Pat Gaudette

‘Random Thoughts’

To watch a live video feed of the BP oil spill, 5000 feet below the surface of the ocean, click: Oil Spill in the Gulf – Live Cam

With various airlines adding more charges and giving less to air travelers, flying is not our favorite mode of transportation if we can drive in about the same time. In other words, if the time it takes to drive to the airport, the security and pre-boarding wait, actual flight time, and cab drive to our destination add up to the hours it takes for us to drive to the location, we drive.

When my husband needed to attend a meeting in New Orleans we originally planned on driving. It’s a solid ten hour drive and one I wasn’t looking forward to since we’d also have to do the ten hour return drive. The only other option was to find an inexpensive direct flight from Tampa to New Orleans. Southwest Airlines had flights that fit our schedule and our budget and we bought tickets. Read more »

My husband and I were in New Orleans a little more than a week ago as the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was moving toward the Louisiana coastline. President Obama visited the area the day after we flew home. Updated reports of the oil slick’s progress took priority in the news, overshadowing the New Orleans Jazz Festival and other local news.

It’s difficult to fathom the magnitude of the disaster slowly inching toward the U.S. coastline. I’ve found an excellent site that provides up-to-date information about the spill: Nola.com’s 2010 Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

And this regarding the impact of the chemicals being used to disperse the oil: Oil Spill Cleanup.

A few days ago I was driving on a two-lane country road with a posted speed of 55 MPH. It didn’t take long to end up behind a driver going 45. There was no reason not to go the speed limit, which I wanted to do, but apparently the driver in front of me was driving to his capability, the vehicle’s ability, or just felt like going slower. I was annoyed and kept waiting for ongoing traffic to clear so I could pass.

As is usually the case, the ongoing traffic was spaced out just enough that I’d have to really step down and go when I saw an opportunity.

And then I realized what road I was on. It was the same one that a couple weekends before, a man in a pick-up truck found himself in the same spot as I was in — behind a slower moving pick-up truck.

It was about 9:30 at night and it had rained most of the day. The headlights of intermittent oncoming cars cut the darkness.

He saw the lights of an oncoming car but took a chance that he had enough time to get around the pick-up truck. As he passed the other vehicle, he struck the two motorcycles head-on. One passenger was thrown onto the windshield of the slower pick-up. Three of the motorcyclists, couples in their fifties, died at the scene; one of the passengers died at the hospital.

If only…

In February, my husband and I flew on Spirit Airlines. The tickets were cheap and the flight was non-stop. Our seats, in the middle of the plane, that we’d paid an additional $8 apiece for in order to actually guarantee that we would have a seat on the plane, had so little leg room that our knees dug into the back of the seats in front of us. It was not an enjoyable flight. Read more »

Traveling through the South, I’ve seen quite a few cotton fields which spurred an interest in growing cotton of my own to satisfy curiosity about the plant. Today, after planting cotton seeds I purchased on eBay, I searched for more information about harvesting and found this YouTube video. Somehow, cotton products have lost their appeal.

The woman caller wanted to speak to the owner of the business or his wife. When I asked what she was calling about, she said it was a personal matter and asked if I was the owner’s wife. I asked again what the call was about and she said she needed to talk to the owner. I hung up on her. The call came from phone number 904-725-6043, with a caller ID of ”Security Center.”

Two hours later, the same woman called again. This time she spoke in a particularly perky voice and asked to speak to “Donny.” When I said no Donny worked here, she laughed and said “of course not, I forgot the owner’s name – giggle – can I speak to him?” I asked what the call was about — although now I’d done research online and found the number reported as a spammer for a plumbing company — and she disconnected the call. She was a little slow on the disconnect and I heard her mutter “bitch” just before the line went dead.

No doubt she will be taking the challenge to get through the “gatekeeper” to the real owner and I will continue to log her calls as they occur.

I told myself I wouldn’t do this but it’s hard not to give an opinion about Tiger Woods’ “apology” and his many mistresses who feel it just wasn’t good enough.

Maybe I’m old-fashioned about marital fidelity but apologizing to a wife who has been betrayed is, in my opinion, more important than having any empathy whatsoever over the “suffering” of the other woman — or in Tiger’s case, the other women — who choose to have sex with a married man.

I could rant on but let’s just leave it at that.

Oh, what the heck! I hope Elin Woods makes the decision that’s best for herself, either stay or go. If she stays, she certainly knows just what type of man she’s married to. As far as the mistresses — well, gee, who cares?