A simple email...

Sending one email to teammates and old friends... About $.02
A request to support a great cause... About 5 seconds.
Receiving a donation to the above cause that may save a life. $20.00
Saving the life of an affected two year old nephew... Millions.

Being told by someone you look up to that email should not be used for personal reasons... Priceless.

There are some things money can't buy. For everything else, there's corporate politics.

Life is a game of chess...

Keeping as clear as mud as I usually do...

I honestly believe I'm a pawn in my chessboard of life. It sucks being on the bottom and being use, abused, and sacrificed. It almost seems common place now so much so that I expect it.

There is one huge bonus when you are a pawn though... When used properly, they can be put into great situations where a move they make can be critical to their life (IE: upgrade to rook, knight, bishop or queen) or detrimental to their opponents (IE: checkmate via a pawn).

I'm in a position to take check. I'm thinking this is pretty awesome. I have the chance to win the game but on top of that be one of the "little pieces" to actually do it. What's better is that I am also in the position to be sacrificed. This of a pawn making check on a King. Why can't the king just take the pawn? Because the pawn (me) is being backed by the queen... And a rook... And two knights... And a bishop... AND three pawn buddies. (Is this even possible in a real game of chess?)

So on my chessboard of life, I'm posed to make a major move.

A.) Do I risk losing the protection and support I have from all my fellow chess pieces to move into the spot that will let me upgrade my role in the chess game??? Obvious loss is all the outward protection I have earned while moving along the board.

OR

B.) Do I stay back knowing that the support and guidance is still there from all the senior chess pieces knowing that I can't advance my role immediately. Obvious loss is the ability to give back and support all the other pieces (including those dear to my heart).

Option B is where I think I am going to head. Option A was extremely tempting but after I announced my intention to make a move, all of the powerful chess pieces made it clear that they would support any move I make, but wanted to let me know that I still have a place of protection in my current spot.

Why the hell am I writing about this? If the queen, rook, knights, and bishop had not spoken to me, I would have made the move without a second thought. But since I told the rook of my intentions, who told a bishop, who told the knights, who notified the queen, and then they all progressively sat down with me to talk about my reasons for the move, one by one, made me realize that they do hold my position of a pawn as powerful and valuable to them, something I had not felt in the past. (Beat that run on sentence. =))

Observations...

I'm definately in a different mindset in gradute schol then I was in for undergraduate and even high school...

People would always tell me that high school was the best time of their lives... I think it was my worst. I didn't enjoy it. I felt pressured to go to school and "perform" to someone else's standards. I honestly think the only skill that I actually learned in high school was how to bull$hit. It is four years of my life I want to forget.

Undergraduate college was the best four year of my life IMHO. I had a great time. I met a TON of friends and felt good about what I was doing. But I still attended because I "had to". You can't get a decent job anymore without that magic peice of paper. So while I enjoyed the four years and loved doing what I did, it was still something that was just assumed you had to do.

But my graduate time, while still only in its infancy, is turning out to be completly different. The students and even the professors are in a different mindset. Everyone works and understands that you work (it is a night program). The work load is a different kind of load since I'm used to engineering type assignments. Still tough, but a different kind of tough... More importantly, I wasn't forced by anyone or any group to attend. I chose to go to grad school on my own to better my career. That is definately something I cannot say about my bachelor's degree or high school.

It's also very motivating. I'm encouraged by the different style of classes and the way thing work out. I'm very excited for the coming years. And, when I finish it all, I hope I can walk away feeling content and happy with what I just accomplished. Instead of just walking away saying, "OK, now I have a degree, my magic piece of paper. So what do I do now???"

Sensitized...

I don't know if it is the becoming a father thing or the I'm just getting older thing but I'm really getting sensitive to crap that goes on in the world...

1- Whenever a story comes up on the Internet about babies dying or mothers getting hurt... I watch them closer than any tech story I can find...
2- For some reason, the Discovery Health channel and all their baby shows are a lot more appealing now...
3- Watching people not take care of their baby or do things in public that I could never dream of doing, really REALLY bug me now...
4- Drug use. 'Nuff said. I don't want to talk about it, but if you know me in person, I'll tell you...
5- Extended family can be a blessing and a cruse now more than ever...
6- I guess the old saying that I will never really appreciate what my parents did for me until I had my own kids really is true.

And more stuff... I is really wierd, but reassuring, how much views change when your own baby is involved. And ask Totem, it happened for me overnight. She was worried about going home because I never wanted to hold my nephew for fear of braking him... Now I carry my son around on one arm while doing other things with my other arm. Jay says I look like a football player running down the field clutching a football. =)

The next rant...

The past week has been really rough. Really high highs and some really low lows (read second last entry)... Work has stabalized back into a norm and thing are returning to as normal as they can. Buts thats enough about that...

On the upswing, side jobs are picking up. I've taken on two webmaster positions with companies in the area. I'm also now the DBA of a third company that I work for part time. They all look like a decent challenge but I'm looking forward to puling through for all of them. Plus, I get some practical experience in the workplace instead of personal experience which is a great advantage...

Three days ago I was followed home, literally. Totem and I were coming home from lisalou's house, Totem was taking an odd route, and well, I had a little case of road rage. ;) We approached an intersecion with a green light, turn into the left turn lane, stopped, and then verred into the right lane and continuted going straight. So I'm fuming, but I notice a car behind me turn on his blinker to turn with us, turn it off and then follow us back on the road. I'm like WTF and I tried to figure out what was going on... Left turn, followed. Right turn followed. OK, now my paranoia has got the best of me. I let Totem drive home while I keep driving (she does not know this is happening BTW)... She turns and the person keeps following me. Left turn, followed. I did a "S" drive up and down a couple of streets and I'm still being followed. Now I'm creeped out... I manage to get a block ahead and park my car in front of a house. He/She (I couldn't tell) pulled onto the street and waited. About two minutes later, they drove off. I never saw them again. I have a feeling a punk a$$ kid was just trying to see what would happen if he keep following me. Whoever it was, they had a souped up neon with fog lights, spoiler, and decals... I didn't get the lics though. I'm just glad I figured it out and didn't lead whoever it was to my house...

I also started playing Final Fantasy XI this week. The online one. I'm not that impressed. The game is huge and very detailed, I'm not putting that down. What got to me early on was the lack of info for newbies to the game... It took me a really long time to get used to the interface and when I did, there wasn't much for me to do. Again on the expansiveness, there are a tons of things to do, but for a newbie, many of those are in areas that I couldn't survive. So, for the time being, I'm limited to local areas with low end monsters. Needless to say, I'm only level 8 and things are very, very repetitive. I don't know if I am going to renew my subscription, maybe one month more, but I don't see me going beyond two months unfortunately.

When Totem and I buy a house, I want to it be one level. Now that the computer is up, I'm spending way to much time upstairs. Totem's even said I can go and disappear now. While being on the same floor won't eliminate me using my computer, we'd be essentially togther. IE: Me sitting on my laptop in the living while we watch TV is better than me going upstairs to play a game...

Onward and upward. New project, I'm redoing my Linux box with a new kernel. It's a biggie redo b/c I tried to upgrade from 2.4 to 2.6 and was not too successful... Plus the box needs to be rebooted every couple of days to make sure it still works... I think it's because I did a hardware swap without a new install (pulled all hardware out of old 350mhz box and put it into 700mhz box with no OS reinstall). Should be fun...

When you thought it had passed...

...it was just hiding in the shadows. Outsourcing.

News here...

UPDATE: The axe missed me... Barely...

Adventures in Anti-Spam...

I FINALLY figured it out... It looks lingering files from an older version of Blacklist were conflicting with the newer ones... Once I wiped the entire system of everything Blacklist and started over, BAM! Everything was working. I just got finished deleting the 5000+ spam comments in the system. I'm getting comment emails again. Seems to be back to normal... If you posted over the last couple of days and your comment has not popped up, I probably deleted it by accident. Sorry. :(

The good news is that MT-Blacklist is up and kicking. Comments are being blocked. Emails about comment notifications (and comment blocks) are coming in... Looks like the amount of spam that was hitting the site before was crippling the email capability. Killed the spam, email returned. ;)

Now just to take down all the moderation features and I should be back to the way I was Pre-MT3. ::glee::

High Risk Pregnancy...

Less than a week after we get the good news, we get some bad news... Potentially really bad news...

Totem is RH-. I am RH+. The long and the short of it, from what I can tell, is that if left untreated, Totem's body will treat our baby as a virus/infection/foreign body and try to destroy it. Once the baby's blood gets into her blood, Totem forms antibodies. Those antibodies enter the fetus and begin to kill red blood cells. Obviously, if left alone, this will kill the baby. The good news, it is treatable. The bad news, we found out that we were already six weeks along when we found out she was pregnant. There is a chance that the antibodies have already formed...

Not only that, blood tests show that Totem is not producing enough progesterone (sp). Again, I'm not a pro at this, but the doctor said that if her levels do not increase, she is at a much higher risk for miscarriage. Under 8 is extrememly high risk, above 20 is normal. Totem's levels are at 15. They're treating her and over time, this should improve. Only time will tell, though.

Needless to say, Totem is taking this extremely hard. She's always been afraid that she won't be able to get pregnant. Then, when she does, she's given this news. I, myself, am trying to do what my dad has always told me to do. "Go with the flow." It's really too early to tell one way or the other how things are going to go. But I'm really, really worried about Totem... She means the world to me. I hope everything is going to be OK. I'm praying everything is going to be OK...

Crap...

OK. Things are going well... I'm getting "500 Internal Server Errors" everywhere... Permissions are set. Newline problems corrected. Things just seem to die or not work. But then they do work. But then they don't work. Literally. I put a cgi file in the root of this website. Runs fine in the shell. Ran it on a browser through Apache, it worked. Copied it to a folder and executed again in a browser, it didn't work. Copied it back. It didn't work. ??? Extracted a fresh copy in the folder where it didn't work before, it worked. WTF!!! Its the same damn code!!! And what errors are listed in my logs??? The wonderfully helpful "Premature end of headers" error which I am told is a catch all for perl when it has a brain fart... >:(

I'm not liking this. Want to know what I'm doing to fix the most of errors I was getting??? I'm extracting the files again... ?!?!?!? Yeah. For every file after trying for a couple of hours to figure out what is going on, and do the above many many many many time, I just extract an original file and things automagically fix themselves. WTF would that do??? Beats the hell out of me... I even put everything in a new directory and repeated all of the above again. And again... ... And again.

Maybe its time to pursue another blog software... MT used to be so simple, easy, and very robust. Now it's flashy, has plugins galore, and does not work... :\ Anyone have any suggestions that does not involve moving my blog to Blogger or LJ???

Good, in a bad creepy way...

It feels good an all to be done, but now that everyone I know is going back to school, and I'm not, it feels kinda creepy... :\ Everyone's getting busy and stressed out already, even before school's started. And (not like I available 24/7) everyone seems to be busy.

I still can't figure out if its because I'm not going to school or because I will have been working full time for more than 3 months straight...

Meh...

Mundane...

I'm slowing down... When I get home from work, I usually watch TV and then goto sleep. I have to kick this habbit and get back into my swing of things that I'm used to. I just don't know how long I'm going to be able to go without ever having a weekend... Yeah, I work Sunday to Sunday. :(

Wedding and Honeymoon - The Report - Part #3

Finally, on to the honeymoon. Totem and I got home as fast as we could, got changed and went to the hotel we had reserved for the night. It was'nt that bad of a deal especially considering that it allowed us to park there for a week. In fact the only bad thing about the night was the lack of sleep. We both fell asleep at 2AM to have our wakeup call at 4AM to be at the airport at 7AM. Got our tickets, boarded and we were on our way to Las Vegas. We were presented with a bottle of chapagne from the travel agency as a congradulations on the marriage. It was a pleasant surprise. I just wish I was a little more conscious when the flight attendant gave us the bottle. ;)

Five or six or four (I don't remember anymore) hours later we were in Las Vegas and on our way to the Luxor hotel with oddest of Taxi drivers... I think Totem was just plain freaked out so I tried to keep the conversation going as long as I could on the way to the hotel. And of course, when we got there, check in was not going to be until 1:30PM and it was 8AM in the morning there. So we're pooped and now we can't even take a nap. ;) Fortunately, baggage was able to hold our stuff for the time and the Luxor had a lot of things we could do in the mean time. We went on the Reboot Imax ride film. Went on a tour of artifacts found in King Tuts tomb. Totem is proud that my first 4D exerience was with her. ;) We saw Pirates 4D and needless to saw it was a blast. 3D was cool but feeling wind, getting wet, and seeing bees come out and try and attack you was awesome. Plus, we saw Nascar 3d in the Luxor Imax theater. After that we were able to get some show tickets and finally got to take a nap in our room.

Don't even start on the order...

15 hours later on Tuesday morning at 6AM, we woke up. Nice nap huh?!?! :) Had a great breakfast at the Luxor buffet but a little too pricey for us to do every day. It was about $12 a person but was really really worth it. We went on more walks that day and like usual, got suckered into a lot of things b/c we looking like newly weds, even though we were. :) After trying to hit up free shows and tours and food, the sales rep got down to the nitty gritty because, as usual, nothing is free. We either weren't old enough, didn't make enough, or weren't staying long enough in Las Vegas. Meh... Walking around a little more we found the Tropicana and their free spin slot machines. Only thing really worth getting out of the were the free playing cards. We came home with 6 decks. :) We also found the $20 for $50 slots area where basically you pay $20, but get $50 worth of slots. The only problem is that you can't cash out and you must use all your credits, even if you don't win. The plus is that if you don't win, you can get a prize. :) That was the life saver for us this week. Totem picked a shoulder bag, something we didn't think to carry around while we were walking. It was a life saver! We had so much stuff *cough* crap *cough* to look through every day that it made life much easier since we were no where near our room.

We hopped on the bus and went over to Circus Circus. Totem got me to go on the roller coaster and we bought the pics. She went on a bunch of other rides that I wouldn't touch. Look at the pics and you'll see why. 8) After eating lunch, we walked over to the Reveria and did their free spin. Got a deck of cards and a mug. We got back on the bus and went back to our hotel for a nap before the Blue Man Group Concert.

You know the drill...

Another concert by Blueman that was WELL worth the cost. We had a great time. They did a good job with mixing the senses again. Throwing stuff at us, getting the audience involved, actually bringing members of the audience up to the stage with them. Not to mention a slew of stuff that made you think, "How'd they do that!?!?!" This was the best thing we did all week and we wouldn't even mind going back to Las Vegas just to see them. 8)

Tuesday, the only highlight was the Zumanity concert in the evening. Interesting cannot even come close to describing the show. Sexual, topless, funny, amazing, acrobatic, twisting, dark, and waterful just start to decsribe it. I never realized how you could make a show out of things that seemed to have no real relation to each other. It was almost like those images that from a distance look like a face or something, but up close you can see the thousand or so individual images that it is actually made of... Still not as good as Blue Man though. ;)

Wednesday was more of a just walk around and be a tourist day. We visited NYNY, MGM, Excalibur, and the Tropicana again. NYNY has the Coyote Ugly club that has great prices on drink so we stopped and got refills for our mug we bought there. Plus they have a rollar coaster of their own that Totem got me on. Gambled a little bit, I lost all, Totem won it all back. ;) Around dinner time we got to go see the Tournament of Kings, which was a midevil dinner show. Interesting, to say the least. Dinner with no utencils and "Dragon Juice" for a beverage. I guess they do know what to call "pop" or "soda" that goes in their authentic midevil plastic mugs... ;) We stayed up late on Wednesday to check out the Bellagio water show and Treasure Island's pirate show. The water show was awe inspiring, but being the dork geek moron I am, I thought was was really simple. A little computer script pumping water at different pressures through pipes. Easy. 8) The Treasure Island show was cancelled last minute because of a gust of wind no more powerful than the fan that was on my desk. That was depressing see we were beat an now had to walk all the way back to the Luxor at midnight...

You're still reading this???

We packed up most of Thursday morning b/c we were switching rooms that evening. When we first got to the Luxor, we asked if they could do anything for us since it was our honeymoon. They offerred us a jacuzzi suite for $50 a night. We really didn't want to cut into our spending money so we just reserved it for the last night. It was 12 floors lower but over looking the front corner of the Luxor instead of the back this time. See pics. We managed to take a three hour nap... In the tub. 8) We also made the decision that if we are going to build a house, we're getting one of these babies. We just need to remember to use less soap next time as we had a little bubble problem once the tub filled up. 8) Later in the evening we went and saw Midnight Fantasy, another topless dance revue. Meh was my reaction. What?!?!? Meh and topless???? Yeah, that'll give you an idea of how bad it was... The funniest part was the comic who came out and did a 10 minute or so comic intermission. Seemed like it was just thrown in with no real purpose, but then again, I would have rather watched her doing standup for an hour or two than watch the dancing... Go figure...

Meh or not to meh? That's the question...

Since the hotel was booked to 100% capacity, we couldn't arrange a late checkout so we were out of our room around noon. Great, the flight didn't leave until 10PM at night and we didn't have a room to relax in... Not to mention we were out of money. :\ We basically walked around until about 6PM checking out some of the hotels and casinoes that we didn't go to before, but not much more than that. We got our bags and took the shuttle back to the airport. Using the wonderful amount of decks of cards that we had, we played a bunch of card games for a couple of hours, boarded and were on the way home to Buffalo. Only downside of this flight is that for close to an hour, it felt like we were falling. I don't know, it was almost like my stomach never settled. I guess I was lucky I could fall asleep, at least it was dark. Totem woke up around 3AM Las Vegas time to the woman behind us throwing up. Yea... Landed around 6AM, bright and early and very tired. We got the shuttle back to our car, went home, slept and let life slowly come back to us.

We have over six rolls of film to develop and once we do, I'll get those up here, but for the time being you'll have to deal with my digital pics. We had the time of our lives. Something that if we do again, we'll be going a cheaper route, but we have no regrets. We had fun and that is what matters. We are finally happily married and can begin spending the rest of our lives together. 8)

PS - Kirk, the glass elevators that move sideways up and down the Luxor, are not on the outside so there's nothing to see. Check out the pics. ;)

Wedding and Honeymoon - The Report - Part #2

After the pictures we went back to the reception hall. We pulled up at right around the same time our parents had just finished setting up. (There was bingo in the hall a couple of hours before so everyone was rushed to get things setup.) Walked in, saw everyone had basically just hung around for a little bit. When more people started showing up, we formed a welcome line or whatever they are called and greeted everyone who came in. Smilemore made this awesome photo album of the wedding while we were out getting our pictures done and that was a BIG crowd pleaser. Many were not able to attend the wedding so that anwered a lot of questions about what happened for us. :) Once everyone was in (I think only two people didn't show), we were ushered in by the DJ with Eye of the Tiger playing in the background. Interested and fun to say the least. I couldn't really see afterwards b/c of the flashes. ;) Totem and I went right over to cut the wedding cake b/c that was the dessert for the evening. We were both nice to each other and only slightly smashed the cake into each others face. See the pics. ;) After we cleaned up, my mom said the blessing that she found out that she had to say a couple of hours earlier. Opps... Damn memory. 8) Jay did a good job at ad-libbing (sp) his toast. I guess he did some research as to what the heck he was supposed to say. One of the big no-nos was to talk about x-girlfriends. He wanted to but in my case he couldn't. I don't have any! Then he tried hitting on how Totem and I met. Normally it goes, "How did you meet?". Then I say, "I met my girlfriend at a Boy Scout camp." ... Yeah, you figure it out. But trust me, Totem is DEFINATELY female. ;) Now I actually did meet her at a boy scout camp, but I think everyone in the room missed the point. My friends and everyone at the wedding party table were the only ones laughing. Oh well... Then dinner was served. Damned good meal...

During dinner, we got another pleasant surprise. Our friend Angela who had sung at our wedding sang a song for us at dinner. Words cannot describe her singing. It was just beautiful. Think of Enya and the Lord of the Rings. Thats how good it was. We were done eating at the wedding party table while the last table in the hall was getting their meal condiments. So Totem and I got up and started mingling. We got halfway through the hall when we were called over to the dance floor to have our first dance together as husband and wife. The song was "our" song, Aerosmith's I don't wanna miss a thing. What made this dance even more special was the bubbles. Let me explain. ;) We had bought bubbles for everyone to blow when we left the church. Rice and confetti were not allowed... Since it was raining after the wedding, we had to hold on to all the bubble bottles. Well, everyone unloaded close to all 200 bottles during our dance (and made sure to empty them by the end of the night). Check out the picture, it was a blast!!! 8) Then we went on to the Father-Daughter dance and the Mother-Son dance. General dancing and then wedding party dancing. The night was turning out great but it was far from over.

Totem threw her bouquet (yeah I know its probably spelled wrong) and my cousin caught it. When I got Totem's garder off *cough* with my teeth *cough* my cousin also caught it. Hmm. Brother and sister cousins catching the stuff. ::shudder:: Luckily the DJ was a quick thinker and got the group wriled up and quicker than we could think, my aunt and uncle (the parents of my two unfortunate cousins) were together in the spotlight and everyone was celebrating their 17 years of marriage. Followed that was more eating, drinking, and dancing. Not like it was bad, I just seriously think most of us there danced for more than an hour after that. My dad's got a little bored and decided to change (check the pic). Towards the end of the evening we lined up for some pictures with the new families. We said some good byes on our video and basically thats how the night ended... Six hours later we would be waiting to board an airplane to Las Vegas.

This time, I'm just out of time to write up the honeymoon part... :p I know when I get around to it in a day or two I'm going to do much more writing then posting pictures. We got 6 rolls of film still to develop but only about 30 digital pictures. Totem was a little more active with her camera than I was with mine. ;) If you want a quick preview, head over to my photoblog for some of the pics. Otherwise, I'll be back in a bit to wrap things up...

Wedding and Honeymoon, The Report

OK. Here we go... EVERYTHING WAS GREAT!

...thats it. Why are you still reading??? ;)

No really, everything went better than anyone could have expected. There were some hitches that no one really noticed. We didn't either so it doesn't matter. ;) But I'm gonna start from the rehersal...

The night seemed to be rushed and a little confusing. The married couple that was going to rehearse with us did not seem to... well not know what they were doing is not right, but they didn't seem to know how the priest was going to do the marriage so they had a lot of things backwards and mixed up. It probably didn't help that they had a different version of the rehersal book than we had... :\ Anyway, the practice went fine, and so did the dinner afterwards. A lot of food. Tons of talking and chatting. Looks like everyone liked the gifts from Totem and I as well. She got all her brides maids jewelry boxes with a necklace that had the first letter of each of their names on it. I got the grooms men all tall mugs that held about a liter of whatever they wanted. I stayed a little later than everyone. But ended up at my parents house around 11PM for the sleep. Totem stayed at her parents house with all the girls. The guys were invited over to my parents house but b/c of distance, only half stayed there.

The day of... July 31, 2004. I wake up around 9AM. Get dressed and ready to go. We were all ready and the only one who seemed to be nervous was my mom. :) So we pull out of the driveway and we see a limo coming. No... We all started saying it couldn't be. It was supposed to be picking us up at the reception hall. It passes and it is from the limo company. It gets to the end of the street and turns around. Crap. I hop out and drive with him back to the reception hall while my dad and bro go get everyone else. When we got to the hall, everyone was there in about 10 mins and we headed over to the church.

Then the wait. And wait. And wait... Traditional, I was told. To my surprise, I wasn't really nervous. Sweating, because of heat, yes. Some pictures were taken and I got to say a message to Totem for our wedding video. 15 minutes after the wedding was supposed to start, the limo with the girls shows up. Nerves kick in. :p And the girls start walking up the aisle before the priest was ready. He peeks out and sees 2 of them almost all the way to the frint and we rush out with the altar servers. The rest is just typical. Read from bible. Do you. Do you. Kiss. Married. YIPPEE!!!

Pictures. Our photographer shot everything digitally so my Dad was able to get them online a day or two after he go them back. Since there are over 620 of them, I'm not going to repost all of them, but just list a link. Some of my favorites are displayed right below the link here. Click it if you want to see all 620 of them... Included the "circus" that happened the morning of at Totem's parents house. ;)

Wedding Pictures.

You're still reading??? You deserve a cookie!!! On to the 6 hour limo ride with LOTS of pictures. FIrst stop on the trip was the Buffalo Botanical Gardens. The weather was not cooperating so we were seeking an indoor retreat. Unfortunately, we were, or at least I was, kind of taken back by the little old lady sitting at the door. "$50 donation to get your pictures taken here." We said OK and proceeded to walk in out of the rain. She was like a hawk. The daggers in my back made me pay the $50 (with the help of everyone, and especially kirk11235) even though some in the party objected. I just wanted a picture. If the little old lady wanted money, I gave it to her, but I made sure it went into a donation box for the gardens instead of her pocket. At least that way I know were the money was going... I hope. Anyway, it was warm. There were a lot of plants and I think Jay and another one of my grooms men had a little too much fun playing with the bushes shaped like animals. I'd post pictures but they are on his camera... :p

Afterwards we went to a local waterfall called Glens Falls. Just a beautiful place. It wasn't sunny but there was no rain so Totem and I got our wish for some nice outdoor pictures. Posing was fun. Got some very interesting shots (me holding my sister-in-law's leg, my brother-in-law face planting in his girlfriend's chest, couple shots, etc...). We were there for a little while, but managed some how to show up before the other 3 or 4 wedding parties showed up. It was nice to see all the different colors that everyone chose, especially because of how good the purple looked when compared to the teal-ish and blue dresses we saw...

After that we went back to my college and got pictures at the usual picture spot for most people who go there. The University at Buffalo's Baird Point. The only thing the really happened here, which was out of the ordinary, was that we (maybe just me and not we) made all the bride walk through mud and goose "stuff" to get to the point. Only after we got there did we find a path. Opps... ;) Plus, since the point was high up almost all the girls had to be lifted up. I think totem's sister was the only one who got up on her own, even if she did have a little slip. ;)

And another first... I have to make a part #2 b/c I ran out of space in this entry... I didn't know there was a limit. ;) If you're still reading this, you REALLY deserve a cookie! :p

If anyone wants to see the pictures that Totem's sister, Raindancer, took, click here... They're really good!!! Check 'em out!

Part #2 will probably be up tomorrow...

Who woulda thunk it...

I've raised a couple of red flags at my new job... It seems my work pattern is showing some signs tat trigger more monitoring and job assessment. I've even been proactive at trying to work things out and change the way I do things.

You want to know why I'm being watched? I'm doing too good of a job. Go figure... ;)

My supers are worried that I am headed towards burn out and suggested that I get up more oftern and even talks walks outside of the building. Since I do work at a call center, I have to be available on the phone for a certain amount of time each day. They consider 6 hours and 45 minutes a good amount of availability. On an 8 and 1 half hour hour day, everyone is required to take two 15 minute breaks and a 30 minute lunch. So subtracing that, it leaves 7 and a half hours to time for being on the phone. The last couple of days, I've been pushing 7 hours and 25 minutes. 30 minutes longer than the average for my team...

Figures that when I push myself to do I good job, I go a little too far... :p At least everyone, supervisors, managers, and team mates, are helping me out with this. (Pushing me to trainings, going for walks, talking, shooting the ... crap.)

Identity...

I never really realized how much of a part in my life identity (the word on general) would play... I've been used to just being a number at school. I was used to living in apartment complexes with more than 6 units... I sat at a folding table with a computer on it, in the workspace area of my last job.

Now I'm out of school, I live in the upper apartment of a house, and I have my own cubical, computer, phone, and cabinets at my new job. Its kind of overwhelming. I know, at least at my last job, I always wanted my "own" stuff. I hated being in the hallway (a room that was the access to another room) with nothing but the lower drawer of a filing cabniet to call my own. But now with all this stuff...

Its like wanting candy sooooo bad that you eat way too much. I'm not sick of it, I'm just numb to everything now. :\ Even Totem has noticed. I come home and just sit down in front of the tv... I even told her that I need to keep moving at night before I start to veg. Work problems? I doubt it. I love it here, but the only thing that has changed so much, so drastically, so quik, would be the stuff I am involved in. My world has done a 180 and I'm recovering...

The really really wierd part is that I still feel the same way about my life after my marriage that I did a couple of months ago. I've always looked ahead to things and a few months ago I said everything beyond the honeymoon seemed empty. It still does. More like a blank slate instead of empty but still odd... Definately something I'm not used to...

Consciousness strikes again...

More observations that I sit through on a weekly, almost daily basis...

1.) Alcohol seems to only negatively affect those that are not drinking.
2.) Choosing between family and friends sucks the big one...
3.) Doing the right thing, is not always the right thing...

Sigh...

Home stretch...

Classes are over. All... classes... are... over... Hmmm... I thought it would feel different than this. Oh well...

Only studying for finals left... Feeling pretty good about the year (past and upcoming). Feeling better knowing the end of schooling and beginning of "life" is near . Better be careful, all your base will belong to me. 8) I can at least look forward to the summer and getting a bunch of my projects finished... I'll finally have to time to get them done.

Roughs days for Totem...

The last days have been pretty rough on my but even worse for Totem...

Tuesday morning at 3AM we woke up to her being in tremendous stomach and back pain. She had been prescribed a new medicine and was complaining about back pain over the last weekend so we figured she was having a reaction to it. We woke up her doctor and after a quick couple of minutes trying to figure out what was going on, he told her to goto the Emergency room.

4AM we were there. One IV, a bunch of tests, and two hours later, we had an answer. Infection. The bladder type. Turns out the infection was bad enough that the pain was being spread to her back, stomach, and abdomen. (We learned from our doctor later that an infection of this type mimicks many things from appendicitus (sp) or pancreas attacks or anything - thats why he sent us to the emergency room.)

So she was given some pretty powerful antibiotics and muscle relaxers (to control the spasms) and we were heading home. I made it into work later that afternoon after she had rested a while. When I was at my second job, she called me. Back to square one. Horrible pain in her stomach and back. Worse then on Monday when we went to the emergency room. I couldn't get out early so all I could do was wait to get home at midnight and see how she was doing. Talk about feeling helpless again... Nothing like listening to your fiancee wailing in pain on the phone and there was nothing you could do... And she wouldn't wake her parents up b/c they were babysitting our nephew and niece.

By the time I had gotten home, she had thrown up everything she had eaten (medicine included) and she was AOK. She was smiling, happy, no pain at all, everything was good... Bad assumption again. The medicine was doing its work and getting the stuff out of her system. So we agreed that she should take the next dose.

4AM Wednesday morning. She's feeling sick again. Pain everywhere and she wants to puke. By 7AM he mother had woken up and was now downstairs trying to console her. Once again, she lost the entire contents of her stomach and all was well. We (her mom included) agreed to call her doctor for an emergency appointment.

12:30PM Wednesday. The doctor confirms everything the ER had said. Prescribes some anti-nausea medicine and something to promote healing in her gastro-whatever track.

3:30PM. Guess what? Its back. Totem cannot stop screaming from the pain. She just can't handle it anymore. A walk in some fresh air does not help. She starts to say that she wants to vomit to get rid of the pain but now she can't because of the new medicine keeping her from doing so... Great. Nothing like handcuffs for stomach pain... Eventually, much later, she does and things look up. She's feeling better so she takes a nap.

Now I start to get nervous. She hasn't really eaten anything in the past two days. Everything she has tried to eat has come back up. We've been through an episode of dehydration with her before and I don't want to go through that again...

Around 8PM she wakes up in a little back pain. Not as much as before, but the same amount and type of pain she was in on Sunday when we first thought her first prescription was causing...

Luckily for me, both her parents were home and did a much better job at making her feel better than I could. Maybe it was because they were telling her to do stuff, instead of offering to do things for her. Maybe because it was Mom and Dad. I don't know...

Stomach pain started to come back. Her father's trick, that seemed to work pretty damned good, ice packs all over her back and stomach. She was in pain still, but not wailing or tossing and turning like she was before.

So I started feeling bad that I couldn't make her feel better but was glad that someone at least could... She's everything to me and watching her scream in pain, knowing that there wasn't much at all that I could do, really rips a guy's heart out...

Her parents go to bed and I try and get Totem to do the same. She tells me thank you for everything I've done. I told her that her dad was the one doing the magic, not me. Then she said to me, but you were there and thats what matters. Now for the sappy part... I smile and tell her, "In sickness and in health..." :) She smiles and seems to be in better spirits.

I get her downstairs and slowly she goes to sleep.

Now wait, I haven't said so far is that when her parents came home, her mom had a long talk with her doctor about what was going on and what to do. Unfortunately, b/c Totem is over 21, the doctor couldn't tell her much b/c of some new privacy law that was just enacted. So she did what every Mom would do. She became Dr. Mom and told our doctor that she was taking Totem off of all the meds. He agreed and suggested she taken some extra strength tylenol.

While her Dad was doing his magic, he thought she should at least try to take the antibiotic again, to get rid of whatever was left in her system. Nothing else, just the antibiotic. So she did...

Midnight Wednesday. Nope, no good. She couldn't keep that down either. But, like usual, she felt a little better afterwards. Just enough to get back to out room and goto sleep...

Now, I've got to head out to work... I've left her with a bunch of ice packs and I hope she'll be doing fine throughout the day. I won't be home until 8 or 9 tonite so all I can so is just hope she'll be OK...

Whats going on here!?!?!

I don't think I've ever gone an entire week without posting before so this is out of the ordinary... Lets just say I'm on vacation and can't write much right now... :(

There is an odd trend developing though... On days that I don't post, I get close to 100 less visitors and 300 less page views when compared to days that I do post... Hmm... When I post, MT pings a bunch of sites to let the world know that I have written something new. Those listing usually last a little more than an hour before they are erased by other people updating their blogs... Do a lot of you come from weblogs.com or any of the other blog syndicating sites???

Belly Up...

Well everything that Totem and I have planned for the past year or so has gone belly up. We have literally done a 180 on life. We've come to realization that living on our own has finally gone beond our control and is an unattainable goal at this time, even though I've thought it could be, and fought for it to be, for over a year now...

Totem is not able to work this semester. I am limited in the amount of time that I am allowed to work at my job. We cannot live, even in a new place, on my salary alone. Student loans are not an option at this point. After talking with both of our parents, and having very long talks together, we decided...

We're moving in with Totem's parents. They have a guest room in the basement that they are allowing us to live in for the next couple of months until I graduate and get a better job. This will allow us to save the money that we would be spending on rent for either a deposit for an apartment in the summer, or maybe even a down payment on a house.

This is not something we've wanted to do, but it is the only thing we can do to not get ourselves any deeper than we currently are. With both sets of parents offering rooms in their houses, we figured her parents would be least inconveniced (sp) by us because they are not currently using the guest room. Whereas if we moved in with my parents, we'd force my dad to move our of his office.

I originally was extremely bummed and depressed about all of this. I've been trying to separate myself from any attachment (financial) I've ever had. IE: Use my money to live my life. Not living off of others. All four parents realized that I have been doing this, and all have been there to talk with me and let me know how they feel. They are welcoming us into their homes with open arms. So, even though I think I will be a burden on their lives, they have reassured me that we will not be.

So while this is not the step that Totem and I wanted to take, we are very gracious for everyone helping us out. Totem and I are happy. That is what I wanted. Thank you Mom and Dad, Mom and Dad. :)

Torn...

Do or die time for the apartment. Totem's Dad is getting in a little too deep in this whole situation and Totem and I are getting uncomfortable. She's nervous that if we don't do what he says, he'll shove it in her face till god knows when(but in not "our face" as in he won't say anything to me but he will say stuff to her behind my back). He basically is checking out a couple more places than we did, but it seems he is limiting his choices to apartment buildings because they are "newer". Totem and I were looking forward to moving into a house finally (even if other people live downstairs). I don't care how old the house is. My parents house is more than 50 years old and it is a great house...

We just didn't need him to say "wait, hold on, don't commit" a couple of hours before we were supposed to sign the lease. (Which we didn't do anyway b/c the landlord wasn't home, but thats not the point.) :\

The day after...

Lots of good things... One bad thing. I don't want to talk about it but my Christmas was overshadowed this year. I love all the stuff I got. I didn't like the sleep on Christmas Eve or wakeup on Christmas Day.

SSDD.

Pattern...

I think I have found a pattern. Every party I've been to... Someone, who is drunk, it is a requirement, has to say the following words:

"I understand that... But..."

Breather...

As usual, there is now a long lull after about 3 weeks of hell from school. No projects, exams, or homeworks that are going to give me a headache any time soon...

Having lunch with Mom today helped get the edge off... It was nice... :)

Drained...

I said I could do it, and I did. But I am really drained...

Last night was rough. The homewrok lasted much longer than I had thought and I got home later than I had planned. Totem is doing better but she's starting to feel bad because she is home alone all the time and when I get home, I have to spend time on homework and not with her. I'm not liking that. I'd love to spend my evenings with her. I want to. But when homework takes 4+ hours to do it kinda ruins all other things... Shoulda done it earlier? Tried that. Was at Totem's surgery. That's more important than hw I think.

Anyway, in the morning I felt pretty rested. I was able to finish up the rest of the homework and eat breakfast all in time for me to still make it to class, on time. So I'm cruising along, feeling pretty good about myself. I was doing the speed limit even though there was no traffic. Everything was good. Then I see a semi in the right lane of a two lane highway. I was pacing a car that had an older couple in it. We were basically approaching the semi to the point where I would have to back off or speed up to get around the car. I sped up. No sooner than me speeding up and well, cutting off the other car I saw another slow car in the left lane. Now to keep going, I was going to have to cut off the semi. I kept up and I did.

Well, the older couple didn't like that. Or at least I thought it was an older couple. They actually were Sheriffs in an undercover car and they wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing. I am afraid of police lights now.

Long story short, I think he saw that I was nervous and that I got a ticket only a little over a month ago so he let me off with a warning. The whole process just knocked me off the pedistal I was on. I wasn't depressed or anything, I was actually happy I didn't get another ticket. I just felt empty, tired, and lost after that. Sorta like you've just run out of energy but in a mental way and not a physical one. I'm just drained now...

I think someone above is watching over me. I hope they keep watching... I could use the help.

Here comes another one...

Totem is getting better each day. So far the only major problem she has had to deal with is a false sense of security (basically the medicine is so good that she moves around a lot during the day, only to suffer at night and in the morning from over exerting herself). She's getting better though...

Unfortunately for me, all this happened in the "middle" of the semester. One of those weeks where all projects are due and tests happen within the same seven days... Its going well, though. I just won't be seeing any relaxing time for another week or so. I've got plans to be out for school/work until after 8 each night and this weekend I'll be working 13 hours at my second job, and another 8 at my first job. Not to mention I have two exams next week and a project due. (Good thing I've gotten through about a quarter of them so far.)

::chugs Jolt cola:: Who said it couldn't be done?!?!? :)

Excited...

I JUST BOUGHT TICKETS TO THE BLUEMAN GROUP COMPLEX TOUR!!!

WOOHOOO!!!!!!!!

I've been trying to get good seats for the last day or two and I finally got them. Direct center of the balcony. Decent distance from the stage and in an EXCELLENT listening position in Sheas Performing Arts Theater.

I'm SO friggin excited. This is the first concert I have gone to in at least a decade and it is definately one I have wanted to see for YEARS. Ask Totem. Three years ago I wanted to take her and I to New York to see them on Broadway. Now there're coming to my town. How awesome is that?!?!?

Did I mention I'm excited? :)

Sigh...

Have you ever had one of those days where you try to please everyone but only end up making everyone pi$$ed off???

:(

Slower...

For the first time in a long time, I had a night were I got to try and relax...

I got sick and called in on work, but still went to school. When a 101 class has 25% of the total points you can get as attendance, I'm not missing a class... Instead of going to work afterwards, I did homework. 5.5 hours of homework. It was loads of fun... Thanks to that, though, I got to play about 4 hours of Morrowind during the night so that kinda helped lighten the stress load. Tonight also looks promising. I'm probably not going to play the game much, but instead clean my office while working on revamping the network at the same time... They kinda go hand in hand. I'm really liking the fact that I don't have any homework due tommorrow...

Totem kinda realized this too... She told me the other day that she really likes only having to do one thing during the day (work) instead of many (work and school). It gives her some more time to do her things and she does not really have to be concerned with what people think about how she plays her instruments (she is a Music Ed major). She can just relax and practice when she wants and at her own pace...

She now understands why I'm so stressed out without my summer...

No time...

I'm really not liking the fact that I don't have the time available to me like I used to have... I get up at 6, gone by 7. I'm at work/school usually until 8 at night each day. Sometimes later or eariler, but not by much. So that gives me about 4 hours to eat dinner, do my homework, and do something for me... Lately it's been eat, homework, then an hour of gaming if I have the time.

What's starting to eat at me (ask Totem, she sees it in my face daily) is that I used to have time to do more than just that... I could clean the house, work on the Linux box, spend some time with Totem, work on my website, all in one day and still have some time left over. Now I bearly can do anything. If you're even thinking of asking why I'm playing a game instead of spending time with Totem it is because she usually goes to bed at 10 and I play when she is asleep... And I can do homework at midnight. I'm a night owl, but Math/Physics/Statics/COMPLEX_CRAP is not my friend after 10PM...

It's really starting to wear me down having to come home and know that I'm not going to get anything done... Even on the weekends, I'm always busy. That's why I've neglected my blog every weekend this month... I just want some more me time like I used to have. And by me, I mean doing things that I can directly see the effects and results of. Now working on 3 hours homework problems that I just might see 20 years down the line in th workplace... I'm hoping that when the second summer session starts I'll have a little more time becuase I'm only taking a 101 class. I'm still getting home after 7 every night though... :\

Yea...

Last night didn't go so well. Totem and I got into a fight over the cats. Chef4lisa24 was over and she just ended up leaving b/c she didn't want to listen to us... After we finally calmed down, Totem and I just talked about about 3 hours, all the way to 1 in the morning... Both of us are running into ruts in out lives... If anyone says college life is not stressful, they haven't lived our lives. She's all uneasy because her family is catering to her brother, all because he is having a baby with a girl (I don't think) he loves... She's tried to do everything right and no one appears to notice. But when someone who is as messed up as her bro has a baby, evrything is forgotten...

I'm still in a rut because the"no summer vacation" is starting to take hold... I'm putting in 10+ hours days every day. So that's a little better than the 12+ I was doing in the Sprin semester, but not much better... I've got a vacation planned soon so hopefully Totem and I can relax for a bit... I hope it works because we're driving each other nuts because of the wrong things. It's killing us. We just want to sit back and relax...

What I would give to be out of college and into the workforce supporting a family right now...

Pretty blue...

I've been feeling really really really crappy about myself over the last couple of days... Today just took the cake.

Woke up with a migraine so I called in from work. Still had to goto my Com class. Waste of time. Now, while my head is pounding, I'm doing statics homework and it is pure hell... I've been working on the same problem for over an hour. And that problem is one of the first ones out of the 200 available. I don't even wanna think about the ones that I have to do in the 190's...

And to make matters worse, like a COMPLETE frickin idiot, I turned down an internship today. Yeah. She called and asked if I was still interested and I told her I couldn't b/c of classes. I didn't even get any info on the job or what hours or available, or the pay, or ANYTHING. I tried calling back but now I only get the receptionist who thinks she knows who I should talk to, and then I am prompt forwarded to a voicemail box...

I can't believe I just did that... I've ben depressed at myself for a lot of things but I think I have to say this is one of the first times I have ever gotten angry over something I did...

I don't wanna do this anymore... :\

No difference...

It's the end of the semester. I've taken my finals exams. I've said my goodbye's to my friends for the summer (most are going home, hopefully I'll be in touch with the ones that stay). I've got my Linux box back to a semi-normal state. I have nothing to do.

I still feel stressed out... And I don't know why...

Work was OK today. They finally had something for me to do and I was able to keep busy the entire five hours I was there. I've got more projects lined up for next week. Home is still the same. I've got piles of paper to file. I;ve got websites to design. I have laundry and dishes to do. Even though I'm coming home earlier, Totem has kept herself busy with babysitting jobs at our house so I'm kinda non-existent unless she needs another pair of eyes. I'm gonna be seeing even less of her in the next couple of weeks... I don't think she realizes this yet and I feel an arguement coming on about it... Nothing I can do about it... I need to goto class and work if we are gonna make it.

So maybe I do have stuff to do. But I still feel stressed though and it's getting to me... I need a vacation and it's not coming soon enough...

Feh.

Stressed over nothing...

I've been stressed out over the last couple of days. Totem sees it. Totem's parents see it. But I've done nothing over the last few days that could be stressing me out...

I think its the lack of work at work. I have almost NOTHING to do until May 17. Reason being is that the computers cannot be touched until the students absolutely cannot use them anymore. IE: Summer. Then I'll have TONS of work to do... But until then, I just sit at my desk... :\

Hey, its money, right?

Can't win...

I'm still getting hits from those "fake" sites... I don't know how I am getting referred from them, or why they always come to my site in the exact same order EVERYTIME, but no one on the internet has access to the log file so I give up... For the time being...

I've got so much crap going on at school, I don't know if I'll ever get around to tracking the problem down... I just want this week to be over with so I can start over again. Financially, academically, and emotionally...

Heavy...

Everything is getting so heavy lately... School has been really hard. I've said it before, but I love it how all classes at once pile on everything at the end of the semester... Work has been ok, but there is a dark cloud looming in the distance. I've got virtually no work now because all the students are in working on their final projects. THe dark cloud is all the work that piles on instantly as we lock the doors to the computers for the summer...

Home would be nicer if I could stay there longer... :(

Gimme a bat...

I'm starting to feel like this more and more every day... :(

James Brain

What the hell is wrong with me...

You might want to ask why am I posting such a personal event because of all the slandering that might happen... Yeah, I know I'm probably going to be called a wimp, softy, pu$$y, and what not, but hopefully if this journal survives in years to come, I'll be able to look back one day and show my children that I was scared, and God forbid, if they ever have to live through a war, they can be too...

1990 or 1991. I was in third grade and my brother was in kindergarden. We are walking through Media Play with my dad and find a shareware version of Doom. We beg him to buy it for us. After 10 minutes of proding, he finally gives in and buys it for us... He reminds us that it is only a game...

Tonite on the news... I'm hearing about the recent losses and happenings going on with the war. The station had a special on following a british news anchor and cameraman who were with a group of American soldiers. THe group was approached by multiple Iraqi's dressed in civilian clothing and bearing signs or peace/surrender. When they get close, they open fire. Out of a close by building, Iraqi soldiers begin to pour out and fire upon the American soldiers, and subsequent British reporters. The Americans a pinned. It's a fire fight. They cannot move forward or backwards. They are surrounded on all sides. Soldiers that are walking are ordered to crawl on their bellies to avoid fire. When the shooting gets intense, artillery strikes are called in. When those do not prove fruitful, the American soldiers soon realize that they are running out of ammo. "Conserver your ammunition!" is heard in the background. The camera shifts to a soldier talking on a phone explaing that they group is under heavy fire, low on ammo, and in need of assistance. Air strikes come and soon after, a white flag is flown by the Iraqi's. The camera fades out...

I was watching this in the kitchen with my mother (I was at their house) making dinner. When I heard the conserve your ammo, I started shaking. I sat down to eat and watched the rest of the story. I was still shaking and now it was pretty noticable that I was fighting off tears. My brother and his girlfriend come in and sit down to eat. Mom notices my and asks whats wrong. I shurgged it off and said I was fine. She came over and gave me a hug knowing I was lying. I think I scared my brother and his girlfriend. Then dad comes home. (Yes, this all happened at the same time.) He picks up on it, but decides not to say anything out of respect for me.

What the hell was wrong with me? When I heard those words being yelled out of the soldiers mouths on TV, all I could think of was me playing Doom, Quake, Duke Nukem, and all the other first/third person shooters I play. Same with paintball, cause I play that too... Then it hit me and hit me hard. Those are games. What I heard and saw on TV was not. That was not a game. That was real and all I could do was quiver. It's like my body shut down and all I could think of was fear and how I did that daily except those guys don't have a reset button.

Dad took me on the side, gave me a long hug. Reminded me that, yes, that is not a game, but that all those soldiers knew what they were getting into. (He used to be in the army reserves, so he has a good idea.) It helped a bit, but all that keeps running through my head is seeing that soldier scream "Conserve your ammunition!" and me running behind a brick wall in a paintball tournament. When the air raids were called, all I could think of was me using a RPG in Quake...

And knowing that those men and women were out there risking their lives for something they believed in scared me... Because there was a chance that they might not be able to come back. There is a chance that they might die...

And that to me, is very scary. Almost so much that I couldn't put it into words. Just imagine not being able to control yourself infront of your parents and your sibling with his/her significant other. If you can imagine what it would take for you to unvoluntarily do that, you might be able to figure out what I was feeling.

It just was too real for me to handle... And the fact that there was real life Quake going on (and I could see it and understand it for the first time in my life), was way to much for me to handle...

::whimper::

Still no time for anything...

Too much stuff is happening all in one week:

Two exams
Two sets of homework due
I moved to a new apartment 30 miles away from the old one
I am systematically turning off the utilities at the old apartment while turning on the new ones at the new apartment
I am still moving stuff out of the old apartment
The new apartment is not getting a phone b/c we have cell phone so I am internet-less out there until next week wednesday (I'm writing this at work right now)
I need to drive to the cable company to turn in all my old Cable equipment

GAH!!! INFORMATION OVERLOAD!!!! :\

They just keep coming...

Down, down, down, up, up, down, down, down, down, down, up, down, down, up, up, down, down, down, down... I can't take it any more... ::whimper::

Starting this weekend...

Saturday:
UP: Signed lease at new apartment.
UP: Realized how much more space we have.
DOWN: I unloaded most of the first van trip to the apartment.
DOWN: I went back to the old apartment 30 miles away and loaded it up again.
DOWN: Our old apartment is on the 9th floor.
DOWN: It took me 7 trips.
DOWN: My back really hurts.
DOWN: Drive the 30 miles back to the new apartment on a sore back.
UP: Jen cleaned the house. Murphy's oil soap works wonders.
DOWN: I unloaded the entire van again.
DOWN: My back really really hurts now.
UP: So far, the new apartment is put away.
UP: Lay down to sleep.
DOWN: Have one of the worst night sleeps I have ever had.

Sunday:
DOWN: Jen's Mom calls at nine in the morning.
DOWN: Jens' Mom reminds me I was supposed to be at work at eight in the morning.
UP: Get to work and read email from past day without Internet.
DOWN: Find out that since I took Friday off to move, lots of jobs that NEEDED to be done then, HAVE to be done now.
DOWN: Finished as much jobs as I could, still not all problems were fixed because users could not figure out how to use a computer.
DOWN: Even though users are not my department, the complaints they give make it look like my job is not done...
UP: Went home (old apartment) in an attempt to relax.
UP: Since TV is not in new apartment, figured out a system to watch TV through my computer.
UP: Posted yesterday's post.
DOWN: Loaded up the rest of Jen's stuff into my truck.
UP: Visited (my) Mom's and got to have some of her Goulach. *yum*
DOWN: Had to leave early for dinner at Jen's family's house. (They're not bad, I just didn't want to leave my mom's)
BIG DOWN: MY THEORY HAS BEEN PROVEN! While talking to Jen's dad about her van, I asked a question about the oil dip stick. It had no writing on it so I didn't know where I was supposed to look to a good oil fill level. He said look for the dots. Future sister in law made it abundantly clear that I was a guy and all guys were supposed to know that. Even she knew that. (She was not trying to make me feel bad, she just said the wrong thing at the wrong time and I was quiet the whole time... As usual...)
DOWN: Jen's dad laughed too.
DOWN: Almost everyone but Jen laughed...
DOWN: I stuck it in the back of my head, trying not to think about it knowing that it will bite me in the a$$ sometime soon...
DOWN: I got to take Jen's dad home since his Mom was going to our new apartment with Jen to hang curtains.
DOWN: Driving with your future father in law is not fun.
DOWN: Making yourself seem like less of a man because you work with your mind and not your hands is even worse...
DOWN: Loaded up the van (Jen and I swapped cars at dinner) with all of Jen's stuff that she had been storing at her parent's house.
DOWN: I unloaded the enitre van again b/c Jen as sleepy and had to finish homework.
DOWN: Jen didn't want her stuff just yet from her parents house.
DOWN: I don't like watching projects (IE: moving) sit to idle...
DOWN: Jen and I started to yell and fight.
UP: After laying down and talking for a bit we were all chipper again.
UP: Made a late night run to TOPS for essentials. Doritos and Pop. =)
UP: Were planning on watching a movie and try to ummm... relax... ummm... yeah...
DOWN: Anything but relaxing took place.
DOWN: More issues with me and living up to stuff that I think I need to live up to... (If you know what I mean, good. If not, sorry...)
DOWN: Even crappier night of sleep...

Monday:
DOWN: Had to wake up early to accomodate for a longer trip to school.
UP: It takes less time to travel the 30 miles to school than it did versus the 5 miles to school from the old apartment. City driving (old apartment) versus Country driving (new apartment).
UP: Got a chance to relax and read the paper before class.
DOWN: Got my exam back in the class I'm SUPPOSED to be doing extremely well in. 6 points above the failing mark.
DOWN: Fell like $hit now.
DOWN: Took a quiz right after that.
DOWN: Had a brain fart and I'm sure I got half of it wrong.
UP: Sue waited for me outside of the exam.
UP: Sue knew how I was feeling and tried to comfort me.
UP: Sue reminded me that there are probably no guys in that class that have a woman waiting for them outside after they finished. ;) VERY KEWL!
DOWN: Went to my next class, bored out of my mind and sulking.
DOWN: Sulking had negative affects on the Gabe.
UP: I fixed my pocket stapler. [OFFICE SPACE] mmmm... Stapler. [/OFFICE SPACE]
DOWN and UP: The Gabe bought me lunch to try and cheer me up.
UP: Sue and Gabe hug-mobbed me in the middle of a building in a popular area on campus with lots of people watching.
UP: Gabe tried cheering me up some more but poking me...
DOWN: I had to leave both of them to go meet with a teacher.
UP: Halfway down the hallway I hear loud feet running at me.
UP: Both Gabe and Sue were running at me.
UP: I got hug-mobbed again. *blush*
DOWN: Teacher I met with, and whom I am trying to make a good impression on, found out I got a low grade on the exam.
UP: He seems excited that I want to do an independent study with him.
DOWN: I have to go to work.
DOWN: I find out that one job I did over the weekend was useless because of info that I was not told.
DOWN: I had to restart that job.
DOWN: I had to unplug a locked faculty system from the network because it was part of a security breach across campus. (Why is this bad? Read below.)
DOWN: The keys to that room were in a secretaries break room and I had to wake the secretary taking a nap in there up to get the keys.
DOWN: I'm still burning from the look I got...
DOWN: That job I had to restart today, I had to restart again because the hard drive died in the middle of it.
UP: I got to vent to my blog while the drive is reformatting...

And yes, that was my WHOLE weekend...

Sorrow...

Too much work and no play make Andy go something something...

Slacking...

This weekend was a real trip... Fights and arguements all weekend. Stress up the ying yang, and then I come to school on Monday... AHHH!!!

At least today is going a little bit better... I just don't feel like writing too much today... I gotta break later so maybe I'll post the new "Spank the monkey" animation I found... ;)

Kewl...

It's still here at 7:30 at night. YIPPEE!!! Maybe it's because I'm keeping myself so busy...

Better...

This morning was a lot better than yesterday... I got up early. Went to my Math recitation. I felt really excited for some reason...

Maybe it was the college-low-budget-only-get-essentials breakfast I had this morning. Oreo's, Ranch Doritos, and Diet Pepsi Twist. ;)

Who knows... But I'm not complaining. I'm gonna milk this mood for all it's worth!!!

Friends...

Why can't any of the friends I have be friends to Jen? Why can't any of the friends that Jen has be friends to me?

It's really aggrevating, and depressing that we cannot find a middle... Of all of the friends that Jen has, I am not close to a single one. I just know their names. I've only done something with two of Jen's friends outside of school related activites... Same with Jen. She only meets my friends when I attend a school event or do something computer related... And then she only gets to know them on a name basis.

Why can't we all just get along... :(

Wow...

I do feel a little bit better. I guess it really does help to get that stuff off your chest... :\

New Year...

New Year = New Problems
OR
New Year = New Beginnings

I don't know... And right now, I'm not really caring either... I guess the last day of this year is going to be a downer for me... I wish these holidays would start to seem like holidays and not just other days of the year...

*sigh*

Back to work...

And I didn't even get to play with my toys yet... WAH!!!

Oh well, I have lots of time to burn DVD's this weekend... ;)

Much Smoother...

Things are going much better now, and not just because I'm feeling better. Less stress, easier days, time flying by, all is good.

Wish it could be like this during the school year. Ahh well. I'm just gonna try and suck up as much as this as I can before it all hits me again like a ton of bricks in January... ;)

People...

So far every job that I have had, I ended up leaving because of social problems, not because of the job or the workload. It happened at my summer camp job, it happened at my job as a tech support rep, and now it is happening at my job at the college.

The work is great. Projects that are reasonably challenging, great hours, and great pay. But I feel so unconfortable there because of the way I am treated by one of my co-workers. It has gotten to the point that I don't want to go to work anymore...

How would you react?

A master building key is missing. You call X co-worker at home to ask if they have it. They do not, no big deal. Early the next moring you get an email from the person who has the key saying they will bring it in soon. You tell X employee that the other person had it and you get the response:

"I know. But thanks anyway for telling me because I really wanted to know."

How am I supposed to take that? It sounded negative... But I didn't make eye contact on purpose...

Why can't I just find a job where I can work for years on end, make decent money, and have most people appreciate me???

*heavy sigh*

Well...

Things went a little better today. Calmed down. No runs ins with... NM. Classes went fast. Work went faster... Just an all around good day I guess...

That's the only thing I like about my job when school is in session. Almost everyday I work late into the night so I get to work at my own pace and not worry about anyone else messing with me. Just me and my work, and that can be very relaxing sometimes...

Not to mention that telling certain people that you do not want to come to work anymore because of the way you are being treated (which worked really well in my case, I guess they value me here. *grin*), or talking to friends and loved ones about your troubles, or sleeping on it... can all relax you too...

Now it's time to spend some money to really cheer me up. ;) (more to come...)

Helplessness...

Have you ever felt helpless? And I mean really helpless? My girlfriend Jen has not had a good week, this past week. Thursday she was in the hospital for severe dehydration... All she could do was throw up. Water woudln't even stay down. But the sad thing about that day was I had to sit in the hospital waiting room with her for 5 and a half hours while people who came in, were walking, able to talk, and hod no apparent life threatening problems were attended to in 30 mins. I mean she only couldn't walk, she could bearly talk, and was hacking up more than just her lungs in the waiting room (not to get you sick, but when you fill up a bed pan with vomit, something is wrong). Most of the people in the waiting room agreed. The nurses didn't. >:(

Every time we asked how many were ahead of us, they lied. There are 5 people ahead of you. 8 go in. I ask again. 1 person ahead of you. 3 people go in. I ask again. 1 person ahead of you. 5 go in. OK, you say it's their right to decide who needs more care? I agree. But who is more sick? A guy who litterally jogs into the waiting room laughing and joking with the person sitting next to him or a girl who is vomiting all over the place, is crying, can't walk, and can bearly sit still from the stomach pain??? WTF IS THAT?!?!?!

Anyways, after they finally got her in, she had to wait a bit to see the doctor. By the time I go to see her they had her on an IV bag and her color was coming back... Thank god. My mom said we could be there for a long time. My cousin took 6 hours to go though one IV bag. Jen went through 2 in 30 minutes. :)

All was better that night. She slept all night for the first time in a very long time. 12 hours straight. She was good until last night. On our way home from my parents house, she complained about jaw pain. Half way back her jaw literally locked up and she started wailing in pain. Her face got tense and she started balling. I didn't know what to do... I was helpless. I couldn't do anything for her...

So I did a quick 180 and sped all the way back to my parents house. She was still crying as I carried her in when my dad came running down the stairs... We got her some ice and made her lay down for a bit. When her parents came over she calmed down and looked like she was getting better. I tried again to get her home this time. When we got home, I gave her some Nyquil and tried to get her to sleep. No luck. Instead of her jaw tightening up this time, it was her neck and shoulders. She was just laying there and I would see her toss and turn, every time her neck and shoulders tensing up. She couldn't goto sleep. Again, the pain came back along with the wailing. I don't know about you, but when someone you love starts to cry and everything you do cannot stop it, something happens in your heart. I can't explain it, only convey what I felt and maybe you have gone through it too so you know what I am talking about...

I finally asked if she wanted to goto her parents house? She calmed down a little bit and said yes. So we made the 45 minute drive at 11:00 at night to her parents house. She was almsot asleep from the nyquil when we got there. She was feeling better though. In a serious way, I thought the "I wanna be with my mommy" thing is what happened. Not because she said she wanted to be there. It's just that she has never been in this much pain in her life. Even her parents said she has never. She just wanted to be home with her parents. I was not going to argue.

Well, I'm at work right now writing this. I'm making up for the badly needed time I had to miss because the hospital trip. Anyway, I guess I had to vent. Even if no one reads this. I'm embarrassed to talk to her or my parents about this because I almost fell apart during both times... Hel, I'm embarrassed to even see them. I've been around with Jen for 4 years and her parents know me as a person. Never before have they seen me fall apart like I have this week. I just didn't know what to do. I felt and feel so small...

Camping in 3 feet of snow in a tent. Yeah, I can do that. Rescue a drowning person from a lake. Yeah, I can do that. Tie a bazillion knots to hold myself tighter to the edge of a cliff I'm climbing. Yeah, I can do that.

Stop the pain that the person I love is suffering from... I guess I couldn't do that...................

Blah...

Not much happened today. My cat is doing a lot better. She is actually a little more playful with her bigger brother now... Wierd. Anyway, work was really slow. Got work done but it just seemed to take longer than normal. At least I can sleep in tommorrow...

Maybe I'll actually try to relax tommorrow... Nah!