All About Bentley

Well it is official. I no longer work for Hertz . I worked there for 10 years and 2 months. Up until the last 2 years or so I always saw myself retiring there. It just wasn't meant to be I guess. I made the best friends I've ever had while I was there, and I'm really going to miss them. Monday I start a new chapter in my life at a new job. Hopefully this chapter is as good as the last (at least until that end part where I quit).

Here's the latest thing that's impacting my productivity: Magic Pen . I've wasted way way too much time on this over the last 3 or 4 days. I'm not sure what to think about my obsession. Either I'm a super genius and I enjoy giving my brain a work out while figuring out these puzzles...or I'm a big geek. I'm sure it's the former.

Well it's no secret anymore so I guess I'll post it here. After 10+ years working for the same place, I've decided to move on. I've been offered a job working elsewhere and I've accepted. It's strange timing and the logistics are odd, but I had to give a 1 month notice. I wont bother with the details right now though. So full-time job number 4 begins April 28th. In more exciting news, we got a Wii (finally). It's the coolest thing I've ever owned. I love it and might possibly be addicted. But my right arm and shoulder are very sore. If you know me, send me your console id so our Mii's can "Miingle". You have to be connected to the internet for this to work though. Oh and I bought the internet channel so I can surf the web through my Wii. Its awesome.

Here are a few of my favorite things, and they are subject to change: Movies: Uncle Buck, The Shawshank Redemption, The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, The Bourne Ultimatum, Green Street Hooligans, Rudy Musicians: Jimi Hendrix, Metallica, Slipknot, Linkin Park, Beastie Boys, Green Day, Black Eyed Peas, Gnarls Barkley, John Mayer, Rascal Flatts, Puddle of Mudd Food: Pizza, hamburgers, pizza, mexican food, pizza, boneless buffalo wings, chicken cordon bleu. Places: My couch (sad but true), San Francisco, San Antonio, Washington D.C., my parents house with all my family, my in-laws house with all my in-laws, anywhere with my work buddies Drinks: Coke, Coke Zero, Dr.Pepper, Peach Tea, Hot Vanilla ...and pretty much the entire Starbucks menu Places to eat: Hideaway Pizza, Buffalo Wild Wings, Earls Rib Palace, Rainforest Cafe Things to do: Play Wii, hang out with my wife and kids, watch OU football, go to a Redhawks baseball game,

1. I grew up in Bartlesville, Oklahoma 2. I have 3 older sisters 3. I have no brothers 4. I played the trumpet from the 5-12 grade 5. I played football in the 9th grade, and I was very bad 6. I played baseball from 3-6 grade, and I was so-so 7. I played soccer from 6-8 grade, and I was very good 8. When I started college in 1987 I weighed 135 pounds 9. When I started the south beach diet in 2004 I weight 226 pounds 10. I lost 35 pounds 11. 4 years later I'm still maintaining, but I need to lose about 15 - 20 more 12. I love junk food (see number 9) 13. I love Mexican food 14. I have never been out of the country 15. I need to get out more 16. I am not very organized except for my dress shirts 17. I keep my dress shirts organized by sleeve length and pattern; solid long sleeve together, solid long sleeve plaid together, short sleeve stripe together, etc 18. I love OU Sooners football 19. On February 19, 2007 I bought my first HDTV 20. On February 18, 2008 I officially hooked up HD...

That title might be a bit of an exaggeration. Saturday I was in my garage and I kept smelling this odd strong smell of plastic. Later that afteroon Deborah came in the house from some shopping and said the garage door wouldn't go down. We both went out and looked, I played with the sensors a little, and told her to try it again. She says "hey look there's smoke coming out of the garage door opener". Sure enough there was. I took the cover off the opener so I could look up at it and think "wow, look at all the shiny parts. I wonder what they do" and then had Deborah hit the button again. This time we saw some pretty sparks. Lots of them. And I noticed that the big circuit board had a hole burned right through it. With my vast knowledge of garage door openers I came to the following conclusion: "I think its broke". Growing up we never had a garage door opener (well we did, and its name was Scott) so I figured a few days of opening the door by hand wo...

Ok men, here's an idea for Valentines day. I'm not talking about the expensive gifts, the elegant dinner, the dozen roses, anyone can do that, if you have the money. I'm talking about the little extras. Last year I just went out and bought a box of valentines like the kids give out at school. The kind you punch out and fold over and close with a sticker. I wrote sweet messages to my wife in each one, and then hid them everywhere I thought she would look. I put one in her purse, one in her coat pocket, one on the steering wheel of her car. I taped one to the orange juice bottle, one to the bathroom mirror. There were about 30 in all. She loved it. And I'm sharing this with you, because this year I cant think of anything to rival it and I need some help. Last year I basically set myself up for failure this year. I'm not that creative. I had one good idea and its been used. So, any ideas?

We went back to Pops this afternoon. This experience wasn't quite as great as last time. For starters we had to wait for about an hour. What we thought would be an off time for dining, it wasn't. Last time we got there about 4:00 and got seated within about 5 minutes. Today we thought if we got there even earlier there might be no wait at all. We were wrong. That's fine, we knew we just got lucky last time, and its fun to look around at all the different pop they have. While waiting to be seated Tanner and I both noticed a table of ladies who were all eating the chicken fried steak. It looked so good. And thats where the rest of the problems started. We both ordered it. It was the worst chicken fried steak I have ever had. It was tough, it was chewy, and it had no flavor at all. Poor tanner had a big bite in his mouth that he couldn't bring himself to swallow. He chewed on it for about 5 minutes before it ended up in his napkin. At $10 a plate I couldn't bring mysel...

We had an interesting night last night. About 6:45 I got a call from a parent of a student my son goes to middle school with. Apparently another student, one that rides my sons bus never made it home yesterday afternoon. They were calling us to see if my son remembered seeing this boy on the bus, and he did. They called back about 5 minutes later to ask some more questions. Then at 8:15 two police officers came to our door and talked to my son for a few minutes just seeing what he remembered on the bus, who the kid might have been sitting with, that type of thing. My son doesn't really even know this kid, just rides the bus with him. They told us that the kid answered his cell phone when the parents were looking for him, but wouldn't say where he was and hung up, then wouldn't answer any more. That put us at ease a little bit because it sounded like the kid just took off, rather than being abducted. But after they left, then a police helicopter flew over our neighborhood...

My birthday is this coming Wednesday, and being on a church night I decided to have my family birthday meal tonight instead of during the week. Deborah suggested Pops and I thought it was a great idea so that's where we ended up. The food was actually really good too. The menu is pretty limited, burgers, chicken fried steak, sandwiches etc. But the big draw is all the different selection of "pop". The walls are lined with different flavors of Jones soda but from what I deduced, those are only for display. Other than fountain drinks, your selection is limited to whats in the cooler, but its still a pretty big selection. Stuff I've never heard of. But I was really hoping for a big huge and strange selection of Jones sodas. I've heard horror stories of some of their weird flavors and I was hoping to try something like Peanut Butter and Jelly or something. There was supposedly a drink menu but I never saw it, so maybe there was more than what I saw in the cooler. Ma...

I just finished reading the Bible! The whole thing. One of my goals for 2007 was to follow a daily bible reading schedule. I've tried doing this for the last few years but got so far behind at times that I just couldn't make myself catch up. But this year I did it. I think the furthest behind I ever got was 5 days and that was just over this Christmas holiday. I started off with the NIV this year but Deborah reads the Message. About halfway through the year I started reading it too and have really grown to like it. I'm really proud of myself. For someone that calls himself a Christian I really dont know my bible very well so this was something I really felt I needed to do. And yesterday we bought a chronological bible and I plan on reading it in 2008.

The language is a wee bit colorful but I'm posting this anyway. Featuring Elwood Bentley as Clarence.

Ok I'm obviously not Jewish but when making the Christmas Card below I also made this Hanukkah greeting, and it cracks me up so I thought I'd share:

I just discovered that my old buddy Chad has a link to my page from his page. I'm so touched. Chad and I worked together about 10 years ago. I changed jobs, he went into the Air Force and for awhile we stayed in touch. And he hosted my website for free for a long time. But I haven't talked to him in a few years now. And to find a link to my site from his....I'm touched. So see, the day IS getter better (in reference to my previous post from about 30 minutes ago)

Well I just talked to my new neighbor. I'd met him once before but just a quick hello. He's about to graduate from college and is apparently a trust fund baby or something, and he paid cash for his house. Anyway, this time we had a nice little chat. Oh and its 3:30am. And about 20 minutes ago I was asleep. He and about 20 of his friends are having a little get together. And they're being really loud, and drinking, and using language I don't care to use. So as the man of the house and the father of 3 I have to maintain the peace. I kept telling myself before I went over to keep my cool. I forgot when I got there. But as I started talking I calmed myself. We agreed that if he just turned down the music and kept his friends in the house it would be OK. Not sure about the friends but so far he's not keeping up his end of the bargain about the music. If I went back with my kids in their PJ's crying because they couldn't sleep maybe that would help. Sorry for the ...

I've added music to this blog. Probably not anything anyone but me likes though. If you dont like it scroll ALLLLLLLL the way to the bottom and you'll see the player. You can stop it from there. Or just turn off your sound. And I'm sure I'll take it off soon enough, I dont typically include multimedia on my websites. Keep checking back, I'll have pictures of the Bentleys Winter Wonderland posted in the next few days. I know everyone is on the edge of their seats waiting for pictures.

Zane was eating a bowl of fruit loops for breakfast yesterday morning. While he was looking at the back of the box I asked him if he knew the name of the Fruit Loops mascot. He said "yeah, Uncle Fruit Loop". Not sure where he got that from, but who cares, I'm still laughing about it.