Hmm.. I missed it.

Apparently my previous post was my 100th. I didn't see any banners, fireworks. No big prizes were awarded and I still haven't caught my sisters post count. Oh well.. someday.

I had a wonderful vacation for those that care. A very busy vacation. Flew to LA and spend a day with Lisa before we drove to Las Vegas together for the weekend. Met my sister and brother-in-law, my cousins Jan and Jamie and their spouses for a fun relaxing time. We gambled some, mostly with the casino's money, ate dinners out together and hung out playing cards, talking and drinking. Then it was back to LA where I picked up my rental car and spent Sunday evening with L before heading to Phoenix the next morning.

I spend most of the week in AZ staying with my sister and surprising my parents. I had a great time getting to see them all and spend some relaxing time just visiting. I didn't go anywhere or do anything really, just spent time hanging out and talking with them. Then on Friday I headed back to LA to spend the rest of the weekend with Lisa before heading out on Sunday morning for WI.

Everyone always asks "So what did you do on your vacation?" While I will say I did more on this trip than I normally do with the Vegas side trip and actually gambling and doing dinners out etc., I am normally one of those people who go on vacation to relax, not pack my week so full of stuff so that I need to go back to work to recover from vacation.

If you have ever seen Bill Cosby's standup routine / movie called 'Himself', he talks about the things people do to themselves in the name of fun. Mainly he is referring to drinking. He was talking about how people in the office would announce that they are going to go out and get drunk because they "owe it to themselves" to have a good time. We all have done it at one point or another. I know I have. I owed it to myself to drink with friends and have a good time. Drink to the point where you are sick.. puking in your friends sink for 45 minutes (sorry Amy). You wake up the next morning and your mouth has the texture like you have a dead rodent stuffed in there. Your head hurts and your stomach is still rolling. Ahh... you owed this to yourself right?

Maybe its because I am older and wiser now. I just had a birthday so thats the reason I am going with! I just don't look at having a good time the same way I used to. I was staying with my sister with a fridge full of cold beer and I didn't even get a buzz the entire time I was there. Thats not to say I didn't have a beer or 5.. but I enjoyed them and was not looking to get drunk. I had a few beers hanging out with my parents when they were over or later at night talking with my sister or just hanging out out back at her place with a good cigar and a crossword puzzle. (Mom just pretend you didn't see the cigar part) I blame my parents for getting me hooked on crossword puzzles now btw.

Maybe its getting old. Maybe its just that I have learned to slow down and appreciate more of the little things in life that make it enjoyable. I would almost say maybe its me finally becoming mature, but if you know me well, you know thats simply not true. :P

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Viva Las Vegas!

So this morning I left the house for vacation again. A nice long trip this time. It was 40 degrees outside as I left the house.. in shorts and a t-shirt. I was a bit chilly and I am pretty sure some of you are getting the chills just thinking about 40 degree weather, but there is a reason I wasn't in jeans and a sweatshirt. I went from my house to my car to the airport. Once on the plane, its always warm with that many people packed in a small space. Also.. I was leaving the 40 degree weather and headed for the desert.

I watched all the people filing on to the plane.. in their jeans and sweatshirts and jackets and moched (yes I know its spelled mocked) them silently. As we were getting off the plane in the CA desert.. they were all complaining about how hot it was on the jetway.. and I laughed to myself. Poor planning people.. poor planning.

It was a largely uneventful flight, although I cut it closer than I like getting to the airport. Left a little later than I wanted and then hit both construction and some early morning traffic. Still made it on time, got my car parked at the long term place and got the shuttle to my terminal. Fortunately I had checked in the day before, printed my boarding pass and was carrying on for luggage, so I breezed through security and made it to my gate with about 25 min to spare.

The flight itself was fast. Scheduled for a bit over 4 hours flight time... it took about 3 hours and 35 minutes. We were at the gate close to 25 minutes early. Im glad it didn't take longer as Ms.Fidget that was sitting next to me was slowly starting to bug me. It wasn't bad or anything, but she was one of those people that can't really sit still and likes to talk with huge hand gestures. I grabbed about 30 minutes of sleep shortly after takeoff and then it was a losing battle. Everytime I would shut my eyes and start to doze at all.. she would bump me enough to wake me up again. I thought about telling the flight attendant that she was not allowed to have anything with caffeine in it for her beverage. :P

We had an uneventful drive back from the airport this time. We didn't get lost once which was an impressive feat. Every other time we have missed a slight lane change or they have closed one or more parts of the route home for construction. Although, as we were sitting at a freeway on ramp meter dealy, we were just talking and then we see a tire roll by us. Not attached to a car.. just a tire rolling down hill along the side of the freeway. I looked back to see if there was a car leaning down like it had lost a tire but couldn't see anyone. We watched it as it kept rolling way out of sight. I hope it didn't run into traffic and cause any problems. Not exactly something you see everyday. Thats for sure.

So here I am.. in the desert. And tomorrow we go to another desert. Or maybe its technically the same desert. I'm not really sure to be honest. Thankfully Vegas is going to have a cool snap for them while we are there for the weekend. Its only supposed to be high 70s, low 80s.. which is about 20 degrees cooler than it is there today. You know.. there is a reason I left Phx. Its October .. it should be cool fall weather. Not 100. It's just not right!

Anyway.. updates will be sporadatic over the next little bit as my computer access and to be perfectly honest, my desire to update while I'm on vacation will be limited. :P Hope everyone has a good weekend. And just to clarify for the peanut gallery.. no, I am not getting married in Vegas. Unless Salma is there and sweeps me off my feet. I am going to vegas to hang out with my sister and two of my cousins that I love spending time with and their spouses. Maybe I'll win big in Vegas. Of course if you win big on penny and nickel slots.. you still only win like 10 bucks.. so there goes that idea. :P Besides.. a special someone is going with me to Vegas.. so I am already very lucky. :)

I leave you with a funny Bill Engvall clip.. enjoy:

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Where do all the porn stars go?

If you have an answer for that question right off the top of your head, then chances are you have heard this song by Everclear:



Really this whole intro was just to get you reading. I mean how can you pass up a title like that? In case you can't view the vid, or are just too lazy (it's really worth a watch/listen), the answer to the question is 'they all become Volvo driving soccer moms". Which brings up my soccer story. And yes, I am sure someone is going to give me a hard time about being a mini-van driving soccer dad, but I assure you, I have no sliding doors on my crossover and there for it is not a mini-van.

Anyway, there I am at soccer like I am just about every thursday in the late summer to early fall. Gabe really enjoys soccer and he has a very good team this year. The games are fun to watch, usually quite a few goals scored. This game was competative with a very good oposing team as well. We were sitting on the side of the field where you don't have to look directly into the sun, which really made sense to me as I like my retinas. Most of the parents were.. as well as the coaches.

Now the coaches take opposite ends of the field to setup shop. They hang out more towards the goal on the side that their team is defending. The might roam up and down a bit, but they are USUALLY very careful not to wander in front of parents and block their view. This game however was an exception. Let me introduce you to Mrs. ObnxiousStandInMyWay. This coach was annoying...treating her players like they were 5, not 9 to 11 like they really are. What bugged me most was that I was sitting pretty much midfield and she would wander all the way down from her end.. and stand right in front of me. Parents have to be about 5 feet back from the sidelines for throw-ins and whatnot, so there was room for her to do it. Repeatedly.

She wouldn't take hints, nor did she just even bother to think about the people, parents that take off work early to make sure they can have their kids to soccer ready to play by 530, that she was blocking over and over again. As I mention above, she treated her players like they were 5. The most obnoxious thing was when she wanted her players to stick with a play, she wouldn't say that. Apparently because all her players had the mental state of a toddler, she had to use code to trigger their minds. She would yell out 'PEANUT BUTTER'.

This bothered me. They are not 5 for one thing. Just tell them to stick with it, I am pretty sure they will understand. For another thing ... GET THE HELL OUT OF MY WAY WHILE YOU SPOUT THAT NONSENSE, I CAN'T SEE AROUND YOUR GIANT ASS. She did have a giant ass for the record. It wasn't quite one of those that look like they are smuggling a giant beach ball in their strech pants, but it was big.. and not even good to look.

I made it through the first half with only a few comments and none particularily rude. I was hoping she would get the hint peacefully. This was not to be the case apparently. Second half starts and within a couple minutes this bitch is standing in front of me... AGAIN. Not only that.. she is yelling Peanut Butter again.

I had enough at this point. Gabes team wears grey shirts and all the teams just go by the color. So its allways people yelling "Go grey! Center it!" or "Nice Defense Grey". When she started yelling PB again and again..standing directly in my line of sight, I yelled loud over the top of her "Jelly Grey team.. JELLY!!!!!" Then I started moving my head side to side to make it extremely obvious that I was trying to see around her planetoid of an ass as she turned to see who had made the Jelly comment. I just gave her a look of death that may have just suggested that I have a metal spork I keep on me just in case I have to shank some obnoxious soccer coach at the weekly game.

Sure, I could have probably just asked her to not stand in front of me, but my way was much more entertaining and much more...me. Hopefully she will think twice before standing in front of the parents that come there to see their kids play as well as stop treating 10 year olds like they are 5 and can't handle complex phrases like 'stick with it'.

I am pretty sure I have yet to see a former porn star as a soccer mom at any of the soccer matches I have been too, but every now and then you see one that makes you wonder. ;P

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LAN Party

This is a week ago now, but I forgot to blog about taking the boys to their first LAN party. For those of you that don't even know what I am talking about, LAN = Local Area Network. So what we do for these parties is rent out a big meeting room in a hotel, bring a big network switch and we all bring out computers and set them up in the same room so we can play networked games locally without the internet. Its a lot of fun and although we don't do it as often as we used to, its always a blast.

This time the boys were with me for the week and so they got their first opportunity to attend one of these events. It was a big undertaking this time. Normally its just me and my computer gear. This time it was 3 people, 3 entire computer setups, and then my xbox 360 setup and all the rock band stuff as well. It was quite a carload.

It took us about 45 minutes to set everything up when we got to the hotel. Gabe's computer unfortunately is old enough that he couldn't run a lot of the games we were playing and so he ended up playing Fable on the xbox quite a bit, which he loved as it was hooked up to a projector and was huge on the wall. Nothing like gaming on a 100" screen.

The rest of us played a mix of games including Call of Duty 4, WC3: DotA, Spore, and of course some Rock Band 2. We actually had two RB2 setups and two projectors. Our original plan was to do a battle of the bands. What we found out, much to our dissapointment, is that there is no way to challenge a specific band and thus sync up the songs. When RB2 announced a battle of the bands mode, we just assumed that you were going to be able to pick someone on your friends list or out on the xbox live service in general to compete against, but that is not actually the case. You can do challenges where your score gets pitted against others on your friends list that have done the same challenge as well as the internet as a whole. But there is no way to challenge a specific friend and his band to compete against yours. Dissapointing.

What we did try was to pick a song, and sync the start so we could do it anyway. This turned out to be quite a clusterfuck. The timing was off due to load times and when people selected their difficulty.. so one was always a few seconds off. This would have been fine had we been in different rooms, but we were about 15 feet from each other. Which means it was near impossible to try and stick with the rythym of your song and not get distracted by the other one playing. We tried it through a few songs before we gave up.

Overall though it was a fun time for all. We had about 15 people there at one point, with people coming and going as their schedule allowed. The boys and I showed up around 10.. and left around 10 at night so we put in a full day of gaming and pizza. The boys really enjoyed themselves and want to go to the next one. I don't think they were too emotionally scarred by some of the things shouted during intense gunfights in CoD4. Or at least they are clever enough to deny even hearing anything questionable. ;)

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Twilight Zone

Ever watch the old twilight zone shows? There was one episode where a guy is flying on the plane. He doesn't like flying and gets it into his head that theres someone.. something out on the wing. Even though they are flying.. he's convinced and starts to go a little crazy when he thinks he's seeing someone out there.

I had one of those experiences last night. Well not quite the same, but had the same usettling feeling. Around 2am, my jaw was killing me.. and I needed pain meds. I stumble out half asleep to the kitchen for a bottle of water and my meds. I swallow them down and have one of those "did I lock that" moments where I can't remember if I locked the sliding door to my patio or not.

So I go to check it to make sure. I have vertical blinds that hang in front of the door which were closed. I reached my hand between a couple of the slats to check the lock and they parted just enough for me to glance outside and there was someone standing there. About 5 feet from my door.. facing right at it. WTF.

Its about 230 in the morning and there is someone standing, facing my patio door, right at the edge of the small concrete patio I have there. Now its not like he was on my patio, he was on the grass, but the patio is very small with only enough room for a couple of chairs. I was not thinking clearly still half asleep and was just a little wierded out by the whole experience. Not what you want when waking up to take pain meds at 2am.. thats for sure.

I thought about it some more, and realized that the guy had a dog with him. Sure, its odd that he was taking his dog for a walk, right by my patio, at 2am, but I was a little more comfortable with the fact that most serial killers do not bring their dog with them so I was probably ok and this was just a guy with a young dog that had to go out at all hours of the morning.

I just hope that my hand reaching out between the blinds to check my lock freaked him out as much as his being right there by my patio freaked me out. Fortunately the pain meds I have say right on the bottle "May cause drowsiness". Realistically it should read "Will induce coma like states". So I was back to sleep in no time.

I am hoping to be done with the need for the pain meds soon as they make life complicated. You can't drink with them. They make you extremely tired.. to the point of barely functioning sometimes. And really I just want to have my tooth/jaw be pain free for the first time in about 3 weeks.

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Time flies.. when you are having fun?

I just realized its been a week since I posted. Kind of odd for me unless I am on vacation, which I was definitely not this time. I have just been out of it, tired a lot of the time, on pain meds which made me quite tired.

Yesterday I had my first root canal. Ideally that will be my first, and last root canal. It was not as bad as I was expecting however. The worst part was them sticking that long needle into my gums and working it around. After that, they let the stuff go to work and pretty soon I wasn't feeling anything on that side of my mouth.

The whole experience was a little strange though. Now I know each doctor has their own way of putting patients at ease and trying to seem relaxed and easy going, but this was just a bit odd. My endodontist was around his mid 40s, and a very nice guy, but his whole demeanor was just a somewhat odd experience. He came in talking about how his female assistant was in a bad mood and that he hoped she would not do anything on purpose to hurt me.. haha. Oh yeah.. I'm laughing.

Next I get my anesthesia and he leaves the room. The assistant promptly starts small talk while we are waiting for it to kick in. We went from nice weather to the fact that she is in the middle of a divorce and that her husband is a jackass who doesn't even want custody of their kids, doesn't want to spend time with them. As a parent, I don't even get that, but realistically, I just met you 30 seconds ago, why are you choosing me to spill your life story to? Just odd.

So we wait a bit, and the endodontist comes back in. He said that half my tongue should be numb by now as well as the left half of my lips. They were not and he said we should take care of that. Taking care of that however required more fun happy time with the long needle he likes to jab into my gums and work around. YAY!

After another 10 minutes or so, everything is numb as it should be and we get going. The endodontist is discussing Dancing with the Stars and which chicks he thinks are super hot and why. Then Christina Aguilera comes on the radio they have playing in the office and he jumps off on how hot she is. He is really having this conversation with himself as I have all this stuff crammed in my jaw right now I cant even really grunt much less answer him.

Now he decides to make a snarky comment to his assistant. I don't remember exactly what he said, but she fired something just a mean right back at him. He looked taken aback.. and then said this: (and no I am not making this up)

"Damn woman.. why can you just let me think for once that my pimp hand is strong!"

Yeah.. that was pretty much about the last thing I was expecting to come flying out of the mouth of my 45 year old middle-eastern endodontist. As I said, it was an interesting visit. But my tooth is not in pain right now, although my jaw is sore and is likely to be that way for a couple of days.

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Tagged for 10 Things...

Lisa tagged me to follow up her '10 Things I am Loving Right Now' post that you can find HERE. So here goes:

1. Rock Band 2. Online World Tour mode. Tons of new songs. Much more party friendly. It's nice when a game company actually listens to the people that actually play the game.

2. Fall weather. Fall is by far my favorite season. Its still warm enough during the day, but the evenings are starting to get crisp and cool. I can leave my windows open at night and bury myself in the blankets and I sleep so good.

3. The fact that my check engine light has gone back off on its own accord. I was dreading having to take my car in for the randon mystery engine problem .. as that never turns out to be anything cheap.

4. Tylenol. Loving the tylenol right now. I wouldn't be making it through the day without it right now. Dentist has reccomended I go see a specialist to see if he reccomends a root canal to take care of the shooting pain in one of my molars. Tylenol is at least keeping me sane and allowing some sleep at night. <3

5. Getting to see some good friends I have not gotten to spend time with in months. Always nice to get together with them.

6. Only 15 days til I am on vacation again. This trip includes Vegas and getting to spend time with family I seldom get to see but love to hang out with.

7. Getting to take my boys to their first LAN party this weekend. They are quite excited to get to bring their computers and hang out with everyone and play games all day.

8. Watching season 1 of Scrubs again .. with the bonus features too. One of my birthday presents from L :)

9. Actually feeling better, healthier, happier even though I am officially a year older.

10. Not to steal one from L's list, but I am a gamer and WoW junkie.. so yeah. Announced date for the Wrath of the Lich King expansion .. well.. I am loving that. Its about 6 weeks sooner than I expected and I have been playing the beta for it so I am quite excited to see it released.

I am tagging Courtney to continue this on. Hope you are feeling better today sis. Didn't sound so hot last night :P

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