Category: general

Where I put something when I’m too lazy to categorize it.

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america’s smarter than a dancer

Wednesday night.  Still have to take the trash out; will probably wait until like midnight-thirty like I always do.

Almost through one wall-to-wall listen of the new Of Montreal record (again).  I’ve gone from a curious interest to pure infatuation with this record; and, through repeat listenings, have gained enough appreciation for it that I feel safe lauding it.  We see them live in the city the week before Thanksgiving, looking forward to a splashy glam fantastic show.

Sharaun’s watching that awful awful dancing show on TV.  No, I don’t know which one… they are all so horrible, and there seems to be so many of them.  Dancing With This, Dancing Around That, America’s Got Dancers, CSI Dancing… whatever.  I’ll just stay here hunched over my laptop, reading and writing and surfing the internet while I try not to listen…

Watched George address us this evening; he deserves some credit for offering a sound and concise explanation of the current situation – hopefully it works to raise the general awareness.  Also give him points for citing a desire for 1) low taxpayer risk, 2) no golden-parachutes for failed CEOs, and 3) bipartisan oversight and process transparency as critical aspects of a successful plan.  Overall, I thought it was a well-delivered and timely address to the nation.  Credit where credit is due.  I still have strong feelings over the whole thing, and don’t desire one bit to see my investments continue in their downward spiral, but I suppose us thirty-somethings are in it for the long-haul at this point.  It’s that, or win the lottery…

OK internet – as Keaton says to me, “I’ll see you in the morning when I wake up!”  Goodnight.

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before the blessed weekend

Friday.  Yahoo.

I took the day “off” today.  Too bad that doesn’t really mean anything in the context of the modern-day e-worker; I’m still sitting on my butt (just on the couch instead of my well-worn swivel chair in my dreary cubicle) doing e-mail, sick or not.  It’s OK, I suppose… afterall my brain doesn’t seem to be suffering; just my sinuses.  Anyway, my morning thus far has consisted of working while vetting the “street” version of the new Of Montreal album today and am busy listening ot that a high-volume as the pile of used tissue grows next to me (yes, I’m writing at midday today, since I’m home and have the opportunity).

At my appointment with the doctor, I saw the nurse practitioner.  (Does anyone get to see a real Ph.D’d doctor anymore at the general practitioner these days?  I think I’ve seen the guy whose name’s on the building all of one time.)  It was a different NP than I’m used to seeing, and I ended up really liking her.  I’ve never really gone to the doctor looking for assistance with any kind of medical mystery, and I’ve usually already self-diagnosed myself and am just looking for confirmation and the almighty Rx to get me back on-track, so I’m usually pretty ambivalent to the “care” I get.  Maybe that’ll change as I get older and start to develop some more obscure infirmities, but for now I typically only need a doctor for their prescription pad.

The NP I saw today though was completely different than the drug-pushers I normally deal with.  Instead of going right to the pad and pushing me out the door with a scrawled script for antibiotics, she instead recommended an “easier on the body” (as she put it) nasal spray first (although she ultimately did prescribe an antibiotic in case that course of action failed to work).  In fact, she actually reviewed with me the two prescriptions I currently take regularly, suggesting potential ways I could eliminate them from my routine.  I liked this for some reason, maybe it’s her bedside manner or whatever but it worked to inspire trust with me.  Kind of a strange notion to have a doctor unprescribing things… but a welcome change in my opinion.

Tomorrow it’s back to work, feel like I’ve been away from my little desk for too long now (although, I did manage to get an impressive amount of work done today from the couch).  One day of work before the blessed weekend.  Saturday we’re going to Pat’s Catholic church to drink beer and eat pork at their annual Oktoberfest celebration (we had a blast last year).  Can you imagine a protestant church having a celebration which is essentially centered around drinking beer, in the house of worship?!  My hat’s off to those progressive folks, and I can’t wait to dance to some oompah with Keaton.  Sunday I work on Halloween.

Until Monday, goodnight.

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Random and scattered today

It’s the end of Wednesday and I swear I’ve done a week’s worth of hard work in this first half.  Between making up for my vacation last week and trying to get a little ahead to take the edge off my vacation next week, I’m cramming…

Random and scattered today, be prepared.

Today, I got re-excited about our hike for a whole new reason.  Turns out Ben has a pilot buddy who owes him a favor and is likely going to be in town next Monday.  In recompense, he may be willing to ferry Anthony, Ben, and I to a small airstrip in the Sierras close to our trailhead.  This would be a in six-seater twin-engine job, flying from here down there in a fraction of the time it would take to drive, and, probably more importantly, salvaging my marriage by taking the burden of the eight-hour roundtrip drop-off from Sharaun and Keaton.  I can just imagine packing into a private plane, all geared out for our hike, loading our packs up and taking off into the mountain skies.  I mean, it’s like a whole super-bonus beginning to what stands to be an incredible adventure already.  And, while it’s not 100% confirmed at this point, I would say we’re trending positively (sorry for the sawmill-speak, laymen).  So rad.

Late last night the new New Kids on the new New Kids on the Block album leaked, and today I downloaded it for Sharaun.  Oh man was she happy.  What?  Oh, you didn’t know the New Kids on the Block were back together?  Yeah, they are.  All their songs sound like the last Akon or Chris Brown song you heard on the radio, right down the the thinly veiled sexual lyics and robotic pitch-shifting voice effects ala Cher’s Believe.  But, my wife, whom I love to death, loves this band to death… and has spent ungodly amounts of dosh on concert tickets for their upcoming shows (where, in the apparent fulfillment of one of her lifetime dreams, she’ll actually be going to “meet and greet” the band).  Anyway, we listened to the album most of the evening – it was even our dinnertime soundtrack.  And, let me tell you guys… it’s bad.  Real, real bad.

Today Keaton and I had a teaparty with three of her dolls, Finny, Claudia, and Hannah.  Although, instead of tea we had coffee… and we doctored it with sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg (her idea, I promise).  We had “biscuits” with our tea, which were actually tiny pieces of plastic fruit (go figure).  Sometimes I like to play the big brother role and do things like pretend to spill coffee or “accidentally” knock over one of the babies… maybe you think that’s mean but I enjoy seeing how she reacts to things.  Sometimes her reponses to situations floor me, she’s so mature seeming in some ways (well, for a two and a half year old… or whatever).  Parts of my insides cry when I think how fast she got here though… so I want to enjoy as many teaparties as I can, while I can.

Goodnight people.

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Don’t old guys like music anymore?

Tonight the JMT hike crew got together at my place to make some final arrangements and do our food shopping.  Several hundred dollars and tens of pounds of pack-weight later we were back at the house splitting things four ways.  The hike nears… the hike nears.

I actually don’t have much to write tonight… but I wanted to share something I thought was funny.  By way of introduction, if you’ve read this blog for a while you likely know I’m a music nut.  And, I find a lot of new tunes “online.”  In the course of this process, I occasionally visit one specialized (completely legal and blessed by the RIAA and whatnot) website in particular and, on this website they occasionally run random polls on the frontpage.  The other day, the poll asked, simply, “How old are you?”  Check out the results:

Looks like I’m sqaurely in the minority, huh?  Me and a bunch of college kids.  In some way, that makes me feel a little “tuned in,” and in another way not.  Either way… it makes me feel old.  Don’t old guys like music anymore these days?

Goodnight.

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Just like you, Daddy!

Friday, Friday; the Lord brought us another Friday.  Give thanks, plebs, give thanks.

Today, while my father-in-law and I were sitting around the house playing with Keaton, she retreated back into the hallway and, this time, didn’t come back right away like she normally does.  Usually, she’ll go back there into her bedroom or our bedroom and get some toy or doll or something before she comes right back out to the area where everyone’s hanging out.  This time, I noticed she’d been gone for a while and got up to go look after her.

When I found her, she had her shorts and underwear around her ankles and was sitting on her little potty (which we’ve moved into the tiny toilet-area in our master bathroom while we have guests) reading one of my bathroom Newsweeks.  I asked her what she was doing, and she matter-of-factly told me: “I’m making a poo-poo and a pee-pee and reading a magazine; just like you, Daddy!”

Awww… she even apes my bowel movements y’all… that’s love.

Goodnight.  Goodweekend.

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giving work the short shrift

Thursday and the sand in my vacation hourglass is running low.

Also running low, the time between my writing this and our departure in a little more than a week for our John Muir Trail “redo” hike.  I put a meeting on the group’s collective calendars for next Tuesday to do a shopping run at REI and some pre-trail pack stuffing and checking (yes, we are so bound to technology that we “calendar” our hike planning sessions).  As time gets closer, I get more and more excited… I really can’t wait to get out on the trail again.  Later next week I’ll publish our finalized itinerary with GPS links for the data-driven and curious.  But, for now, let’s do some boring blogging.

Vacation with the parents-in-law has so far been perfect.  Sharaun’s folks are low-key vacationers, not really wanting to run around and see this or do that… but rather wanting to spend time together hanging out and relaxing.  I can really identify with this kind of vacationing.  Last night (Wednesday) we had some friends over for some barbecue, drinks, and Olympic-watching socialization.  We’ve been to a couple different parks to let Keaton run around and play, made a visit to the zoo, and are planning a trip halfway up the mountain tomorrow to go swimming and picnic at a little tucked-away spot on the river.  And, even though I’m technically not on vacation today… I sure am giving work the short shrift.

Now to change the subject a bit, to the nerd-stuff…

With the advent (or rather, my recent discovery) of programs like Simplify Media, which streams your home-based music collection to your iPhone, I’ve become painfully aware that, despite previous monumental efforts on my part to clean up and standardize the MP3 tag structure of my music collection, I’ve still got a long way to go.  This becomes immediately apparent when using applications like Simplify, which rely solely on the MP3 tag data of your collection to sort and display your music.  Minor differences in band naming schemes (to capitalize the ‘I’ in Architecture in Helsinki’s name or not, for instance) presents as two different artists, as an example.

Because of this, I’ve dutifully undertaken my most monumental tag “cleanup” effort to-date: Using a combination of tagging and renaming programs to scroll through my entire library and edit things for efficiency, accuracy, and useability.  I figure that this whole remote-streaming/access to home music collections is the way of the future, so I may as well baseline now and be ready for the glory that is to come.  It’ll take time to change all those instance of “Eric Burdon and The Animals” my preferred “Eric Burdon & The Animals,” but I think it’ll be worth it.  Update: I wrote these paragraphs a couple days ago (on one of those days I didn’t end up posting), and have since finished my great tag-update.  The work didn’t end up being that bad and, even though I still have a few things to tidy, I got it done in relatively short order.

Bye guys, I’m off to dial into a meeting (told you it was some sort of quasi-vacation)…

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before i knew it

A Monday morning and I’m comfortable on the couch instead of at work.  OK, so I have me work e-mail open and I’m actually doing things I shouldn’t be… but still, I’m on the couch.  That counts, right?  It’s gonna be short today, but I just can’t let this thing go for nearly a week.  Last week was super busy again at work, and I just didn’t have time to write at night – sad but true.

Saturday Sharaun’s folks got into town, and we’ve been spending the past couple days just hanging out and settling into vacation-mode.  Yesterday after church, I ran up to Home Depot and grabbed some sprinkler parts for a little job I wanted to do in the backyard, father-in-law came along (men do trips to Home Depot like women do trips to bar bathrooms – together).  Gary (my father-in-law) helped me work the sprinklers a bit, and we both enjoyed some cold beers in the sun.  We enjoyed them so much, in fact, that before I knew it was going on 11pm and we were still sitting around the table in the backyard.  Sharaun and her mom had long gone inside and left us alone, we’d moved the beer into a tableside cooler for easier access, and the iPod was kicking the classic Motown (Gary’s favorite).

Eventually, we wobbled inside and watched a little Olympics with the womenfolk before calling it a night.  Was a good day: got the sprinklers fixed, and hung with Sharaun’s dad like we were old college buddies.  And now, I’m looking at three mostly-vacation days before I do some “working from home” vacation days (part of the many subtle shades of vacation my sawmill permits, neither really 100% disconnected – but both still very fulfilling).  Should be a good week.

See ya around.