Thanks to Rob, I now have no fucking appetite. If you really want to see what happens when you hang out in Berkeley for too long with a bunch of fucking hippies smoking dope, check this out. I saw what is either a chick with a goatee, or a guy with huge fucking man-boobs, as well as a guy that looks like a chick, or some lady that is in the midst of her sex-change surgery. Damn.
July 2005 Archives
As I've posted before, I don't watch a whole lot of television. I was over at HBO's web site to see when the new season of Sopranos (one show that I do watch) begins, and saw that they have renewed Deadwood for a third season. Cool beans. It is supposed to start production later this year and air sometime in 2006.
August 10th is National Underwear day. Whatever.
I managed to get the old hard drive up long enough to ghost it over to one of the extras. Hopefully I won't have any more trouble for awhile. It is booting right now. As long as I plugged the usb stuff into the right connectors I will be good to go. Haven't heard too many complaints about there being no TV, but that wasn't going to last much longer.
And it wasn't me, haha.
Apparently Russia's biggest spammer was murdered. Damn, noone deserves to die like this, but if it has to be someone, I guess the assholes that fill up my inbox are just a tiny bit above shit on the evolutionary scale.
Actually it was only a few hours, but it sucked nonetheless (is that actually even a word). Has to drive to Norcross tonight to cater something at our office, but got ensnarled (I loke that one too) in this fucking mess. Two cars and four tractor trailers tied it up and at least one person has died. That is the really sucky part. I can deal with traffic, but it sucks thats someone had to die. I hate taking 285 anywhere, and this just makes me not want to get anywhere near it. Needless to say, I never made it to Norcross. 45 minutes after I should have been there, I was sitting 1/4 mile from the South Cobb exit. Got off, went the fuck home. Luckily we got in touch with the people at the office and they took care of it. I didn't understand why one of the management teams from Atlanta weren't taking care of this in the first place, rather than us having to drive 75 fucking miles so that we could stand outside in 100 degree weather and grill stuff for 170 people anyway. I will readily admit that we have the best team in the company, but they can't all be nucking forons.
"Toby is the cutest little bunny on the planet. Unfortunately, he will DIE on November 6th, 2006 if you don't help."
This place was fucking great. In particular, check out the hate mail section. The stupidity of some people never ceases to amaze me. Then again, some of them have been posting here in the Natalie Holloway comments I do believe. Same line of mindless bashing (unlike my brand of mindless bashing).
I should be working, but damn.
Apparently the goddamn power has gone off and on again a couple of times. I have most of my PC's set to stay off if there is a power outage, so as not to damage the hardware. Got home and my HTPC was off, and now won't detect the hard drives. I have several pieces of paperwork I have to finish for work before I can even begin to troubleshoot it, which means no fucking TV until then. No big deal to me but Stephanie and the kids will have a fit when they get home. I think it is the hard drive that I recently RMA'ed, so if it is fried, at least I can get it replaced for free (except shipping).
I always hate the last day. Still have too much that I want to do, and need to make sure I can get it done and still get to bed early. I usually spend the first couple of days awake by 6am, but by the time my vacation is over, I am having a hard time getting up by 8-9am. Don't need to wake up at nine tommorow, considering that I have to be at work by 6:30am. That would just make for a real shit day, especially considering that my boss is off tommorow, which pretty much leaves me running the district. Damn.
Stephanie is outside starting to clean the rental. Have to return it this morning, then get Ruth enrolled in a fucking daycare. Have a bunch of yardwork to do, and I have been fooling around with and tweaking my home automation stuff. Running the beta test for Homeseer 2, and there have been some issues with my setup. I just need to finish my coffee and get my ass cracking I suppose. Inertia has sort of set in the last few days.
Well, we got there at 9:30 this morning, so as to beat the crowd. We did pretty well with that, got to ride Thunder River several times before a line formed. Took Anna on the Mine Train a couple of times. We spent quite a bit of time at the new part, Skull Island. Pretty cool. Definately do as I did. I took a bunch of sandwich bags for my wallet, phone, smokes, etc. Came in very handy.
Took this one during a much needed break. We stayed at the park until 7:30 or so this evening. I originally wanted to stay until the park closed but I (along with everyone else) was just too damn tired. My calves hurt and I am pretty fucking sunburned. Blew right at $200 not counting the tickets and we really didn't get too much. Drinks and food are just getting ridiculous there. Every year they go up more and more.
It took a few minutes to get this one. There were several kids that were waiting to get their pictures taken, Anna and another little girl were patiently waiting their turns, and this bunch of little kids kept breaking in fucking line. I was starting to get pretty pissed off and made sure to tell Anna (loud enough for the lady that was handling some of the pictures to hear) that she just needed to go up there NEXT because those kids were going to keep breaking in line until she did. Some people just need to fucking get a handle on their kids. That is where most of the problems with kids nowadays starts. They just don't get taught any fucking manners. Along the same lines, a lot of the service has started to really suffer over the last few years. One of the things that Six Flags has always done is to hire high school and college kids during the summer. Cheaper for them, and good work experience for the kids. The last few years though, it seems as if they just don't give a fuck. You don't see most of them smile, and they walk around like fucking zombies. Stephanie and Anna waited in line near the top of one of the new waterslides forever, and finally had to get on a different water slide. The girl who was running it would not let anyone go down. The reason? It was time for her fucking break. Stupid bitch. If your relief is late, you keep your stupid ass working until they fucking get there, or you send for your boss. Rather than do that, she just fucking sat there and wouldn't let anyone go. So if anyone knows a girl named Kendra that works at Six Flags, tell her I think that she is a stupid fucking cunt.
Anyway, on to more pleasant subjects:
This was Stephanie and Anna's third time on the ride. Chris and I waited at the end for them to ride. This was about the time that the line started backing up all of a sudden (they didn't have enough help there) so it took about 30-40 minutes for them to finally get through. Got this as they came out of the tunnel just before the last waterfall.
All in all it was a pretty nice day, even with my anal bitching. Neither Stephanie nor myself have much patience for stupid and slow fucking people, but that is more our problem than theirs, other than the fact that they make it so. When I PAY for service, I expect GOOD service, especially when I am going to be dropping $200-300 in a day. We are thinking about taking the kids to Disney World this October, so maybe things will be better there. It's been about 23 years since I went to Disney, so I have no idea what things are like now.
Taking the kids to Six Flags this morning, at least the two oldest. Ruth is going to church with her babysitter and will hang out there until this evening. It was interesting looking for tickets. Gate admission is something like $44. Online they are $35. You can get $15 off gate admission with coke cans, or go to publix and pay $25. Needless to say, I did my grocery shopping at Publix last night. Three adult tickets for $75 ain't bad considering.
Of course Chris is pouting because he couldn't find any friends that could go today, so he wants to stay home, says he won't have fun, blah, blah. I hate it. He's getting ready now. I remember how difficult it was being 16 (actually I went through most of my fucked up moodiness prior to turning 16, by then I was gone from home most of the time) but that doesn't mean that he can exclude himself from family activities. Will post some pics later.
I received my copy of the MD.45 album, The Craving (1996) today. It is interesting to compare the original version with Lee Ving singing lead to the re-mastered copy with Dave Mustaine singing that I downloaded from iTunes last month. I like them both, still not sure which one I like most. I like Dave, but Lee Ving is pretty cool. I have always enjoyed Fear. I linked the official site, not much there yet, but hopefully soon. It has changed slightly since I was there last a couple of weeks ago, now has the link to be added to the mailing list.
We had a pretty good time the last two days. I don't know what it is, but even when I am off work, I am up by 6-6:30 every morning (hell, that's two hours later than I get up on work days), even when I have been up till 2am or later, as in Wednesday morning. That can make for a pretty shitty day.
As usual, I was up about about six this morning. It does have it's benefits, because I managed to get a bit of free time without the kids underfoot. Went down to the lobby, got some coffee, and hit the beach. Very peaceful. It was already in the low 80's at that point. I wrote the prior post at that point. I tried to connect with the ipaq, but couldn't. It pisses me off, because I was able to get in for like 10 minutes the first morning, paid $9.95 for access for the day, and couldn't connect again after that. I know I am going to have to fight with someone over that, and force a charge-back, even if it is only $10, it's my fucking $10. Panama City can kiss my ass if they think they get $10 free. Oh well, I will deal with that in the morning.
We all at a little breakfast, then headed to the pool. After last night, the beach (at least the ocean part :> ) was still closed and I know that Ruth is less than enthusiastic about swimming in the ocean. She loves the swimming pool, but you can't get her in the water at the beach. We hung out there for a couple of hours, then checked out of the hotel. Once we got the van loaded we went and hung out at an arcade for awhile, went and ate lunch, and took the kids for putt-putt. It was pretty fucking hot, but we all had a good time.
It took a bit longer to get home (around six hours) due to VERY heavy rain through parts of Alabama. We got here about 10:15 or so. Had some problems with the pond. One of my damn pumps is acting up again, and there was only about 6-8 inches of water in the bottom of the pond. Very weird. I refilled the pond and will have to look at it tommorow. I had thought about driving down to Savannah or Hilton Head tommorow, but I don't think so now. I may take some of the money that I would spend there and work on my gardens this weekend while I am still on vacation. Need to brick in a couple of areas where I have that crappy plastic border, and need to build up a couple of brick borders a bit higher in the back yard.
Didn't take as many pictures as I would have liked, but I will post some later. I think that Stephanie already has posted a couple, at least one. Well, time to surf awhile, then crash. I am pretty damn tired, although she did all of the driving on this trip.
One cool (geeky computer nerd thing) that I did was to use the ipaq for music on the drive back. Last year when we had an ice storm, I had to pick up a 400 watt power inverter for work. Of course the thing came home with me, because I will use it more, and if it snows again this year, it will go back with me. Any way, I hooked up the ipaq to that so as not to kill the batteries, then hooked up an el cheapo belkin FM transmitter, in combination with a 1 GB SD card full of mp3s. Hell yeah, better than a damn case full of CDs. Stephanie and the kids think that it is a pain in the ass when I start playing with my toys, but when they work well, they kick ass.
We've spent the better part of the morning swimming at the beach. Ruth got worn out pretty quickly so everyone came back to the room to de-stress.W00t, cartoons. There is a Hooters next door, so I think we are doing wings for lunch.
May have to do the goofy golf thing later this afternoon for the kids. Hell, it is the only kind of golf that I know how to play. Have to remedy that someday, but I have better things to spend my money on.
I signed up for and paid $10 to access the net, then promptly lost fucking access, so these posts may or may not make it before I do.
Never was able to connect from the hotel, so everything will pretty much get posted once I get home.
I have not watched the local news this morning, so everything that I know about the drowning is pretty much hearsay. I was feeling like shit last night after supper, so I walked the baby and myself back to the hotel. There were a couple of firetrucks, police, and an ambulance. The ambulance pulled out of the hotel before I got there. Rurh and I headed up to the room,and sat out on the balcony for a while. Everyone on the beach was just milling around and there was a police vehicle with it's lights on. Apparently some kids got caught in a rip current, someone swam out to help them. The person who swam out drowned, and one of the others was still missing.
When Stephanie and the kids got back to the room, she I?d that someone had been pulled out of the water and was being given CPR.
It's all really pretty sad. One of the things that I tried to impress upon the kids when we got here is that the currents are much stronger than in Hilton Head, and to stay close.
As I am sitting here, it looks like the purple flag is up, which I believe means Shark. Once Stephanie and the kids get up we will probably go for a swim anyway. I am not sure, as She seemed pretty upset last night.
Otherwise we have had a nice couple of days, and I am considering lengthening the trip.
I'm sitting on the 5th floor of the Days Inn here in PC. There appears to be a hotzone here but my connection has been intermittant (sp?). Hopefully I will be able to get online later. Everyone is still asleep. No such luck for me, I woke up shortly after 6am (after not checking in until 2am).
Trying to type on the ipaq is a pain in the ass, so I am going to keep it short.
Getting ready to head to Panama City. Just had to come in and burn a CD for the trip. Cya
...on my fucking couch.
Yes, I went and did it. I am a big Harry Potter fan (all of us here are), so I pre-ordered it several months ago. It arrived yesterday, Christopher finished reading it this morning, and I am now about a third of the way through. Probably would have been through, but we went to see my grandmother at her birthday party today. That was nice. My grandmother (Mimi) was there, along with my great-aunt, my family, my parents, and my mom's two sisters.
Anyway, I grew up reading Tove Jannsen's (sp?) Moominland books, as well as the Taran books, the Chronicles of Narnia, and of course, The Lord of the Rings. Harry Potter reminds me a bit of all of them. Just fun to read. Nothing too serious.
Damn, talk about technological innovation. A few years ago is was bananas and cucumbers, now this.
Reserved a room for a couple of nights next week, and an SUV. My damn car has 160k+ miles on it, don't need the extra mileage. Plus it will be a hell of a lot more confortable than squeezing all five of us into my little stinky car. Hopefully no damn storms will blow that way while I am there :>
Will try to post some pictures while I am there if I can find someplace with Wi-fi access close to the hotel. We are staying at the Days Inn on the beach, so that will be cool. It's been 20 years or so since I have been, and I have heard that it has changed alot. Looking forward to taking the kids.
I am about a month overdue for my vacation and I can tell. As my wife would say, I am so stressed that I want to bite the heads off of little children. That would count about 90% of my damn employees because they are children in maturity if not fact.
Don't know if I am going to be going anywhere or not. I wanted to at least go to Savannah for a day or two, and maybe Jacksonville. Originally it was the Redneck Riviera, but I figure if I go down to the gulf a Hurricane would come along for sure. I had to put my car in the shop last month and paid for it on my Amex, and now the $1800 bill is due. I should have enough to pay it from my check this friday, but that means no damn money for two weeks. I think that Amex lets you roll purchases over $250 to the next month if you have to, so maybe I will pay half of it and go out of town for a day or two. Need the R&R.
The really cool thing is that the way my days off go (6 on 2 off) this is my weekend off, I return Monday, and start my vacation on Tuesday. W00t!! I thought about trying to skate by with an 11 day vacation, but my boss won't get a day off while I am gone, so I told her I would work for her Monday. Will still be like a vacation even working that day.
Someone left an iPaq at work a couple of weeks ago. I have had it sitting in my safe since, waiting for someone to pick it up. Pretty soon and the damn thing will come home with me. It is a pretty sweet upgrade considering I have been using a Palm V forever. I'llo sell that bastard on eBay and use the ipaq. Very cool. Wifi, headphones, MMC card, etc.
CNN.com - New Potter book leaks in Canada - Jul 11, 2005
I have to say that I enjoy the Harry Potter books and eagerly await the release of the new one. Pretty entertaining, along the lines of C.S. Lewis' Narnia series (at least in maturity level, if not content).
Thanks to Sean Gerety, another West Georgia blogger, for the link to Church Sign Generator.
