I upgraded my Dish Network 722 DVR to the Hopper. This was of course accompanied by a series of customer service calls, misunderstandings and corrections that I don't feel like going into here or now. It's too soon.

The new equipment has an improved UI seeing how it's been over 6 years since I had the last one installed and this is at least the second generation of the Hopper. With the improvements come change and change isn't always easy. Previously the recorded shows were grouped (by our choice) by show title and ordered by what was recorded last. Our recording habits were a little gluttonous. Choosing a show became harder and harder to base by mood. We sought a neutral solution.

I downloaded Big Sauce Radom Number Generator for iOS on my phone and used the total number of shows recorded to get a list of numbers. Each show was numbered by the DVR. We simply went to that number and watched the oldest episode of that show.

The Hopper doesn't have a list so much as a grid of icons for the shows.

This is not an image of my DVR

This now begins my new search to find a way to randomly choose something to watch on my DVR.

Keely suggested getting a set of 2 random numbers and assign them coordinates. For example "2,4" would be the second row fourth column (in the image above that would be 2&1/2 men).  Its a sound method but we're going to spend more time than I'd like determining how many rows there are at any given time.

Wish me luck.

I like to think I'm clever

I use AppsGoneFree (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/apps-gone-free-best-daily/id470693788?mt=8) to get iOS apps when their cost has dipped down to nothing in a promotional effort to stir up buzz for their app. It has made me an app horder. Usually in a few days of downloading and trying 1/2 of the apps I come to the conclusion that they are not for me.   I can be temperamental and change my mind later on even after the apps have gone back to their normal price because they have been recorded as purchased in my iTunes cloud.  When I see them in the AppStore instead of having an "install" button I see a cloud button with a blue arrow pointing down.

However some apps truly are not for me and will probably never be for me, forever.  One such app is 100walls (https://itunes.apple.com/tc/app/escape-100-walls/id659546545?mt=8). It's a puzzle game with little to no instruction (http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeryE-e3frBCOlHGjmH541WvGAwe8FMF_) and as of right now I have enough thinking puzzles in my real life and have no need to supplement my brain in my spare time that way.

It did however lend itself to some value for me anyway. The start up screen had some pretty images that I screen captured to make my lock screen and home screen wallpaper. 

When the phone is unlocked the door appears to open. 

http://youtu.be/E3BND_PGoKI

Useless yes but it makes me feel clever and I'm happy with myself when I feel like that. I've come to the general conclusion that being happy with myself is the ultimate goal for this life. 

Pay the city to remind you about things you don't want to care about.

Last week the now routine love letter from the city of mishawaka came in the form of an orange card stock slip of paper creatively designed to hang from a door knob crammed between two panes of glass in my storm door.  

It was from my buddy Randy.  I call him my city appointed pen pal. Due to unknown forces of the universe (highly suspected as a complaint call from judgmental creepy a-hole neighbors) these correspondences occur once twice a year.  I've accepted them now as a my tax money powered alarm system for yard work. The notice comes that I have a deadline to jump through whatever hoop he's been made to make me jump through. Then I call him and as nice as can be we discuss what needs to be done, how long I have to do it and then what I am able to do and how long it's realistically going to take me to do it.

This process is so routine and in my eyes completely outside of the realm of what my tax powered government should be spending on my time on that I've come to a very blunt conclusion. There is no need to waste my time keeping a routine schedule of exterior maintenance to my property when it's obviously consuming the minds of.my neighbors. No real consequences come from waiting for the letter to come and then handling the issue, I can safely assume that if there isn't a letter there must also not be an issue.

One of the biggest complaints is that a strip of grass between my property and the train tracks that has tire paths left over from the 1940's but no one can tell me if its actually an alley since its not on any maps and dead ends behind a carpet store, is blocked by vegetation. I feel like if this is an alley I shouldn't be being asked to mow it. If its owned by the city they should mow it, if its owned by the train tracks they should mow it and my personal favorite if no one owns it or uses it let it grow what ever god allows and keep people that much farther away from my yard. 

I understand the I am a horrible lazy person, or that my actions might appear to support that I am, but I don't care. Outside the boundaries of my property might as well be a wild amazon, a war zone, an uninhabitable desert or a brick wall.  I don't like or even really know the people around me. I certainly don't trust them and they've made clear that they don't like me. I imagine that they are engaged in an epic battle with me as we each wait endlessly for the other one to either move or die. I wish they would die. 

In all fairness my driveway looked like hell. I had debris left over from the recent remodel, boxes from the new baby furniture, last years solar pool cover that was so green it biodegraded and ripped this year and the fence that was destroyed by an over zealous demolition team that took out the house next door. Mostly I just stuffed what I couldn't throw away or burn into my garage. To throw away or burn later. 

Self loathing

A couple months ago my toe nail started to turn white. It got thick and hard to cut. Then it was pulling away from the toe. I began to think something was wrong I google image searched toenail issues and that led me to fungus medicine.

My body has failed me again.

This wasn't supposed to happen it me. This kind of thing happened people in commercials for products that cured this issue. I haven't taken my foot anywhere that put it in danger of exposure to what ever this was. I didn't even do anything that might have resulted in this kind of karmic retribution.

It's just another short coming I have to endure until my time is done here.

Grey Water

My airconditioner produces a large amount of water. It pulls it out of the air in my home and dumps it down a hole in the floor in my basement.  I have no basis for comparison to know if this is normal or okay.

I really wasn't aware of how much water it was magically pulling out of the air using only electricity and harmful greenhouse gasses until I blocked off the hole in my basement floor (that looks like a drain but I still have my doubts) durring some alleged remodeling.  I put the hose in a bucket.  The kind of bucket that has gradient markings that do not relate to any kind of actual volume measuring guidelines we use on the planet earth.  Just arbitrarily counting by tens from the bottom of the green limp plastic bucket to the to brim.

It is producing 20-40 somethings every 24 hours.  Which is physically a lot of water to carry across the basement to a slop sink where I'm dumping it down what I know for certain is a drain.

When you are billed for your water by the utility companies they are charging you for the amount of metered water you use in your home.  They take that number and estimate how much is going down your drains and bill you again for that service.

By creating water to pour down my drains that isn't metered I found a way to stick it to the man.  They can't bill me for sewage use that they don't know I'm using.

That's not really good enough for me.  Sure I like sticking it to the man, he deserves it.  It's just such a waste to make all this water that isn't doing anything but joining other waste and eventually being released into our river (I can't back that up but it sure seems like how the process works).

I need to engineer a system that takes that water and uses it (probably with more electricity) in a positive way.  If I could get it up and out of my house into a container that could later use to water my lawn, plants or some day a garden, that would be using unmetered (essentially free (not including the electricity)) water.

Now I have to start planning this system.

*buckets pictured are not actual buckets being used, but very close.

Water bug

Just like his parents, Paulie loves the water.

I've lost my Thursday pants.

We're finishing our basement which is where we plan to move our bedroom and where we currently do our laundry. Last weekend we unhooked the washer and dryer (which were ten feet away from each other in the current set up). It had been a long time dream of ours to upgrade these appliances since we'd had them from before we were married twelve years ago.

We've been without a hooked up washer for less than a week, that's how I know my Thursday pants aren't just in a hamper somewhere from last Thursdays adventures.

We nearly went mad price comparison shopping for a washer and dryer at our big box and DIY stores locally and online. Luckily we found a pair of grayish LG Steam washer/dryer and made them ours. Home Depot had an exceptional deal on a clearanced floor model that appear flawless. On our journey to our purchase we had to deal with a slimy HH Gregg guy. I hate those kinds of stores, I hate salesmen, I hate people and worse of all I love stuff which always makes these interactions so unavoidable.

Trying to buy appliances online is a nightmare. We wanted to look online to see what we could buy in the store and at least for washers and dryers the field is too wide on the function list to have any clue what you need/want. Sadly just like when we bought our Mariner it came down to color and one or two features. The feature we decided we couldn't live without was the steam.

Friday in the office is Jean day or Casual-Casual day (as every other day has the misnomer of being Business Casual). All of which are just a rouse to imitate a luxurious reward of comfort under the guise of continued oppression. However Thursday is "push the limits" day, where I wear a forbidden pair of cargo pants. These are more or less green khaki that have had extra pockets sewn on very near the knees. They are not of the absolute verboten variety that are baggy, wringkly, adorned with big floppy pockets, eyelets, drawstrings, elastic cuffs and all manner of fastening mechanisms. And for two years or so these Thursday pants have gone unnoticed by the fashion oppression police. They are my silent rage against the machine. Today, on this thursday, they are missing.

I would hope that they are gone because a wave of anarchy free'd them from their slavery. Worst case scenario my compulsive obsessive chocolate labrador has them held up in whatever hidey hole he keeps his precious fabrics. He humps blankets and pillows but clothing, clothing he protects and hordes with his life. You will lose blood if you come between something that you used to wear and he now considers his. That's a dark tale we can talk about some other time, right now I have to lament the loss of my rebellion.

I have a blog?

The things you forget when you stop being a content creator and start working for a living and the safety and comfort of your family. Life choices. Blah blah blah.

Tony joins the club

Keely and I asked her parents to keep Paulie a little longer than
usual yesterday. After work we went to the Goshen Hospital to see Tony and
Tara. At 4:42pm on the 8th of February, they had a baby girl and
named her Ella. She is amazing, the way every baby should be to their
parents and the people that love them, the same way Paulie is amazing
to us.

Nightmares

I love to dream. Recently I've been plagued with nightmares...

Keely, Paulie and I were somehow associated with at Barn. We were alone in it one night, miles from help and it caught on fire. The rest of the dream was trying to put it out and make sure no one got hurt. No one did get hurt but we lost everything we owned.

Last night I had a dream I was walking through my house and I came to the living room. Keely was watching television. I was standing across the room from her watching television next to me on the couch. I looked at me from across the room and then in a very creepy movie moment he and I met eyes. It would have been really scary or creepy but I was saying to myself in my head while we uncontrollably smiled at one another "This is a dream, now we can have fun." I tried to fly and the whole scene melted away.

Groggily I opened my eyes. The hazy darkness of our bedroom was only slightly more visible in the ambient light from our alarm clocks and electronics. I thought I saw movement near the foot of the bed, not that it wouldn't be normally Max comes and goes from our bed all night. My impaired vision focused as much as it could without my glasses and there seemed to be nothing there to see.

Even when my eyes were acclimated to the darkness it was too hard to focus on sharp edges. The bassinet, the dressers, the television and the edge of the bed all where they should be and nothing was moving. Over by the closet it was darker and seemed lumpy, but probably just my imagination. Then it moved.

I jumped out of bed and began running towards it. I got close enough to strike it when I thought I would begin screaming at it. Then I could see behind a blanket in a chair it was Shelly. She was crying. She'd been there with us since high school and was a big part of Paulie's birth. My voice was gone; I could barely breathe let alone speak. She motioned towards the bed.

Moving quickly to Keely's side I asked if she was alright. She was whimpering too. Between wet sobs and shivering she told me to go the bath room and read the highlighted portion of the instructions on the medicine I'd been giving her throughout the pregnancy.

Frustrated that she couldn't just explain it to me I went into our bathroom believing that she was more or less physically okay. Inside our cramped bathroom it was dark. Water dripped into a full tub and I could not remember which light switches went to the lights versus which ones when to the noisy exhaust fan.

I tried all the switches and could only muster up the amount of light available in a photographers dark room. The red glow coming from no discernible direction did not properly illuminate the pill bottles or any highlighting on them. I still didn't have my glasses and this task was getting very tedious.

After several bottles, I found the one that I had been having no luck cutting in half evenly for Keely. Then I held the plastic bottle close to the only bulb that seemed to be lit and read the instructions. A slightly different colored line of text read..."Any dose over 700mg will lead to the increased chances of Dogdenzes Disease in Infants."

I reached for the door but it swung open pinching my fingers. I screamed in pain and the door shut almost super naturally. Reaching in vain for the lights my hand ran into a wall mounted hand dryer like one might find in a public restroom. The fan whirred into action but it seemed to have been filled with tiny bits of toilet paper or paper towel. The force of the air shot them out sporadically into the air where they floated down like feathers into the bathtub.

In pain and fearing the chronic situation of my child and the impact of that on my wife, I threw my towel into the full tub. As it whipped past the counter the momentum pulled a stack of rubber nipples in its wake to join the towel and bits of paper in the bath tub.

I dropped the remote control to the bedroom television in the tub on accident. It floated for a moment on the towel but both quickly began to sink. Struggling between the weight of importance between the many traumatic things that were happening to me, I dove my throbbing hand into the water to rescue the remote control.

Turning around to leave the bathroom and console my wife I sat the remote on the counter to dry. Behind the closed door next to the sink was Keely and again I wanted to scream comforting assurances to ease her worries but the breath escaped me and I couldn't say a word. Had she seen my buffoonery while waiting for me to catch up to the fact that our son was dying? I didn't know.

I woke up from that in a daze of what is real and what is not. Daylight seeped into our room and I was spooning Keely. I asked her if she was okay. He reply was "Sleeping." It was obviously time for me to get up and comes to terms with how blessed I was that the nightmare was not reality. If I remember I think I will be more hesitant before I trust a sinister doppelganger to take me on an adventurous dream scape fantasy.

The birth of Paulie

Dropping the ball on being Awesome

I'm going to go out on a limb and assume this has happened to the whole world recently and I shouldn't feel bad about it. We've all had a lot on our plates, the economy, the ecology and various other impending doom situations that end in the letter Y.

The most quickly approaching one is the upcoming arrival of our Baby. A cultivating process I should have been better at chronicling. The process of our ten year struggle towards the miracle of life some how slipped through the cracks. It has been at the very least easier to document smaller aspects of my life through the wonders of TWITTER. A sad reality, attesting to my new acceptance into a sloth lifestyle.

Now however, with the baby very near and I can't continue this degenerate level of living. We've remodeled our spare bedroom into a Nursery, spent more money than we had on furnishings and accessories (which included a 2010 Mercury Mariner (not the Hybrid version)). All the things one should do before having a child you wish to raise in poverty. All our dreams are coming true.

At&t highspeed Liars

There seems to be a communication error between the people manning the phones at At&t promising the moon and the men and women in the field handling the on site maintenance.

I was told when I called At&t that I could up grade my internet speed. There were actually two speed tiers higher than the one i was currently at. The middle speed was $30.00 and the highest was $35.00, what would you choose? I was feeling my inner speed demon and thought what's five dollars more for that kind of bandwidth.

Immediately after the upgrade had taken place my connection was temperamental. In the afternoons and late evenings it crept slower than dial up. I tested it and was told as much by the Cnet speed test.

After a month of being lazy and stupid my wife made me call. Tech support directed me to speakeasy.net/speedtest which failed to load 100% thus signifying that there may be a problem with my internet. She ran some test from her side and declared "Oh yes there are a lot of errors on your line. Your phone line might not actually be able to handle this kind of speed." Really?

The technician came out and ran some tests. He said everything looked good and it was not something that I had caused. He kept baiting me into admitting that I download a lot, but I held my ground "We're having so much trouble streaming video." It turned out they should have never have sold me that higher package because my wires could not support it.

I had to downgrade to get better performance. So far it's been great and now I have an extra $5.00 each month. I'll never get the $10.00 from the two months they screwed me on but such is life.

Music Piracy is my anti-drug

This is where my sickness grows and gets enabled by that huge engine of satan: Google*. I was watching a DVR'd episode of Bones "The Princess and the Pear" one of the lab techs was listening to headphones and began singing along with a song. No mention of the song was brought up for the whole episode. I took the words he said and placed them into Google. It as it often does returned enough information for me to find out who sang the song and the songs title. I then went to Project Playlist, where I searched for the song to see if I could listen to it. Up until this point I had no real idea what the band sounded like. Then as part of my process I went to Torrentz to see if it was available for download via bittorrent. It was. Infact the bands entire discography was available.

* - I am not saying Google is directly connected with the Adversary, but come on any evil thing on the internet can be quickly found using it. Coincidence?

The last interesting thing that hapened to me in 2008

Keely wanted some McDonald’s after a long day of cleaning our house and re-arranging furniture.  It wasn’t exactly striking my fancy so I headed over to the Taco Bell being allured by the rumors of a Bacon Cheddar Gordita Crunch (the only combination of two popular internet memes “TACOS” and “BACON”).  The plan was to go get her food after mine, that way her’s would be hotter and fresher.  I walked into Taco Bell and there was a moderate amount of people already waiting.  There were three waiting for their food, one waiting to order and another in-between the two groups causing a mild ruckus at the counter.  A medium sized man with light skin and blonde hair was disputing the change he had received.  The thin black kid behind the counter was arguing the fact that he had accidentally shorted the customer a ten dollar bill.  The customer waiting to order told the cashier to run back the security footage and check it out.  Eventually the kid just gave in and gave the guy a ten.  The white guy joined the other people waiting to get their orders. 

The guy waiting to order began ordering like this was his first day out of the box and I was getting irritated.  The guy who had the issue walked passed me as he left with what looked like one taco and small cup of ice water.  This seemed odd to me but not as odd as the guy in front of me was annoying.  Now he appeared to be asking what a biscuit was (my local taco bell is also a KFC).  I decided that even though for $3.99 I could have gotten seven honey BBQ boneless wings, I needed to get back to Keely who had been starving.  This was simply taking too long.  I left. 

I got into my car and saw the “missing change” guy getting into a dilapidated maroon van.  Not thinking to much of this I got into my car and left the parking lot, not too surprisingly following the maroon van.  I drove the two blocks over to hit the Mickey D’s all the time this van was in front of me.  He even went into the McDonalds.  I tried to get out of my car as fast as I could because I didn’t want to wait on this joker again, but he jumped out of the van as if before the vehicle was even in park. 

I stood behind “van” guy and watched him order one McDouble (which is the new $1.00 two patty one slice of cheese version of the Double Cheese Burger (Double Cheese Burgers are no longer on the dollar menu, inflation and that other slice of cheese have just moved it to a whole nother level)).  He handed the cashier, a young twenties white girl with long dark hair pulled up into the back of a baseball cap, a $20 bill. She returned his change.  I was watching closely this time.  One, two, three dollars, a five, and then a ten and some change.  She almost counted it like a banker might.  He brought the money close to him, slipped the five and the change into his pocket and began counting the money.  It was now short a five and he showed her moving each bill from his one had to the other.  She apologized for her mistake and promised to get the money out of the drawer during the next transaction.  The next transaction was my order.  I received, just as he had, perfect change.  Then she gave him another five dollar bill.  Our wait time was long as the drive through was just as busy as the dinning room.  This gave me a lot of time to think about what happened and debate in an inner turmoil what if anything I should do about it.  As I stood there waiting somewhat behind him bored out of my mind finding myself in the usual awkwardness of what to look at without seemingly staring at someone or randomly off into space at something that couldn’t capture my attention in a glance, I turned to my cell phone to twitter.  Glancing up at the windows that reflected the dinning room now that the sun had gone down I saw him looking in it at me.  He had recognized me from the other establishment he scammed and was probably suspicious of me knowing what he was doing. 

It was here my moral dilemma began to peak.  He looked like a less than educated individual and had just over the course of thirty minutes stolen $15.00.  What level of desperation do you have to reach to con for such a small score?  I suppose it’s almost what I make in an hour so if he could constantly do this it would add up, although it’s a lot more work than my job.  There is the slight possibility that the forty bucks he started with was two counterfeit twenties.  In the past I was a cashier at a Big-Lots, I hated it because every night my drawer was off.  I’d always attributed that to being hasty in delivering the change and not that good with quick math.  Now I wonder if I just got played repeatedly.  In that light he made two people have a bad night, because their drawers were not going to match.  I generally feel that steeling from huge companies isn’t a bad thing, but this directly involved normal people and for so little gain.  I wanted to call him out on it.  I wanted to say something to him or the cashier.  As I was getting my change and she was digging back in for that five I thought about giving her a sign.  Maybe it was a coward move but I didn’t see any scenario where it didn’t play out with him blowing his top and beginning an altercation.  After she gave him the money I wanted to physically hurt him.  These thoughts played out in my mind and whether I won or lost a fight or actually killed him, I was going to be in more trouble than he was going to be for stealing five dollars.  I have a job, a house, two cars and a wife.  Keeping those things is my incentive not to go around beating and killing people even if they deserve it. 

            We ended up leaving the parking lot at the same time, he got back into that van, only this time I noticed he got in on the passenger side.  As soon as he did it tore ass out of the parking lot.  I thought as it sped away that it might be on it’s way to one of the other fast food places on that street.  I was surprised to see it continue on.  Shocked more so that he had a get-a-way drive for his $15.00 heist.  They were probably meth-addicts just working on a fix.  And to all this I am just and observer.  It made me feel like “the mentalist” or a magician to have picked up on this just from being near the situation.  However it also made me feel helpless to watch it/let it happen.  I left on my way home wishing I was an off duty cop in plain clothes that could have apprehended him legally.

No more melted chocolate before bed?

I woke up to the sound of my rapid breathing at midnight.  I had experienced the worse dream I’ve had in a long time.  It began in a theatre or some sort of venue where I was one the privileged few to see some sort of live performance.  At the end of the show the auditorium filled with circus acts who were practicing as people left.  I was alone but I don’t think I had been.  It was then amongst the carnival folk that I saw my friends middle child.  She was an easily distracted little girl with no supervision in sight.  It became my instant responsibility to reunite her with her mother.  My car was no where around so once I finally pulled the girl away from the unicycles and people on stilts we had no other option but to walk.  We walked up and down hills on an unpaved road surrounded by corn fields.  At some point I acquired a flat bed cart and convinced the child to stay with me by getting her to pretend she was surfing on this cart.  The hills became more aggressive until we crested the last peak from then on it was mostly down hill.  It became too difficult for me to hold on to the cart and it was more or less pulling me down the hill.  I did all I could to steer the cart.  A machine built like a garbage truck was in the road facing us and moving forward as we came upon the first trees we’d seen on our trip.  It had a large armature in front with a huge circular saw blade.  In the back of the vehicle it had legs and arms for leverage and stability, with some sort of main goal of clearing fallen trees from obstructing the road.  The machine came to a monstrous halt and I moved us out of the way from colliding with it as we passed.  The spinning wheels on the cart made it hard to maneuver and we came close to the rear of the vehicle just as the hill had leveled off.  Stopping the cart I noticed Rynn had jumped up and grabbed a hold a part of the machine until she monkey’ed her way deep into the mechanism.  The reason the truck stopped was because it was ready to clear some debris and the machine began to back towards a tree trunk in the road.  I couldn’t reason with the girl to get out of there, she dangled her legs and swung them while she sang to herself, smiling the whole time.  I ran to the front of the vehicle that’s when I heard the hydraulics and the cracking noises.  I beat the glass begging him to stop but it was a process  that couldn’t be interrupted once it had began.  I woke up thankful that it had been dream but horrified by how real the situation seemed to be and how futile it was to try to save her.  Her tiny body crushed into so much wooden debris.  There wasn’t anytime for her to scream before the air was pushed out of her.  It was horrible.  I couldn’t catch my breath.  I couldn’t think of anything else.  It was terrifying. 

My first blog post from Microsoft Word 2007

    I'm not a Microsoft fan boy. I just thought I'd put that out there. I use it because it's an industry standard and I use it in my industry (which sadly isn't technology). I first learned of this from an http://www.makeuseof.com email that I get daily. That place is freaking awesome. It went on to explain why such a commonplace and boring word processing program is worthwhile as a blogging tool in this release version.

    The picture to the right should explain most of it. I clicked that bad boy into existence in seconds. Also the link above happened just by typing it in. I thought it was funny at first, but I might actually do this more often.

    

It's been a real mind fuck kind of day.

It started with twitter. I haven't received any twitters via SMS today.
At work I'm not allowed to access social networking sites so I won't be
able to really look into it until I get home. Being without twitter is
like 7 of 9 when she first left the consciousness of the Borg. It's so
quiet. It feels cold and disorientating it is so quiet.

In the void I welcomed a text from my dad. Until I read it. Out of the
blue...

"If u saw a porn clip & saw someone u knew would u tell anyone?"

He later told me that it was in the bottom of his favorites and hinted
at, without actually suggesting it; that I should go to his house at
lunch and check it out. He was going to be at work for a few hours
longer so I would be alone. It's not like he was asking me to come over
and watch it with him. It was weird thinking about watching some porn
that he'd already seen.

I needed to return the electric impact wrench and check in to my twitter
issue anyway, so I broke down and decided that I would go over to his
house at lunch. When I get there I walk into the garage to put away the
borrowed tool when I almost run into my mother's car.

She was home early, or as I suspected this was some sort experiment in
social behavior. That sealed the deal I wasn't going to be looking at
any porn. I didn't even check my twitter page because she wasn't doing
too well. She'd come home from work sick because of the stress she was
having trying to function in her new position at her new company. I ate
my ramen cup-o-noodles and comforted her with a listening ear.

When I get back to work I find that I've missed a call on my cell phone
from my wife. K never calls me at work. I noticed that she also text
me.

"I am so mad at you."

I had done very well at avoiding angering her in anyway for a very long
time. A fear began to boil deep within me. I had no idea what I could
have done. I began thinking this must have been a joke. I called her.
She answered. The other day when she checked into her employer provided
insurance company to see if I could be a part of her plan and she was
denied. She emailed me to explain. Evidently when I replied "Okay, Add
me to your plan when I die," It went directly to her head of benefits
who took it very seriously and was quite upset. That individual took
the issue to her supervisor the head of human resources who had there
after had a talk with K. She was made to feel as if she'd created a
hostile work environment and had no idea what had happened. I explained
to her that also didn't know what had happened.

I apologized profusely. I don't think it was enough and she doesn't
want to talk to me anymore right now. I think it's mostly because she's
at work.

The next phone call I miss is from my boss who is telling me that I was
missing a mandatory meeting that I accepted an invite to via Outlook
because I was in another building. When I get back from my fiasco of
learning my job by falling through procedures I notice that the meeting
is still going on and I try to join it.

Surprisingly they forgave me easily for that indiscretion. I was
surprised I thought for sure I was in big trouble. It could have easily
appeared to them that I simply didn't care, which is so far from the
fact.

After the meeting I felt lost and distant, unable to get back into the
groove of work and needing to put extra hours in. I want to leave early
and the plan was not to have use any vacation time.

Now the real dilemma unfolds. Do I go home at normal time to see my
presence can comfort my wife? Do I stay possibly distancing myself
further from K? She goes to class tonight and normally I take her so
she doesn't have to deal with the nightmare of finding a spot to park,
having the change for the meter or leaving early enough to park in a
free spot and have time to walk the rest of the way to class without
being late. We agreed that it wouldn't happen tonight but I thought it
might be nice, to make that one less thing she has to worry about. I
don't think I'm going to get much else done tonight. Ugh the agony.

[nsfw] office story

Stories that try to retain anonymity in the workplace because they are inappropriate, are incredibly hard to follow.

 

This person was seeing two other persons.  They met on the internet.  One person needed $2000 and the one person gave it to them.  The person who received the $2000 disappeared.  The other person who did not receive $2000 also left because the one person would give head but not swallow.  The moral of the story being if you swallow you’ll turn up ahead…

 

…this was followed with enough hints to actually learn who the co-worker was who divulged this information to begin with.

 

All I could think about was a passage from a blog I read http://www.blazingshark.com about the act in question.

 

Of course once it was revealed who it was I wish I hadn’t known at all.

 

 

 

 

Lethargic Cult

Of all the answers I got this was the most creative and then I noticed that if you put the words together you are rewarded with a new word "PENISLAND" which looks a lot like penis-land. Just to see if this was some sort of internet meme I hopped over to google.

Oddly enough the first result seems to be a legit Pen selling web site. Although they don't offer you any options other than to email them so it may be a front.

Urban Dictionary had a fun entry about Maturbation and Uncyclopedia as usual was entertaining.

But as far as writing it on your hand and considering it a secret society that seemed to be new or a really well kept secret.

Verizon will not PWN me

http://mobile.yahoo.com/messenger/sms/setup


Anyone on Yahoo instant messenger can now IM me while I'm not sitting at my computer. paulmcbrierjr is my IM ID (at sbcglobal dot net) if you want to shoot me a message. I didn't want to buy the IM client for my phone so I found this link using Mosio.com.

I feel like most blogging/micro-blogging I do are tiny infomercials. Mosio.com is a good place to get answers for questions, or to answer questions if you are so inclined.They helped me find the link to set up YahooIM via TXT MSG (SMS) when I was too lazy to look for it myself.

Wine

My wife has never been a huge fan of drinking.  She had her fun in college but didn’t take the aggressive pursuit that I have for it, until we went to a wine tasting.  It was a whim.  When in Traverse City do as the wine country people do.  Which is get up early drive into the mountains and pay the price of one cheap glass of wine (around $6.00-8.00) and get to taste several. Trying many different kinds of wine without buying a whole bottle quickly lets you find out what you’re most going to enjoy.

 

For those of your unable to get to tasting but in serious need of some information this is what we learned:

 

Wine doesn’t have to be dark and dry to have high alcohol content.  Some of the sweetest desert wines have more bang for their buck without all the heart burn.  Lambrusco while a good casual wine, paled in comparison to the sweet Riesling (Reese Ling) or Moscato/Muscato.  And if you like it extra bubbly Moscato D’asti is probably what you’re looking for. 

 

I still enjoy my Merlot and Burgundy but finding something I could share with Keely was well worth the trip.

 

These are of course the opinions of one man, but I hope this helped you one your quest.  

IUSB Atheletic Building

I've gone back to the IUSB Gym. There is something about being broke and wanting to leave the house to do something that will lead a person to desperate measures such as joining a gym. Having a terrible self image is also an inspirational force. Of course the cost of the gym could be a deal breaker. If you are a student at Indiana University of South Bend membership is free. If you have a friend who attends your membership could be $20.00 if they like you enough to get you signed up. Keely happens to like me just enough to make me go to the gym and use her friend discount.

It does eat into the time that I would just be sitting around my home and stops me from idly munching on crap. Overall could be a good thing. It feels right, being there. Which is something I never would have thought I could feel about a gym. In school they were places of dread. Being a fat kid, it's always been one of my least favorite places. It may be fitness dementia or the natural degredation of my brain that I associate with people who are fitness nuts but I am optimistic and generally happy about this.  

We'll see over the next few days, weeks and months what becomes of it.

hOMESTEAD EXEMPTION

I called Jan who let me know that they were trying to file my Homestead exemption but the house isn’t in my name.  I told her that it was land contract and she said that I needed to bring her a copy of the Documented Land Contract.  Then she said it should be on file in the Recorders office and maybe I could request that they simply send it down to her since she is a few floors below them.  She transferred me up there where they told me “No.”  You have to sign for these documents and to get a copy of them it’s $1.00 per page.  I called Jan back because Records was not courteous enough to transfer back down to her, so I could tell her what they had said.  She suggested bringing the documents from home (if I had them) and copying them at work, then bringing them to her.  I guess she needs to keep what ever I bring.  Their office closes at the exact time I get off work so I’ll need to leave early.  I asked if I could fax them and she said it be better if I didn’t because of how many pages it probably was going to be.  She told me I didn’t need to come in over the next two days, it wasn’t that urgent just some time over the next two weeks.  Since I don’t know if I’ll be in town or not next week, I’m going to take off early tomorrow.  This way I can knock it out.  Or more likely find out the documentation I have is not correct, and the Recorders office doesn’t have it on file because I did something wrong or didn’t do something three years ago.  I can’t wait to lose hours and be disappointed and then get over-taxed.  

 

It started out like a normal day.  I was up earlier than I expected because I have failed to master the fine art of correctly setting and resetting my alarm clock after a late night of DVR and internet.  Max had kept me up most of the night with rampant barking at the sounds coming in from the newly opened windows.  He’s very frightened of everything, including parts of his own body.  I was running a little late because of morning internet getting complicated.  When I got to work I didn’t clock in.  My computer takes a good ten minutes to completely boot up after the weekend.  When my first boss of opportunity arrived he called me into his office to explain my infraction.  Apparently Friday I wore shorts.  I did in fact wear jean shorts on my half day casual Friday.  However now I know that shorts are not allowed up in the front office where the professionals work. 

 

Even though it was in the sweetest most understanding tones that Roy informed me never to do it again my day was shot.  I wasn’t threatened, I wasn’t bullied.  There were no repercussions.  The handbook states that the employee would be addressed and sent home for the day.  Sadly those events did not unfold.  I would have liked that.  I would have liked something go according to plan.  When processes that are well documented don’t follow the documentation I cry a little to know that someone got paid for nothing.  I’m not getting paid for nothing. 

RE: google maps?

She’s a little smaller than him.  Huge smile, short blonde hair, young (not ridiculously young but visibly younger than him (once again Carl looks older than he is)).  She looked like she was more fun than Carl ever led on or just more fun than Carl.  I did get a hint of hidden mischief where maybe she is much harder on him at home than in a public setting, I kind of know that feeling.  She also had a kind of goofy quality to her, which may have just been her religious strictness resonating with good clean fun (that idea is perpetuated by conversations I’ve had with Carl over the years).

 

I was a basket case.  I don’t know what to say in those situations.  I don’t know what to say in most situations.  I’m used to being the one in mourning not a guest.  I kind of stood there and waited to answer questions I was directly asked.  Luckily Marsha got there and stimulated conversation.

 

External Stimuli

Regrettably sitting just outside my boss office with her open door policy I hear a lot that I shouldn’t.  I suppose it’s a matter of trust or respect that she allows herself to speak so loudly or me to stay where I am when she knows that I have this unbreakable habit.  However other people’s conversations are often very interesting to me.  More so that television most times.  It’s interesting to hear nonscripted strong opinions being shared even when it’s about the most mundane things. 

 

The topic was “Movies Christians don’t need to see.”  It seemed pretty interesting to me how strongly they felt.  They took into consideration that films are fantasy and in no way real, but still felt that watching them allowed something to penetrate your being.  Something bad.  The conversation soon shifted to Hypnotism and then ended.  If you were wondering allowing someone to do something with your mind while you are not aware of it is also bad.

Island of Blues

I was last to be considered for the free tickets to the Elkhart Annual Island of Blues Festival that we received from a local shrink wrap vendor that happened to be sponsoring the event pretty largely.  No one else was interested or available.  I lucked out.  When I heard what the tickets were for I immediately thought of my parents.  My dad loves the blues and my mom loves festivals.

 

This is going to be brief but since there is so little information about the festival online I thought I would highlight the main points.

 

The music started at 4pm.  There was a thirty minute break between each band.  It was roughly 8 hours of music.

 

They had four food vendors two fair food regulars, a BBQ place and Coldstone.  Prices were fair, but selection was duplicated between the places.

 

Beer and Wine were available for $3.00 a drink.  They had an elaborate system of tickets where for 20 bucks you get 7 tickets.  One ticket buys a drink.  The secret is that you also buy the $6.00 light up pint glass that holds twice as much as the Dixie cups they have and you get it filled with beer with for one ticket.  Beer and wine choices are as follows: Bud, Bud light, Lambrusco, White Zinfandel, Chardonnay and something else.  Pretty limited.

 

The bathrooms were on a trailer.  They were the best festival bathrooms I’ve ever seen with fully functioning plumbing and fully enclosed not to mention air conditioned facilities.  I was blown away.

 

The island is small and the crowd wasn’t very big.  It was generally nice.  I had a good time, even though I’d been up since two thirty am and was crashing hard by the fourth act. 

 

The fourth act sounded more country than blues and we bailed.  The heat was miserable and when we got to my parents house to get our car the rain just downpoured.  We had left in just the right time.

FW: Your Weekly Savings Tip

 

 

---

From: Benjamin Bankes [mailto:feedthepig@aicpa.org]
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 4:32 PM
To: McBrier, Paul Jr.
Subject: Your Weekly Savings Tip

 

 

Credit Reports Your credit report contains information about your past and present credit transactions. It's used primarily by potential lenders to evaluate your creditworthiness. So if you're about to apply for credit, especially for something significant like a mortgage, you'll want to get and review a copy of your credit report. Be sure to obtain a free credit report every 12 months by visiting annualcreditreport.com. Once received, review closely for any inaccuracies and unauthorized activity. Take steps to report wrong information. To learn more about what good credit can do for you and steps to repair less than perfect credit, check out the new Feed the Pig Podcast or visit FeedthePig.org. I.O.U.S.A. As gasoline, food and health care costs continue to rise, Americans are looking for solutions to the ever-growing financial challenges being faced today and in the future. I.O.U.S.A.: Live with Warren Buffett, Pete Peterson & Dave Walker addresses these challenges while offering solutions in a one-night-only, exclusive in-theatre event on Thursday, August 21st. Theatres across America will become community town halls as five of the nation's most notable financial leaders and policy experts engage in a 45-minute LIVE panel discussion following the viewing of the acclaimed documentary "I.O.U.S.A."  Watch the trailer, locate a participating theater and submit a question for the panel.

 

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Being young

I was going to post yesterday about how the autumn which this year has decided to start in August, is my favorite time of year.  It always reminds me about when I began seeing my wife in high school and doing crazy things outdoors in the cold with my friends.  The main focus of that entry was that we don’t do crazy things anymore; our lives are governed by our free time and energy levels which are governed by our jobs.

 

Last night while Keely was at school for their open house I sat at home and drank.  This may be confusing for some but I while my wife enjoy drinking in large groups of people, at home with just me it’s not quite the same thrill for her.  Thusly it’s more fun for me to drink when she’s not home.  I am not a sad drunk who drinks alone (not most of the time).  I had four drinks; vodka and diet sprite.  Take one old fashioned glass fill with ice measure out 2oz of vodka, top with sprite and stir.  Every time you make another one add more ice to the old ice.  The ice gradually takes up more and more space in the glass (in addition to the rumor that it may hold alcohol it’s “absorbed”) as the cubes get smaller and fit better from melting.  While you always have the same amount of alcohol you begin to use less soda.  This is fine because as you continue to drink you care less about your drink getting stronger.  It ended up being one 12oz can of diet sprite to my 8oz of vodka which may have tasted different mixed in huge glass all together to begin with.  It’s hard to say.

 

When Keely’s open house was over at 7:30pm, she came home to pick me up.  We had to go get Dog food.  We drove out to the Wal*Mart and had dinner at Chik’Fil’a (or chicka flick – if you’re Grandma Rose).  When we got home she had lots of school work she had to do.  We didn’t go to bed until 11:30pm.  Normally we hit the sack around 9:30-10pm at the latest we stay up on a weekday.  I got up at 3am and she got up at 6am.  That’s about as crazy as we get anymore.  It was more spontaneous than I’m used to, although I’m sure Keely didn’t enjoy it half as much I did.  She was pretty focused on the workload, 

 

The best part is being at work tired as all get out.  If I concentrate I can make myself think I must be drunk.  It’s probably going much worse for Keely.

It was all a dream

I was sitting at home with no lights on. It was a gloomy day and my dad was over. He's never apart from mom so that was weird. Weirder than that was the other company I was keeping. Brian was there from work. I hate and sympathize with brian. Also someone I don't know and can't describe was there. They passed around a guitar and started the age old conversation of "Should we start a band?" They looked at me asking if I could sing, because I had no music talent when it came to instruments. Driver Paul was playing on my stereo and Tim had just broken out into one of his what ever you want to call it and the whole situation seemed very pliable. After spending an afternoon with my father a stranger and a co-worker I don't really like, my wife came home and eventually her friend came over. We went out to a bar and they had some drinks we ate some food and paid way to much for some sort of virtual reality experiance. The was the last time I saw Keely. I was wondering around in the dark. In japan. If they have dirt highways in marshland type areas, that is where I was. A tiny car, smaller than a go-kart pulled over, thinking I wanted a ride. I only wanted to look at how small it was. This was unacceptable in their culture. Put out that she broke free from her commute and had to speak english she drove away kind of huffy. I was on a recumbant bike and cruising in the cool night air. The moon was out or there was a street light that followed me everywhere. I was on my cell phone trying to call Keely. We hadn't planned this trip as well our chicago venture. There were no maps of walking directions, no itineraries and no orginazation. All of which had to have been my fault. The phone service said that making a call in Japan from my indiana number to another indiana number wasn't covered by my plan but I was then turned over to another carrier who played some comercials in order for me to use the service free of charge, which I wouldn't really know until I got the bill. Who knows it might have just been playing comercials to mess with me. I got caught up in a cul-de-saq. Behind me was a police car but it was already full of americans it was taking home. I kept ridding.

I had a job. Keely was there. It wasn't just Japan it was the Future or Japan is the Future. Our jobs were non descript but it was about 8pm and just like the night before Japan was shutting down. I was told that was part of their culture. I laid down on what appeared to be an ottoman that sat on a motorized cart. It must have been robotic because there didn't seem to be any controls. Keely must have done the same thing . We were out side of the factory and rushing away from one another. It was probably only ten miles an hour but laying on your stomach on a vehicle you're not controlling, factors in on how you perceive speed.

I was wisked around a corner and down an alley where it seemed like it was starting to rain. There was a girl. She wasn't very Japanese. She wore a french maids uniform and looked as though she had been crying. My cushion stopped and she began singing Sweeny Todd numbers. I tried to sing with her. As it turns out this was not something I was good at either. A black lady came up to us and said something. I don't remember what it was. I was having a moment with this mysterious lady. I got off my ottoman and walked closer to her. This alley had open garage doors and white step vans parked every which way. There we no vehicles in the garage doors.

I was blinded. I turned my head away from the garage and gained my sight back. Reglancing to figure out what had happened I noticed the professional lighting. Inside these garages were set up like homes and they were being completely lit by professional stage lighting. None of the people bustling around were Japanese. At least five people were walking around in silk robes and it quickly became apparent to me that this was the set of a pornographic film.

Dan in real life soundtrack began to play and I got up for the day. Ripped my future, Japan, perverse sex ramage to a tuesday of the usual let downs. At three am my dishnetwork resets itself making it un-watchable for twenty minutes and on tuesday World of Warcraft is down until well into the hours that I am at work. Luckily I had such a crazy dream it gave me something to write about while I had nothing to do.

Twitter takes over

So while I’m waiting for my software to update I can mess with twitter when our server won’t let me actually visit the website because it promotes social networking.  Anyway, I just thought it was an interesting coincidence.

 

Building up to heart break

I am the center of the Universe. Or at least more accurately and importantly; the center of my Universe. The one thing Social networking has done with a negative impact is show you the secret friendships and acquaintances your friends have had with other people the whole time you've known them. The biggest problem with this is that it shatters my illusion. I can handle living in an illusion as long as I'm not reminded it is an illusion in a way that makes me desperately wish that is wasn't an illusion.

My illusion is simple. I am not getting older and the friends I had in high school are not changing nor am I. We are in a happy state of stasis and things couldn't be better so shut your mouth because this is all dependent on us being complete monogamous in our circle of friends.

You have not known so and so since before you met me (even if you have I will fail to accept that as a fact) and his life does not interest you in the least. I assure you that you are too cool to follow him and his stupid meandering and can only truly be entertained with someone who is already on your level like myself.

You did not have casual sex with those people randomly after years of avoiding all thoughts of touching me or allowing me to touch you. We're all happy little virgins dancing in our pure white robes of innocence waiting for that blissful first embrace of passion that will not be some horror show, quirky anecdote or violent mistake.

And so on and so forth, I think you see I'm right.

These blanket statements are simply examples and do not specifically correspond with any one living or dead in my life, but you know who you are and I really think things are better my way.

Office Destiny

I would have never thought that I had an office destiny. It certainly was never my plan growing up. I went to "bring your daughter to work" day with my mother, even though I was her son. She was a Purchasing Administrator. It didn't seem even remotely enjoyable to me.

I went down a career path of varying levels of physical effort. In this hap-hazard selecting of occupations the only clear goal I had in mind was money. I needed more money. I have to do what to get more money? You bet I'll do it, because it's more money.

Then I got in with a company that had a clear vision. The more money you make the less physical work you do. That's not to say you don't have to do work or work hard, you just don't have to sweat. In fact the more money you make the better conditions you have to work in. This seems like maybe it's the business model of the world.

5 things

This was in my drafts – I forgot to send out.

 

On Management (dark)

 

There is a severe difference between Business Ethics and behavior governed by strong morals.  For clarity anything that costs the company money is a violation of the Code of Business Ethics.  Anything that seems morally wrong (in the grander sense of right and wrong) is ethically acceptable as long as it doesn’t break any state or government laws pertaining to your safety or your rights or cost the company money.  This is nearly all inclusive because we work in a “work at will” state.  There were no contractual agreements signed between you or the company that lock either of you into this relationship.  You can quit at any time and they can fire you at any time.  Which leads us back the age old Randy Waller/Rodney Buck argument “If you don’t like it you can leave.”

 

At any level of employment in any company you are never more than the grease that oils the machine.  Eventually you will dry up and be replaced.  Just as with any company in the United States is the grease that oils the economy.  The wheels go round and round.

 

It always seems like there’s an idiot above you in the workplace.  Take the time to understand that once you begin climbing the ladder into a leadership role, you become someone else’s idiot.

 

There is no need to over achieve if there isn’t anyone noticing. 

 

Anarchy can be your friend.  Nosey people that are obviously listening in can be lead astray by letting them over hear false information.  If you’re ever caught doing it you were simply helping them learn the errors of their ways.  It might be misconstrued as starting rumors, but is easily denied by saying they must have heard me wrong while I was talking to someone else…

Taste of Chicago

            Keely and I got up at 4:30am to get ready because my parents were going to pick us up at 6am.  That’s pretty early for them and for us on a Sunday morning.  We don’t normally sleep in an incredible amount of time but it’s a little later than that.  Surprisingly my parents were right on time.  We hustled out to their little grey toaster and bustled to the Southbend airport without stopping for any reason.  After some slight confusion navigating the streets of South Bend that my parents hardly ever travel through we arrived at the parking lot which was a little confusing but me made it.

            Just as we were getting out of the car it started to rain.  We were a parking lot away from the entrance where they sold the train tickets so we got a little wet along the way.  Periodically along the perimeter of the parking lot were “Walkways” that were clearly marked and easily traversable.  Keely went for a more direct route over a three foot tall caution orange barrier.

            The airport was pretty dead, it reminded me of the last days of the Scottsdale mall.  There was one crappy eatery open at the end where we awaited the train.  Breakfast was a card board boat of sausage gravy slopped over two biscuits.  Despite the presentation the meal was palatable.  We paid for our tickets before breakfast then returned to the doors we came in to wait for the train to arrive.

 

[some stuff happened]

 

We went home and got sick.

Oh dear

So after a complicated couple of hours tossing and turning in my head about whether or not to pay the $5.00 to join the Big Huge Labs website for seven days.  The motivation behind this was oddly enough their ability to create motivational posters.  They do that for free, but if you want it in high definition like the picture you supplied with the ability to print out at 24”X36” or whatever large size you might enjoy, you have to pay.  You don’t have to pay for each one, in fact you are allowed to get as many you like over the course of time you paid for.  I’ve never joined a website and paid for a certain amount of time.  It was weird.  I was unhappy.  What they produced made me happy.  What I obtained from them made me happy.  I will probably even be sad when my seven days are up.

 

The most bizarre part is the web app they have that I am the most attracted to.  Writer.bighugelabs.com  They are calling it the internet typewriter.  It’s a black screen with green writing and probably old news as far as the rest of the internet is concerned but it’s new to me so you’re going to hear about it.  It saves automatically and has a lot of other functions that are a major part of programs that allow you to write with them.  The best part was where it differs from a typewriter; spell check.  I could be showing my n00b here.  When I say spell check I mean that nifty red underline that appears when you mess up a word that allows you to right click on it for an alternative spelling.  It seems like to me that it’s available some places and not others but maybe it has to do with my browser.  I really don’t care where it comes from but I wish it were everywhere.