Pink Heals part deux

I'm currently sitting between a petite (thank God) woman and a not-so-petite man who has firmly staked out his territory here in scenic row 10.  

Part of the joy of traveling standby.  

I'm on my way to Orlando, FL.  No, not to see the richest mouse on the planet, but to start the final portion of my Pink Heals Tour of the season.  That's how I found myself between these two.  

My original plan was to fly down tomorrow, but as the pirate started checking flights this morning, she saw there was no availability tomorrow. 

Zero, zip, zilch, nada, bupkis. 

All day. 

There was, however, this flight. With enough room (well, more or less) for me. 

OK, back after that brief timeout. Flight attendants get pretty cranky when you don't "power down your personal electronic device" when you're supposed to. 

So, yeah, my plans (if you can call them that) got altered (you've met me, right?) and I had to pack and get to the airport in pretty short order. 

A few words about the pirate here...

She. Rocks. 

She got me on the flight, drove me to the airport, came down to the gate with me and made sure I was, in fact, on the flight. She even offered to book a room for me in Orlando in case everyone else got delayed. 

Geez I kinda sound like a 12 year-old, don't I? 

What I'm trying to say here is she takes pretty great care of me and I probably don't tell her (or you people) that enough. 

Now then. 

On to random observations...

Thug up baby!  There's a story behind this, the people that need to know it, know it.  The ones that don't...

Moving on...

As I was sitting in the gate, minding my own business (not really) I noticed the family sitting very near me had British accents. 

So what, you might ask. 

We'll assume you asked, this will go much smoother. 

All I could think of was "So I Married An Axe Murderer" the Mike Meyers movie from back in the 90's and particularly the father (one of several characters played by Meyers) and his repeated taunts aimed at the size of his younger sons head. 

"Aye go cry yerself tah sleep in yer great, huge, pillah" 

"Head!"

"It's a virtual planetoid, it's got it's own weather system"

I'm sure they thought I was a bit odd as I giggled to myself. 

Meanwhile Girth Brooks seated next me is getting bigger by the moment, I swear to God. 

As I write this, the tv screen I front of me is showing some modern-day, police drama, headless horseman tripe. Apparently Chicago Fire ran through storylines faster than I thought they would. Speaking of which, they are supposedly shooting scenes in our town this fall. One of our neighbors stopped by to say she signed up online to be an extra or something. 

Sorry. No interest. Whatsoever.   

Oh good. Now he's got hiccups. And I'd regularly spasming into what little space my left side has been granted. Plus, I think he just far... Ahhhh... Errrrr... Ummm... Broke wind. I'm not sure but I felt the seat vibrate a little. Thank God I can't smell. 

Sorry but I'm trying to paint a picture here, you know?

Also? Randomly he shakes from his stupor and briefly lifts the shade to confirm, I'm only assuming here, that we ARE, in fact, still airborne and he hasn't slept through the landing. 

Truth here. I'm not going to shut off my personal electronic device when we land. I just discovered I can't save this little literary gem without a wifi connection and  I don't have one in flight. Nor is one available to me.  On top of that I'm chewing through battery life so... 

I'm setting this gown for the time being. 

Alright this can't wait. We're 40 minutes out from Orlando and he's awake. Big deal, right?  Here's the thing. He's looking at his copy of Sky Mall (which btw I didn't get. Captain, can you fix this?) and he's focusing on the fitness products. Really dude?  Stop the delusions, you're a big man. Embrace it. Be who you are. 

I know, I know, call me Mr. Kettle, ok? But c'mon!

OK, wrapping up... 

Got into Orlando around 5:45 eastern and met Dave at the airport. We got a ride from the wife of one of the Florida guys.  For an hour.  After she drove an hour down to pick us up.  And before she had to drive another 45 minutes to take us home.  She was awesome, to say the least.

Finally as I've finally settled in to my hotel room for the night, I met one of our newest drivers, Mike from the UK.  Seems as though he's heard of this wild ride and would like to try and bring it back home with him.  He's here for 18 days.  Should be a lot of fun.

Pink Heals!

Peace.

Sigh

My last morning on tour.

Well, at least for the summer.  I'll be back on the road in October.  Of course, it still feels a little bit depressing knowing I'm done here. 

Don't get me wrong.  It'll be good to be home.  I miss the pirate.  I miss the animals, well the dogs anyway.  I miss my bed.  I've slept like crap on the road.  No Eddie, it wasn't your snoring, even though you can bring it like few others.  I couldn't sleep when John was my roomie.  I couldn't sleep even when I had the room to myself.  So yeah, it'll be good to be back home and back into my routine.  I am, after all, a creature of habit. 

Still...

How can you not miss this?  The shared emotions, traveling together, working together, the hijinks (an under-used, under-appreciated word in my humble opinion, in fact I'm going to use it again) yes, I said hijinks (see? I told you) that all blend together to make The Tour what it is. 

We've got some pretty special people here with us.  Of course, it's strange not seeing my guy from LA here working the room. 

We're leaving the tour in good hands though. Vickkkkkkkkki is still here and Jaime is the MAN, my guy Leonard knows what he's doing and Nick seems like he gets it too.  Seth is always eager to put on the turnout gear. 

Ok, brief detour here.  This is something I wanted to touch base on the other day but got sidetracked.  You know how sometimes you think of a snappy comeback to something but you think of it too late to use it?  So, here's my most recent...

On move-in day when we were getting ready to go back to the SUV which was parked outside, I thought I'd remembered hearing about a shuttle to the remote (but honestly not too remote) parking lot.  As we started across the show hall floor, one of the exhibit guys (a fire chief from who knows where) came driving by on one of the scooters provided to them for the show.  I asked him how we could catch a lift to our vehicle and he looked at me and said "it's only a five minute walk".  

To quote Jack Nicholson from "A Few Good Men" 

Don't I feel like an asshole. 

Except, it occurred to me (far too late to be of value) that the guy that belittled me over a five minute walk had his fat ass perched on a gas powered version of a Rascal scooter.  

Ironic, no?

But back to the show.  It's over in 6 minutes.  Then it's back to the hotel, back home and back to some semblance of routine. 

Again, sigh. 

Everything is packed up, we're just waiting for the official god bless from one of the Rascal scooters so we can start up the vehicles, build up air pressure and roll back to the hotel. 

Speaking of hotels, let me take a few minutes to throw kudos to the manager at our hotel last night. Wish I knew his name... 

While we were at the show, five boxes of shirts were delivered to the hotel.  That manager put them in a back room and forgot to mention to her replacement that they were there. 

They got sent back. 

Or so we thought. 

The manager got on his phone, tracked down the five boxes of shirts and then went and picked them up and brought them back to the hotel. 

ON. HIS. OWN. TIME. 

That's a something right there. 

Ok, here's another random observation... The show we just left was put on by the International Association of Fire Chiefs, a wonderful organization, I'm sure. 

Now.  Having said nice things.  Let me just add, I don't know which one of these fire chiefs had the responsibility for scheduling, but let me just put forth the proposition that holding this event on the same weekend as the Air & Water Show was probably not the best choice.  I'm glad I don't work for his or her department. 

Just sayin...

Ok.  We're finally almost back to the hotel and my ride home.  

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!!!

As we pulled to a stop in the parking lot of the hotel we saw a Mom, and her two young daughters, in their car taking our picture.  I grabbed a couple brochures and handed them to her.  As I started to explain who we are and what we do, Leonard, Nick and Seth walked up.  I passed the proverbial baton off to them and walked into the hotel. 

My tour is done. 

Pink Heals Tour Baby. 

Pink Heals!

Peace.

Quick update to this post.

I just found out Mickie, our home visit from last week, passed away this morning.  She was at home, surrounded by family.  She never smoked, yet lung cancer took her away from her family and friends far sooner than any of them wished.  Please keep Mickie, her family and her friends in your thoughts and prayers.  

If it's Friday, we must be in Bartlett...

I think I mentioned it in my post this morning, I really did lose track of days.  Not only days of the week, but shift days.  I have to stop and think about what shift it is today and that's not something I usually have to do.  It's Red Shift today, right?

Right?

OK, that's what I thought.  

Today we had a much shorter (YAY!) day than (not that I mind being busy) we did (but it's kind of nice to have a five or six hour day once in a while) yesterday.  We went to Bartlett for a quicky parade through the town and then a static display at a local shopping center.  We, as usual, met a bunch of great people, including (for the second day in a row) a guy that used to work with one of the guys at DG.  So it seems we've turned into the Chris C homies portion of the tour. And I texted him and told him that, lol.  I don't get to work with Chris very often, but he's a great kid and I really enjoy being around him.  And I hope he read this too the jerk, lol.  

But back to our event...  We met a woman that was just diagnosed recently and she, coincidentally she's the secretary for a nearby fire department.  We all lined up and hugged her like we usually do and handed her a marker to sign the truck.  We talked to her for a little while afterward and she took down my name and Chuck's name.  She wants to bring the Tour to her town next year.  I believe she'll make it happen too.  I'll do everything I can to help her do it.

A little while after that, a young lady came up to me with one of the guys from Bartlett FD.  Her sister has stage 4 cancer (I think she said lymphoma but I'm not sure) and she wondered if we could do a home visit.  She lives in a town near where I work.  We have an off day Monday. Dave is good with it.  The guys are good with it.  We're going to go see her sister Monday morning.  

I love this stuff.

I must admit, despite that above statement, I miss being home a little bit.  I miss the pirate.  But I also miss these two goofs...

So, it should come as no surprise that I kept getting drawn over to this...

I mean really, how cute are these guys?  Check out this one...

As the pirate often says, how can anyone hurt these guys?

It's time for Meet Your Pink Heals Tour Drivers!!!!! WOOHOO!!!!!

Tonight meet Eddie Mac from Lower Alabama -

That's him on the right.  Eddie is from Orange Beach, Alabama where their motto is "protecting paradise".  For real, that's their motto.  I know, I usually make something up that makes people laugh.  Well, it makes me laugh and that's all that matters so, really...  

Eddie is a truck driver by trade and he handles Karen and the trailer like he's a truck driver by trade.  Which is to say he handles it like he was born in it.  Eddie is pretty passionate about this work, many guys are, but Eddie just seems to get it more than a lot of guys do.  

And I'm not just saying that because he's my roommate now.  

And we're talking while I write this.  

About Pink Heals stuff.

Another nice thing about Eddie?  He really is a good hugger, I know, I've been watching him and Chuck hug people for the last week and he's good.  

He also likes to fire on people that don't get Pink Heals.  Not people that are just learning about it, people that should know better, people that have history with the organization.  He's a lot of fun to be around.  And he's a good dude.  

He can't dance worth a damn though...

I thought we were gonna have to get him some oxygen.

Finally as we wrap up this little gem and get ready for a long couple days in Joliet (named for the famous French mada uhh nevermind) I found this, sent to me by a friend that works for Advocate Health Care.  It's a little photo gallery of our time with the people at four of Advocate's hospitals.  Warning, if you're using your mobile device this may not work properly.  Go to the bottom of the linked page and click of "mobile version" and you should see the pictures.

Pink Heals!

Peace

Ok we're off and running.

 As I was waiting to get picked up for the first stop of the season, and I must admit, it was kinda nice to get picked up at the house instead of flying or driving somewhere, I looked down and saw this...

 

Now, if I thought for a minute she was doing that because she would miss me, I might've been moved.  But this one is named "Stupid" as in "what is wrong with that stupid cat?" which makes it slightly less meaningful, don't you think?

 

So the first official stop for me is in the books.  My friends Ann and Bob came to see us and Ann signed the Chicagoland chapter's future truck Leslie.  I was really glad they were able to come by.  Ann had a pretty big smile on her face the whole time they were with us. 

 

The folks at Fox Point (a senior living community in McHenry) put together a nice little stop for us. And for a somewhat last minute thing, we drew some people in from the area.  A bunch of survivors got to sign our "girls" 

 

 And we had some really nice visits with people, including a chat with these two survivors.... 

 

the one on the left (no, your left) is actually friends with one of the guys I work with, something we discovered while chatting about what it is we do on tour.  So, of course, since we had common friends, we HAD to take a selfie in front of one of the trucks.

 

It's a thankless job, but somebody's GOT to do it...

 

We've got a down day tomorrow.  Apparently the guy that did the scheduling for Illinois is a slacker...

 

Hey I tried my best.

 

We'll most likely find somewhere to go and do a static display for awhile tomorrow, we may be moving to a different hotel for a couple days too.  I've got a friend of the program looking for deals for us. 

 

Geez I'm gonna owe him big time.

 

OK, I think that's the high points.

 

Oh, wait, I almost forgot.

 

So driving home this morning, my regular routine when the pirate is not at sea includes pulling into our local Pacific Northwest based, super mega global, coffee-based beverage serving business (still available for endorsement opportunities, you know "the official coffee of I can relate to ducks" kind of thing) and as I walked up to the door, I looked across the street and saw a pink SUV (picture to follow at some point) with the driver, one Dave Graybill, sitting inside drinking coffee and checking email.  He was in getting coffee for the troops.  We chatted briefly and then I went home to finish my prep work for the trip.  Nice surprise.

 

OK, that should do

 

Wait one more thing...

 

I was going to do an edition of "Meet your Pink Heals Tour Driver" but Brad left before I could get a picture of him.  It'll have to wait for a day or two...

 

This time for sure.

 

Pink Heals!

 

Peace

It's 2:16, what did you get me?

Today, the Blond Child's Mother is supposed to be 53. Of course, if she were still here, I wouldn't have put it quite that way, lol. I suppose she'll let it slip this time, but I'll probably try to word it a little more tactfully next time. I took flowers and balloons down to the cemetery today, it just felt like the thing to do. And then, after that, I went shopping in her honor. Bought myself a new sweatshirt and a pair of sandals. Bought some squeaky tennis balls for the dogs today too.

She would have approved.

It's well documented that she and both of her girls could work their way around the mall. I guess I must have learned a thing or two from them. How could I not?

I had a couple people check up on me today, I told them I was fine. I am too. Really. Last year I think was more difficult than this year, probably because it was my first with the pirate. This year, I was more prepared for it. That makes a difference, I believe. If you can anticipate an event, you can kind of not be surprised by it or by the rush of feelings you may feel. The firsts are, of course, always difficult. But the seconds can be too and I learned that from some more experienced grievers before I got caught off-guard by them and so I was OK. Last year was a "first" for me. Even though it was the 4th birthday since she died, it was the first since the pirate and I had been together and I wasn't as aware of that as I should have been.

This year, I've been looking at today for a couple weeks or so. As a result, today has been a pretty smooth day for me. I checked on the middle child to see how she was doing. The pirate is at sea, so we've spoken today, texted back and forth a few times, but she's not expecting to be home til late tonight, so...

Anyway. I've been reminded about the time we took the oldest grandchild to Disney On Ice (Thanks for making me smile today C!) and how much fun we had. It was, I think 2005 at the United Center and we had sweet seats about four or five rows off the ice. He had a smile from ear-to-ear and so did his Nana. Me too. I've still got his picture on the fridge. The cheesy (no pun intended) picture frame (get it? Disney?? Mouse??? Cheesy????) fell apart a year or so ago, but the picture is still there. Him with a couple of the most famous mice America has ever produced.

So, all things considered, today has been a pretty good day. Weather was beautiful, especially for February in Northern Illinois, went to the cemetery, stopped in at the old hometown for a little business, a little shopping and hung out with the dogs.

Not a bad day at all.

Oh yeah, about the title... The BCM would invariably look at a digital clock at 2:16 and say

"Hey! It's my birthday! What did you get me?" And then flash one of her smiles.

Every so often, at 2:16, I'll get a text from the middle child that reads "Hey, It's my birthday..." and I always smile at the memory.

So, I've got that going for me...

Yikes.

In less than 3 weeks, it'll be a year since I've posted to this (or any other) blog.

Hmmmmm.

I'm not really sure what to make of that. It was often difficult to write here, as I mentioned then. So that may have been part of it. It was a new experience, a new "behavior" if you will, so maybe that was it. My life, as everyones' does, was evolving, so there's that.

I don't know that I have the answer. In all honesty, I even forgot HOW to find this little blog for a bit. Don't think THAT didn't make me feel stupid. Messed with my head pretty good.

As have a few things.

Here's an example...

Last year, towards the end of August, I met "someone". Let's call her ˆThe Pirateˆ. And as our relationship has grown over the last year, I came to realize she was, without question, my best friend.

I loved the Blond Child's Mother. With all my heart. Truly. But, and here's the thing that messed with my head, I never felt she and I were best friends. In fact, I do remember thinking it was a good thing we didn't work together, cause I thought that would've been a recipe for disaster.

Not so with The Pirate. I mean, we don't work together. Not even the same industry. Not even close. But we could. And be successful at it. I mean relationshipily... I won't presume to say we'd be a success at whatever we chose to do, but, well, you get what I mean.

So yeah, that kind of threw me off my literary game. Maybe because I didn't have much game to begin with. I don't know.

But I'm thinking I'm going to stick with this a little bit longer this time. I do enjoy it. And I've started up again with another little project, so, maybe between the two I can build a little momentum and see what happens.

And besides, The Pirate is gearing up to go back to sea and that should leave me with some idle time and Lord knows I've gotta find something to do instead of taking care of things around the house.

We'll see...