Before Tall T kills me

Last week I went down to Florida and stayed with the Mitzman. He had told me that we would go to a party when I was there. So he picked me up at the airport and then told me that it was a work party we were going to and I was his date. What the hell is that? Yeah, he totally suckered me into being his date for his work's Christmas party. One of the guys at the party started making fun of Dave for bringing a guy. I made sure that he knew I had no idea. Damn the Mitz and his gayness.

Done working for the year

Current music: Ella Fitzgerald - This Love of Mine

Talked to Jennie. Glen and the crew are gonna be at her house tonight so I might go. I am so indecisive. Finished up what I wanted to work on here at work and I don't want to start another project now so I will just wait until next week. I am pretty tired. I guess I will go home and eat some lunch. Maybe I will hit up the skatepark for a little while this afternoon. Not sure though because I am really tired from last night.

There is one thing that would make up my mind about tonight...

Work? what is that?

Current music: Ella Fitzgerald - Taking a Change on Love

Last night was pretty sweet. Holly and Sarah showed up in Buffalo so Tim and I went to Pano's with them. Sarah misses Wegman's so we spent some time there then went to Moe's party at the Blades house. Tim went to the Pink though because he wasn't "cool" enough for the party.

The party wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. After the party Holly wanted to hit up the Pink so we went down there. I played some pool with Kris and we got our asses kicked by some really sexy chick and her partner, but the really sexy chick totally carried the game.

Finally made it home about 3:15 and bed about 3:30. I got up at 8:15 this morning and made it to work at 9. Good thing today is only a half day so I am gonna be leaving at noon.

Jennie is having a party she neglected to tell me about so I had already told the other Sweet Dudes that I was gonna be at Parz's. I will at least go to dinner with those guys, but I might head over to Jennie's after dinner. I really wanna see some of those Rochester folk. It depends on who is gonna be there though. I don't wanna go if it is gonna be lame Nobody Cares groupies, but if Glen is showing up I might go.

Time to do some work or pretend I have some to do.

Run to the Hilly

Current music: Iron Maiden - Run to the Hills

So I amreally not getting much done here at work today. Jon came by and talked for a while. I never did get that cup of tea because my boss was on the phone and then left for a meeting. I had to break into my own stash of Tazo Envy Green Tea. Really pleasant stuff, but I was looking forward to trying some of Shawn's new stuff.

Been playing my desktop putting green game a lot today. I love it.

Time to finish up these incidents and get on with porting my latest invention to two other products. Shhh...can't talk about what it is yet since we haven't released it or even announced it to any customers. We don't want our competitors catching wind. That's right... I invented something...

Run to the Hilly. Piss on the rugger field! Run to the Hilly. Piss on the rugger field.

After work my body lay cold

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Death of an Interior Decorator

So I have made it to the afternoon. I have had several good convos with Jason today. Politics as usual. Here are a few conclusions we have come to:

The dollar will continue to be deflated until in 2005 the Amero (like the Euro, but for the Americas) is introduced. This is a plan which has been outlined by the World Bank and INF in 2000 and you are starting to see the dollar drop now!

The world elite (Bush family, their cronies, Rothchild's, Bin Laden's, etc...) are attempting complete financial domination. To do this the Amero and Euro will eventually be merged into one common currency which they run.

On of the other major parts of financial domination is oil (and all natural resource) domination. This is why the US is in the Middle East. We will continue to take over until all resources belong to the US (which really belongs to the world elite).

Ok, you probably think I am some kind of complete nut job. I know it sounds completely crazy. If you have questions about this or disagree with me I am happy to discuss it. Let me know.

Other than the demise of the US things are going well today and I am going to go make a cup to tea. My boss got some kinds of green tea in, so I am going to try one of those if he is around right now.

Frusterated over several things at once

Current music: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - Tell Balgeary, Balgury is Dead

I went to the new skatepark yesterday on Hertel. It is a pretty cool place. Really big with nice ramps, a stage, and a climbing wall. Bowling was rockin last night. Everybody was there. It was good to see everybody again. Ringer says there has been some shows at the new skatepark. Where the hell have I been? I think I am gonna do some skating there tonight.

Stupid people here at work decided to give me a boatload of new incidents, but most of them are not even really incidents. Now I have to write up explanations why they are not. Just a pain in the ass. Frusterating.

Girls give mixed signals. I give up. I'll just go to NZ where the girls don't play the games.

Vacation is over if you want it.

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Expo '86

Back at work today and I have absolutely no drive to do work. Not really many people here today. Kinda nice and quiet. I do have some work to do so I will do it, but then after that I think I will just work on some pet projects I have.

I got a miniature desktop putting green at the Chinese auction we had at Aunt Fran's house. I have that sitting on my desk now and everyone keeps playing with it.

Good thing we had Chinese Monday today because I woulda been outta luck. I had no money and no lunch. I guess I could have gone to the bank, but nobody likes doing that.

I think I am going to go to the new skatepark on Hertel tonight after work and see what that is all about. I need to get my skate on. I am definitely bowling tonight as well.

Yesterday I sent my last college loan check. Yeah, that's right... I am completely done paying for school and I paid for it all by myself. Now the only money I owe to anybody is for my car and my car is currently worth more than the outstanding loan. Yeah boy...I'm in the black - sorta.

Time to get back to work I guess. I think I will be lazy a little longer and go make a cup of tea.

Current music: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - Dirty Old Town

Hit up my aunt's house on Christmas Eve. She lives in Brandon, near Tampa. We had dinner there and opened some gifts then went home to my grandparents' in Brandenton. Their neighbor's house is painted orange with yellow trim. Don't get me wrong, orange is my favorite color, but damn...it looked like a taco stand.

Christmas day my brother and I went golfing with my dad and his brother, my Uncle Danny. My uncle and my brother are certainly the black sheep of the family and it is really frusterating trying to talk to either of them, but it was fun to golf anyways.

We had a big Christmas dinner at night with gnocchis, cutlets, all the good Italian cookies. I loved it.

In the morning on the 26th we got up early and drove the two and half hours to my mom's parents in Lady Lake...just north of Leesburg. I don't really like going there because it is so boring. THey live in a retirement community called The Villages. Everybody drives golf carts and everyone is super old. We went down to the pool and laid in the sun for a while then went home and had a big dinner. Just pretty much sat around the rest of the night and went in the hot tub. The Bucci's came over. They are friends of my dad's parents and live in the Villages as well.

The next morning I went golfing again with my brother and my dad. I played so much better. I guess that is what happens...not golf for ages then twice in a week and the second time is better. Who'd a thunk?

Today we got up early again and drove to Orlando. Now I am just sitting in the airport and I have about an hour before my flight. Bored...

I believe in a thing called Florida

At my grandparents house right now in Bradenton, FL...near Tampa. The weather is beautiful so what the hell am I doing sitting in here on the computer? Had a great time in the Keys. Kayaked, snorkeled, etc... Went golfing this morning. That's right...it is Christmas and I went golfing...and I loved it. I did crappy. Not sure if that is because I haven't played since the summer or the course was really hard. I have more to post, but I will post later. Big up yourself. There is definitely some one I miss...

Current music: Far - Water & Solutions

Well, the past few days I spent in the Florida Keys. Pretty sweet place. Went out to Key West one day. It is much busier there than I thought it would be. Today we are driving up to Brandon to see my aunt then over to Bradenton to stay with my grandparents. It is a pretty long drive and we are driving right now.

We stopped by the Everglades National Park shortly. Saw some alligators and birds then r-u-n-n-o-f-t because we need to get to Aunt Fran's. The sun is shining now and I can't really see my screen very well so I am gonna stop typing now and just take a nap or something. Seems like all I have done is sleep this week. I did go snorkeling yesterday though they wouldn't let me dive because I don't have my dive cert with me. Pretty gay if you ask me.

Florida here I am

Current music: The Darkness - Do You Believe in Love?

Last night I went out to dinner to Taste Good with Holly and Tim. Went back to Tim's house and hung out for a little then went to bed. We got up at 5 am for Tim to take me to the airport. I txt'd Dave and woke him up. Got into West Palm Beach about 2 pm after playing many games of TuxRacer.

The Mitz picked me up at the airport and he had to go back to work. We went back there and I chilled with Tall Todd. Now we are back at Dave's but we have to go now because he has a work party at Red Lobster and it is unlimited food and booze. (sarcasm)Good thing about the booze. What would I do without it? If I had to come all the way to Florida and not have any booze I would...I don't even know.(/sarcasm)

Time to hit up the party, but I need coffee! We are gonna get over to Barnes & Noble on the way. Boyashaka!

Damn I'm hardcore

Current music: Overcome - Lethargic Duration

Last night was pretty sweet. Holly called me up to eat at Natalie's with her and Tim. I love that place and I wish it could be behind my house wherever I live. I would walk over there all the time.

After dinner I called all over to find movie theatres that had tickets to LOTR - Return of the King. Finally I found some at the closest theatre to my house. You would think I would call there first but nope. Did it up with Jeff and Beth. It was amazing, but I won't say anything more so I don't ruin it for people. I ruin the OC for people, but that is way different.

Work has been pretty slow lately. THere is not a whole lot to do and since I am leaving for vacation my boss doesn't want to give me anything new to start. I am just twiddling my thumbs now for the next hour.

Found out our work holiday party is the 17th of January...way after the holidays are over. Wash me in your blood!!! Sorry...singing on the keyboard.

I have so much to do tonight before leaving for Florida. I have to pack. Ship the Neuros back Digital Innovations. Go see the new skatepark on Hertel Ave. Eat dinner with Tim. Pay my bills. Mail my laptop rebate. I hate having things to do. I have enough of those at work that I like the rest of my life to just be fun. I guess it is all ok though because I will make up for it when I go diving in a few days.

I seriously hope they let me dive. I might totally flip out and kill someone like a ninja if they don't let me. I took the certification classes, but never obtained the actual license certificate for whatever reason. Things were all screwed up because I didn't have a passport photo to give PADI at the time. I think they will let me though as soon as I demonstrate I know a little bit. That is what Laust did in Tutukaka when we went to Poor Knights Islands.

This post is getting really long. I guess since I have so much free time I can just keep going here. I probably won't be posting much while I am in Florida unless I have an internet connection at the place we are staying. I don't think I will though. I won't make my parents pay extra for it. They are already doing enough...

Ha. It is hilarious that I will see Mitzman tomorrow. Haven't seen that dude since graduation. Uh oh...I am gonna be at a Jew's house during Hannukah. Something new I guess. Should be pretty fun.

I hope I have all the stuff I need on my laptop. I have been transferring all my stuff over to it slowly so I can start using it as my main machine and abandon my desktop. I have been slowly migrating, but since I am going tomorrow I had to finish up the migration. I think I have everything I want for the next few weeks. I will stick a few da VD's in my case too and some VCD's and crap. Stacia and I will have a good old time.

I wonder how she is getting along with her new camera. I am sure she has figured out how to use it effectively by now. It is so easy, especially with her iBook.

Ok, well. I am gonna go write some emails and then take off. Gonna leave work so early today. I have nothing else to do here so why am I staying?

sleepy but at work

Current music: The Cure - Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me

Last night was a late night for me. Holly and I went out for some dessert. Alethea's makes some amazing stuff. Went back to her apartment and watched The Two Towers.

I hope I can get tickets to see Return of the King tonight. Definitely excited to see it. Maybe Beth, Brickey, and the rest of the crew are going. I should ring em.

I had an away message yesterday that said something about "Boyashaka!" and something else. I was so happy to get home and see that another American watches Ali G and appreciates him and knew the reference. To cont that theme:

Ey! I am for real wrecked and just dig to ead staines and go to me Julie coz i was up all night wiv a wicked bitch.

Sometimes I am speechless. Sometimes I am clueless.

Current music: Michael Knott - Rockstars on H

Never did make it to bowling last night. Nobody was going but the Blades crew and Dave and I didn't wanna bet with them this week. I guess I coulda bowled with Marie, Tammy, and Donnie, but I just stayed home and went to bed early.

So many incidents lately to resolve at work. I am almost through all of them.

I am confused and don't have any ideas on what to do...maybe I should just ask.

I've got a hunger twisting my stomach into knots

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Transatlanticism

Another week, another day at work.

Last night I was totally not tired. Probably because I was excited playing with my new mp3 player. I didn't go to bed until after 1 and that messed me up because then I couldn't get up at my normal time this morning. Then on my way to work there was a big accident and it took me forever to get through there. Finally made it to work an hour later than usual. Eh...guess I'll be staying late tonight.

This weekend was good. I think I am seeing a trend here. Weekends are good, weekdays suck. Friday night I went out with a really sweet girl who I definitely think is one of the best people I have met in Buffalo. I wonder when I will get to see her again.

Saturday I didn't do much during the day. Just worked on getting my laptop set up. Made some serious progress. Tim and I hit the mall in the evening searching for a pink shirt. He wanted a really bright pink one. We searched that mall from top to bottom and the only one we found was being worn by the cashier at Express. We asked if they had more and he said probably not since it is a "spring color". Stupid marketing people trying to dictate when you can and cannot where pink. Finally we found a sorta light pink shirt at Wet Seal. Damn, that is a pretty bad store, but he got it. Went over to Lihn's place and then to 3rd Room. That is one of the lamest bars I have been to in ages. So we only stayed there about 15-20 minutes then went to the Pink. Shot some stick with Leah for a few hours and inhaled my share of smoke for the next 16.7 years. Tim got pretty wasted and rowdy. It was cool hanging out with Lihn, her sis, and Buttercup. I think I have met Buttercup before, but never formally. Neat chick with fun clothes.

Sunday morning there was snow on the ground and it was coming down in full effect. I got my stuff together and headed to Rochester. My family was exchanging presents then instead of bringing them all to Florida and them bringing them back. Just seemed like too much of a hassle. I got some cool stuffs. MP3 player, Ansel Adams print, fleece blanket, Death Cab's latest album (hint hint...that is why I am listening to it right now) and a few other small things.

The MP3 player I got was the wrong one. I told my mom which one I wanted and I told her wrong. Totally my fault. I am trying to contact the company to see if I can return this one for the other. Either way I am damn happy with it though.

Chinese Monday and I am ready. Like I said earlier, my stomach is in knots. I am just writing documentation today for some software I have been writing over the past two months or so. Docs are boring, but necessary I guess.

Time to get a little more done before Chinese gets here.

Geek talk follows

Current music: Karate - Airport

Ok, if you are not a geek please ignore this post.

I have installed Libranet 2.8.1 on my new Dell Inspiron 1100 laptop and here are the issues I am still having. I downloaded and compiled 2.6.0-test11 and am running it. Nice because it has the b44 driver for the Broadcom ethernet chip. ALSA works, but I can't get multiple audio streams at the same time. My mouse touchpad was working fine until I decided to upgrade to Debian Unstable. It reinstalled Grub and screwed up my bootloader. I had to go in and modify the XF86config-4 file to use the correct mouse driver. It is working better now, but now I can't use it for tap-to-click. There is a website about using the Synaptic Driver which should be installed in this 2.6 kernel. I can't get it working yet and it was after midnight last night so I finally gave up. I will work on it again when I get home.

Stuff I have yet to get working and haven't really tried is ACPI. Supposedly it half works on the latest BIOS (which I have). I also want to get a USB mouse working along with the mouse touchpad. My wireless card I haven't even plugged in yet. I need to take it someplace that I can do some testing since I don't have an access point. I will probably go over to Kris and Tim's.

For the most part things have gone smooth. My USB CF reader that didn't work with the 2.4 kernel works with 2.6 so that is pretty sweet. Supposedly it is difficult to set up the display, but I didn't have much problem. The ALSA stuff has so far been the most difficult. I have never really had it working correctly on any machine. Now I have it installed and working, but I just need to get it to handle multiple streams. Almost there.

Oh so much better

Current music: Jimmy Eat World - Bleed American

Called in sick to work yesterday. My wickedly dry throat finally manifested into a sorta flu-like thing. I am doing so much better today even though I am still not 100%. My sister drove up from Rochester to bring me soup and hang out.

Also, my laptop came yesterday. I spent much of the day trying to get it set up, <geek>but I think I screwed up ALSA so I am gonna start over and use a 2.6 kernel</geek>.

I am back at work now and once again posting to my blog even though we don't have full internet access. I have my ways around that... Now I am sitting here listening to Jimmy Eat World's worst album by far and loving it. I haven't listened to this album in about a year. Reminds me of NZ.

My crushes go no where. NZ, SF, TS...reasons that I can't have the girls I like...

Maybe I should get back to work now.

The day is upon us...

Current music: Karate - Original Spies

The day is upon us that the internet was turned off.

So I came into work this morning and fired up my PC. I had an email from one of the executives. The email stated that the new "Web Security Software" would be fully enabled today. As far as I could tell everything was still working just fine. That was at about 7:45. At 8:25 the guy in the cube next to me said he could not get to google.com. Now the blocking has started. I tried going to Google and was presented with a page stating it is not in the "allow" list. However, after I restarted my browser I was able to get to it again. I have not tried any other sites. It gives me a generally unclean feeling when the "this site is blocked" page comes up.

Right now I have logged into my firewall machine back in my apartment through SSH and started up links (like lynx but with tables) and I am going to try to post this from there. I have tried this before and was unsuccessful, so we'll see how it goes.

In other news, yesterday was Mark Brickey's birthday. Beth gave me a text and told me they were going up to the Seneca casino in Niagara Falls for some dinner at the buffet and asked me to go. So naturally when there is food involved I went. Damn, that place has some food. There was an unreasonable amount of food there. It was unreasonably too much. I ate 2 full plates of dinner then some pie, ice cream, and bread pudding. The bread pudding was gross though. I am never gonna eat that crap again. Now my insides are all messed up. It was way too much meat. I don't eat much meat normally and that was pretty much all I ate there.

Anyways, I love hanging out with that crew. I need to hang with them more. I always say that and then I don't. I need to start calling them up.

Hope this post works...

Strangeness is madness

Current music: Iron Maiden - Fear of the Dark

Back to work once again... At least I get to play in C++ again. Anyway I went to the Bills game yesterday and they won! It was so damn cold, but it was cool hanging out with Dave and seeing some foosball.

I thought the internet was gonna get blocked here at work, but if you can't tell, I am still blogging! I haven't had any problems yet with sites being blocked except that I had to start routing my web traffic (port 80) through the proxy.

Nuff geek talks. Mark Brickey's birthday is today and a bunch of us are taking him out to the casino in Niagara Falls (USA side). It'll be pretty sweet I am sure. I guess that means bowling is off for tonight, but that is ok. Bowling isn't the same since Ballz Bowling ended.

I wish Ryan and I had gone to Stowe this weekend instead of a few weeks ago. They got 22-28"! Oh well, it was good to hit the slopes when we did. Hopefully KB will open up soon. We don't have poop for snow though.

Back to work I guess. I am out of stuff to write for now. Not sure if I will still be able to blog from work in the future, but I will try... I have a phobia that someone's always near.

Hey Ya!

Current music: Andre 3000 - Spread

Yesterday I went out to Two Four Five in Lockport to see some snowboard jackets and found one I liked so I went back today and bought it and got free gloves with it! Weee!

Tonight I went downtown with Tim, Holly, and some of other people I didn't know to see the fireworks and tree lighting but missed it so we went to some Greek restuarant instead. It was funny seeing kid fall on ice skates though. The Tetris tourney was mean as.

I am needing of a sleep.

laptop on the way

Current music: U2 - All I Want Is You

Well, finally got the laptop I have been wating to get. I got a Dell Inspiron 1100. Should be pretty sweet with Linux on there. 2.3 GHz Celeron, 256MB RAM, 20GB HD, 14.1" display... Got a pretty sweet price on it as well.

In other news, they are taking away the internet at work. EVERYTHING is blocked by default and there is a whitelist (aka. a list of sites that you can get to). I don't think the guy that is implementing this (the VP of Operations) has any clue about Engineering. This is going to be a huge hinderance more than anything else. It has already been a pain in the ass today and it went into effect (sorta) at 3 pm. Well, when it is full on Friday we will see what happens. As long as I can SSH to my machine at home I am happy. Then I can run links (tabled version of lynx) and still get the news and crap like that.

Man, my life has been boring these last few days...too much tv, not enough life.

I could ruin another episode of the OC for you

Current music: U2 - Who is Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses

...but I won't!

I watched it last night and I will let you enjoy it this week.

Weekend ends once again

Current music: Explosions in the Sky - Snow and Lights

Lori finally called and came over. We went down to Spot and had a nice cup of coffee then to Wegman's to get some sushi. It was decent for prepackaged stuff. We went back to my house and watched O Brother Where Art Thou? I love that movie.

Sunday was a nice day. I got up and did some work around the house, just cleaning and whatever then went to Barnes & Noble for a few hours. Tim called me and reminded me that Kris's fund raising spaghetti dinner was that evening so I met Tim at his place and we went over. Joe met us there too. It was pretty good, but I ate too many desserts. At night I just watched some TV and went to sleep early.

This morning I think I slept too long because even after 9 hours of sleep I was too tired. I finally dragged myself out of bed and made it to work. Of course right on our street (where I work that is) it was snowing. No place else, but it was a damn blizzard of soggy snow and I was drenched by the time I made it the 100 feet from my car to the door.

During lunch I went out and got a money order for my criminal record check and mailed my fingerprints and the money order to Albany for the background check. Now I just need to get the blood work done and I am nearly done with my visa stuff. Woohoo!

Finished up the DHCP stuff I was doing here at work and moved on to finding a new incident to work on... Still haven't decided whether or not I should purchase that laptop. I keep going back and forth in my head.

Waiting is my life

Current music: U2 - The Joshua Tree

So far I have really enjoyed my few days off. Wednesday night Kris, Pizza Kid, and I went out for some laughs. Hit up Jim's Steak Out, Spot, then the Pink. Kris got way too wasted. Thursday I drove to Rochester and had a nice Thanksgiving with the rents and watched Finding Nemo. Friday I went out to breakfast with my sister to Brueggers Bagels then just hung around the rest of the day and played with the dog. Went over to Jennie's at night and watched Zoolander. I love that movie.

Today I go up early to do breakfast with my rents at Sweetland, but they were closed so we went to the New Yorker instead. It was pretty good, but Sweetland is better. After that it was snowing too hard to drive back to Buffalo so I waited until about 1 then left. Since I have been back here I haven't done too much interesting stuff. Just cleaning and burning CD's.

I might buy the new Dell Inspiron 1100 Notebook for $599, but I am not sure yet. I need to decide quick before the promo ends. Now I am just waiting for Lori to call. She is a punk. Says she will call at 6:30...yeah...it is nearly 8!

Making up my mind

Current music: Mogwai - I Know You Are But What Am I?

Well, it is the weekend already and it is only Wednesday. I love it. Finally got those pictures online that I promised...

I was planning to go to Rochster tonight, but I changed my mind. I will hang out with Kris, Tim, Bob, and Parz tonight instead.

My cousin helped me change my oil in my car today. First time I did it myself.

Got the DHCP renewal working now at work so it felt good to finish something up just before the weekend.

Mondays are sleep days

Current music: Pedro the Lion - A Mind of Her Own

I got home from work last night and fell asleep on the couch by 5:30 pm. I woke up at 9 and made a few phone calls and watched the OC. Then I did a little work on the computer and went back to bed at 11:30. It was pretty awesome.

So the new OC wasn't that great of an episode in my opinion. Lots of weird stuff happened. Marissa's old boyfriend and Ryan become friends and find out that his dad is gay. His dad tells his mom and then everything explodes in town and ends with them getting in a fight with some homo-haters. Marissa and Ryan get in an argument over whether or not Marissa told people about her old boyfriend's dad being gay. Kirsten helps out Marissa's mom with sorting out her life. Summer and the Pittsburgh girl become friends until Seth apologizes to them. Then they both want dates with him. There, now I have ruined another episode for you!

I am at work right now and just figured out that we can't renew the DHCP address when the lease expires because we are doing it from the wrong place and ignoring ARP's that come through. This causes a timeout. So now I have to write a whole subsystem to put into the health monitoring system to check whether or not the DHCP lease needs to be renewed then renew it at that point.

I am really learning the intricacies of DHCP. Not that it is all that complicated, but I guess it is a good protocol to know.

Got more email from that girl I mentioned yesterday. Why is she so far away?

Back from my excursions

Current music: Appleseed Cast - E to W

Well, Friday was intense. I called Stowe in the morning and they said they were going to open Saturday. Called Ryan and we made the plans. I left work at about 4 and packed my stuff. I was at Ryan's house in Rochester at about 6:15 then we left for Plattsburgh. Got up there at 11:30. Pretty good time considering we even stopped for dinner.

Visited with Shaun and Mario and Lori came over too. Slept at Mike's for about 4 hours then at 5:45 am hit up Dunkin Donuts and took off for Stowe.

We were at Stowe by 8 and riding by 8:30. The day started really icy, but quickly softened up. Ryan took one hell of a digger on a rail and injured his ass. Rode all day until about 2 pm then hit up the Cabot outlet and then back to Plattsburgh we went.

Dinner was at Mangia's and Coffee Club meeting was at Coffee Camp. We went to see an illusionist and that was really weird. This guy could totally read minds and crap like that.

After that I simply passed out. I couldn't take any more. In the morning we went to eat at this really crappy diner where Something Cool used to be and paid too much for a crappy breakfast. Ryan, Mike, and I went over to see the Hartman's and then left to come back home at about 2:30 pm. We made it to Ryan's at about 7:45 then I visited the rents quickly and came back to Buffalo. When I got back to my apartment and looked at my computer I had a message from someone that made me really happy. I don't think she ever reads this, but if she does...it made me happy.

Holy crap. I am tired today!

This morning I was a disaster. The temperature is going to drop today from about 58 this morning to 28 by the evening. Of course I didn't pay any attention to this and didn't wear a jacket so I am gonna freeze going home from work. I also completely forgot that our Chinese Monday coordinator is out this week so we are not having it. Ended up going to Pizza Hut and stuffing myself.

I think I need a cup of tea. Pictures from the weekend will be up soon and there are some mean ones.

Sleep was needed

Current music: Ben Folds - new EP

Last night I sat down at 7 to watch The Two Towers and I rememeber seeing the first 20 minutes and I woke up at 9:30. At that point I just turned off the TV and went and got in bed. Next thing I knew it was 6:15 this morning and time to go to work. Felt good to sleep. I needed it.

Working on this stupid DHCP stuff right now. Our product isn't renewing its DHCP lease when the lease expires. Pretty simple fix, but for some reason it doesn't want to compile.

It is almost time for Pizza Thursday, only about 15 more minutes.

Ready for LOTR

Current music: Snapcase - Steps

LOTR-TTT extended edition came out yesterday. I am definitely going to watch it tonight. I bought it yesterday, but I was busy with a few other things so I couldn't dedicate 4 hours to watching it.

Ryan and I might go up to Stowe this weekend to do some riding, but now it is looking like plans will probably be cancelled. Too much rain the forecast.

I think it is time to change my desktop background. I have had this one on for quite a while now. I am using this one here at work...of course a much larger version though.

I have decided to switch to this.

Through a window!

Time to ruin another

Another week...another ruined OC for all you people reading. I didn't quite make it a full 24 hours early this time, only 22!

Ryan and Marissa go to Chino to see his brother. Ryan gets asked to deliver a stolen car and does and almost gets beaten up, but Marissa saves him after she learns about his old girlfriend and how Ryan used to do musicals. Seth manages to piss off both Summer and the Pittsburgh chick by hooking up with both of them and then they both find out. Seth's parents try to hook up Jimmy and Rachel and it works. Seth's grandfather and Marissa's mother show up for Thanksgiving dinner and the whole thing turns crazy. It all smooths out in the end with everybody eating Chinese, even though Seth's girls are both gone.

I remember sitting on your car that night.

Current music: Ben Folds - newest EP

Damien Jurado was so awesome last night. Rosie Thomas was really good too. I didn't have enough cash on me to get one of her CD's though so I ended up with Damien Jurado's new EP called Holding his Breath. It sounds really good. I have only listened to it once today and I didn't really focus on it since I was coding at the time.

I can't wait... the new Lord of the Rings - The Two Towers came out today. I am gonna pick it up on my way home and watch it tonight. If anybody wants to watch it with me then give me a call.

Damn, this new Ben Folds is really good. Ok, back to work now.

Damien is tonight...really!

Current music: Ben Folds Five - Mess

This weekend rocked almost as hard as last weekend...maybe harder because the mission was completed last night.

Friday Kris and I went over to Jimmy's house and hung out with Leisha and some others then hit up the Pink. We played some pool with a crack head. Pretty awesome.

Saturday I spent most of the day either at Barnes & Noble reading or at my computer. How exciting!

Saturday night I went out with Beth, Brickey, Frank, Daryl, Clint, Liz, and some other people to Spicy Thai. Beth said that my meal smelled like elephants. I guess that is not a good thing... It wasn't the best Thai I have ever had. We went to Texas Chainsaw Massacre after that. Pretty sweet movie. Acting was terrible, but seeing Jessica Biel in a wet white tanktop isn't a bad thing. I was "sufficiently scared" since I have never seen the original one.

Sunday we had Ballz Mission Night again. Got some food at Pano's then commenced on the mission. Joe whistled. Sarah mooned. Kris pressed ham. Sarah invited. Mission completed!

Can't wait to see Damien Jurado tonight. Everybody should go...Mohawk @ 9.

Tasting India

Just got back from an awesome lunch at Taste of India! Man, that place rocks. Prices aren't bad and the food is fantastic. I don't know why I haven't gone there before since it is so close to my apartment. Hit up the doctor's office on the way. I have to get blood work, urine tests, and x-rays next week and bring them back to the doctor so he can complete the forms. Once I have that done and I get my fingerprint stuff back all I will have to do is send out the visa application to the embassy! Getting ready...

Back to work because I am really busy lately.

And if you focus very hard...

Current music: The Rapture - Echoes

Work is starting to really pick up in pace lately, but I think it might fall flat again soon. Yesterday was pretty cool. I just hung out at Barnes & Noble for the evening and read. I think I am gonna start doing that more. I enjoy it. Started reading a book about investing. I am really starting to get wrapped up in it.

Tuesday night Matt and I went to the mall. I got the new Rapture cd and I love it. I have listened to it atleast 8 times since then. It is pretty good coding music and I have done plenty of that lately. I am writing a JPEG decoder right now. It is a really simple one that just extracts height and width information. However, it could easily be made into a much more elaborate one. I am doing it for work. We are going to be embedding it in one of our products so that if images change sizes (which they could because of our demanding OEM's) we need to restructure the page to accomodate.

Another new OC

Current music: The Postal Service - The District Sleeps Alone Tonight

Just finished watching the OC's new episode more than a full day before it is out. Not bad huh? Marissa and Ryan are now officially boyfriend and girlfriend. They don't go out on their new date, but he catches Marissa's mom kissing Seth's grandfather. Marissa exposes the affair on a yacht at a party when she thought that her parents were gonna get back together. Summer admits that she like Seth and kisses him. Seth doesn't tell Anna. Anna tries to kiss him, but he walks away. Quite a bit happened this episode. Good thing I spoiled it for you!

Weekends are better than weekdays

Damn that was a good weekend. Went to see Elf on Friday night with Beth, Brickey, Rachel, and a ton of other people. That movie was really funny. Afterwards we went over to Jim's Truck Stop. We should hang out in truck stops more often. There are some pretty awesome characters there.

Saturday I got up early and made some eggs then headed off to Rochester. Jennie and I went to the AJA Noodle Company. It reminded me a lot of Xin Vego. Their chinese dishes were similar, but not everything was vegetarian. Saw Colin Mockery (from Whose Line is it Anyway?) in Geneseo with my parents at night. I missed the peak of the eclipse because we were in the show, but I saw most of it. Drove home after that I got in about 1 am. Kris wanted me to meet him out at Goodbar, but I had to decline. I shoulda gone though because it was quite a night according to him.

Sunday morning I went to Aunt Patty's investment club meeting. It was pretty good. I learned quite a bit and have some new investment ideas. Right now I have two stocks I want to buy. Neither of them are tech stocks. I need to diversify a little. One is a medical supply company and the other is a retailer of home furnishings and such. I am again not going to name them yet. I will track them a little bit and make sure of what I think of them. I will tell you though...the investment club decided to purchase 75 shares of Bed, Bath, and Beyond, 50 shares of Hot Topic, and 50 shares of Corinthian College. All three of which I am fond of investing in although I would have chosen University of Phoenix Online over Corinthian. After the meeting I went home and called up Kris. We went hiking down in the Niagara Gorge. We went to the Upper Whirlpool Rapids. It is really awesome this time of year because the water level is low and you can walk out on the rocks that are usually the river bed. We took a lot of pictures then climbed this 25 foot rock wall that we could have just walked around but then where is the adventure. Called up Tim and Joe on the way home and met them out at the Golden Duck for T. Decided to go hang out at Starbucks after and that is where the madness began. Ballz Missions night began and moved to Target then to Wegman's.

Pictures from the gorge will be coming on my website soon...

2 days of chicken, hot sauce, and pizza

Yesterday Kris told me to come over and eat chicken wing pizza. So I did. Today is Pizza Thursday at work and I got chicken finger pizza. Only in Buffalo!

I called the police this morning to set up my fingerprinting... Stupid appointments were all taken up by 8:05 am. I gotta call tomorrow at about 7:30 am. I need to print out my doctor's stuff too and bring it to them to start filling out.

Hung out at Kris and Tim's last night for a while. Kris definitely played a Stacy Clark song on his guitar and sang it! Ha!

Ok, that investment I made a few weeks ago now...maybe it was the beginning of last week...was Corning Glass (GLW). It has done quite well since I bought it. Up 6.07% since I bought it as of 1:14 pm today. I would put it at a long-term "strong buy" right now. General Communications (GNCMA) isn't doing terribly either. That is up 4.24% since I bought it as of 1:15 pm today. I don't really wanna say much about GNCMA other than I have it. The latest earnings reports that came out today are kinda mixed. I guess I would say "hold" for now, but that may change soon.

So I am making a little cash there. I have a few more investments that I am considering lately... I'll keep those to myself for the moment.

Waiting waiting waiting

Waiting for my boss to get off the phone.

So last night I fell asleep on my couch and woke up on my living room floor. Only problem was it was 6:14 am. It was 1 minute before my alarm was gonna go off. So I slept the entire night not in my bed. I am not sure how much of it I spent on the floor though.

He is off the phone. Bye.

Here we go again

Current music: The Beach Boys - Original Gold CD2

Back at work for the day. I am waiting for the NYS Department of Criminal Justice to call so that I can figure out what I need to do about my visa fingerprinting. I think I will wait until after lunch and if I still haven't heard from the woman I will give her a call again.

Last night I pretty much sat around and watched tv all night. I watched the new OC that is playing tonight. I watched 2 episodes of Simpsons. I watched The Office Season 1 Episode 1. If I don't get more active I am gonna start gaining weight again. It is so hard though when it is dark and rainy and there is no snow to do some riding.

Does anybody wanna go to the Reggie and the Full Effect show in Rochester tonight? I might go if I have somebody to go with so text me or something.

The OC...before it aired...two weeks in a row!

Well, Marissa and Ryan kiss. Everybody knows that from the previews. Ryan slide-tackles her old boyfriend and causes lotsa drama. That girl from Pittsburgh likes Seth, and kisses him. She plays it off as she is just trying to help him get Sommer. He ends up riding the tilt-a-whirl with Sommer in the end and the Pittsburgh girl is all disappointed. Now that I have ruined it for you again maybe I will next week as well.

I'll get through it. I'm better than this.

Current music: Onelinedrawing - 15,000

My boss is the first person to notice that I am going for a winter look... He said "Nice beard you're starting...I like Winter Lenny."

Chinese Monday was a success even though it was late. Man, I really need something to do today. Time to see the boss.

Here I am...naked

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Your Bruise

Back at work after 3 days off. That felt pretty good. Reggie is playing tomorrow in Toronto and Wednesday in Rochester. I am definitely going to one of them!

Yesterday I hit up the outlet mall in Niagara Falls. I got some pretty sweet pants from Gap for only $10. I didn't really find any other good deals.

Got a meeting soon. Made some progress on my stuff this morning so that feels pretty good.

I need to get my police report about myself filled out for my NZ visa, but it's a pain because I have to get fingerprinted. Since I already was printed last summer for a job I think I should just be able to have them use those prints. I gotta call the FBI or State Police during lunch and ask, but I don't really have any numbers to call. I am gonna just call the State Police I guess and ask them what I need to do. I need to print out the doctor's forms too and bring those to the doctor to have filled out. I hope I don't have to go through a whole eval. That would be crap.

I am wasting away the day

This weekend has been pretty awesome. Last night I went out with the dudes. I got snuck into the show, but my keys were in Joe's car and Joe and Tim didn't get in so I left with them. We went to Leisha's then to Davina's then to some party. Party was so lame but there were some really cute girls there. Then Kris and Tim and around in underwear and speedos. Some girl ripped Kris's underwear off and that made the party. Hit up the Pink for a while, but got bored quick.

Ballz night is making a comeback.

halloween is a waste of time

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Title and Registration

Last night was pretty sweet. Dan came to visit Jeff and I before he left to move to Vail. Damn, all my friends are moving far away. I guess I am next. I was cool to see Dan one last time and as always it is good to spend time with Jeff and Jen. We watched 28 Days Later and I was surprised. It was actually pretty good. Maybe a little over the top some of the time, but really cool nonetheless. Weird stuff to think about.

Show tonight! It should be fun because Kris, Tim, and I will all get to hang out. We never do that anymore. I think we might go out for some dinner beforehand. I can't wait to see ETID. Last time (the only time) I saw them I missed most of their set but from what I did see I loved it. Snapcase is always ok to see even if I do hate their new stuff.

Halloween is upon us

Current music: Stickmen Soundtrack

Pics I took today...

Back and worn out

Current music: Beatles - I'm a Loser

A lot of driving today, but I definitely saw some cool stuff. I went to the Little Rock City and check stuff out there. Then went to Alleghany State Park and hiked Mt. Seneca to go caving in Bear Caves. I couldn't get into the Mother Bear Cave, but I got into Papa Bear and Baby Bear. Papa Bear was so long...over 120 feet! I'll post pictures sometime.

Came back home and ate some gnocchis with the sauce and meatballs I made last night.

Day off

Current music: Recess Theory - To Be An Anchor

I was half way to work today and I decided that I didn't want to go. It is so nice out. So I stopped for some coffee and made a call to my boss. Just came home and packed up my stuff. I am gonna head down to the Southern Tier and do some hiking. I need to hike sometimes and just get away from this damn city.

Don't try to find me until later today. You won't.

Are you kidding?

Current music: Mineral - 80-37

I can not believe this... The Bin Laden family has won a contract to take over control of a Saudi airport!

Not only that! Jessica Lynch's rescuers and company are turning up dead!

This all makes me sick.

Markets

I have been getting into the stock market lately. I have been following it a lot and finally decided to throw in some money... Just a little at first then maybe I will up the stakes later. Tuesday morning I bought GCI. They haven't done much since, but I will give it some time. I have another buy order in, but it hasn't traded yet. For right now I am going to keep that one to myself as I am not sure if I will get my bid price or not. Depends on how the opening goes.

Jeff and I went to some sweet farming, hunting, and tractor stores last night. I bought a pretty cool shirt. It is totally a women's shirt, but I don't think people will know. It was only $3 so I couldn't pass it up.

I was gonna make some homemade spaghetti sauce last night too, but by the time I got back from the stores and went to Wegman's and all it was past 9pm. I guess I will do it tonight. I have never made it before so I hope it goes well. Either way, my apartment is gonna smell good. If anybody wants some let me know. I am gonna freeze most of it so you can have some if you want!

Decided not to go to Plattsburgh this weekend. Tor is gonna go up to do some hiking, but just Saturday and I don't feel like making the long drive this weekend. I think maybe I will go around the beginning of December sometime and go snowshoeing instead.

Need caffiene...

Alread watched the OC

Current music: UB40 - So Destructive

For all you who wanna know...Marissa doesn't go to the mental institute and Ryan gets into the private school. Haha, I have ruined it for everyone!

Sleepy...

Jeff and Beth called me last night to meet them at Natalie's for dinner. I love that restaurant. Hit up the mall afterwards and got my phone fixed. Hung out and listened to music with Jeff for a while. By the time he left it was too damn late to do any shopping and I need food. I had nothing to eat this morning for breakfast except Special K cereal bars...that is not a breakfast. I also had nothing to make for lunch for the second day in row. I just cooked some frozen gnocchis and I guess I will be having a small lunch.

I wanna go back to bed. I guess I will go make some tea instead.

It's better to burn

Current music: Onelinedrawing - February (Barrier)

Ballz Bowling just isn't the same anymore. I love bowling with Marie, Tammy, and Donnie, but it's not Tim and Joe... Kris and I are gonna have to get them to start coming again.

we need more weekends

Current music: Rainer Maria - Long Knives Drawn

What a weekend. I like having non-boring weekends. Went to Canada with Stacia, Kris, and Kristen Friday night. We ate at Xin Vego...mmm, I love that place. We decided to hit up the casino and lose money. Kris and Kristen definitely did, but Stacia and I rocked. Stacia won almost $200US and about 5 minutes later I got over $120US. I like casinos again. Damn...they always fool me into like them enough to take my money again.

Everybody left their leftovers at my house because the guy put them in 1 bag. I ate mock chicken balls for 3 meals...

Stacia and I went out for breakkie in the morning then to the mall then to Mighty Taco. I didn't really feel like going there, but I hadn't been in ages and she loves it. After she went back to Rochester I just slacked the rest of the day until night time. Went over to Beth's new place. Damn, I really like her house. I'm impressed. I think Brickey is living there with her now. Frank was there and Kris came over too. We played some serious XBox, geeked with Macs, and ate nachos. That is how Saturday nights should be...

Sunday morning went to an investment club meeting. I am getting old. Spent the afternoon with Rachel between the art gallery and Coffee &. It was cool to just hang out and talk with her.

I need to get work done. It has been dark for weeks because of the clouds and rain. When it stops later this week it is just gonna be dark because we turned the clocks back. Blah

will be here. will be there

Current music: Portishead - Cowboys

Ah...home from work for a few days. Stacia is coming here tonight and should actually be here real soon. Should be fun. I think we are gonna go up to the casino because she is finally 19 and wants to lose money. Probably go out to dinner while we're out. Kris might come. Tim might come. Matt might come. Maybe I should call them...

Made more progress on my stuff at work, but still 1 major problem and one minor one. Poop.

It's not superficial...it's not.
Why decide so quick?

hrmmm

Current music: Death Cab for Cutie - Something About Airplanes

Kinda got myself in a weird place right now... Not sure about much at all.

Bummed

Elliott Smith dead at 34. Sucks.

In other news... my sister is gonna come visit this Friday. That should be pretty cool. I don't think she has been to visit in a few months.

Last night I was so tired again. What is wrong with me lately? I started watching the World Series and totally fell asleep at about 9 on the couch. This morning I woke up in my bed, but I don't really know how I got there.

The doctor didn't have to take my finger off. Good thing huh? Just got prescribed some antibiotics.

Not matter how far I go...not so far away.

Current music: The Promise Ring - My is at Home

Compiling in Solaris! Still some problems. Do you really wanna know about them Jayzorbeard?

Anyways...401k meeting went well and I like some of the new choices, but on the other hand I am kinda dissappointed we are losing some of the others. All in all, I think this new one is probably better. I think I am gonna do a mix of a bunch of funds in this style... Bonds = 8%, Large Cap (value/growth/blend all combined)= 40%, Mid Cap = 20%, Small Cap = 17%, and Global = 15%. That should be a good aggressive mix.

Ok...back to sipping my tea and trying to compile while drowning myself in bread and coffee.

Deboogering

Current music: Explosions in the Sky - How Strange, Innocence

Made a doctor's appointment for later today about my infected hands. Man...they are starting to hurt a little I think. Got meetings today for our company's 401k switch to a new provider. That is gonna be a hassle, but maybe it will be good and maybe we will get some better funds to invest in...

Last night was pretty sweet even though I only bowled one game. I shoulda bowled more, but I didn't bring enough money and I was tired. Monday night and I am too tired to bowl? Something must be wrong. Maybe it's because nobody has been coming to bowling lately so I just felt slack.

Why won't this email send?

I got my body and my mind on the same page, and now happiness is all the rage.
Promise Ring

This country will know us by name... This country will know us by name... This country will know me by name...

Current music: Damien Jurado - Where Shall You Take Me?

Rocked the Bills game with the old people and the Bills won. Then I came home and watched the Yankee game. They won too! I have been such a sports enthusiast this weekend.

Back to work for the week now. I have some people interested in the wxWindows work I am doing on UDP sockets so that is pretty cool. Now I just need to get it to work in Mac... <rant>Why is Mac so special that they feel they can use a completely different set of networking libraries? Just use sockets like everybody else does...</rant>

I really need to go to the doctor because my hands are both infected now from my wipe out on my bike... Why does this happen to me? I think I am gonna soak them again tonight and see if they get better by tomorrow. If not I am definitely gonna go tomorrow.

Why isn't it 5pm yet?

who is going to the Bills game?

Current music: Michael Knott - Die Baby Die

My aunt called me this morning with a ticket to the Bills game. So I am going even though I am really not a football fan. It should be fun.

Yesterday was a busy day, but it was really good. Except for one part. The Yankees lost.

Talked to Blair for a while this morning. Good to hear about the old NZ crew now and again. Weird...Blair says hi to pirate girl... He also says I should go on a mission like in Coffee Club days. This one would be to fill in that damn ditch that I hit on my bike. Fill it in with cement. That would teach those construction workers to mess with me.

More concerts...more music

Current music: The Gloria Record - The Overpass

Tiredness is setting in...maybe it is time for caffeine. Last night I left work a little early and headed up to Toronto with Tim for Death Cab. They played with the Long Winters and Nada Surf. Neither of them were very good and I couldn't get the idea out of my head that I was seeing the band that played "Popular". Anyways, DCFC rocked my socks. They played a really long set too, I think it was about 18 songs!

We got home at about 3am so I slept in this morning until 8. Now I have to stay at work late. Boo. Oh well, I have plenty I need to do anyway. I wonder how the Onelinedrawing show went for Kris... I'll have to give him a call after work.

Just got back from lunch. We went to a kickin Greek place (sorta) called Sam's. One of the guys I work with knew about it. It had Greek foods, but then some really American stuff too like chicken fingers. Weird. I had one of the best falafel sandwiches I have ever eaten.

Woo! Beth's birthday today and we are going out for some fun times.

Damn drivers

Current music: Maritime - Adios

Coming into work I turn from North French Road (2 lanes in each direction) onto CrossPoint Parkway (2 lanes at first, narrowing after about 200 feet to 1 lane). I turn right onto CrossPoint. People turning left should wait their turn. No, they never do. They always feel the need (even at 7:30 AM when there is not much traffic) to turn at the same time I do. Damn Buffalo drivers almost hit me today. What really gets me about that intersection is that the people turning their are either coming to work with me or going across the street to NCO. The bad drivers seem to always be the ones from NCO.

Aside from that...the Mico, Maritime, and Weakerthans show last night rocked. I had never heard of Mico before and they were pretty good, but nothing special. Maritime has some of the former members of the Promise Ring, including the singer. I love the Promise Ring and Maritime is really good too. Much happier sounding and almost danceable if you are a hippy. Sounds much more like old Promise Ring than the recent stuff which is fine by me!

Tonight is Death Cab for Cutie in Toronto...road trip with Sweet Baby Moose (ex-Sweet Baby Tim).

Ouch...ouch...oooo

I am work now. We had a corporate breakfast this morning where we talk about the state of the company and stuff. Of course I had to sit at the table with the President and CEO of the company and I look terrible with all my cuts, scraps, and bumps.

They are starting to all scab up now although my head is a bit pussy and my right hand is not starting to scab at all yet. I have it covered while I am here at work so that I don't get an infection. I keep resting my elbows on things and that is not fun at all because they are so bruised.

I am not a complainer...really, but I am pretty messed up.

On the other hand, sweet to see Lori Vag last night at bowling, and Craiger came, and Rob and Pam came. It was like the good ol' days. I didn't bowl because I am messed up, but hung out.

Yanks better win tonight. I guess I am just gonna sit at home tonight (after buying tickets for the Weakerthans (and Maritime and Mico)) so I will probably watch the game.

Time for work...

I fought against my bike and it tore me to pieces

Current music: Cool Hand Luke - I Fought Against Myself (and tore myself to pieces)

So I decided I would get a little exercise and go for a bike ride on this cool brisk night. Yeah. I thought I would make it short. Just as I am coming down the biggest (read only) hill in Amherst I go over a big bump but don't think twice. I have been down this road many times before on my bike and on my longboard. I make the turn and immediately see a huge hole in the pavement. The town must be replacing a pipe or some crap. Of course instead of putting the construction sign in the light or even before the hole they put it next to the hole in the darkness under a tree. I slam into the thing and fly over my handle bars and about 20+ mph. Bruised and bloody I straighten out my wheel and get back on my bike and ride home. The very first thing I did when I walked in the door was pick up my camera and take some pics... Now I am cleaned off and ready to bowl with 8 band-aids covering my wounds.

Current music: Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary (wishing is was the new The Fire Theft album, alas...

So let's see...I think I did nothing on Saturday... Yesterday I went and saw Under a Tuscan Sun with my parents. That was pretty good. My dad was taking the piss because it is a chick flick, but I think he liked it. My mom made some ziti with homemade sauce before that. I have had so much good food lately and I'm loving it. Saw my grandparents again. They are leaving today and that sucks. Actually, they are probably passing through Buffalo right about now.

I haven't seen the sweet dudes in forever. I just keep telling myself, "Don't fret, you will see them tonight!" We need to have another huge Ballz Bowling night soon where everybody comes.

Coffee Club

Current music: Dido - Life for Rent

Just got back from a nice long bike ride. I finally got to go for one after we have had such crap weather and I was sick. Visited Erica and Jenny at Buff State and met Erica's super cute friend...

Now it is time to have coffee club with...with...with...myself :(

Damn SonicWall

So we have a SonicWall web filter here at work to keep us doing things that we should be and not hte things we shouldn't be. Well, I decided to check Friendster as I occasionally do and it is blocked! It never was before... Oh well, not a big deal. I just SSH'd to my machine at home, executed 'dig friendster.com' and used the IP I got back and it goes through the filter.

Last night Matt and I went bike shopping. He found one he wants I think and is gonna go back to buy it either today or tomorrow. Afterwards Tim and I were race car driving. We bought tickets for the Death Cab show in Toronto and we had to go pick it up at a TicketMaster in Canada. So we were gonna leave at about 7:30 or so and we thought the place was open until 9. Nope, it closes at 8... Tim found out and called me so after shopping with Matt I raced over to his house. I did 85 all the way there and that is crazy for me, because I don't like to go more than about 7-8 over the limit ever... I got there at 7:25 and we hopped in his car and we had to stop for gas! Then we made it to the Peace Bridge and the guy only asked us what we were going to Canada for...nothing else! Tim drove really fast on the QEW all the way to the mall and dropped me off in front. I ran to the record store and got there at 7:59 pm...1 minute before TicketMaster closes.

After all that excitement we headed up to Niagara Falls for some ass-kickin Xin Vego! I love that restaurant. Today I have leftovers for lunch. I can't wait...

Buffalo's food is good, but that is about it

Current music: Stickmen - Soundtrack from the Motion Picture

I really love the food in Buffalo. Had two huge slices of chicken finger pizza from Pizza Junction. Mmm. I finished up this wxWindows app I am working on and it works great in WindowsXP. I tried running it in Linux using an X11 build, but no dice. It compiles and runs, but there are some bugs in the threading and mime types. I guess I will work on that more tomorrow. I am going home...

coffee coffee coffee

Current music: My fingers slamming on the keys

Weeee... We have a new coffee machine in the lunch room. The coffee in the old one sucks so much that I refuse to drink it. This new one is for "specialty" stuff and is a demonstration from now until Monday. After Monday we will have to pay to use it. Boo. I will stick with tea I guess, but I will be sure to make good use of it until then.

I am really starting to like C++ and wxWindows more and more as I learn and understand them.

My grandparents and aunt are coming to North Tonawanda today to visit some relatives. I think they are going to call me. I hope they do. If they call during the day I will bring them in to work and give them a tour.

Yesterday I found out that a co-worker of mine is on Friendster. She is my friendster now, but I kinda feel uncomfortable about this. I don't think I wanna get my friends and my co-workers mixed.

Finally!

Current music: Billy Joel - The Longest Time

Well, it is nice out and it is about time. Went for a walk during lunch today and saw some snakes... weird, I have never seen them out here before.

My grandparents 50th anniversary was pretty fun. Got to see all the old people that I never really see since I am not in Rochester anymore. Went out to breakfast with Stacia. Went to Canandaigua and ate gnocchis and cutlets that Aunt Ann made. She is possibly the best cook I have ever met. Went back to Penfield to go to Jennie's house and meet Patrick and of course see Marissa! Hadn't seen her in a long time. Bowling last night was cool because Zubz was there and he never comes anymore. Lori is gonna be back next week so she is gonna bowl with us and I think Matt will come too. I hope he starts coming every week because I really like hanging out with him. Why am I so emotional today?

Nope

Current music: Ben Folds - Rockin' the Suburbs

So yesterday was pretty average. Went to work and stuff then went to Jeff's "party". It was supposed to start at 9pm. I got there late at about 9:30 and nobody was there. I stayed until 11:30 and people were just starting to show. After that I went to Kris's party. I was pretty tired though so I was real low key and just kinda sat around.

I am "blah" lately.

Here I am

Current music: DLT8000's shining their tapes

Well, no bad drivers this morning. There is still plenty of time though...

So I am finally almost better from being sick. I am not blowing my nose nearly as much. I guess I am going to Jeff's party on Friday and then Kris's. I wanted to go to Matt's in Rochester so I could see all the Rochesterarian folk, but I really have to go to Jeff's so since I will still be around in Buffalo I will hit up Kris's after.

Back to invalidating cache lines...

Redemption's all we need

Current music: Boy Sets Fire - Live for Today

Tim and I got tickets to Death Cab For Cutie in Toronto on the 16th. I am pumped. I wanted to go to the show in Philadelphia, but it is in the middle of the week so I won't. I gotta find another show to go to down there.

Once again I pretty much slept all evening and all night yesterday. I guess this is just what my body needs. I am feeling a lot better today, but still tons of snot coming out my nose.

Since this blog really has no purpose I am gonna give it one. I am gonna start documenting here stupid things drivers do in Buffalo because the drivers here are so damn bad... I am not saying that I am the best driver in the world or anything like that. I know I am not, but the drivers here are the worst of any place I have ever driven. They don't drive crazy like in Boston, the traffic isn't bad like in NYC, they don't overtake in no passing zones like in NZ. Buffalo drivers just do stupid crap all the time.

Stupid driver of yesterday:
I was following this car and the driver made a left at a light. I also made a left at the light following him. I proceeded to move into the right lane since I was turning right in a few hundred meters. This guy was going ultra slow so I moved up next to him then he started moving over in a side swiping action. He never turned on his directional, never looked, nothing... I honked and slammed on the brakes. I couldn't move over because there is a curb, not shoulder. He finally realized that I was laying on my horn and he was gonna hit me within inches of my car. Damn stupid driver! As with most of the stupid drivers I see on N. French road...he worked across the street from me at NCO.

Stupid driver of this morning:
I was on Millersport Highway where the speed limit is 45 MPH at about 7:20 this morning. A woman there was going all of 35. I passed her in the left lane. Nothing special there. All of a sudden she passes me in a flash on the right only to pull in front of me and slow down again to 35. This time I could not pass her because she did it just as the road went from 4 lanes to 2 (one in each direction) so there I was stuck behind her. Luckily as we entered the 55 zone she sped up to 40! I followed her the rest of the way to work. I was surprised when she did not turn onto N. French and go to NCO.

English summer rain seems to last for ages

Current music: Placebo - Sleeping With Ghosts

That was my fastest dentist visit yet. Turns out that my bite was off and making my nerves mad so I just had my filling filed down a little and off I went.

Just revised my work estimate for a new project. That should make my boss happy because the original estimate I gave was 80 hours. Just changed it to 40! I guess I should get back to it if I am gonna finish it in 40.

Computers are unreliable, but humans are even more unreliable.
Any system which depends on human reliability is unreliable.
-- Gilb

I didn't see you comin out of the corner of my eye

Current music: The Promise Ring - Wood/Water

I think one of my fillings came out. I'm not really sure because it is hard to see that far back in my own mouth... It hurts like crazy when I drink anything though. I'm gonna hit up the dentist at noon and see what he can do for me.

Damn, all I did was sleep last night. Still sick...

Tests

Conscious self	Overall self

Take Free Enneagram Test

Yeah, it's mostly accurate except for the sleep part...

Chinese Monday celebrations begin in a few minutes

Current music: Jimmy Eat World - Clarity

So while I am still waiting for this crap to compile I decided to start looking at why my firewall has a load of 9+. For non-geeks please stop reading here...

Looks like there was some sort of rpm thing that Mandrake decided to throw into the daily cron. It was running some rpm query command, then sorting them all. Well, since there was one rpm hangup I think I have a corrupt rpm database and none of the jobs were finishing. They kept stacking. So I started killing them. Now my load is back in normal ranges... I am gonna have to look into what is corrupt about the database soon, but the celebrations have begun!

Cold

Current music: The sound of a co-worker blowing his nose

Hope I didn't give my co-workers this damn cold that I have. His kids were sick last week too so maybe he got it from them. Anything to take the blame off me right?

Nick and Sarah's wedding was fun. It was cool to see all those guys again. I hadn't seen them in so long. I'm glad Jennie had fun too... I was worried she would get bored, but I guess I shouldn't have because she knew a lot of people there and she always finds a way to have fun anyway.

My grandparents came up from Florida a day earlier than expected. They got in late Saturday afternoon. That was really cool because I miss them. They are in town for two weeks. My grandfather went to my dad's softball game with us on Sunday. I'm glad to see him doing so much better than he has been for several years now.

Don't know if I am gonna bowl tonight. I really want to, but being sick blows and I need to sleep. Maybe I will sleep when I get home from work until about 10 then bowl... Maybe this new build of wxWindows will finish soon and I can get back to work.

I ran out of Kleenex.

Current music: Cursive - Driftwood

So I have been sick all week. I am still sick now and it is the weekend. All I have done all week is go to work then go to sleep then go to work again. I am feeling a bit better today, but I am still stuffed up and pressure in my right ear.

I gotta drive to Rochester today to go to Nick's wedding. Hope I feel better by tonight so I can get down and party.

On a brighter note, I did watch a lot of movies while I was sick. I saw Once Upon a Time in Mexico. It was really good. I recommend it to all.

Work is weird

Current music: The Eagles - Desperado

So last night when I was leaving work about 7pm, I was one of hte last people in the building. As I was leaving I saw a guy dart into a cube carrying a big box and wearing a pink shirt. It was one of the lower managers. Now, last time somebody was carrying a box around after normal hours they were the upper management putting boxes into the cubes of the people to be laid off the next day., so naturally I got scared.

This morning when I came in I found a folded pink slip on my chair, but it had a kazoo attached to it. It says "Let's Make Some Noise!" On the inside it is an invitation to a party at 4pm today in the break room.

I just saw the HR director and her assistant in the break room with balloons and champagne glasses. This is really weird. Some people think it is the end of the fiscal year celebration since our fiscal year ends at the end of this month.

The "logo" or whatever for the party is "Ring out the Old, and Ring in the New." Not sure what that means, but I never take that as a good thing!

Sick

Current music: None

I hate being sick. Yesterday I had a sore throat all day and now I have a stuffy nose. Hopefully I will get get better soon eh.

Wanting to sleep...

Cars are shitters

Current music: Jets to Brazil - Perfecting Loneliness

Ok, so I have a few things to say here. I had to take my car in last night and they said it was not a warranty problem so it cost me $228 for 2 sets of pads and a rotor. Damn car. On top of that big kick in the nuts when I started walking the five minutes to the dealer it was sunny. By the time I got half way there I was running because it was thundering and pissing down.

Bowling was cool last night. Matt drove me there because I didn't have a car. It was only Matt, Jay, Dave, and me, but still pretty sweet.

So now I am at work. Didn't get here until 10:30, but its ok. I guess I won't be leaving until after 7 tonight. So some non-geek read about my geek troubles with wxWindows and UDP/Datagram sockets. Yesterday I finally figured out the problem after a week. Here is the solution (once again, non-geeks need to stop reading here unless you are JayzorBeard):

I put in some new accessors in many levels of the wxWindows code so that I could do setsockopt and change a socket from streamed (TCP) to unstreamed (UDP). Once those were in place I thought it should work, but it didn't. So I ported the changes I made in wxMSW to wxX11 and tried compiling my code in Linux. It worked fine and I could do broadcasts. So I had to figure out why Winsock wouldn't let this broadcast through. Finally I found this site which described how to use Winsock2 to do broadcasts. I realized they were using SOL_SOCKET as the 'level' parameter to the socket constructor. So I changed my ctor to use that instead of IPV4. Now I can do UDP/Datagram broadcasts in wxWindows through Winsock2. Exciting isn't it? Turns out that SOL_SOCKET makes it so that all flags are enabled I guess... Not really sure. Anyways it works.

Current music: None

I hate waiting for wxWindows to compile, especially on a 600 MHz P3. So slow... Then right when it finishes, thinking I have changed directories, I type 'make clean'. Now I have to compile all over again. On top of that...the stock market is DOWN today which sucks and I missed my investors' meeting last night, I have to take my car in for brake work, and it is raining. What a crap Monday.

Can't wait to bowl tonight. Matt is gonna come!

back to work

Current music: Ester Drang - Infinite Keys

Another Monday, another weekend gone. I won the Chinese Monday challenge today...

There's something happening here,
What it is, aint exactly clear.
There's a man with a gun over there,
Telling me I got to beware.
_____________________________________________________

I knew it...
Missing lyric: I think it's time we stop.
Artist: Buffalo Springfield
Song name: "For What It's Worth"

Now I provided this challenge for next Chinese Monday...

The same old story,
But it's worth telling just once more.
It's all fun and laughter.
They lived ever after in ecstacy.
________________________________

Who knows it? I do...well, I made the challenge. I better know it. You need to tell me missing lyric, artist, and song name to win!

weekends are better than weekdays even when the Bills lose

Current music: DCFC - The Stability EP

Party on Saturday was pretty sweet. What a weekend. I'm ready to go back to NZ. Today was Gareth's 21st I think. I missed that by about 12,000 miles. Met a girl this weekend who looks like Brooke and I just wanna go back now - party with Gazzy and Brooke. Gotta get my work visa sorted.

Update: Nope, his birthday is next weekend...

Damn cars

I don't want a car any more. My brakes are messed up. The pads in the rear are gone and I only have 21,000 miles. Gotta take it to the dealer on Monday night, but I can't drive until then. I don't wanna ruin my rotors.

Went out last night to the Pink with the lurker and the moose. The lurker and I played serious pool and lurked in the pool corner all night kicking everyone's butt. From what I hear I might be going to a party tonight with Kris and Erica. That would be cool because Erica is a cool chick and I haven't seen her in ages.

I sometimes feel a little strange, a little anxious when it's dark.

wx-whatever

Back to grinding away at wxWindows. I am beginning to understand really how the internals of this framework/API/library works and I really like it. I am gonna have to contribute my changes to the UDP sockets back to the project as soon as I get them finished. I will once again be an open source developer. Maybe I will stick with this project. I really like it.

Rode my bike up to the SPCA last night to look at dogs again. Lost my waterbottle on the way somehow. Got rained on when I was riding back but it was really not bad.

Bend It Like Beckham is really a pretty good movie. Keira Knightley is so hot.

wxWindows->Compiling() ? wxLenny->BridgeCustomization() : wxLenny->WriteWxDatagramSocket();

Cmoix

So I won 10 tickets to Comix Cafe for filling out a stupid comment card. Sweet huh? Now I just gotta get 10 people to go...

Pizza Thursday

Today is Pizza Thursday! Mmmm...less than an hour til white pizza with Canadian bacon and tomatoes!

Jennie is so smart.

Who likes Cursive anyway?

Last night I went down to Nietzsche's to see Cursive. I already knew the tickets were sold out, but Tim and I thought maybe we could get in. Tim got there before me and went in and had a drink. He ended up staying in there and seeing the show. I got there just after him and people were already lining up outside. I waited in line until about 8pm, but they still weren't letting people in that didn't have tickets. Jeff showed up and we said screw it and went to Pano's. Wasn't that bit a deal to miss in anyway...

I don't want to work on this R&D project anymore. I don't know what the hell I am doing and I keep running into dead ends. This is getting frusterating. I guess that is the only way to learn though.

Jeff (not the same as above) is moving into his condo today. I think I'll go over there after work and help him out.

Too much stress

I hate when bugs in other people's software (ie. Microsoft) makes me look bad. Do not read farther if you are not a geek...

XHTML1.0 spec says the alt attribute shall be used for all img tags. The alt attribute specifies what shall be displayed when the image cannot be displayed. The spec also states that the title attribute is optional and can be used in nearly any tag and will provide a tooltip on mouseover.

Standards compliant browsers like anything based on the Gecko engine or the KHTML engine do this properly. Of course, MS Internet Explorer has decided that the alt tab will be used for tooltips instead. Since I do not use IE, I developed a website for one of our embedded products and used the alt attribute as it should be used and did not use the title attribute because it was extraneous.

Today we received a call from a customer complaining about this. I put in one of the alt attributes "not much" since not much would be missed if the image was not displayed. Now it has turned into quite the hoo haa around here.

Aaaaahhhhhh! I make software compliant with open standards and get blamed when uncompliant software that MS wrote misbehaves.

Drool

The new (drool) powerbooks (drool) are out. Damn, now my keyboard is all wet.

On a different note...Cave In rocked last night. I missed half of ETID's set though. From what I saw they looked pretty good. I'm so glad that Cave In has gone back to their old stuff.

Cursive tonight, but no ticket. Sweet Baby Moose and I are gonna go try to work our magic and get in.

Wok22 = sickness

I really need to stop ordering food from Wok22 on Chinese Mondays. I feel like crap afterwards. US financial markets are set to dive this afternoon. The upcoming end of Q3 usually has some nice warnings for us all. Back to coding...C++ is my life lately.

Hmmm...

This one is from gnome-blog. I had never seen this one before in all my searchings. Then as I was looking at LinuxToday.com for some linux news this morning I saw a release notification. Apt-get worked and now here I am. This is a much cleaner interface and when I start using Gnome it should be sweet. Currently I have been dissatisfied with desktop offerings and I am using WindowMaker. Maybe I will switch back to Gnome now that 2.4 is out.

Well, I figured I would give a shot at some blogging clients. I am using Chronicle Lite right now. It is a pretty standard Java app. Not sure if I like it... Feels kinda clunky. I wish LogJam supported Blogger!

The one of me...contraband and my bike

18+ miles. That is a bike ride.

Happy Deathday!
Your name:	lenonblog
You will die on:	Saturday, October 15, 2033
You will die of:	Drive-By Shooting

When will you die?

The King and I

Hit up a pretty awesome Thai restaurant last night with Jeff and Beth. I think I might have some left over roasted duck for breakfast.

Getting oh so tired

Made it to Becky's party after a cup of coffee and met some kerang. Now the coffee is leaving me and I am getting tired. Good night.

Accidents

This is the 2nd time in about a month that a car has been run into on my street. Damn, glad it wasn't mine. Maybe I should start parking in my driveway more...

new G5 at work

So I was just over in the test lab to get a snack and I noticed that one of the test guys was setting up a G5. Yes, this is a dual 2GHz G5. He said he was about to run some benchmarking on it so I stuck around for a few minutes. He was only running SCSI data through one of our HBA's out to two disk arrays, but he said normally he gets 189 MB/sec on a dual 867 G4. This time he got 364! Impressive...

Anyways, I have been working on getting UDP sockets working in wxWindows all morning. I think I just found the option to do it. Damn, all this time and all I had to do was pass the wxSOCKET_DATAGRAM flag.

UPDATE: We changed the config a little bit and let the drives in the disk arrays spin up all the way and we can crank now! 480+MB/s

First post!

Whoa. This is almost like getting a first post on Slashdot.

I wanna be in a flash mob...but I am at work right now, so I should do some.