Make That Change

Oddly enough, tonight's blog entry has nothing to do with a politician talking about changes on a stage.

This video first came out over 20 years ago and the lyrics to the song were about changes we needed to make in our lives so that we could change the lives of people around us. The imagery displayed in the video was of problems, strife, and accomplishments that we had made over the previous 4 decades leading up to the end of the 1980s.

Funny thing is, is that the imagery conjured up by the accompanying lyrics today haven't changed much and no amount of rhetoric spoken from a stage can make any changes...it's still up to us.

"Sunday Thoughts"

"The best kind of rain, of course, is a cozy rain. This is the kind the anonymous medieval poet makes me remember, the rain that falls on a day when you'd just as soon stay in bed a little longer, write letters or read a good book by the fire, take early tea with hot scones and jam and look out the streaked window with complacency."

--Susan Allen Toth, England For All Seasons

Fay-ed In: Interior

Get it?

Fade In?

Tropical Storm Fay?

I have to stay inside?

Aww hell, it was funny in my head, anyway.

It wouldn't be summer in Mobile, Alabama if I wasn't watching a weather map of the tropics and tracking a tropical storm or potential hurricane.

It looks like Tropical Storm Fay that has soaked the state of Florida for the last week will finally arrive in Mobile, Alabama tomorrow.

We are expecting lots and lots of rain, but relatively little wind. Forcasts predict 30 or 40 MPH gusts. That's not bad.

I'm "on call" this weekend for my day job, so I might have to venture out into the storm in case of an emergency, but preparations have been made, so the possibilty is slight.

So, I should be inside for the weekend watching it rain...and rain...and rain. Hopefully, that will be the extent of Tropical Storm Fay on Mobile, Alabama.




(Please, Don't sue me Weather Channel)

I'm Not A Doctor; But...

I'm not a doctor; but I sort of work for them. It's not as good as playing one on TV, but with this economy, you take what you can get.

As some of my readers know, I work for a home medical equipment company and pharmacy as my "daytime gig". Yes, even aspiring comedians have to pay bills and eat on a regular basis and a full-time job is a necessity at this time.

Ordinarily, there's not a lot of excitement at work worth blogging about, except that time I wrote about work and voting. But, we have something new at work that's pretty exciting...a website.



MEDI-STATRX.COM was unveiled August 15th, 2008 and is set up to serve patients and physicians on a national basis.

We, at work, are pretty proud of it and I asked one of my bosses if he'd mind if I blogged about it. Since, he was the chief designer and put in some countless hours and a few sleepless nights, he was pretty jazzed about the idea. I even managed to add a little "copy" to the new site, so I'm pretty jazzed, too.

Medi-Stat Rx was founded with the goal to provide health professionals and clients with specific medications through innovative professional compounding services. Medi-Stat Rx prides itself in high quality customer service one customer at a time.

To put it simply, compounding is the process of mixing medications by a pharmacist or physician to meet the unique needs of an individual. The ability to compound medications gives the patient a much wider scope of prescription medication strengths and forms.

Throughout history, there has always been a need for pharmacists to compound drugs in individualized dosages. Mass produced products contain standard drug strengths that may help one patient, but can be adverse to another. A compounding pharmacy solves this problem by using a pharmacist to tailor mix drugs to fit the uniqueness of the patient according to a doctor’s prescription. Medi-Stat Rx prides itself on its service and experience in providing prescription compounding and nutritional supplements for the individual.

Originally founded in 1996 under the name Newman Pharmacy, Medi-Stat Rx has grown from a small neighborhood pharmacy and durable medical equipment company in Mobile, Alabama to a nationwide presence in the compounding community. In the beginning Medi-Stat Rx’s primary focus was on respiratory medications and equipment. Through the evolution of pressures of an ever-changing medical industry we moved our interests into the newly revitalized compounding industry. Medi-Stat Rx has expanded its product lines to include Sterile Injectables, Hormone Replace Therapies, Topical Pain Creams, Skin Care Products and other highly specialized medications to meet individual needs of each and every patient. Medi-Stat Rx adheres to the strict guidelines set forth by United States Pharmacopeia to ensure the highest quality medications are available to our patients.

So, if you've got the time, if you think you might need our services, or you just want to keep me gainfully employed; check out Medi-Stat Rx-- there's even a photo of me on the site, but you'll have to squint.

"Sunday Thoughts"

"Writers are just people who have a whole lot on the inside that they need to get to the outside, with pen and paper as their preferred method of transport. Same with dancers, artists, and singers - all the same urges with differing transportation."

--Graycie Harmon

Buffer Zone

It's no secret that I haven't been blogging much. Truth is, I have a really bad case of "writer's block". Lots of things seem worth writing about, but few topics have captured my imagination or inspiration enough to put the words in print.

Today is Sunday and no Sunday escapes me that I don't feel the pressure to at least publish a "Sunday Thought". The problem I faced today was that I had not blogged since last week and the publishing of that day's edition of "Sunday Thoughts". That creates the problem of publishing a "Sunday Thoughts" back-to-back...and that just doesn't look good.

So, I'm writing a "buffer zone"; a small blog entry to place in-between last week's "Sunday Thoughts" and today's edition.

It's cheating in mind, but maybe if I at least write this explanation then I might break this vacuum that my mind seems to be in. I could have re-posted some video from YouTube, or some news story that every other blogger might be using instead of writing something; but I'm choosing this route.

You can bet that today's thoughts will be centered around writing, for sure. In fact, let me leave you with a quotation I found about writing a diary, which is what a weblog was at the term's inception.

"It seems to me that the problem with diaries, and the reason that most of them are so boring, is that every day we vacillate between examining our hangnails and speculating on cosmic order.

--Ann Beattie, Picturing Will, 1989

"Sunday Thoughts"

"I'm an ordinary guy with an extraordinary job."

--Bernie Mac

PR Guy Re-Run / The Amway Idol

Last year, when Alticor and Quixtar announced they were reverting back to the Amway name for all their global operations, I was inspired to write another installment of my "D. Robison, PR Guy" series.

A few days ago, Bridgett at "The World According To Bridgett wrote an entry entitled, "An Ode To Soap", where she is reminded of the importance of the Home Care line of products produced by Amway.

This got me to thinking about the entry I wrote last year.

Occasionally it's nice to remind readers of past articles, so if you've never read a "PR guy" episode, here's your chance.

"THE AMWAY IDOL!" I yelled. You have GOT to be kidding me! There's no such thing as an Amway Idol.

Doug rose from his chair. "Yes there is! It is real. It is powerful." said Doug. "We shall leave it with you and trust that you will hide it away so that it's magic will continue to work for not only our company, but for every loyal Quixtar...I mean, Amway distributor in the world."

"Sunday Thoughts"

"Most collectors collect tangibles. As a quotation collector, I collect wisdom, life, invisible beauty, souls alive in ink."

--T. Guillemets

Site Meter Down

I use a free service call Site Meter to track my visitors to On The Road With Dave.

Currently, this service seems to be having problems and the meter code was causing an Internet Explorer Abort error. It seems to be caused by a script error in the site meter code.

I've removed the code temporarily which might affect the actual count of visitors to my site.

I have also removed the meter at Tex's Quixtar Blog.

UPDATE


FROM SITEMETER:

SiteMeter IE Issues Resolved
Dear SiteMeter Users,

We corrected a compatibility issue with our SiteMeter tracking code and IE7 and IE6 browsers that started last night.

The problem was related to some work we were doing on the backend system for our upcoming website launch.

We’ve identified and resolved two separate but related issues -

1 - IE Users viewing pages - The error occured when the SiteMeter tag was not a direct child of the body tag (e.g. if the tag was within a table or div). Recent changes we made created a failure for visitors viewing sites using Internet Explorer 7 and Internet Explorer 6.

2 - Accessing SiteMeter and Stats - Individuals trying to access or view their SiteMeter stats by clicking on their SiteMeter logo/icons were unable to gain access. This again appears to have affected only individuals using IE7 and IE6.

At this time both problems have been fixed and our services are fully operational.

For those who removed the SiteMeter code from your pages please be assured that the problem has been resolved and we sincerely apologize for the inconvenience.

If you have any questions please let us know by submitting a support ticket at support.sitemeter.com.

Sincerely,
The SiteMeter Team

Being Tony Bourdain

Lately, I have become a huge fan of chef, traveler, author, and TV personality Anthony Bourdain. So much so that for the past week I have been trying to write about my most recent trip to New Orleans in a "travel writer" style. I know exactly what I want to say, but have no "fricken" clue how to write it.

Well, that's not exactly true; I write a bit of it and then get distracted or frustrated or tired. It's been a long week at my "day job" of doing things totally removed from the life of a travel writer or comedian or even a lowly blog writer; and after I have arrived home, it seems that the inspiration can't break through the fatigue.

But, now it's the weekend and I'll be finishing that travelogue, so keep a look out for it.

Also, for all my readers still interested in my opinions about Multi-level Marketing and Quixtar there's a new entry brewing for next week.

Stay tuned.