Bring on the 5 day weekend!

One of the small perks of my job is that we have a flexible schedule and we are allowed to work 4 10s instead of having to work 5 days a week. With the cost of gas and the fact that I drive 80 miles roundtrip to work and back, this extra day off saves me money and a lot of drive time. I used to have Mondays off, which I really liked. Recently however, I was asked by the guy who has Fridays off to switch with him.

Why did he want/need to switch? His wife recently switched to 10s as well and also had Fridays off. They tried it for a few weeks I guess and according to him "it just wasn't working out". I found this very amusing. His Friday off used to be "his" time to do whatever he wanted. It wasn't packed with activities and errands and whatever his wife wanted to do. She apparently tried to take over his day.. and thus he wanted to switch.

I find it amusing the dynamics of that relationship. I understand the need for downtime and relaxing days where you just do what you want and take a break from worrying about all the little things that need to be done. There are ALWAYS things that could be done. Errands and little projects around the house. Maybe you keep saying that you are going to check out this new store, or restaurant, or go visit some point of interest.

I guess in a way I am a homebody. I am one of those people who like a day where I don't go anywhere or do anything on anyones schedule. I shouldn't just say I like those days. I NEED those days periodically. I am not one that goes stir crazy just hanging out. A day just crashed on the couch watching movies, playing some computer games or some Rock Band is a perfect way to spend a day off in my opinion. I don't feel like I wasted the day.. I feel like I made optimal use of a day off. Maybe it has something to do with how laid back and low-key I am. I don't know, its just the way I am.

Some people say they need "time to themselves". I wonder though, do they really need to be without their spouse/BF/GF/fiance? Or do they need their downtime the way that is most relaxing to them and it just isn't compatible with their SOs way of relaxing and spending that day off? I know there are all sort of theories about relationships and if they work better when you have more similar interests .. or if you are opposites that can compliment each other.

I don't know what the right answer is, but lately I have been really paying attention to those around me and what they do to relax and de-stress. How they interact with their SOs and what that dynamic is. For my coworker, having "his day" is how he got the time to relax how he wants and that is important. If his spouse enjoyed a lazy day off the same as he does, so they could share that downtime together, would that make them a stronger couple? I think it would.

Obviously every couple cannot have that. People are different. People relax in different ways. They wind down differently. I guess what I am saying is that that downtime is VERY important. It gives you a chance to have a breather without having to stress about everything going on in day to day life. However that has to happen, make it a priority. Maybe it can't be a whole day for you, but at least take a few hours and get to that state of relaxation. If you can enjoy that time with your SO too, all the better.

Anyway.. what I wanted to say was that I have a 5-day weekend. Its like a mini vacation! Fridays off now and then Monday is the holiday and Tuesday is Gabe's first day of middle school so they have a wierd half day schedule that the parents are supposed to attend with them and of course it starts at 12:30 which makes it awkward to go to work before or after so I took Tuesday off. So to all of you with a measly 3-day weekend. GET OWNED!

Read more...

Things that make you go hmmmmm

Why does the Pope, who according to the Catholics is God's #1 guy here on earth, need a popemobile with 3" of bulletproof plexiglass between him and the mass of people that come to see and hear him? How is that faith? If he were attacked, killed, assasinated, wouldn't that be God's plan?

How does a kid with a Barbie Doll fishing pole catch a record 21lb catfish? Story here. Better yet, why is there a Barbie fishing pole in the first place? I have never seen "Fly Fishing Barbie". Isn't fishing, outdoors, worms and fish about as anti-barbie as you can get? And why the hell was this front page news on MSN one day?

Why, when my kids get great grades at school and do extremely well on all the state scholastic tests, can they not handle a simple task like "put wet laundry in dryer AND START IT" ?!?! Is it to see how long it takes to make a sane parent completely looney? Are they really evil geniuses in some big experiment testing the limits of the parental psyche?

How is Kirsten Dunst still getting acting roles? Have these producers not seen any of the Spider Man movies? Seriously .. W T F? If anyone needs a popemobile with bulletproof glass its her.. because I would definitely take her out if I had a chance.

Why do bad guys in futureistic sci-fi movies all have to be punk rockers? Just once I want to see a movie where all the bad guys dress like bellhops. Or flight attendants. Or McDonalds employees. I mean seriously.. if anyone has a reason to have a bad attitude and want to kill someone, its the guy who has been working late night drive through at the 24 hour McD's and is dealing with the 2am bar crowd.

Why with all of todays technology can't they make something healthy and good for us taste like say Oatmeal Cookie Batter ice cream?

Why am I not legally allowed to hit a coworker in the face with a shovel when she is so loud on the phone that I can clearly hear every word of her conversation on the other side of the room even when I am TRYING to ignore her. No one should be allowed to annoy other people that much without some kind of consequence.

Read more...

Random Movie Reviews

Lisa and I have watched several movies together lately that I have been meaning to talk about and never got around to so here goes:

The Dark Knight (IMAX Version): Visually stunning on the IMAX. Worth the higher ticket price without a doubt. The movie itself was fantastic. Dark and gritty like Batman Begins which I also loved. Ledger did an incredible job as Joker. Thoroughly enjoyed the movie.

Definitely, Maybe: A romantic comedy / drama. Starred Ryan Reynolds who I really enjoy and is basically a dad going through a divorce trying to tell the story of how he met his wife and the two other key women in his past to his 11 year old daughter. I didn't know what to expect, but Lisa and I both loved it. It had some hilarious dialog with the 11 year old. Like when her dad is talking about how he was kind of juggling the three relationships and the little girl asks him "Dad.. what is the male word for 'slut'?" That's just money right there. Great movie and worth a watch.

Meet the Spartans: Yeah.. its pretty much what you would expect out of one of the parody type movies. It's just like Scary Movie, Hot Shots etc. Extremely lame in parts. Moderately lame in others. Some parts so over the top it was mildy amusing. Towards the end when Leonidas get in a car GTA style and turns on the car radio and sings along with the Barbie Girl song.. well that just made me laugh. Yes, I find stuff like that funny as hell for some reason. Not a movie I would reccomend to anyone however unless you are in the mood for an insanely stupid comedy. I get that way every now and then.

Doomsday: This one.. well.. I like these kinds of movies. Lisa does as well. Apocolypse, end of the world type movies. Be it a killer virus or some natural disaster. So we watched this one about a deadly virus that causes them to have to basically seal off the northern half of great britain to stop the spread. We are talking a wall across the island etc. Years later, when the virus gets out somehow and the scientists need a clue how to beat it, they realize there are people still alive up there so there must be a cure or a clue in those immune to it. So they send people in to investigate. What they find is two opposing factions. The punk band Green Day on one side and King Arthur and his knights on the other. I can't even begin to describe how odd I found it that even after like a decade with no sources of food or anything up there. They were not only still alive, but had the time, desire and products to keep that look going. I would expect ragged.. but these punks were finely groomed. Hair dyed green and orange and purple. Massive hair spikes, shaved parts of their heads etc. I mean they had no food, and were eating people .. but that didn't stop them from looking their punky best? Was a little much for me to be honest. The opposing faction had taken over a castle further north and had reverted to a medevil society.. just odd all around. Overall.. decent movie, but that a a few other small things put me off.

Sunshine: Another end of days type movie. The sun is dying and a team is sent to the sun with a nuclear weapon the size of Manhattan to shoot into the sun to 'jumpstart' it. Decent story, pretty good acting. Not a top 10 movie by any means, but it was an entertaining flick. To those on the ship though.. NEVER GO TO A DISTRESS BEACON IN SPACE. Nuff said.


Two quick bits on TV shows. Lisa brought the first half of Weeds season 3 for me when she came to visit and I got sucked right back into that show. Very different and interesting if you are looking for a break from the usual drivel on TV. It's a Showtime series though, so you would have to have the channel to see it. I borrowed Entourage from my brother to see what that show was about, and just couldn't get into it. It seemed to be a show focused around a pretty boy actor with little talent, his asshole manager and 3 of his high school friends who collectively have an IQ of about 46. Just couldn't get into that show. I also borrowed a series called Numbers which I haven't gotten to watch yet but have been told is excellent.

Read more...

Temporary Insanity

You know how you can get that feeling like there just aren't enough hours in the day? That is pretty much my everyday. Up at 430am to be at work by 6. Work 10 hours, hour drive home. 90 minutes at the gym. Shower. Dinner. Hang out with the boys for a while if they are with me that week. Maybe play some cards or WoW with Lisa and/or the boys. Talk on the phone with Lisa for an hour or so and suddenly its 11:30 at night again.

What I would like is just an extra 3 hours. Thats all. Its not much to ask for, but if I could bump sleeping up to 8 hours from 5, I think I would be a lot happier all around.

In my grand planning, I was trying to eliminate the rush that is gettig home from work and going right to the gym to get it out of the way. Some days with school and sports starting back up, I have stuff to do right after work and that means the gym doesn't happen those days. Not a good thing.

My brilliant solution to this plan? Maybe I'll work out in the morning instead. That way I get the blood moving in the morning, can take one shower a day instead of 2 to save on utilities, and then when I am done working for the day I can come home and relax. So I did the math. Normally get up between 430am and 5am. I can push it to 5 if I have to and be out the door in 15 min, so I used that as a starting point. 90 minutes for the gym means.. umm.. 330 in the morning? WTF. Is that even a real time?

Daunting yes, but I thought I would give it a go this morning. So I set one alarm for 330 and my normal one for 430. Its only an hour earlier right? That logic might work if you go to bed an hour earlier, but I am not willing to give up my evening time. So I went to bed around 1130 as usual. I am never happy when my alarm starts going off at 430, but at least I know I can snooze for 30 minutes and work my way into getting up. When the alarm went off at 330, I knew I had to get up then if I wanted gym time.

My body decided that it most definitely did NOT want gym time at 330 in the morning on about 4 hours of sleep. I'm pretty sure one of my legs actually said FUCK YOU as I tried to motivate it to the edge of the bed. Which was creepy let me tell you. But I decided if my leg was THAT against getting out of bed right then, who was I to argue? So the morning gym experiment failed miserably. Thats when I decided that even considering getting up at 330 in the morning was temporary insanity.

So I am back to lobbying for an extra 3 hours a day. Someone hook me up!

Here's a quick video I think of everytime I hear the word 'insanity'. Great song. Fabulous video. Just a link as embedding is not allowed on the song. Jamiroquai has got some great music if you are looking for something fun and interesting to listen to.

http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=YMMQqE9x6i4

Read more...

Play on LeRoi :(

One of the founding members of Dave Matthews Band, LeRoi Moore, passed away yesterday. He was incredibly talented on the saxophone and other instruments for DMB.

Not everyone likes DMB, but personally I love them. They blend so many different styles of music into their own unique sound. Jazz, Rock, Blues etc. Acoustic guitars, drums, violins, sax and other horns, keyboards, bass ... all mixed together for a sound unlike most of the standard fare out there. A big part of their sound was LeRoi's saxophone. He will be sorely missed.

DMB puts on an incredible live show if you ever get a chance to go see them. Absolutely amazing live.

I will leave you with a video of DMB performing the song '#41' live. This song features LeRoi pretty heavily. It's a great live version of the song and worth a watch, but if you are impatient, you can let it load and skip to 4:45 which is where his big solo starts.



Play on LeRoi. You will be missed.

Read more...

Mummblemmblemblblmlb

I have been told I mumble a lot. I don't really think I mumble all that much, its just a combination of the fact that I have a deep voice and I generall speak fairly quietly. I am a very relaxed, laid back kinda guy and that follows right into my speach. I know there are times I drive people crazy with it though, so I try to keep an eye on it and if people are asking me "What?" constantly, I figure I probably need to speak up a bit again.

For those of you that saw The Dark Knight (incredible movie BTW) you will probably get a kick out of this clip that my friend sent me a link to. I had to post this seperately as I didn't want people to miss it if they go bored too early with my rant in the previous post. Its related to mumbling in a way, so without further ado. Here you go.


- Watch more free videos

Read more...

Added to the list of people that need a shovel to the face..

So the road right in front of the place I work is under some serious construction. It needed it. The road was in crap shape and it was a 2 lane road that really needed to be 4 lanes, so thats what they are working on now. Construction of course means ripping things up, lane closures and even worse roads for a while.

Right where I turn into work, I have to go down off the new blacktop they had put down on the one side about 2 inches onto a section of the old road that is left. Then from there you go down another 2 inches or so onto a small section of dirt and gravel. It's pretty well graded, so not a big deal at all. I pretty much floor it through there as its the closest I get to off roading and actually its a lot smoother if you just keep moving across it quickly.

On several occasions now, I have been stuck waiting to turn behind someone driving some big fancy SUV. Escalades, Navigators, Excursions, Tahoes even a Hummer. All big vehicles with good ground clearance and 4WD. Big engines. Tough vehicles designed to handle tough terrain. The drivers should be excited to hit some rough ground finally. Instead, they baby those things across that section of road like the car is made out of glass and any big bump is going to shatter the damn thing.

Anyone that drives an SUV with 18" tires and is afraid of a section of dirt and gravel road that is all of about 25 yards long is in desperate need of a shovel to the face. I have a front wheel drive only Pacifica and I tear right across there. You are in a vehicle with 4wd, huge ground clearance and you are driving like a nancy boy. The guy in the Chevette with the rusted out floor boards and no hood just went through there 3 times as fast as you and if anyone is going to fall out the bottom of his vehicle when he hits a good bump.. its Chevette guy.

I think I am going to set up a stand on the side of the road just after this section of dirt and gravel. I shall deploy out of work Wallmart greeters to push their walkers along this section. Sure it will be tough for them to push through the dirt and gravel, but its good for them to challenge themselves. I will use these walkers as a guague as to how long it takes Mr.SUV to get across the dirt section. Anyone getting beat by a walker gets flagged over to the booth. I will then ask them to step out of the car so I can present them with an award. When they step out, I hand them a certificate that recognizes them for the asshat that they are. Then I will ask them to smile nice for my assistant with the camera. While they are mugging for the camera, I will quickly smash them in the face with a shovel as hard as I can.

Maybe you don't understand why I am fascinated with hitting someone right in the face with a shovel. It's mainly because of the pure joy that ensues when the metal face of the shovel makes contact with the bones in their face. Is is the crunch of the bones? The vibrations like a tuning fork that run up the handle of the shovel? Is the the startled "AHHHHHHHAHAHA WTF WAS THAT?!?!?" Truth be told, its a comination of all those things. That and no one is worried when you are carrying a shovel. If I had boxing gloves on, or was carrying a shotgun or something, people would be very suspicious. No one expects a shovel to the melon.

Why do they buy SUVs? Is is the amazing gas mileage and low environmental impact? Let's see.. Cadillace Escalade 2008 has this written about it "The AWD is equipped with a standard 6.2-liter, V8, 403-horsepower engine that achieves 12-mpg" So I am going to go ahead and say NO. Its not for its 'green' status.

It must be for the towing options to get all your recreational vehicles around then right? Oh.. wait. I noticed while the guy with the walker was pulling ahead of you on the right that you don't even have a hitch on yours. Guess not!

Is it for driving safety in the winter time? Based on your fear of 25 yards of dirt, I am guessing you don't even venture out if the roads have snow on them. Even if you do, any vehicle is safe at the 0.3MPH you will be driving it at anyway.

Maybe they need all the extra seating for their large family? Oh wait, large families don't drive $65,000 SUV's. One, they don't want kids trashing an expensive vehicle and two, they probably can't afford one if they have a whole brood of kids anyway :P

My last theory was that they were clearly compensating for something. But then I remembered that if a guy is compensating for something, he is more likely to buy a little gray Mazda 6. Or something small and sporty. I am not sure why I mentioned the Mazda there. Just a random example. :P

I don't know that a shovel to the face will make these people realize how retarded they are driving their SUV's like they are afraid to jostle their jar of Grey Poupon they have in their glove compartment, but it will make me feel better.

/em waves over the next SUV.

"Sir, Wayne here started crossing the dirt the same time you did and beat you with his walker. I am here to bestow an award on you for safe driving of your 4WD SUV. If you'll kindly step over here for a picture... THWACKKKKkkkkTWWayayayaynnnnGGGGGGGGG. Ahhh. Thank you Sir. Have a nice day and go buy a golf cart if you want to drive like that you tool."

Read more...

If it's too loud....

Last night my boys and I headed over to my brother's for our first Rock Band and Pizza night since they have moved to the area. They have been here for a bit, but between them getting moved in and settled and J's flying schedule, this was the first time we were able to work out.

I brought my hard drive over with all my downloaded songs and we got J's xbox setup with rock band. Only to discover he was missing one of the guitar adapaters. He took off for best buy to grab a new one while the boys and I finished setting up. We quickly discovered that it didn't want to play any of the downloaded content without being able to log into xbox live since the HD was attached to a different console. As he didn't have his router/cable modem near his xbox, he couldn't hook it up as he didn't have the absurdly priced wireless adapter for the xbox.

So, over the course of about 90 minutes, we rewired half the stuff in his apartment to move his cable modem and router close enough to the xbox to plug it in with the cables he had. We had to reset the router and reconfigure the wireless security to get it all working finally. Got both his computers back online, ordered pizza and finally got the downloaded content working on his console.

My sister-in-law showed up with pizza and we watched Chris Angel's show while we ate. The boys liked it, but I think the guy is a prima donna who loves to see and hear himself and is overly impressed with his illusions. Anyway, we finish eating and we settle in for some RB finally.

During the first set we played early, we had the TV up a bit loud and his downstairs neighbor started banging on the floor, so after dinner we turned it way down as it was about 830pm and we put a couple of mats to cushion the bass pedal on the floor to make sure it wasn't stomping noise. We played through a new 4 song set and about 2 songs in, he was banging on the floor again. We turned it down a bit more so it was actually too quiet sitting 4 feet away from it and B was playing the drums as quietly as he could, missing notes in trying to play softly. Still.. neighbor was not happy.

We turned the stuff off and gave up, not wanting to cause problems with J's new neighbors so soon after they move in. Much to my surprise, when the xbox and tv were off.. what did I hear? The racetrack. Apparently there is a actual car racetrack not too far from their apartment and Sunday night is a race night for them. Even with the windows and doors closed, it sounded like a NASCAR event was being held in the parking lot outside. So WTF were they complaining about? They probably couldn't even hear the RB over that noise.. especially since they had their windows open I saw as I was leaving.

So to J's downstairs neighbors. Remove the large stick from your ass and realize that some noise from your neighbors is going to happen on occasion and stop banging on your ceiling like a bunch of babies. WAAAAHHHH.. I'm in an apartment and I can hear noise other than mine. Deal already asswipe. Its part of apartment living. If you don't like it.. go buy a house in the country with no one around for miles and then it will be as quiet as you want.

So .. after trips to the store, reconfiguration of the apartment wiring setup and almost 4 hours, we got in about half a dozen songs.. most interrupted by the guy below who could have at least had the decency to slam the ceiling in time with the drums or something if he wanted to participate. Next time, we are doing it at my place as my neighbors will all be in the garage next door smoking and drinking anyway and won't hear anything. :P

Read more...

Canadian Stags

You often hear some interesting stories when a group of people get together with a large quantity of alchohol around a campfire. Even with that expectation, I was not fully prepared for the story that was related to me on our trip to Canada.

One of the guys on the trip, we'll call him Bartholemew to protect the guilty, is a pretty straight laced guy for the most part. Down to earth, easy going, suburban, and well just plain normal. He decided to tell us about his Stag Party .. which we assumed was the Canadian equivalent of a bachelor party in the states. We were thinking a few friends, alchohol and maybe some strippers. Canada apparently takes their stag parties to a whole different level.

Bart starts to explain that shortly before his wedding, his best man set up a stag party for him. They decided to go camping at a campground with a bunch of Bart's friends. I'm thinking this is about what I expected for Mr. Normal. Some beers and time hanging out with good friends. Pretty low key, but it fit for him. But alas, all was not as it seems.

Apparently Bart's best man and friends decided he had to have a costume to wear for the weekend. The outfit started in fine form. Silver thong banana hammock. I'm guessing something along the lines of:

Next, add a tutu. According to Bart, it was pink and lacy and not one of the long ones. In fact they were surprised how little it covered. Really more of a waist accessory than a way to hide the banana hammock.

As if that wasn't enough, they apparently brought a t-shit out for him. With the stomach of it cut out in a very gay fashion. But they left the rest of the shirt there. Why you might ask? Clearly so Bart can collect signatures.

Now at first, I assumed Bart's buddies were the ones going to be signing said shirt, but I was wrong. He had to collect signatures from other random parties. Since they were at a campground, he wandered around, hopefully rather drunk at this point, dressed in that outfit and tried to get random campers to sign his shirt. Doesn't that sound like good times?

That however was clearly not enough. So they packed up, and drove into the nearest town to hit up a bar, with Bart still in his outfit. Not content to be drunk in the woods dressed like some demented fairy creature, Bart is now in public. As Bart is pushed by his "friends" to collect signatures from random bar patrons, in walks a Stagette party. The female version of what they were doing.

Bart's friends and the stagette's start talking and buying drinks. Bart manages to collect signatures from most of the party. As the evening wore on, it got late and Bart's party was ready to head back to the campground. But not without one last signature. Bart needed to acquire a signature for the guest of honor at the stagette party. So he goes to request said signature and is told that she doesn't want to sign his shirt. So what does she sign? His ass. Yes, Bart is now in a bar, wearing a thong and tutu, bent over and allowing a drunk woman who is not his future wife, to sign something on his ass with a permanent marker.

Not being able to see what she is writing, Bart is pretty sure it was not just signing a name however. When he gets back to his group, his buddies want to know what it says, but since Bart can't see it, he is forced to bend over again so his buddy can read his ass for him. Much to Bart's surprise, it said something along the lines of "I want your big hard cock". Now that is what you want your friend to be reading aloud off your ass in public wearing that outfit. Priceless.

Edit: I was informed that I forgot a key element to the story. When Bart was outside with a couple of his friends waiting to head home, a guy drove up right next to them, stopped his car and said to Bart "I'm not goint to say NO, but we are going to negotiate the price!" Those wacky Canuks!

Now I can only imagine what went on for the rest of the weekend, but my guess is that it involved a lot of drinking and much time trying to scrub that message off his ass before he went home to the future Mrs. Bartholemew. All I know is that Canadians have a very odd sense of humor.

Read more...

Random Randomness

My coworker was just easting some green bean dish about 4 feet away from me.. and the smell makes me cringe and I'm close to dry heaving.

Bigfoot has been found. For real this time or something. Story here

There is an 8 year old blues guitar prodigy in Wisconsin that is no longer aloud to play in the clubs he had been with his parents supervision because older musicians were jealous of the crowds he was drawing with his talent and dug up some obscure law relating to nightclubs and child labor laws to prevent him from playing there. He is really quite incredible. Its worth the watch. Youtube video of him playing with Buddy Guy:



The subconcious mind is a funny thing. I was on my way to work this morning and thinking about the wonderful visit I just had with girlfriend and thinking how much I can't wait to see her again. Next thing I know, I have driven past the freeway entrance to head north to work and realize that I was on autopilot headed to the milwaukee airport to pick her up. :D

When taking some pictures of the really cool transformer shirts Lisa made for me, I found the pictures I took of my nephew when he was here visiting and getting in some Rock Band time. He is just the cutest thing ever.









That is all for today. Getting in late to work and sitting through a 2 hour meeting chewed up my blogging time. Some of you are probably quite happy about how short this is :P

Read more...

Blame it on the rain.. yeahhhh yeahhhh

Oh yes I did post that video. For those of you who grew up in the 80s .. you probably remember these guys and the big lip syncing scandal. But this video is relevant in two ways. First, it rained, it poured, it hailed, it rained even harder, it rained a little less and then it poured again. All day Saturday while we were camping in Canada. The second reason its relevant is that no matter what station they seemed to tune the radio to in Canada, it was invariably some "mix" station and songs like this would come on the radio mixed in with country bad pop/rap music and easy listening crap.

Friday night at the campground was great. It was damp from the previous days rain, but not wet. We had no problem setting up and then after some beer shopping we settled in around the campfire to hangout, chat and drink large amounts of beer. We laughed and drank, relived the glory days of DAOC, Lineage 2, WoW and other games we have played together along the way. Here is what one of the picnic tables looked like after a few hours of drinking.



Friday night ran late and so most people slept in.. some of us til the afternoon. It was raining off and on as I dozed in and out Saturday morning, but then it let loose. It rained.. hard. It didn't stop. It didn't blow over. It just kept on raining. And raining. And hailing. And raining. And blowing. And raining. It would slow down long enough to run to get something from your car or run to the bathroom, but then it was right back to hard rain. Cold and windy. We were all huddled around the one picnic table that had a tarp over it for some protection from the elements.

Some of the campsites were well set up for draining.. and some were not. Despite the fact that the tent was patched and checked before we left, we still got water into the tent. It has a mesh top to it to let in cool air and then the rain cover goes over that. It works really well. Right up until the wind starts blowing hard enough to push the raid up the side of your tent. Then it starts dripping down on to the blankets and air mattress.. and then pooling on the floor.

Needless to say, the tent was not sleepable by Saturday night. The guy who organized the whole shindig for us, offered us a guest room at his house for Saturday night, but we needed to be up early and get packed up and on the road Sunday morning, so we decided to suck it up and sleep in the back of my car Sat. night. The two back sets of seats all fold down to make one big flat area. How bad could it be right? I mean we unzipped the sleeping bags we had luckily brough just in case. One as padding, one as a blanket. No problem right? Sure.... if you are a midget with no bone structure. Lisa's legs were touching the back of the car.. and she is 13 inches shorter than me.

At first I tried sleeping on my back with my legs folded indian style. Yeah, that was not going to work. So I tried to get comfortable on my side as thats how I normally sleep. I soon learned exactly where the outer most points of my pelvis bone were. Apparently I was trying to blance all of my wieght on this tiny point of bone too. Felt GREAT! Or something. After much complaining and shifting and I'm sure knocking Lisa all around the car trying to get comfortable, I found a spot that was at least not causing physical pain as soon as I tried it. I slept for a short time, but as most people do, the move during the night. Well once I moved, the rest of the night was spent in a half daze trying once again to find that elusive position.

We had an alarm set for Sunday morning so we could shower and pack up and get out by 9am. I didn't need the alarm. About an hour before it went off I finally just couldn't stand it anymore and had to get out of the car. I started packing up the soaking wet camping gear. Dumping gallons of water out of the tent. Putting all the wet bedding and tent etc. in trash bags to transport home. By the time I had everything packed up I was cold and wet and covered in mud.

We showered, said our goodbyes and hit the road. Only to spend most of the day driving through the rain. I was looking around today trying to find a rainfall total for that day, but all I could find for the Toronto area was general articles about how they have basically had enough raind already this year to clear the total normal rainfall for an entire year. One of the guys had left a big glass that he had been drinking beer out of empty on the table friday night. By saturday night this glass had at least 6 inches of water in it. Just craziness.

The camping trip was still fun and Lisa and I had a good time still, but let me just say DAMN CANADA and their rain. Damn Canada as well for the fact that their beer costs double what a sixer would go for in the states. Literally double.

Read more...

Border Crossings

The past 5 days have been a whirlwind. Wonderful times with my girlfriend Lisa, a fun evening with her and the boys, and of course a road trip to Canada to meet friends for a weekend of camping.

The drive up was pretty uneventful. Lisa and I discovered that we can handle many hours in the car together without driving each other insane and actually travel very well together. She stayed awake and kept me company the whole trip even though I am sure she would have enjoyed a nap.. especially on the way back when the drive dragged on and we just wanted to be home.

Whe drove down around lake Michigan, through the Chicago area and then up through Michigan heading for the border at Sarnia. As Brian put it as he was looking up stuff on mapquest for us while we were on the phone in the car, its like Narnia with an S. I had called him as we thought we might have missed the exit for getting on highway 69. Yes. 69. Got to love those people approving road signs. I was afraid that in trying to scramble to find Lisa's camera to get a shot of the exit sign for Climax that we may have missed the turn. Yes, there is a Climax, MI. Sadly we didn't react fast enough to get a shot of the sign. But if you doubt me, google Climax, MI and you will see for yourself. The best part of the Wiki page on Climax is this quote:

"Climax is twinned with Intercourse, Pennsylvania, a town of about 1000 in Lancaster County in south-eastern portion of Pennsylvania in a sister city exchange programme establshed during the early 1970s."

Anyway, having had the excitement of Climax, we kept on 69 and pushed hard for the border. Savor that statement for a minute. Yes, I am quite proud of myself. Sorry Mom. Once we reached Sarnia, we got our $1.50 ready to pay to cross into Canada and got up to the little booth where the friendly Canadian lady had a few questions for us. I handed her my WI drivers license and Lisa's CA license. She glanced at that a second time but continued on with the Q&A undaunted. The conversation went something like this. CBPL = Canadian Border Patrol Lady

CBPL: Hi! What is the purpose of your visit to canada today.
Me: We are going camping with some friends.
CBPL: Oh? And how long will you be in Canada?
Me: We are returning home on Sunday. Just here for the weekend.
CPBL: And how did you meet these friends of yours in Candada?
Me: Well, we play online games together.
CPBL: (raises a questioning eyebrow) And what are you bringing into Canada today?
Me: Just camping gear for the weekend.
CPBL: (checks licenses again) So how did you two meet?
Me: Ummm.. we met online.
CPBL: And how long have you known each other?
Me: About 7 years.
CPBL: Well enjoy your stay in Canada. Have a good day.

At this point she hands back our ID's and gives me a look that expressed what she couldn't say outloud. I could tell she was going to call someone right after we were out of earshot and go "I just had this guy from WI come through my booth who had a girl from CA with him who looks way too young to be with him voluntarily, no matter what her license says. He said he met her on the internet! He also said they are going up to go camping in the woods with a bunch more people they met on the internet. I swear we are going to see something in the news in the next few days about a group of campers found mutilated in the woods and it will all trace back to the crazy guy from WI luring internet "friends" to a remote Canadian wilderness. You mark my words!"

So thats how we made our triumphant entry into the Great White North. Lots of crazy stuff in Canada that I will blog about bits and pieces of over the next few days, but the return border crossing into the US was interesting as well. The line took us about 30 minutes of waiting to get to the booth. A older guy that definitely had an ex-military look about him takes our ID's and pretty much yelled something about country of residence. I was caught unaware... expecting more of the pleasant friendly personality we ran into on the way into Canada, not a drill seargent.

Now he is pissed that we didn't answer.. so he yells the question this time. A little taken aback, we shout UNITED STATES! Not sure if I should salute or what. He looks at our licenses and then glances around the booth a minute and types a few things into his computer. I am sure that my ID brought up our crazy story about camping int he woods with strangers from the internet and he was probably scanning databases to make sure there were no unsolved murders at campsites we needed to be detained for questioning on.

He then asks for proof of citeznship. I said you have it. He said NO! Proof that you live in the United States. This is not acceptable! Lisa had her passport and handed it to him. I had nothing. I told him that I had double checked the State Department's website to confirm that until summer of 2009 that a state issued drivers license was acceptable for land border crossings and that only air travel required passports. He told me I didn't know what I was talking about and gave me a lecture on not having proper documentation. Eventually he gave us our IDs back and told me to be properly prepared next time. He tore a sheet off this pad he had that had all the information on the requirements that I should read "AS SOON AS I HAD TIME!"

As we drove off, I was still a bit confused as I know I checked to make sure before I left the country that I had what I needed to get back in without problem. Lisa is sitting beside me reading the sheet that he just handed to us. Guess what it said? A state issued drivers license is valid for indentification and proof of citizenship for land border crossings until summer of 2009! Oh now I was pissed. I so wanted to turn right the hell around and go talk to that guy! Apparently he just gets his kicks from giving people a hard time at the border crossing.

The good news is however, that he didn't call for a full inspection of the vehicle. So we made it through without the bodies of our "internet friends" that we had stuffed in trash bags in the back being discovered! /whew

Had to take Lisa back to the airport last night. Always tough saying goodbye to someone you love. I miss you already. /kiss

Read more...

Ahhhhh vacation

So here is my typical "I'm going to be MIA for a while" post. Lisa arrives this evening and then we are spending the day here tomorrow before we drive to Canada for the Cessation Guild get together / camping trip. Looking forward to meeting in person a bunch of people I have known for quite a few years, but never actually gotten a chance to meet.

We are currently hoping it doesn't rain and that it isn't a wet mess when we arrive Friday night. Supposedly its been raining off and on for a week in that area and the weather report I saw said chance of rain again on Friday and Sunday. At least Saturday is supposed to be dry as that is the main day we will all be up there together.

We have people coming from various locations in Canada, Wisconsin, California, and the New Jersey area.

As I type this, I can hear my older son playing the song Afterlife by Avenged Sevenfold on Rock Band. He is working his way through all the hard songs and that one seems to be a sticking point and I don't blame him. Its not easy. Not at all.

See.. I can keep it short and sweet if I want :P Doubt I will be updating over the next few days, although I might pop on to give my review of The Dark Knight on IMAX as Lisa and I are going to see that on Thursday!

Read more...

It takes a lickin and keeps on tickin..

If you are old enough to remember the Timex ads from back in the day, that was their slogan. I remember one ad with sumo wrestlers doing some very wrong things to that poor watch.. and supposedly it still worked afterwards.

In this day and age, that kind of mentality is very rare. We have turned into a society that thrives on cheap and disposable. Gone are the days where it was worth spending that little bit extra for a quality made product. Most stuff today, even from the name brand manufacturers is mass produced, cheap, disposable junk. When was the last time that you actually had a VCR or DVD player that broke and you considered actually finding a repair shop and getting it looked at? Nowadays just having somone use an hour of labor to look at an item like that will run you 75-100 bucks before parts even come into it. Considering most people spend 100 or less on that kind of stuff these days, its just toss it and buy a new one.

Its something very hard as a parent to get through to your children these days. I remember growing up, having it ingrained that if you took care of things, they would last. Nowadays, it seems no matter how careful you are with somethings, they are just so cheaply made that there is still a good chance that they will break at random. So how do you explain that to your kids? Kids are rough on stuff as it is and when the stuff is cheaply made, it just can't withstand anyting but a delicate touch.

Nowadays, when I find an item that has been able to take a beating and keep on working, I have to praise it and the company responsible for it. So I present to you, the Motorola Razor cellular phone. I was looking for a phone with good signal and good battery life and I had a couple friends with them that reccomended them for meeting those requirements. So I picked one up and have been quite happy with it for some time now.

I carry it in my pocket.. with no case. I bang it around. Flip it open and let it snap shut. It survives all that with a few minor scratches on the case, but I have put it through some serious trauma as well. About 5 months ago, I was looking for my phone as I was heading out .. and couldn't find it. At the same time, I was wondering what the clunking noise was in the dryer. I figured the kids had left their keys in their pocket or something again. I go open the door to the dryer and out drops my cell phone. Yes, I had washed it.. for a full cycle with detergent and fabric softener and then put it in the dryer for about 20 minutes before I investigated the noise.

The phone was wet still.. but hot to the touch as I picked it up off the ground where it had tumbled out of the dryer after banging around in there for almost half an hour. I had no real expectations of it working ever again. Its electronics. The three worst things for electronics are: water, excessive heat and impact. I had pretty much given it a heavy dose of all 3. However, I decided I wasn't going to rush out and buy a new phone without at least trying to dry it out and see if by some miracle it would work still. So, I dismantled the phone, turned my big fan on high and let all the stuff dry for about 2 days. After which I put it back together, turned it on .. and to my amazement it worked! Everything was functioning fine. I had one key that was a bit 'sticky' and slow to respond, but other than that it was 100%!

So fast forward to this past Friday. My phone has been working fine for months. Lisa and I were doing a movie night and watching Definitely, Maybe. Which for the record is a great movie. Some of the lines the little girl has in there are priceless. But anyway, once we get a movie synced up, its a pain to pause and then restart it. So when my phone rang, I picked it up and caller ID said 'unknown call' That means its work 95% of the time and as I was not on call, I had no intention of interrupting my movie for a random call. So I went to set my phone back on the table and not really looking as I set it down, knocked it on the edge of my big 32oz cup of water and knocked it out of my hand and down it went. Right into the water. SONOFA ... /sigh

I was pissed. At myself of course, who else could I be pissed at? So I grab my phone back out of the water, shake it off best I can and pop the battery off so its not running with all the water in it. I do the same thing I did the first time, took it apart and let it dry. 12 hours later, I put it back together and turned it on. Only this time, despite the fact that it did power up, none of the keys were working and I could see there was still moisture behind the LCD screen. I decide to take it back apart and give it another long time in front of the fan. After another 20 or so hours with the fan, I assembled it again and lo and behold, it works perfectly again. In fact, the key that was sticking before is now working as it should again!

Here's to you Motorolo Razor designers, for restoring some faith in the fact that not everything made today is a cheap pile of trash that is designed to be used delicately until it falls apart on you and then thrown away and replaced. The fact that this phone even powers up at this point is a minor miracle, but the fact that it still functions just as it did the first time out of the box is nothing short of incredible. Kudos to you.

If you are into computers at all, you will see the same disposable trend getting worse and worse. If you are not into computers... well .. I am so deal. It used to be that you could buy a system and realistically it would remain at the upper end of performance, features, and compatibility for 2-3 years. Also, the way the components worked, you could generally upgrade your PC without replacing a majority of the parts. Processors used the same voltage and sockets. Memory was pretty much the same for years. Hard drives used the same interface and were largely unchanged other than capacity.

Today, the pace of change is rapid. Most product cycles for series of motherboards, processors, memory, video cards etc. is around 12-14 months .. tops. Upgrading is rarely done these days. Motherboards, processor sockets, memory interfaces, all change so rapidly that if you wait a year and a half and think "Hey, I should upgrade the memory and processor in here", it will most likely be cost prohibitive if even possible. So you end up getting a new system basically, maybe carrying over a few components like your optical drives and monitor.

Very few things retain any kind of upgradeability these days. I won't even get started on backwards compatibility. The one bright spot that has caught my attention lately is the coming of Rock Band 2. Not only will the instruments from RB1 work with the new game, all of the songs you downloaded for it will work in RB2 right out of the box. In addition to that, all new downloadable content will work on both platforms. Oh, and you can import all of the songs from the original RB disk into RB2 and play them there as well so you don't even have to swap disks to have access to both libraries of songs. Now that is a company that listens to their users and is going out of their way to support them and give them the best product they can.

I know this was long and rambling.. but hey. Thats what my blog is for. Based on the number of comments lately, I am not sure anyone reads it anyway :P

The best part of today.. is that its Tuesday.. and that means Lisa gets here tomorrow! I can't even describe how excited I am to see her. The weeks apart get long for sure, but evertime we are together I discover all over again how wonderful and amazing we are together. I am so lucky to have her in my life. She makes me so happy. See you tomorrow baby! <3

Read more...

DIAF U.S. Cellular

For those of you that are not intiated in the world of online gaming, DIAF stands for Die In A Fire. I have my theories of where this phrase came from and why it became so popular in the online gaming world. One reason.. well dying in a fire sounds horrifically painful. I mean you get shot in the head and boom.. its over. You get hit by a train.. and yeah.. its pretty much instant. Dying in a fire however sounds like one of the worst ways I can think of to die. Right after drowning... but that is because the thought of drowning is about the most horrible thing I can think of. I am not entirely sure why.. but it is. The though of being trapped under water.. not being able to breathe.. knowing that your body is going to make you try and breathe and it will be nothing but water. It just freaks me the hell out for some reason.

Anyway.. the other reason DIAF is so popular among gamers is that it happens when playing quite often. Many of the high end raid level encounters have fire breathing monstrosities, demons, dragons, or lava and flame effects on the ground. Part of the challenges of these encounters is having 25 or 40 people, depending on the size of the raid, staying out of these fiery traps as they will usuall kill said person in a matter of seconds. Its almost comical to watch the learning process on these runs. After you fail an attempt, you look around and see 15 people lying dead in random pools of fire and flame.

For an example.. check out this video of the fight against Alar the Phoenix God. At about 4:45 in on the video, you can see the change into phase 2 of the fight and see that he starts randomly dropping pools of fire on the ground.. and keeps doing it so that the floor slowly becomes a maze of places you have to avoid standing so that you don't DIAF :P Let the video load and then just jump to 4:45 if you don't want to watch the whole thing.



Anyway.. that is my really long explination for the term DIAF. Now why do I want US Cellular to DIAF? Well, being in a long distance relationship is not an easy thing. Luckily for me, my girlfriend is amazing and is willing to work through all the hard times with me and I assure you if you have never had to do the long distance thing, they aren't exaggerating when they say its rediculously hard. I mean relationships can be tough and take work when you are right there...able to talk about things face to face. Able to reach out and give the other person a big hug and a kiss when things get rough. When you are 1800 miles apart and only get to see each other every 6-8 weeks, well its a whole different story.

In order to stay as close as we possibly can we are in pretty constant contact. Phone calls, emails, instant messaging and of course text messaging. Other than emails, they are all supposed to be "instant" communication methods. Meaning that the recipient is supposed to be notified and the message delivered as soon as you hit send or their phone rings for a call. Normally this is the case. Lately though, we have had a number of issues with text messages not going through. Usually its not a huge deal, but let me tell you.. sometimes depending on the timing it can be.

One night we were having an important conversation and I thought she got tired or frustrated and stopped texting with me. I got frustrated and upset and finally went to sleep. My alarm goes off for work at 430 in the morning for work. I hit the snooze button when it went off and 2 minutes later I heard another beeping noise. I wake up enough to realize its my phone. I had 3 text messages waiting. I read them and find they are from Lisa who wanted to still talk. I thought it was odd that she waited so long to send them and that she was still up, but I didn't want to leave her hanging when she wanted to talk, so I call her. I hear a groggy voice on the other end of the phone wondering why in the bloody hell I am calling her at 230am her time. Whoops! I apologized for waking her and told her we would talk in the morning.

This kind of thing has happened several times now where for whatever reason I don't get text messages from her.. and then all of a sudden at some random absurd hour of the morning they will come through in a flood. It's very frustrating that it doesn't work at very random times and for no apparent reason. She gets no message on her end that it wasn't sent.. her phone says it whent through. I get no notification or message on my end.. sometimes not until 6 or 8 hours later. Its retarded in this day and age of technology that there is no way of confirming that the message has been received by the person you sent it to. There is no reason whatsover that the texting system should randomly not deliver messages for hours on end. I work in IT. If our messaging system suddenly stopped delivering messages for more than a couple minutes, we would be all over the problem resolving it and making sure it doesn't happen again.

I know you are thinking its a petty thing for me to gripe about, but when you use texting as much as we do.. and you are paying for a service, you expect it to work. We know now that if the other person is not responding, not to assume they are being rude or don't want to talk and to make a phone call to see whats up, but we shouldn't have to just to make sure the system is working properly. Fix your shit US Cell.. and then DIAF. That will be all.

On a happier note, its Friday.. glorious Friday. Fridays are quiet around here usually, its heading into a 3 day weekend and means only 5 days left! :D

Read more...