Unfolded Mind

Work in progress

Page Purpose:

I’ve been seriously out of touch with people from High School. I should be ashamed. Here’s where I’ll give a recap of what I’ve been up to since then.

1981

• Graduated
• Got into Rutgers at the last minute, thanks to string pulling by Mr. Naffziger.
• Too late to get a dorm room, so parents rented me room from an old lady in Highland Park, and I got a job at McDonalds in New Brunswick

1982

• Moved back home, started commuting to Rutgers
• Got a job pumping gas
• Flunked a couple courses

1983

• Flunked more courses
• Ran with a bad crowd
• Got “dropped academically” by Rutgers

1984

• Enlisted in the US Army
• Basic Training at Ft. Dix, NJ
• Tank Mechanic Training at Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD
• August: went to to Illesheim, Germany for duty station
• Fell in with a bad crowd
• Saw “Monsters of Rock” concert in Nürnberg

1985

• Stayed in Illesheim all year…
• …partying like a rock star…
• …could spend a month’s pay in one weekend (and did) and still have 3 meals a day and a place to sleep for the rest of the month
• I and my peers fealt so little threat from the Soviets…
• …that we called all our field exercises “Camping Trips”
• Met several nice young ladies, took advantage of them, and then became a jerk

1986

• Still in Illesheim
• Meet several more nice young ladies, then yadda yadda (see above)
• Army extended my tour in Germany by three months
• In October went home for a month of leave, then on to Ft. Knox, KY, where I…
• …fell in with a bad crowd

1987

• Spent the year at Ft. Knox
• went on “Camping Trips” to Ft. Bliss, TX
• Ft. Irwin, CA
• Ft. Campbell, KY
• continued to party like a rock star
• continued to run with a bad crowd
• Somehow managed to get promoted to Sergeant

1988

• Blew up the engine in my ‘79 Pontiac Sunbird, just before I…
• …got out of the Army
• Stayed in Kentucky, until I could replace the engine, then high-tailed it back to NJ.
• Got a job fixing construction equipment out in Manalapan
• Totalled my Sunbird while driving my dad home from my grandmother’s wake. Dad gave me my sister’s old Chevette.
• Quit job, got another fixing school buses in Ewing
• Quit job, got another at a machine shop in Neshanic Station building lab equipment for measuring how far plastic stretches when heated.

1989

• Quit machine shop, got job as car mechanic in Lawrenceville.
• Got involved in a one-year house sharing deal in Princeton
• Minor car accident, with expired car insurance leads to…
• …car getting impounded until I can prove insurance coverage. Can’t afford new policy but can afford a mountain bike, so I buy the bike and use it to get to work until…
• …I get fired, then kicked out of house.
• I spend the summer with friends (bad crowd, see above) until I get tired of sponging off of friends, and decide to sponge off relatives, instead. So I..
• Go with my folks to visit my Grandmother in Brunswick, Maine, and stay, getting another mechanic job.

1990

• Change jobs, start doing wheel alignments and brake jobs at Sears.
• Fall in with a bad craowd, but a little more warily this time.
• Found a really really cool bookstore in Brunswick, where I buy the “book of the Subgenius”
• Mostly keep to myself.

1991

• Keep at same job!
• Go to New Hope, PA to see Karen marry Chris Mitchell

1992

• Move with Cathy to our own place, a basement apartment in Randolph, Maine.
• Sears Job ends, not by my choice. Get job at brake, transmission and muffler shop in Auburn, ME. I won’t say the name, because I’m just about to slander them.
• Cathy and I get married, honeymoon in Boothbay Harbor
• Quit job after being told to boost estimates by 25% if customer has out-of-state plates. Get job in Augusta as oil change guy at a GMC dealer.
• Go back to school, at U of M Augusta, taking one course, a required one in small group communications. Get an A!

1993

1994

• Jason born

1995

• bought house in Bowdoinham

1996

• Cathy and I divorce

1997

• Meet Margaret on IRC
• Drive to Minnesota

1998

• Margaret and I live in sin

1999

• Margaret and I got married. Honeymoon at Tuscarora Lodge, on the Gunflint Trail, north of Grand Marais, MN

2000

2001

• Karen and I have 40th Anniversary party for our parents at Karen and Chris’s farm in Frenchtown, NJ.

2002

2003

• Lose Mom to cancer

2004

2005

2006

• Lose Dad to cancer

2007

• Bought house

2008

2009