Archives 2007

I got this “IQ” test from my mom.  To call it an IQ test is not accurate, it has some intelligence questions and some trivia type questions.  Anyway, the twist is you only have 5 seconds to answer each one so the added pressure makes it more difficult.  I took it twice and got a 20 and a 22.  Here ya go.

I stopped by the garage on the way to work with the van but the lot was jammed with cars and people waiting so I knew it wasn’t a good time to have the owner feel my wheels.  I am going to call and see if I bring it over late in the afternoon will be better.  Half of me just doesn’t even want to be bothered.  It’s driving fine now.  I have a feeling the trip out to New Mexico will be it’s last hurrah anyway.  I just don’t like the feeling I have of waiting for the other shoe to drop with it, much like the feeling I had with the 88 Vette…..

For the past week or so I have seen this car in our parking lot.  It is just covered with some sort of berry or fruit things.  I would love to see the person driving this vehicle.  What levels of ignorance/laziness are required to park your vehicle in a spot where the paint will be literally destroyed by falling organic matter?  I mean, look at this thing! It’s not like it is an old beater either.

Ali was sent a survey by RCI regarding our recent booking.  She was kind enough to forward it to me so I could vent.  I rated most aspects of the survey decently.  What I was waiting for was the “other comments” field.  I filled that box with a rant about how sick I am of being fee’d to death with RCI and that I wouldn’t recommend them to a freind for that very reason, too many fees.  Not that it makes a bit of difference as I’m sure the survey will be looked at by someone who could care less about what I think.

Big news, Sir Randall has joined the Spartan Halloween challenge!  Find him here!

Ali just found out yesterday that she is going to be quite busy leading up to our trip out west.  She will be working nearly full time hours.  This is bad from the viewpoint of being so busy but good from the viewpoint of getting paid bukuu bucks to do the work.  The money definitely could come in handy, if she ever sees some of it.  Her former employer has not been exactly speedy in paying invoices, asking Ali to jump through hoop after hoop to become an official “vendor”.

We have officially booked our Vegas birthday trip.  We are staying a total of 5 nights which cost $99  from RCI for the “booking fee”.  Yea 20 bucks a night is dirt cheap but it should be absolutely free with all the money we have laid out.  The flight out to Vegas is reasonable, the flight back is going to be expensive because it is 4 days before Christmas.  We could drop close to a grand just on the flights.

I talked to my mom for awhile on the phone yesterday.  She was telling me her latest medical woes.  Some of the procedures she has had to endure sound brutal.  It’s just another reason for me to absolutely dread each step further I make into old age. 

It’s funny, over the weekend I was weed whacking while there was a nasty, nasty thunderstorm approaching.  There was lots of lightning and thunder rolling in.  It didn’t stop me from walking around with a big aluminum lighting rod, weed whacking under lots of trees.  I was admittedly nervous about it.  I had visions of a bolt striking at any moment, taking me out in the process.  I even imagined the head line “Golden Gate Estates man killed in thunderstorm while weed whacking”  Even though I was concerned about getting struck, there was a part of me that thought about how it would at least relieve me of the “getting old” problem.

Speaking of storms, maybe my memory is bad but I don’t ever remember since we have been down here being this late into rainy season with no standing water on the property.  It seems like by now we always have our rainy season ponds around the property.  We have been getting rain but not the 2 or 3 inches a day rain that normally hits this time of year.  I’m not complaining personally but in the big picture it is a bad thing for the water tables in our area which depend on the summertime drenching to survive the winter time drought. 

I didn’t see the Eagles first preseason game but by all accounts it was a stinker.  It sounded like they were equally unimpressive on both sides of the ball.  Although when I think about it, I don’t know if I ever remember the Eagles looking impressive in preseason under Andy Reid.  I think .500 is the best they ever have done under him in the games that don’t count.  I realize preseason means nothing but as a fan I would always prefer if my team looked strong than weak.  There was a lot of weakness going on.

  Too bad about Ryan Moats.  It sounded like a make or break year for him and he wound up breaking, his ankle.  When he came up 2 years ago I thought he had real talent,  quick as hell, strong runner.  Unfortunately it seems that he may be somewhat of a mental midget, unable to grasp the other responsibilities a NFL running back requires, like blocking and making adjustments. I have high hopes for the team this year, just like every year.  The realist in me sees them making the playoffs and then exiting early.  McNabb just has become too injury prone to be able to count on him for a full season.

Another 300 workout in the books today.  Instead of push ups, I came up with holding myself in push up position with arms slightly bent for 90 seconds.  I still used slightly less weight for the clean and press, 30 lbs instead of 35.   I was able to do floor wipers once again, yay.  They didn’t magically get any easier but I managed to grind out 40 of them.

After the gym I stopped at Office Max to pick up some labels that you print on laser printers.  As I walked in the front door I am greeted by a woman standing guard like a police officer.  Corporate people are dumb.  Customers don’t like being accosted the second they go in the door.  If I want help, I’ll ask.    Anyway, the woman spits out her line “Welcome to Office Max.  What can I help you find today?”  I was still breathing heavy from the 300 plus I was rushing to get back to the office.  I’m not sure if it was those factors, being unexpectedly greeted by the Office Max gestapo or just my normal brain misfiring, but I was drawing a blank on how to explain what I was looking for.  After a pause I spit out something like “I need laser labels” after a look of confusion on the woman’s face I continue sputtering “um you know the type of labels you peel off and stick on envelopes that you print on a laser” I think I mushed a few of the words along the way.  The woman points me off in a direction.  It was not a good interaction.  As I walked over to the aisle, which I could have easily found myself without her direction, I cursed myself for once again sounding like an idiot, not being able to put a simple sentence from mind to mouth.  It’s so aggravating.

This was an odd weekend.  Because of work related stuff Ali had to do, I spent the majority of the weekend at home by myself.  That means all the house/yardwork that we normally tag team instead fell on my back which kept me busy.  The tractor did a noticeably better job cutting the grass now that the blades are no longer on backwards, imagine that.  I was aided in my chores by my dual Roomba cleaning crew.  I set them loose around the house sweeping merrily away without complaint.

Speaking of my Roomba’s they are going to be joined by some new siblings this week.  A Dirt Dog and possibly a Scooba.  My old Vaio sold on ebay for considerably more than I planned so it opened the door to expand my robotic staff sooner than originally thought.  The Dirt Dog will be put to work sweeping up the garage, the lanai and the shed.  The Scooba will be used to clean the hard surfaces in the kitchen, utility room and bathrooms.  The tile hardly ever gets mopped so this will be nice to have the Scooba do it for us.  Expect a full review shortly.

I spent some time cleaning up the van in prep for the trip.  I concentrated mainly on the interior although I did address the rust streak that was running down the passenger side rear corner.  I used this stuff named Lime Away.  Even though on the bottle it said to not use on painted surfaces, I had at it, the paint job on the van is way past the point of worrying about blemishing it.  The stuff worked pretty well.  It cleaned up the stain to the point where you wouldn’t notice it from 10 feet away, good enough.

So this week I plan to stop by the garage first thing so they can get a first hand feel of my toasty brakes.  I am so sick of dealing with mechanical issues with the van.  My years of new car ownership with minimal repair issues has spoiled me somewhat.

On Sunday afternoon I actually took some time to enjoy our pool.  I had a World Series of Poker event playing on the tv on the lanai while I floated in the pool.  I was out there for almost an hour and a half.  I even dozed off for a little bit. 

This morning I got to adorn the paper gown once again.  At least this time I got to leave my underwear on.  I had to go to the dermatologist to get my annual screening.  I told him about a little spot on my nose that looks like blackhead but actually was bleeding a little bit a few weeks back.  He checked it out and said it was probably nothing but he shaved it off it sent it for testing just to be safe.  Other than that it was a non-event.

My shoulder is definitely better than it was but I still don’t think I can tackle push ups yet.  I am able to extend the arm without shooting pain which is good.  I need to make sure this heals.  I don’t need yet another body part to add to the continuous cycle of problems.

I have been playing a decent amount of Hold Em on Pokerstars.net, trying to get a better grasp of the game.  Sometimes I think I am doing ok and then in a flash, a couple misjudged ALL INS, f me over.  It is fun though.  I need to try the real thing sometime.  The money in the tournaments is insane.    

We officially booked the room reservation for Vegas for our birthdays.  The flight out is cheap, the flight back is $$$$.  We are waiting a bit to book the flight to see if we can hit a better fare but it is looking like we will drop 900 bucks on airfare alone.  It’s a bad time of year to fly.

Well even though Nicki did a number two for me at 7am and another small one for Ali before she left for a couple hours, Ali came back to yet another stinky pile.  So we are back to square one.  After the gym I picked up more of the same medicine.  It doesn’t quite make sense to me, after two or three days on the pills we had no more problems and she was on them for a solid 10 days, finishing up only a couple of days ago.  They should have killed whatever was going on.

Then I think crazy thoughts like “maybe Nicki thinks she has the green light to shit in the house since I didn’t scream at her yesterday for doing it…”  Regardless it is very frustrating.  My suggestion is from now on, if she is left home alone, she is restricted to the kitchen.  Excrement cleans up flawlessly on ceramic tile, plus dogs are less likely to shit in an area they are confined in.  Ali hates to confine her but it is the same thing she preaches is missing with most kids nowadays, repercussions for actions.  You shit on the floor you are confined until you regain my trust, pretty simple.   

Yesterday we put my theory to the test that if Nicki did one number 2 before Ali went to work, she would be able to hold the rest of the day until I got home.  Well I was wrong.  I got home to a big pile neatly tucked away in the corner of the dining room (Nicki’s preferred indoor toilet)  I couldn’t scream at her because we knew this was a possibility leaving her home for 10 hours plus.  I guess we should have kept her in the kitchen.   There actually was a secondary small pile next to the kitchen island too.  So I guess we go back to Ali’s later schedule.  Originally we hoped that our neighbors would be able to let her out on days when Ali works but that hasn’t seemed to be working out.  Ali feels like a pest asking twice a week.

Yesterday I went crazy and had my TWO functional Roombas cleaning at once!  It was cool in a nerdy, geeky way watching my two vacuuming robots have at it.  

Nothing else much to say, I will keep busy this weekend as normal.  I want to give the van a nice cleaning, tend to my cantaloupe jungle, all that jazz….

Remote assistance is a feature that has been around since Windows XP hit the scene some 5 or 6 years ago.  What it does is allow someone to request help from someone else.  They send an email with a small attachment to the person, the remote person opens it and then through the magic of remote control, the two people are connected.  I knew about the feature but never have used it, until yesterday.

My brother’s 6 year old laptop was giving him problems so he went to Best Buy and got another one.  He had the Geek Squad there pull his old files off and put them on the new laptop.  However there were two problems.  All they did was grab the files off the C drive and dump them in a  folder on the desktop called OLDHDD.  So most users aren’t going to know where to put the stuff on the new system so it appears at the same place.  The second problem was the majority of his files actually were on the D drive, which they didn’t even touch.

So as I had him on the phone, I quickly looked up the procedures for establishing a remote assistance connection.  After a few minutes I successfully was remote controlled into his Windows Vista laptop.  I was able to do most tweaks just like I was sitting there.  The only time I was handcuffed was if one of those incredibly annoying Vista “are you sure you want to do this?” dialogue boxes came up.  Todd had to click that box, I was unable to.  Anyway after a lot of screwing around we got the basic stuff working that he needs for his business.  Anyway, it’s a cool feature.

The new Roomba arrived today.  It is a nice deep maroon color.  I had Ali take it out and charge it while I was still at work so it would be ready to go when I got home.  I fired it up and let it do a quick run.  It seems quieter than my Discovery model.  It did a fine job.  I also tried out the new cleaning tool for the brushes.  It is awesome.  It makes the job of cleaning the hair off the brushes much, much easier.  Once my ebay auctions close out I will be snagging a Dirt Dog next.

So I may be attempting Roomba surgery shortly, combining two Roombas with different problems into one that is 100% functional.

I took the van to work yesterday and it performed just fine, no shakes, AC blew cold, and the brakes worked well. When I got back home last night I decided to go and touch the wheels to see how hot they were.  The passenger side rear wheel was hot!  Not as hot as it has been in the past but when I touched the driver side rear wheel it was only a little warm.  I called the garage again this morning and they owner said I should drop by and they can check it.  It’s a major pain in the ass logistically getting the van there nowadays since Ali and I don’t drive to work together anymore.  I have pretty much decided this is the end of the road with repairs with this garage.  I like the owner but the reality is every single repair I have had them do (except the replacement of the starter in the Toyota) has required multiple visit follow ups, which is extremely annoying. The joys of owning a 14 year old vehicle…. 

Barry Bonds broke Hank Aaron’s record.  Yay.  Barry’s feat is near meaningless to me. MAYBE, just maybe, if he manned up and admit that he knowingly took steroids, regretted doing it and accepted the consequences I may feel slightly better about him.  But as things stand, to me, he is a piece of shit.  If he had any class, he would have retired a couple seasons ago so he wouldn’t tarnish the record books with his steroid and cattle growth hormone aided homerun escapades.  Loser.

It seems that thus far, there is an interesting cast of characters assembling for the Spartan Halloween challenge. We are up to 7 participants.  I found that the simple act of entering this “contest” was all that I needed to light a little fire under me.  My competitive nature will drive me to push myself even harder at the gym and push me to be more disciplined with my diet.  Let’s see where I can go with it. I already am making plans to not shave for at least the month of October. 🙂

Some of the links off the site lead to other contestant blog sites which had some interesting quotes.  Here is one that caught my attention:

World-Class Fitness in 100 words:

Eat meat and vegetables, nuts and seeds, some fruit, little starch and no sugar. Keep intake to levels that will support exercise but not body fat. Practice and train major lifts: Deadlift, clean, squat, presses, C&J, and snatch. Similarly, master the basics of gymnastics: pull-ups, dips, rope climb, push-ups, sit-ups, presses to handstand, pirouettes, flips, splits, and holds. Bike, run, swim, row, etc, hard and fast. Five or six days per week mix these elements in as many combinations and patterns as creativity will allow. Routine is the enemy. Keep workouts short and intense. Regularly learn and play new sports. From Crossfit.com

And here is another one I liked:

The problem is not solved if you send an email. The problem is not solved if you leave a voicemail. The problem is not solved if someone tells you they will handle it. The problem is not solved if you tick it off your list. The problem is not solved if you get it off your desk. The problem is not solved even if you eliminate every symptom. The problem is only solved when the problem is solved. And it is still your responsibility — despite emails, voicemails, promises and list-ticking — until it is done. Get it? From Scott’s blog http://thinkfit.blogspot.com/

And finally, this:

If the day’s workout prescribes hard work (as opposed to recovery or “conversational” intensity) and you can read a magazine, or talk, or take a sip of your favorite sports drink, or recognize it’s your phone that’s ringing, or if you’re not feeling dizzy, then you are not working hard. Avoiding hard work isn’t wrong but it should not be confused with embracing effort, mouth wide open and giving it a bit of tongue …(from www.gymjones.com)

A nice blog entry with only a few CTRL-V’s – nice

I drove the party van to work today.  I want to drive it at least once a week leading up to the trip to make sure the issues are squashed. So far, so good.

$1132!  Yep another 4 figure van repair bill!  I expected it to be high, not quite this high but oh well.  The garage went ahead and put in an aftermarket stabilizer kit for the front end.  It was something he mentioned to me early in the procesess as a possibility but I never agreed to it.  I wasn’t in the mood to argue, if the stabilizer helps the situation I am more than willing to lay out the extra bucks.  The 1100 bucks also bought me new rear brake shoes and wheel cylinders, two new emergency brake cables, two bushings for the front end and two new tires.  At least for the drive from the garage back to work, the van seemed to act just fine.  Now I just need to give it a thorough cleaning to prep for the trip.

Evidently there is a huge demand on ebay for broken Oakley Eye Jackets.  I listed the three pair on there for 10 bucks each and they were gone within a couple hours!  Nothing like taking a 95% depreciation hit on your investment.

Shhh, keep it quiet but my shoulder actually feels a little better today….