and I believe there are now more empty locations than there are full ones. Steve and Barry’s, in an anchor spot, is gone. Books-A-Million is gone, in another large spot. KB Toys is gone, as part of the chain’s complete closure earlier this year. The former Piece Goods location has never been filled for any appreciable length of time since Piece Goods left. The old CVS/Pharmacy location is still empty after more than two years since CVS moved to a freestanding location nearby.
Additionally, Peebles, while open, is in deplorable shape, with visibly worn tiles, stained and worn carpet, and stained ceiling tiles. That location needs to be renovated badly, but I doubt that Stage Stores (which owns Peebles) will invest in it, considering that all they did when it changed to Peebles from Stone and Thomas was change the nameplate, change some interior signage, and wall in a gift-wrapping counter. Meanwhile, the Belk store in Staunton Mall has never been remodeled since I’ve been there, aside from changes related to when the store changed its nameplate from Leggett to Belk in 1997 or so. It, however, looks to be in better shape than Peebles, but partly because the lighting is somewhat darker in there, and thus it hides the aging. Still, it certainly says a lot about what a company thinks about certain locations when they don’t bother to ever remodel or update them, while remodeling and updating other locations, sometimes multiple times.
Categories: Shopping, Staunton, Staunton Mall
Ladies: Would you really want your guy smelling like a cheeseburger?
December 18, 2008, 11:11 PM
You know, I thought it was enough getting used to the scent of the Brut. But then one of my coworkers forwarded me an Email about Burger King’s releasing a meat-scented cologne for men. Seriously. Take a look.
I don’t know about you, but that’s not the kind of scent I would want to be spraying on myself. Honestly, the smell of meat is not the kind of scent I would want to wear to impress someone. Personally, if I encountered someone smelling like meat, I’d start to wonder. “So are you carrying a few hamburgers in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?” Besides, hamburgers, and especially fast food hamburgers, are kind of gross. For that matter, Burger King food is just disgusting in general, and along with McDonald’s, I try to avoid it.
Personally, I’ve never really seen the point of cologne in general. It makes you smell like something, but you usually have to really use your imagination to decide just what the stuff smells like. However, even the cheap stuff costs too much money, and too often, cologne is done badly by the person wearing it. I remember two specific examples of colognes done badly. One was my sophomore year in college. My RA in Potomac Hall wore way too much cologne. You could smell him coming way before you saw him. His fumes preceded him. Likewise, when I worked at Wal-Mart, there was this one guy who wore too much cologne who worked the cigarette line regularly. His fumes preceded him, too. He smelled awful because he wore far too much cologne.
This new deodorant is burning my nose today…
December 18, 2008, 1:31 PM
Well, folks, I made one of those changes last night that only happens once a decade. I changed my deodorant brand. I used to use Old Spice, but am now giving Brut a whirl. We’ll see how that goes, I suppose.
But today is definitely the break-in period. Any time you change deodorant scents, even within the same brand, you can really smell it on the first day or so. So today, I can’t smell anything except for Brut. As far as I’m concerned, the whole office smells like Brut (even though I know it’s really me that smells of it). And this new scent is burning my nose. Seriously, it’s enough of a change that I’m getting that burning feeling in my nose. Of course, I’ll get used to the smell and then won’t be able to smell it anymore, but for now, it’s burning my nose.
The only problem with Brut, however, is that it’s a bit harder to find than I expected. I went to Target and Shoppers with no luck, and then finally found it at CVS. So we might still be giving a few more things a try.
Until then, though, my nose is getting used to a new scent…
Categories: Products
Gas went down eighteen cents in three days?
November 26, 2008, 8:25 PM
Yes, it’s true! If you look about two Journal entries back, you’ll see that gas at the Martin’s in Waynesboro was $1.59 per gallon on Sunday. Now, three days later, on Wednesday, look:
Categories: Charlottesville, Family, Shopping
So Katie and I had fun yesterday…
November 26, 2008, 5:23 PM
Katie and I went out and about in Staunton and Waynesboro yesterday, and we had fun. I can’t believe it had been three months since last I saw Katie, but indeed that was the case. But of course, that doesn’t mean we had any less fun.
First thing we did was go over to the nTelos store, since it was just about time to upgrade Katie’s cell phone, and so we were seeing what the scene looked like. I think Katie’s going to get a really good phone this time around – one with an on-board camera, and one that can do all of the cool things that cell phones can do nowadays. And I demonstrated the picture feature on one of the demo phones:
Categories: Blue Ridge Parkway, Katie, Products, Staunton, Staunton Mall, Waynesboro
So maybe someone wants us to just believe that $4.00 per gallon was just a bad dream or something?
November 23, 2008, 7:50 PM
First of all, hello from my parents’ house in Stuarts Draft, where I’ll be for the better part of a week. I’ve set up a little Lappy workstation in the kitchen, which is where I write you today.
And with all the price speculation on oil having subsided with the economy in the dumper, look at these numbers:
Categories: Afton Mountain, Gas prices
Did you ever think that milk would one day be cheaper than gasoline?
June 22, 2008, 12:38 AM
Did you ever think that milk would one day be cheaper than gasoline? Take a look…
Milk is $4.09 per gallon at the CVS store in Aspen Hill. I can get it in the upper 3s at Shoppers. That just blows my mind, as the various gas stations along Georgia Avenue are either meeting or beating that price. Then if you go into Washington DC, they’re beating it – soundly.
We really need to make some serious progress on sustainable alternative fuels – and soon.
Categories: Gas prices
Mom, Sis, and I had a great time…
June 15, 2008, 10:24 PM
I always enjoy when my sister comes back from Chicago. This time, she took a week and went to Stuarts Draft. However, as my own schedule precluded going down to Stuarts Draft, which meant that we didn’t get to have a the-four-of-us kind of moment this time around, I still did get to see her. Mom and Sis spent Thursday and Friday in DC with me, so the fun was still had.
First off, Mom and Sis met me Thursday afternoon at the office. Mom knows where my office building is, and so after stashing the car at Wheaton Plaza, she and Sis rode on down to Dupont Circle and met up with me in my office.
Getting back to Wheaton, they got to see how much I had done my restaurant homework for them. See, Mom was displeased in her earlier visits about how little I knew about the restaurant scene where I lived. I could tell you everything about places in Pentagon City and Dupont Circle, but nothing right in the immediate area where I actually live. After all, if I’m going to eat near where I live, I’ll just save the money and nuke something at home. But I found a restaurant for us to go to, and in Wheaton, no less. It’s called Umbertos, and it’s a family-owned restaurant located in this cluster of hispanic-run businesses in between Georgia Avenue and the Wheaton Plaza shopping mall. If you’re ever in Wheaton, I highly recommend it.
Then Friday, we headed to Georgetown. Yes, that Georgetown. So after an unexpected shopping trip at the JCPenney in Wheaton Plaza (Mom and Sis seem to be unable to turn down a sale on clothes), we took Metro down to Rosslyn, and then from there, walked over the Key Bridge to Georgetown. Sis’s big thing in Georgetown was seeing the Exorcist steps. And here they are:
Categories: Arlington, Family, Gas prices, Washington DC
A belated reportback is better than no reportback at all, I suppose.
May 25, 2008, 5:29 PM
Hey, I’ve been busy. So sue me. But I must report back that Katie and I had a great time last weekend. We went all over the place, and had a great time.
However, it started out somewhat rough – Katie took the train up to DC, specifically the Cardinal. And it was late. According to AmtrakDelays.com, on May 16, the eastbound Cardinal, train #50, was an hour and 42 minutes late arriving in Staunton, where Katie got on. Then at Union Station, where I was waiting for her, the train managed to rack up another 44 minutes of delays, and thus ended up getting in at 8:21 PM. That would make it two hours and 26 minutes late. This thing was supposed to show up at 5:55 PM, which would have fit my schedule quite nicely. Leave work, take Metro to Union Station, wait a few minutes, get Katie, and then ride back to Glenmont. However, I found out about the Staunton delay from Katie well in advance, so no problems there. I compensated other places as far as that delay went, and ended up staying later at work, since there were a few things I needed to take care of anyway, and planned to arrive in time for the new delayed arrival. Okay.
So arriving at Union Station, I got in, and immediately checked the boards to see what the deal was. Another delay. Lovely. So I ended up just kind of wandering around Union Station for the next two hours, as I had nothing else to do. I was totally unprepared for a longer delay. However, I did have my iPod, and so at least I got to listen to Randi Rhodes (now on Nova M Radio!). And with headphones on was how I passed a good hour or so of that delay, as I went in and out of stores, seeing what amused me. I also managed to find a relatively quiet corner of the station to make a phone call, finding out about how things were going on the train from Katie. That quiet spot ended up being in a far corner of the parking garage, interestingly enough. But hey, it was nice out, so it worked. I got to watch train movements north of the station, and found out that the initial delay was due to weather, and then heavy rail traffic caused the delays closer in. Okay. Beyond the control of either one of us. What are you going to do, I suppose.
Categories: Activism, Amtrak, Arlington, Arundel Mills, Katie, Project Chanology, Security, Washington DC, Wikipedia
What a great visit!
April 5, 2008, 11:42 PM
Mom came up for a teachers’ convention during the latter part of this week, and she stayed at my house. And we had a great time. She arrived on Wednesday, and we met up at Wheaton Plaza and then went to my house. Then while I went to work on Thursday and Friday, Mom was at her convention for the Virginia Writing Project. On Thursday, Mom actually lobbied a few Virginia representatives and senators, and then on Friday they had some workshops.
And Mom got to be a DC commuter for two days. She took the 51 and the Red Line just like I do. She left the house ahead of me in the mornings, but we rode back together in the evenings. Thursday, Mom got to see her first big Metro delay, as there was a train having a problem at Van Ness-UDC in the direction of Glenmont (of course). An out-of-service train whizzed by Dupont Circle station, and then I took the next (very crowded) train, to meet Mom at Union Station. Then from there, we rode to Glenmont and took the Y5 back home.
Then on Friday, Mom and I got Breda 3062, which had advertisements on the ceiling. Take a look…