From the “Now I Understand Why Dad Didn’t Smile!” Dept:

It's been less than a week since Nicholas graduated from Enloe High School and he has gotten to experience many of the unbridled joys of adulting up close and personal this morning! There's a reason they call this "the real world" and many more reasons why it occasionally sucks! We started out the day registering him for his automotive courses for the fall semester at Wake Technical Community College's new Shangri-La for learning wrench turning…

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From the “Doing Heroic Things” Dept:

Katie and Nick got their first doses of Pfizer today and are well on their way to being vaccinated. All in all, it was pretty painless even without appointments with the only real hiccup being the registration volunteer who took three reminders about HIPAA and privacy before he took the hint. Another patient had entered the small space we were in but fortunately the vast majority of the protected health information (PHI) portion of the…

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From the “Swine Birds!” Dept:
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From the “Swine Birds!” Dept:

Oh, what a difference a year makes! Last year, we were able to find some measure of joy in the COVID-19 lockdown by following the adventures of Lord and Lady Robin who had taken up residence in their nest atop one of the pillars on the porch. Let's just say that the local birds have hatched far more nefarious and diabolical actions this year...so much so that I can't help but think of Inspector Clouseau.…

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From the “Lest We Forget” Dept:
Photo courtesy Julia Williams

From the “Lest We Forget” Dept:

(Photo courtesy of Julia Williams) This Memorial Day is a bit of a milestone with Nicholas preparing to graduate from Enloe High School and it being just slightly more than five years ago that we got our date for Dad's service at Arlington National Cemetery. It seems almost a lifetime ago that it was my turn to walk across the stage at the Ocean Centre in Daytona Beach as a graduate from Spruce Creek High…

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From the “Sometimes The First Amendment Sucks” Dept:

Nicholas and I were rolling up to Enloe High School this morning when we noticed an interesting looking group of what appeared to be ultra-fundamentalist characters unloading a fair heap of anti-abortion posters from a truck just up the street from the conga line. Sure enough, as I'm pulling out of the traffic circle in front of the western building housing the main office, I can see a couple of them stationed on the sidewalk…

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From the “All Dressed Up And No Date” Dept:

The main reason I opted for the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine was that it seemed to be much more predictable than the others in terms of side-effects induced when the second jab in the sequence irritates the immune system into creating many B and T-cells which will be the body's long-term defence against infection. From a casual survey of other Pfizer recipients, it seemed that the worst period was generally 24-36 hours after the second injection.…

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From “Sometimes The Story Tells Itself” Dept:

The Petrol-Pocalypse(tm) has left the vast majority of petrol stations completely out of fuel thanks to the Russian criminal gang DarkSide taking down the Colonial Pipeline with ransomware that got behind their firewall and royally buggered their operations. The Colonial and Dixie Pipelines are the ones that supply the vast majority of petrol, diesel, and aviation kerosene from Houston TX to New Jersey and all points in between with the Colonial accounting for 45% of…

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From the “Time To Turn Those B and T Cells Loose!” Dept:

On this 108th anniversary of Grandma Williams' birthday, it was finally time to get the second dose of the Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 and start on the journey to getting a reasonable immunity against this bloody virus. Shot #1 was three weeks ago which I detailed in this BLOG post: https://www.sunfox.com/doing_the_news/2021/04/21/11221/ Give me that Pfizer jab! Today's experience was pretty much the same as before...everyone was polite and efficient, the nurse listened to what her…

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From the “Pretty Much the Same As Yesterday” Dept:

We actually ended up starting the annual acknowledgement of the entropy odometer yesterday evening due to a certain someone having to go to work later today but that trip to Neomonde for an amazing Mediterranean dinner was definitely an enjoyable appetizer especially after being up until the wee hours of the morning putting the final touches on the evidence for the upcoming hearing in front of the State Property Tax Commission. The morning started out…

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From the “Nothing Reminds Me More of Port Orange” Dept:

Yesterday, I was going on about getting the Pfizer COVID-19 jab and a bit of the process I use to relax as it's being administered and realised there's another story in there to be told. Key to finding that moment of calm and Zen is having my mind playing a piece of music over and over in my mind so that it becomes relatively easy to tune out everything else that's going on around me.…

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From the “Set Pfizers to Kill The Coronavirus” Dept:

This morning after dropping Alex off at school, I received the first dose of the two-dose Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine regime at the building that usually serves as my voting precinct location. Wake County has done a reasonably decent job of cutting down on some of the more tedious aspects of getting the jab...the registration and appointment were made online, a QR code scan and some girls asking questions armed with the contact-less temperature phaser currently…

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Walkabout 2021 Now Available

All of the trip reports and photos are now available in the Walkabout section. This six-day journey made a grand loop via Chattanooga TN and St Louis MO and back again through Columbus OH all the way to Washington DC. It was about 2,400 miles in total (when you add the driving round various places in addition to the straight-line distance) and roughly 33 hours in the chair. Enjoy! :)

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From the “God Save The Queen” Dept:
BELFAST, NORTHERN IRELAND - JUNE 24: Queen Elizabeth II meets cast members of the HBO TV series 'Game of Thrones' Lena Headey and Conleth Hill as she views some of the props including the Iron Throne on set in Belfast's Titanic Quarter on June 24, 2014 in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The Royal party are visiting Northern Ireland for three days. (Photo by Jonathan Porter - Pool/Getty Images)

From the “God Save The Queen” Dept:

Today started off with the sad and unwelcome news that HRH The Duke of Edinburgh has passed away at Windsor Castle at the age of 99. Prince Philip as he was also known was a larger-than-life figure who was a decorated veteran of the Royal Navy prior to marrying Princess Elizabeth who ascended to the throne much earlier than anyone had expected in 1952 and has been sovereign ever since. His tireless devotion to his…

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Keeping the Promise (Again!)

The final day of going Walkabout was yet another beautiful day in a string of them. Honestly, the only day the weather was lousy was the trip to Chattanooga and even then the worst of it was one downpour that happened to catch me handing over some tax papers to my client! All in all, no complaints at all! The final visit was the one I don't think anyone had any doubt would happen when…

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Here We Go Again (Metro Edition)

On the way to Metro Center station, I spied some lovely carving tucked into the wall of the National Press Building that I just had to capture. Once at the station, the Smartrip card on the phone where the three-day pass was clearly visible still stubbornly refused to open the turnstile gates after being tapped. Yet another station manager (at least much nicer this time) spent a couple of minutes trying to diagnose the problem…

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Traversing the Ellipse

After a gourmet lunch of a polish sausage and some pop in front of the Federal Reserve building, I continued on my somewhat diagonal journey that would lead me eventually to the Metro Center station. The Ellipse is directly south of the White House and stands between it and the Washington Monument. A fair heap of it has been turned into an overflow car park for workers at the White House and Executive Office Building…

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For Everything There is a Time

Not too far east of the Lincoln Memorial is a monument that I have never visited in all of the times I've gone wandering round the District. It wasn't so much lack of desire to do so but rather a feeling that whilst it was certainly an exceptionally important one and worthy of spending some time to visit, there seemed to be a crucial element missing for me. This is of course the Vietnam Veterans…

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Abe’s Place is Still an Adventure!

The last time I was in DC, I didn't have enough time to spend some quality time at arguably one of my favourite memorials in the city...the Lincoln Memorial at the Potomac side of the National Mall. Getting to the memorial proved to be one hell of an adventure, though...and it had nothing to do with making several laps around it which is what I did a couple of times when Alex was in hospital…

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Rolling Down the Old Pike

After a lovely visit atop Mt Washington, it was time to head out for the next leg of the journey to Springfield VA just outside of Washington DC. When staying in the DC area, Springfield tends to be my favourite thanks to the Franconia-Springfield Metro station that is close by. I hadn't been on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in ages but it's nice to see they've embraced the all-electronic toll collection revolution which is why I…

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On Top of Mount Washington!

This hotel had introduced the third different variation on breakfast...grab and go bags full of nothing of interest and I was still rather full from the Cracker Barrel the night before so it didn't take long to get the cargo loaded and be off on my way. Thanks to a wonderful idea from Suzette to check out one of the most scenic locations in her hometown, I found myself making my way from the airport…

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A Bit of a Scare and a Decision to Make…

After lunch, it was time to head out again on the journey but the first stop was to visit a camera store in the western end of downtown Columbus. He had a lovely Nikon F4 available but sadly would not budge on the price which was a bit more than I wished to spend and so that was pretty much that for shooting film on this trip which was one of the things I was…

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Polish Ploughman’s Lunch!

Having blown off the breakfast bingo worksheet at the hotel, I was more than ready to enjoy some fine Polish fare at Pierogi Mountain in downtown Columbus with the entire crew from Galena. Of course, I had to get a few dash cam shots of the downtown area where the skyline is dominated by one of the area's biggest employers who not so coincidentally sponsored the name of the nearby hockey arena that is home…

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Polaris Area Petrolheads

After finishing up a couple of hours having fun with Miss Mairin and my camera, it was time to head round the corner to a local camera store to see if I could replace the buggered F5. As I'm getting ready to leave, a Lamborghini Aventador turns up and parks right behind me. Well, of course we need a few shots of this rather rare beast. What I didn't plan on was getting a few…

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Highbanks Metro Park

Today's adventure starts at a beautiful park literally just down the street from the hotel...Highbanks Metro Park in north Columbus to meet up with Patrick and Suzette and the girls. A couple of weeks prior, I was watching the live stream of Mairin and Keelia's dance competition whilst working on five sets of tax returns in tax preparation hell. As I'm texting back and forth with Suzette, she says at one point that she wished…

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Time to Put My Foot Down!

As it was getting to be early evening, it was time to make a speed run along I-70 to the next waypoint north of Columbus OH. Along the way was a quick trip through downtown Indianapolis and then a conversation with Mom and Meghann about Hutsonville that allowed the Ohio state line to sneak up on me! After checking into the hotel, I was greeted with a completely different way of handling the breakfast. This…

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