Moment of Zen

I need a bigger oatmeal bowl

Every morning when I make it, if im not careful it overflows the bowl and then I have a real mess.


Edit: I also need to learn to turn my phone sideways when I take pictures for the blog with it.

Hmmm….something’s not right here

I got the mail this afternoon and when I looked in, I saw what looked to my bank statement.  Odd thing was…there was no envelope, it was literally just the pages of my bank statement.  and in the corner there was the postage mark.  So….yeah….somebody mailed my bank statement with no envelope so any number of people at the post office were able to see what checks I wrote and to whom.  So now I get to go into the bank monday morning and close out the account just to be safe.  the lady at the 1-800 number was pretty stunned and at first said “Well, it must’ve been somebody from the post office who opened it”  to which I replied “Yeah, I would’ve thought that too except it’s got postage on the first page of it. 

UPDATE: I went to the bank this morning, got the same kind of response that I got from the 1-800 number.  They were ready to let me walk out the door with just putting a flag on the account to check for signatures and id (which I didn’t ask but the thought crossed my mind…shouldn’t you be doing that already?)  They asked if there was anything else I’d like to do like close the account and reopen a new one, to which I replied yes.  They set me up with a new account, waived all the setup fees.  I also turned off paper statements to avoid this happening in the future.  They’ll be rushing me my new checks and debit card and hopefully I will have dodged this little identity scare bullet with only a little inconvenience.  

Pop Quiz, Hotshot!

Who’s drunk in this picture?

Random Thought of the Day

Even if you do everything you think you’re supposed to do, chances are pretty high you’re not necessarily going to get picked.  And that’s how life goes.  You can let that fact knock you on your ass and get swallowed up by the disappointment.  Or you can stand up, dust yourself off, take a deep breath, and take another step forward.  And then take another one after that.  and another one, and another one and another one…

You can’t expect what should happen or what could happen, but you have to accept what does happen. 

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Found this interesting article today..

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

This passage really struck home for me..

“I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.”

I haven’t been able to sit down and a read a book for years now.  Like the author of that article said, I lose my focus after a few pages. 

I was thinking about kids these days and how when my nephew ends up in college in 4 years how drastically different of an informational landscape it’ll be.  The internet was still in its widespread infancy back in ‘94 when I started college.  I remember being a Prodigy user back in the day.  I had an email address through an honors english class I was in.  I could get on the web in the computer science lab.  But the majority of any research I had to do was done by trudging to the library, searching titles for something that might be somewhat relevant to my topic, trudging *editor’s note* did alot of trudging in college, must’ve been all the books I had to carry through the bookshelves, craning my neck to read the spines of the books to find the one I needed, taking the book back to a nook and skimming through it, trying to decide if it was relevant enough to my topic or not, putting it back, wash, rinse, repeat…

Now in the age of google and wikipedia and mobile devices with internet access, information is so readily available for us at our fingertips.  But is that a good thing?  I think it was a good character-building experience to have to go through the actual research process.  It was kind of like a right of passage to get through higher education and achieve a degree.  You want a degree?  Prove it.  Do the literal legwork necessary to complete the task put before you. 

Random thought of the day..

When I get depressed, I feel like nobody cares whether I’m happy or not, and I wish that someone would try to cheer me up.  But when I’m depressed, people don’t generally want to be around me.  So in order for people to be around me, I need to try to make myself happy again.  By doing so, people are more likely to be around me.  So, basically in order to get what I want, I need to get it for myself. 

 

Make sense?  dunno, that’s why it’s a random thought. 

I suck (revisited)

Way back in the olden days (summer of Aught 07 specifically) I put out a request for blog topics.  I’m revisiting the comments I got from that request now.

Today’s request comes to us all the way from sunny Mentor, OH.  Jenny asks “is it ok to joke at a funeral? (an essay on when it’s ok to bring out the funny)”

This is unfortunately a timely topic.  Monday I attended the funeral for my best friend Scott’s father.  With respect to that event, there was levity before the service itself and following it at the memorial meal.  Personally I think humor is one of the more powerful coping mechanisms we have available to us.  A properly timed and worded joke can short-circuit grief before it can get to that soul-crushing stage.

Looking back to when my dad passed (btw, Happy early Father’s Day, Dad!) I remember how on edge and exhausted and emotionally spent I felt the day of his (unbeknownst to us at the time) final surgery.  When the moment came that the end had come, I was overcome with an explosion of negative emotions that had been building that day.  Terror, rage, etc.  I remember running out of the ward and just starting to punch the wall out of disbelief.  Friends and family tried to console me, but for that minute or so, I was just shut off and running on pure emotion. 

(inner editor’s voice) *cough* where are you going with this?

Anyway, the emotional wave finally crested and I was able to get myself back under control.  The whole family went back out to the waiting room to wait for the next step.  We started talking about dad.  It’s strange, how many details of that night I can remember, but then some I can’t.  Someone made a joke about something dad used to do.  it might've been me.  regardless, laughing at that point felt so cleansing.  I helped ground me and realize that the clock on the wall continued to tick. 

I think it’s something similar with respect to a funeral as well.  There is a time and place to be one with your grief and let your emotions flow (ok, perhaps not to the wall-punching level, I admit) and to pay your respects.  But I think at a certain point in time, grief needs to be reigned in, and humor does a really good job of doing that.  It tries to remind us that no matter how terrible of a sorrow we’ve been through, that none of it should discount or lessen the good things that have come before it.  I think if we spend too much time grieving that we can sort of “disrespect” those who have passed. 

Humor at that point in time needs to be handled by a semi-professional though.  You have to wait for the right moment.  You don’t want to take attention away from the ceremony.  But there comes a time when things have settled enough.  There’s a kind of still in the air.  Some of the “fringe” relatives and loved ones may have already left, and the “core” loved ones remain.  If you time it right, and do it with enough care and love behind it, it can really turn into a joyous situation.  I know following my dad’s funeral, my cousins and I got pretty laugh-winded, sharing classic Dad stories.  And even joking about things not even related to Dad.  Same thing occurred at Scott’s father’s memorial dinner.  Like I said above, ….

Wow, great spot to get pulled away by work…Umm…yeah…anyway, no matter how bad we feel at the time of the funeral or memorial or the passing, I see humor as life’s way of reminding us that time keeps on moving along, and we’d best make the best of it while we can. 

What to say…

Jennifer says I need to blog more. So…yeah…guess I need to come up with more stuff to blog about.

I’m trying out Windows Live Writer.  It’s supposed to make blogging easier.  We’ll see.  It’s got lots of tools which I’ll probably never use.

 

For now here’s a map of where I work.  hooray!!!

Perception vs. Reality

I have a problem. "HA!", you say, "and this is news how?" or do you? maybe you say "Oh cool! Chris has figured out something else about himself!"

That's kinda my point. Perception vs. Reality. Perception is like a pair of glasses with multiple, multi-color, variable prescription lenses. Looking at Reality through these special glasses can warp, distort, discolor, etc what Reality actually is. Not having a clear true view of Reality and relying on our Perception of it can lead us to unnecessary anxiety or irrational expectations.

So, in the example above, trying to guess what people would say is based on Perception. The first "negative" response is based on the Perception that I talk about my problems alot, which probably annoys people since that's all I seem to talk about, so therefore they would probably react in a manner similar to what I put. The second "positive" response is based on a different Perception that everybody enjoys reading my posts about my personal struggles and that they'd be happy that I've made a new "discovery". Which one's right? Which one's wrong? Does it matter?

Well, let's take a step back and look at the Reality. This is the tricky part, at least for me. This requires you to be able to recognize when you still have the Perception glasses on, and recognize when you still have one of it's distorting lenses flipped down over your eye. I've been trying to work on this since last weekend, and I've noticed times where I thought I'd flipped up all of the lenses and was seeing the Reality, when actually there was still a couple layers of slightly distorting lenses flipped down that were tweaking my view of Reality just slightly. (note: that whole last sentence was one massive analogy, but I didn't feel like putting ""'s around all the "facets" of it. seriously, I love ""'s, and can't seem to stop "using" them)

Anywho, back to looking at the Reality from the first example. Let's try to find the Reality. First off, I can't predict whether anyone will read this post or not. so how can I try to predict how people will respond to it? And even if, for some reason, I was able to predict that x number of people were going to read this post, how could I truly predict how they would react to it? In Reality, should I even give a crap about whether or not anybody reads this? No. I should be writing these for myself, and if someone happens to read it, so be it :) and if they happen to take something from it, so be it :) and if they think I'm full of BS and should stop writing about my crap, so be it :) The Reality is, it's not all that important anyways.

So, there it is, that's what's been on my mind lately. Trying to make myself recognize what is my Perception of a person/situation/event vs. what's the actual Reality of it.

Appreciation

I appreciate...

• that the weather has been beautiful this week.
  
• the taste of a Robek's Strawnana Berry smoothie and a DiBella's turkey sub.
  
• being able to get up in the morning, make my breakfast, watch the news, get showered and go to work.
  
• being able to come home after work, make dinner, chat with friends online and channel surf
  
• having full use of my mental and physical faculties.
  
• my intelligence and my sense of humor.
  
• my friends who care about me.
  
• Jennifer, Dan, Rachel, Jen, Todd, Kathy, Scott, Garland, Denise, Jodi, Amy, Mike, Jennette, David, Sharon.
  
• the fact that I can go to a store and buy most anything I feel like, without having to be concerned about paying my bills.
  
• the fact that I'm not in debt.
  
• that I'm respected at my job.
  
• that I am very competent at what I do.
  
• that I have freedom at my job to do things the way I see fit.
  
• that I have a short drive to work.
  
• that I have a nice apartment
  
• that I have nice furniture
  
• that I have a large collection of movies and video games
  
• the fact that I can be 32 years old and still enjoy playing video games
  
• the fact that I have the freedom to do what I want with my free time
  
• a walk in Liberty Park, or the South Chagrin Reservation
  
• all the parks and trails that we have throughout northeast ohio
  
• my family
  
• Mom, Caryn, Joe, Ben, Will, Molly, Connie, Don, Darlene, Andy, Barbara, Sam, DeNiece, Thelma, Cindy, Kay, Ralph, Craig, Carol, Katie, Annie, Grace, Victor, Cary
  
• having a fan for when I feel hot
  
• being able to drink clean cold water when I'm thirsty
  
• having the foresight to be able to study myself and learn from my mistakes and grow as a person
  
• having had a father for 30 years of my life
  

...More to come later

Update 3:16 pm

• sending good morning emails to Jodi, Rachel, Denise, Jennifer, Scott and Garland
  
• sending Time Check emails to Jodi
  
• making Jennifer cry now and then
  
• making Jennifer hard type
  
• "therapy" emails/ims with Jennifer
  
• hours-long phone conversations with Jen
  
• acting random and goofy just because I can
  
• having a blog where I can dump whatever thoughts are in my head
  
• music
  
• finding new music I've never heard before but really like
  
• finding classic music I've never heard before but really like
  

omfg

Taking a break from my content as of late to post this video...I'm amazed

Optimism (Anxiety Part 2)

Where does Optimism come from? what gives some people the ability to see something that's still formative, new, or unknown as a potential success? Are we born with optimism as a child and can lose it as we grow into adults? I really don't know how to answer those. I look back, and I have a hard time seeing whether or not I've been an optimistic person. I think as time went by and "bad" things happened to me (and by bad I just mean unfavorable or difficult or trying) my natural anxious tendencies kicked in. But I don't know. maybe optimism is too black/white of a concept? maybe optimism isn't what I should be striving for, but just realism. trying to take a rational view of the future, and accepting that some things could go bad or good, and give them equal weighting. I'll edit/post again when I think of more.

Update: Good comment from Glittergirl..."i think folks like us are more sensitive to stuff, and it's hard at times, but it's also a gift. we see a lot of beauty in things others miss."

This kind of highlights my point but not in the way she intended. That statement, at it's core, is one of positivity. Calling it a "gift" and being able to see the "beauty" in things. I had to stop and think for a second, because that's not I would see it at first. What is different about her brain, her experiences, her life, and my own, that leads us to those different viewpoints? We've both been through hardships in our lives, so it can't be that. Maybe she wants to believe that more than I do? Something about her allows her to appreciate the positive side of things. Maybe those of us with the "worry gene" as she put it over time develop the ability to say "fuck it" and take away some of the worry gene's important or effect?

Something else I've thought of is that I may have gotten my hopes too high early on in life and those unrealistic expectations were dashed enough times to make me "gun-shy" to having even realistic or rational expectations. Somewhere along the line I got hooked on the idea that good things happen to good people. I wish I could remember when and where I got that concept and in what context, because I think that's been a big problem for me. I think my negativity towards the future and the unknown is a mix of frustration that I'm not getting what I "deserve" for having done the "right" things in my life, and too many dashed unrealistic hopes that led me to make the deduction that hopes and dreams generally get dashed...

I dunno. Will post more as thoughts come to mind.

Anxiety

So, I had an anxiety attack this week. I've started seeing someone new. Things were going pretty darn well at the start, better than most of my previous relationships have started. But I still ended up having an anxiety attack. As I've done before, I let my mind wander and get caught up in the emotions of the moment, and started to project into the future. For some reason, the future to me is full of fear and potential disappointment. I'm not sure why I do it. I'm hoping that by typing out this blog post that maybe I'll get a glimmer of a clue. Anyways, I started projecting to the future that we're going to end up in a relationship, and that I'm not going to feel as strongly about her as she feels about me, and that I'm going to have to disappoint her and hurt her feelings or break her heart. I flipped out and nearly ended the relationship. We were able to talk and I let her know about some of my problems, and I think things are better now. But the stigma's still there. So, why can't I be optimistic about the future? I can't control what's going to happen, but I also can't expect things to go wrong. I dunno. Anyways,I'm going to take a break for now. I'll write a follow-up later or in the morning.

Update #1: Whitey makes a great point in his comment "The only thing I can tell you is that after I faced the scary moments, wether they turned out in my favor or against, I didn't have to be afraid anymore. It was over..." That initial hurdle for me feels insurmountable somedays. When it's something I have to face alone, I buckle. If it's something I'm doing in a social situation with people I feel comfortable with, I have more strength inside, or I don't give a shit nearly as much about how things will turn out. when I'm on my own, I lose faith in myself, or I fear the outcomes too much. More updates to come as things pop into my head

My Johari Window

Arena (known to self and others) caring, intelligent, logical, silly	Blind Spot (known only to others) able, accepting, adaptable, clever, complex, dependable, friendly, giving, happy, helpful, kind, knowledgeable, loving, mature, modest, observant, reflective, relaxed, searching, self-conscious, sensible, sentimental, shy, trustworthy, warm, wise, witty
Façade (known only to self) introverted	Unknown (known to nobody) bold, brave, calm, cheerful, confident, dignified, energetic, extroverted, idealistic, independent, ingenious, nervous, organised, patient, powerful, proud, quiet, religious, responsive, self-assertive, spontaneous, sympathetic, tense

Dominant Traits

60% of people agree that copaX is caring

All Percentages

able (10%) accepting (10%) adaptable (10%) bold (0%) brave (0%) calm (0%) caring (60%) cheerful (0%) clever (30%) complex (20%) confident (0%) dependable (10%) dignified (0%) energetic (0%) extroverted (0%) friendly (20%) giving (30%) happy (10%) helpful (30%) idealistic (0%) independent (0%) ingenious (0%) intelligent (10%) introverted (0%) kind (10%) knowledgeable (20%) logical (10%) loving (10%) mature (10%) modest (10%) nervous (0%) observant (10%) organised (0%) patient (0%) powerful (0%) proud (0%) quiet (0%) reflective (30%) relaxed (20%) religious (0%) responsive (0%) searching (50%) self-assertive (0%) self-conscious (10%) sensible (30%) sentimental (20%) shy (10%) silly (10%) spontaneous (0%) sympathetic (0%) tense (0%) trustworthy (10%) warm (30%) wise (10%) witty (30%)

Created by the Interactive Johari Window on 30.4.2008, using data from 10 respondents.
You can make your own Johari Window, or view copaX's full data.

Lyrics

"I wanna get lost in my life sometimes
sit on the side and watch the world go by
I wanna get lost and I don't know why
Sometimes I wanna get lost and I don't know why
Sometimes I wanna get lost and just dream for a while"

"I work hard every day of my life
I work till I ache my bones
At the end I take home my hard earned pay all on my own -
I get down on my knees
And I start to pray
Till the tears run down from my eyes
Lord - somebody - somebody
Can anybody find me - somebody to love?"

Blizzard of Aught 8

The view this morning when I got up..

(note the far left white car. See that stick like thing sticking up out of the snow? Yeah, that's my snow shovel which I had left outside. Someone conveniently borrowed it last night to try to dig themselves out, but didn't bother to put it back. Needless to say the shovel stays inside from now on)

And here's the view this evening, after an hour or so of shoveling 2-3 foot drifts and some thawing thanks to the wonderful sunshine.

Random

I don't know where this is gonna go, just kind of a free association post...

Life's like a river.

I've heard a few people tell me that, jennifer for example, and I've read some books that refer to it that way.

Sometimes it's calm and peaceful..

(source)

..and other times not so much

(source)

There's this sense that we have more control over the flow of this river than we really do. We try to paddle or swim, or redirect the flow, but all we end up doing is wasting our energy and getting ourselves frustrated. Would it be nice if the river flowed through that beautiful valley over there?

(source)



Sure would. Will it? Maybe, maybe not. Should we let ourselves get upset if it doesn't? Only if you thrive on frustration, which last time I checked most (normal) people don't. (I gotta admit, I've known at least one person in my life who did, oddly enough). So, what can we do? Things would be really cool if we ended up in the pretty valley. What we have to do is make the best out of what we have. We have to make the most out of the path that the River of Life ends up taking us. Sure things could be better. But who's to say there's not another valley up ahead that's just as pretty, maybe even prettier.

Ok, so we can get our hopes up that around the next bend will be another valley right? If you're the gambling type, then go for it. But wouldn't it be a bit more peaceful, and maybe even more fun honestly, to just ride along with the flow and see what happened? Not have expectations about what's around the bend, just have a keen interest to see what's there. For better or worse, just patiently wait and see what's around the bend. Not like we should just close our eyes, lay back and blindly float down the river. A) you still have to make some minor course corrections here and there to avoid the rocks and the shallow sections and B) where's the fun in that?


That's like taking a long car trip sitting in the backseat of a station wagon with your nose buried in books the whole way. I should know, that's how I lived most of my childhood. Anytime we went anywhere, I had to make sure I had toys or books or games that I could do along the way. I ended up missing a lot of life by doing that. I also ended up with a rather horrible sense of direction, that I'm still trying to overcome in my adult life. (thank GOD for GPS units). I had a point somewhere around here I was aiming for....hmm, must've fallen under the desk. Ah, there it is. Anyways, the point is to open your eyes and be witness to where the River of Life ends up taking you. When it's pretty or not so pretty, there's still much to be learned from where it takes us.

UPDATE: Music recommendation. Yael Naim - Endless Song of Happiness. Listen to it.

it's batTERies, not batTRies, ya bloody wankah!

and there were no pieces of wood on fire, so where's this supposed "torch" he speaks of...god, you'd think he was a foreigner or something

Glittergirl's famous!

Sorry glittergirl, but I took your video down for a while. It loaded up everytime my blog loaded and kept freaking me out.

Glittergirl's WKYC Page of Famousosity

Some things change...

some things stay the same.

a looooooong time ago I gave eharmony a try. Well, some friends of mine are in burgeoning relationships, so I thought, "You know what, I've gone through alot of personal development in the past couple of years. Maybe I've changed enough to be a better match for someone." So, I went through the peronality test again. I cleared my mind and just went with my gut and answered the questions honestly. At least, 3 years later, eharmony doesn't appear to reject people outright. This time I was allowed to upload a photo, so I thought there was a chance. Got in, and was presented with my "home page". 0 matches :)

I'm actually sitting here smiling about it, chuckling.



I've been reading books about Taoism lately, trying to find some inner peace and happiness. Guess that's why this isn't really bothering me that much. Last time this happened, I reacted a little bit differently :)

For those curious about Taoism, I recommend reading The Tao of Pooh I'd get into details, just take my advice and read it. it's a short book, easy read.

Found Cameras and Orphan Pictures

Found Cameras and Orphan Pictures

Interesting site concept. Basically if you run across a memory card or camera with pictures on it, you send a couple in that would be the most identifiable and hopefully through the power of teh intarwebs and good old word of mouth, they can be reunited with their proper owner.

I think it'd be fascinating to find someone else's pictures like that. Does that make me voyeuristic? That I want to see other people's pictures? I don't have any ulterior motives, I'm just fascinated at seeing how other people live their lives compared to mine. I also have the same problem when I'm riding in a car in the evening down a street with alot of houses. I tend to try to look into the living rooms where the lights are on and the curtains/blinds are open. Not because I want to spy on them, it's just merely curiosity's sake. I tend to think things like "Wow, the average television size has gotten insanely big." or "That's a very interesting way to have your living room setup."

I also have started going to the Art section of Borders, and checking out as many of the Post Secret books as I can, looking to see if anyone left their own postcard in it, like I've read stories about people doing. No luck yet, but I'll be sure to let everyone know when I do.

Amaryllis Update

Here's where the Amaryllis started back on 12/26



And here it is today

You Suck at Photoshop

Be sure to check the Related Videos for parts 2 through 5

Hmmm...

You're Adventures of Huckleberry Finn!

by Mark Twain

With an affinity for floating down the river, you see things in black
and white. The world is strange and new to you and the more you learn about it, the less
it makes sense. You probably speak with an accent and others have a hard time
understanding you and an even harder time taking you seriously. Nevertheless, your
adventurous spirit is admirable. You really like straw hats.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

My Birthday Weekend - A Play in Three Acts

Also, new pictures have been added to the Flickr Zeitgeist on the right

Act 1:


Act 2:


Act 3:

An open letter to my father

Hi dad,

It's that time of year again. I figured I'd try to get some of the stuff out of my head and into the blog, see if that helped me any. I miss you so desperately, dad. I just wish I could sit down with you face to face and talk. I wish I could hug you again, and tell you I loved you. I wish I could show you around my apartment, show you what I've done with it, have you tell me all the things I need to be careful of. I wish you were home with mom so she wasn't alone. I wish you could give me advice on how to be a better manager at work. I hope I've lived up to your name. I know I'm not perfect, but I just hope that I've taken everything you gave me and have put it to good use in becoming the man I am today. I just want to hear your voice telling me you're proud of me. I'm sorry I wasn't able to give you a grandson to carry on the copac name before you passed, but I know that ben and will carry on the copac spirit at least. I have trouble remembering much of our past together, I don't know if I've blocked it out in the past couple years or what. I hope that someday I'll be able to remember more of our life together. I wish I could've had the chance to help you with your anxiety in the same ways I try to do it now in my own life. Dad, I'm trying so very very hard to become a better person. I want to be happy. I want to be in love. I want to not feel so alone and lost anymore. I have alot of good friends in my life, and I try very hard to take care of them. I know how important that was to you, taking care of other people. But even with all of these good people, I still feel so alone without you. I feel very lost and without direction. I'm trying to find my way without you here to lead me, but it's really hard, dad. It's the second hardest thing I've had to do besides saying good-bye to you. I'm trying, dad, I hope you know that. I'm trying really hard. I screw up, and I take steps backwards, but I'm still trying. god, dad, I miss you so much.

My wishlist

People have been bugging me to make a wishlist. I guess people for some reason want to buy me things. I don't know why. Doesn't make sense to me. anywho... here's my wishlist :-P

My wishlist

Software Request

There may be something out there that does this, but I haven't had the time or luck to find it yet. I've found a bunch of list software, but no luck finding something like this.

I'm looking for some kind of list management software. Each item in the list just has it's position in the list, relative to the rest. 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. No priorities, nothing like that. First item entered is #1, second is #2 and so on. Then you can click and drag an item to move it from position #3 to the top of the list, or anywhere in the list really.

I've tried using Microsoft OneNote, but it just doesn't fit what I'm trying to accomplish.

Bonus features:
- Ability to enter a list item as a simple sentence, then expand the item and enter more details or benchmarks about the item, then collapse it back down into the simple sentence description
- Windows Mobile version would roxxors my soxxors.

If anybody that reads this blog knows of something like this, I'd appreciate a point in the right direction.

Journal Entry - January 15, 2008

"I've seen a rich man beg
I've seen a good man sin
I've seen a tough man cry
I've seen a loser win
And a sad man grin
I heard an honest man lie
I've seen the good side of bad
And the down side of up
And everything between"
-What It's Like - Everlast

There’s a big
a big hard sun
beating on the big people
in the big hard world"
-Hard Sun - Eddie Vedder


Let's see...what happened today. Not a whole lot besides alot of snow. I was able to give somebody some good news at work today, so that was a nice switch compared to the past week or so. Honestly, I can't really thinkg of anything else "journal"ish to write. So I'll just go off on a tangent for a while..

I picked the first set of lyrics above for two reasons. A) it's what was playing on the Shoutcast station I was listening to as I worked on this post and B) It seemed like a good way to describe how life should be treated. Not so much from the pure irony standpoint the lyrics seem to take, but more from the standpoint that expectations are a tricky thing.

I picked the second set of lyrics above also for two reasons a) it's the second song that's come on since I've been working on this post and B) it kinda helps to remind me that life's unfair, and you gotta get over it.

Ok, enough with the lyrics, let's get down to the nitty gritty here. I didn't like the tone of my frustrations post the other day. I have this problem where I get caught up in this irrational idea that because I'm a supposed "good" guy and that I follow the rules and do what I'm "supposed" to do that I'm entitled to something as a result of it. I've tried to figure out where I got that idea from, but at this point I'm not really even sure if that would make much difference. Maybe it's just from being too logical of a thinker and looking at cause and effect so much throughout my life up until now. I dunno. Whatever it is, I need to find a way to counteract it. I should be able to accept what life gives me and make the best of it. and not get caught up in expectations and feeling due something. I guess that's kinda why I'm doing this again, this whole blogging thing, to try and document these times like these and try to work out in my head where I went wrong and try to find a way to make changes. I feel a little weird putting this out in the public like this, but I think it's necessary. I think I need to own up to my actions more and not just write them off. So any readers out there, feel free to call me on my shit now and then

frustrations

this post may sound whiny or bitchy, but I don't really care. Part of my resolution this year was to get myself to get stuff like this out and documented so that I can hopefully learn something from it and make myself a better person. This here is one of those such posts.

frustration is something that has a firm grasp on my life. Here's a list of the things that caused me frustration today: (Please note, I'm not justifying or rationalizing these things, I'm merely listing them)

• a good friend is getting married. someone I had a crush on for a while but never acted upon
  
• a project a former employee of mine was working on needs to be completed, and I found out that he didn't complete nearly as much of it as he had claimed
  
• a good friend who's going through some job difficulties, who I've been trying to support and be a good friend to, opened up to someone else who has more..ulterior motives behind being their for her.
  
• somebody cut me off on the way home.
  
• I spent a couple hours last night going through personal ads and not getting any replies.
  

ok, first off, most of these things shouldn't be causing me frustration. I can see that now, but when those events occurred, my first reactino was that of frustration. Either out of jealousy, or a sense of "unfairness". I shouldn't feel that I'm owed anything, but I do. Anyways, I'm going to watch some tv and chill out for a while. I'll come back later and edit this post with some more thoughts and musings.

Journal Entry - January 14, 2008

Need to play some catchup this morning:

Friday - busy day at work. After work I went over to my cousin's house to work on her and her husband's wireless network. I had set it up for them last year and for some reason it stopped working for them. I have no idea what happened to it, but the router was making a high-pitched whine that changed frequency depending on whether or not a pc was plugged into it or not. That being beyond my scope of tech support, I suggested we buy a new router. Put the new router in and they were good to go. After that I showed my cousin how to synchronize music to her new cell phone. then I tried to get their new road runner accounts setup, but stupid RR would say their password was valid on their account management site, but not on their webmail site nor through POP access. whatever. Then I showed them how to burn cds in iTunes. After that it was about 11 and I headed home.

Saturday - slept in until 11ish, got up and did some straightening up. the Doors (Scott and Garland for those that don't know them) came up and we hung out. We went to best buy, did some shopping. I picked up Geometry Wars for the DS (highly recommended for DS owners). Then we went back to my apartment and watched Shoot 'Em Up. Very fun cheesy action movie. No real deep plot, just alot of over the top action. After the Doors left, I watched Shortbus, a movie recommended by my surrogate girlfriend Jen (NOT Jennifer "glittergirl" Charlton, this is a different Jen). And by surrogate I mean, not my girlfriend, we're just good friends that talk on the phone almost everyday like a boyfriend and girlfriend would do. But we're not, and she already has a bf, and even if she didn't, things wouldn't work out between us. So yeah, that was a tangent, anyways, back to the movie. It was this odd artsy kind of movie revolving around this couples counselor/sex therapist who's never had an orgasm. It's a pretty graphic movie, but I thought it was really interesting. It explored a bunch of different people and their quests for finding themselves basically. If you're open-minded and don't get freaked out easily when it comes to sex (hetero and otherwise), I think it's worth a watch.

Sunday - Got up early for some reason. Ok, so it was 9, but for me that's early on a weekend. I got motivated and did dishes, washed my cpap mask, started laundry, tore down some cardboard boxes and took a whole car load of cardboard up to the recycle dropoff. Got a call from Todd and Kathy inviting me out to go shopping with them. We went up to Value City. I picked up 3 pairs of jeans, a couple sweatshirts, and a pair of shoes. Came home, and just kinda shut down for the rest of the evening.

So there's my weekend wrapup.

"Are you ticklish?"

boredboredboredboredbored

I'm at work, and I'm bored out of my mind. I'm burned out from this week. All the stress from the bad news, plus I've been extra busy lately trying to pick up some of the programming slack. And right now, I'm just spent. I'm trying to think of a way to cruise through the last hour and 9 minutes of the day. so here I am blogging about nothing. Nope, nothing at all. kinda like seinfeld. "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" wonder how many different ways I can come up with to indicate nothing..

nothing
nada
zip
zero
zilch
nein
negatory
non
empty
void
transparent
blank
...

I'm stumped, that's about all I can come up with. well that wasted about 3 minutes.

Out of body experiences

There are nights when im turning off the lights in the apartment, and starting my routine preparations for bed when im struck by a thought. All of a sudden its like im finally slowing down enough to the point that reality catches up to me. All of a sudden the realization hits that im living on my own, something that hasn't been the case for 31+ years of my life. And the realization also strikes me that my father is still gone and will never come back. And those realizations act like a chill down my spine and I suddenly feel like a child who's lost and alone. After a few seconds the feeling goes away. Some nights it leaves a lingering sadness behind. I just had one tonight, and the sadness is hanging on. I think because its coming up on the 2nd anniversary of dad passing that they're lingering. Only tonights different because a new thought has struck me. I wonder if mom has moments like these and if they're any worse than mine. Sorry for the depressing post, just needed to get it off my chest.

For any single women...

or friends of single women...or people who know single women...

Girl Guide to Geeks


Sure alot of it's stereotypical, but there may be some gems of truth in there too

Journal Entry - January 10th, 2008 (now with 100% more pictures!)

Wednesday - I got the desk finished, and got the chair put together. Boy I thought the desk was tricky, but the chair was a royal pain in the ass. But the desk is in place, the computer is setup on it, and no longer setup on a rubbermaid container, and the office is looking like an office, and less like a room full of boxes. I can now do "office" type stuff in there like paying bills, filing paperwork, updating my financial software.

Thursday - This has been a really long week. There's more work developments looming in the near future. I'm just trying to make it to the weekend so I can unwind a little. Took some pictures of the new office additions,also a new picture of the amaryllis project. My time-lapse movie project was a failure, literally. Had a power outage which turned off my pc the webcam was connected to, and subsequently wiped out the frames that the software had already captured up until then. It was a nice idea, but I think I'll have more fun just enjoying the plant as it is.

Hang Ten

C'monnn...just gotta ride this crashing wave a little bit further so I can make it shore....

Journal Entry - January 8th, 2008

The desk and accompanying office chair have been completed. The chair was a real bitch, so I'll get pictures in the morning (if I remember). Other than that, it was a pretty quiet day. This weather is pretty crazy, even for Ohio. 10 degrees last week, 60 degrees today and yesterday, supposed to be in the 30s and snowing again next week. It was a very nice break in winter though. I think if we had more of these warm streaks like this, maybe we'd all be better off emotionally without so much of the "winter blahs" Once every couple of weeks having a day that you can roll the windows down on the way to and from work sounds like a good idea to me.

Journal entry - January 7th, 2008

Monday Monday, can't trust that day,
Monday Monday, sometimes it just turns out that way
Oh Monday morning, you gave me no warning of what was to be
Oh Monday Monday, how yould cou leave and not take me.

-The Mamas And The Papas


Today was a stressful monday. The bad news that I mentioned in a previous journal entry was delivered today. It wasn't my decision overall, but I was put in the position of deciding who got the bad news. Thankfully I wasn't alone when I gave them the news. That would've been very difficult for me to do. Even though I didn't have much choice in the matter, it still bothers me that I had to negatively impact someone's life in that way. Hopefully the person in question will end up ok in the long run.

Not much else happened today. After the drama of the morning, I laid low for the most part.

I started working on the desk last night, got the bulk of the structure put together, still have to put the drawers together. Oh! Imagine my joy when I barely make it past step two out of 20-odd steps when I see I'm missing a "hidden cam." I wasn't happy. thankfully I was able to find a spot that it wouldn't have much structural effect. Hopefully in the next couple of days when I'm not so wiped out I can get the desk put together and finally make my office into an actual office rather than a room with boxes and a computer setup on a rubbermaid container ;-)

Journal Entry - January 6th, 2008

I've already screwed up my resolution this year, and it's only the 6th of january. Oh well :) Anyways, I've decided to stop numbering the journal entries and just put the date on them. So, onto to a weekend recap journal entry..

Friday...what happened friday...Not a whole heck of a lot.

Saturday...Slept in until noon. Guess I was tired. Got together with Todd and Kathy in the evening. We went to the new BW3's in Aurora for dinner. Good food, nice place. Then we did some shopping in the area. I went to Target and got myself a Rubik's Revolution (see prior journal entries). Went to Circuit City and picked up season 2 of Stargate Atlantis. I've been hooked on watching the first season. The circuit city in aurora has really lacking inventory. It's the nearest electronics store to the apartment. Maybe I'll luck out and they'll open a new best buy in aurora/twinsburg/solon ;-) Went to Dick's trying to find an OSU shirt to wear to work on Monday and to wear monday night while I watch the big game, they didn't have anything that looked big enough. Todd got some surround sound speakers. Then I came home and watched more Stargate Atlantis. Started to notice my ear was ringing, not sure if it was from checking out the speakers with Todd or if it's a remnant of the cold/flu bug.

Sunday...got up around nine, called mom and got setup with her. I went home and got her xmas lights and extension cords wrapped up and put away, helped her bring the rest of thexmas decorations down from upstairs, got them stashed away in the basement, and helped her pick up sticks in the front yard and loaded them onto the trailer while she drove the tractor. After that I went to Wal-Mart and picked up a computer desk and computer chair finally, along with Shoot Em Up on dvd and Stargate Atlantis season 3. Had a heck of a time getting the chair and desk into my car, but I was able to get things jammed in, and had the trunk lid held down by the cargo netting, since it wouldn't close. Got back to the apartment and got the desk and chair unloaded, then went back out to giant eagle to pick up some things and prescriptions. Got back to the apartment, got the car unloaded again, and now I'm sitting down watching football. Got some pizza hut ordered online, since I'm exhausted.

so there ya go, now I'm back up to date with my journaling :-P

Journal Entry #3 - January 3rd, 2008

Today didn't start off too well. I had trouble sleeping, woke up at 5, and for the life of me couldn't get back to sleep. And my acid reflux seemed to be riled up too. I was just laying awake waiting for 7:30 to come so I could have an excuse to be awake. After I got showered and dressed, I remembered I forgot to take my morning pills. So I go to the pillbox and notice my pills are still there from last night. *proverbial smack on the forehead* Well that explains all that. I took both the evening and morning meds this morning and made my way into the office. Of course I had to dig out the car first. I've only had to dig out twice so far this winter, but I'm really tired of winter already.
Made it to work, and was really feeling out of whack physically, probably from the meds. Proceeded to take down the xmas lights around the office, since it was my first day back since the holidays. Everybody else followed suit and we got the area back to normal.
Then the fun began. Got some bad news from the boss. I'm gonna try to avoid going into any details on work-related things like that, just to avoid any potential problems. Let's just say it was bad news. After that I spent the majority of the day working on a rush report request, had to take a late lunch. So, late lunch, work stress, and med funkiness left me a bit of a wreck for the rest of the afternoon. But I tried to keep my cool about it all, and realize I was just having a shitty day and could only do so much about it. I've kinda stumbled upon a new mantra i'm trying to employ. "Find the/your peace" or "Find the/your calm" It's still a mantra-in-progress. My weakness is getting caught up in the moment and letting things snowball on me. I'm hoping the new mantra will help me find a way to defuse those stressful times a bit. Gotta find something until my free therapist can squeeze me in again, since her schedule's gotten a bit busy lately :) (KIDDING!)
I came home, thought about breaking out the leftover irish creme mom made for new year's, but decided against it. I've been drinking when stressed a little too much lately. Instead I plopped down in the recliner, turned on the heat and massage and just chilled, watching Law and Order Criminal Intent, and a little bit of SVU, but then switched over to the bowl game.
I have to do rollout tonight. Hopefully it goes smoothly and tomorrow will be more of a quieter day. I'm thankful it's friday tomorrow, but it kinda stinks that i'm already wishing it was here, after only being back to work for a day :-P

Journal Entry #2 - January 2nd, 2008

Today was a very quiet day. I'd already taken the day off as part of my extended New Year's Eve vacation, but had I not had it off already I would've taken it as a sick day. I spent most of the day in bed trying to kick this flu/cold/whatever I've had since Saturday. Didn't really do a whole lot. I've learned over this 6 day "weekend" that weekday morning television is an absolutely wasteland. There's a predominance of "Judge" shows. There was even one I saw today called Jury Duty. The concept is there's three "celebrities" that have to deliberate the usual small claims crap that the "judge" shows deal with. The "hook" (seriously, can I use quotation marks anymore in this post? Let's find out!) is that the "jurors" (HA! I knew it! more quotes!) get to ask questions. as in during the normal proceedings, the "jury" (they can't be stopped!) asks questions. Then they show them deliberating (I almost used the quotes there, but they're getting old). I dunno, but if I had to stay home during the day and try to find something to watch, I'd probably read more. Wait, that'd be a good thing.
Anyways, back to my "journal" entry for the day (look, I'm actually getting close to making the air quote sign in the air whenever I type these) I got the second half of Garland's xmas gift in the mail today. Went out this evening and shoveled my sidewalk so I wouldn't have to do it tomorrow morning before I head to work. Got about 6-7 inches worth of snow I think. This is the second time this winter that on the day after a bad snow I haven't had to go to work. This is both positive and negative. Positive because I don't have to worry about trudging through the snow. Negative because the snow crew here at the complex plow around my car and I have to dig it out.
I called home to check on mom, her back's still bothering her. She's waiting to call the doctor until she's supposed to go back to see him for some followup...in about a month. It bothers me that she's in pain, but I can't force her to do what she doesn't want to do, so I'll just keep asking her if she's called yet. Maybe it'll get to the point that she can't put up with it. At least the massage pad that Caryn and Joe got her for xmas is helping her relax in the evenings. I told her I'd try to get back home again this weekend to finish taking care of the xmas lights and the rest of her decorations.
I think that's about it. Gee, for such a quiet day I typed quite a novel.

Journal Entry #1 - January 1st, 2008

Well here's my first Journal entry of 2008. Got up around 9, went down to Mom's. I spent a couple hours getting her water filter replaced, replacing her garage door opener, and taking her christmas lights down. It was very windy, cold, and snowy by that point. I was trying to get them wound up and all put away but ran out of time, so I'll have to go back down again and finish that part of the job. I drove Mom over to Caryn and Joe's. We had appetizers to start. Then I started playing a new game I got them for christmas called Polarity. Basically the game is all about magnetism. I'll let you read the site rather than try to explain it. It's a really fun, unique game. After that we started playing with their new Rubik's Revolution It looks like a Rubik's cube, but it's not, it's 6 different electronic games that revolve around pushing lighted buttons inside the centers of each of the 6 sides of the cube. I'll probably be picking both of those up someday. After that I laid down on the couch and passed out for a few hours, not sure how long. this flu/cold's really kicking my butt, and I don't think I did it any good going out and taking down the lights today, but they needed to get done. We had dinner (pork, sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, corn) and I got Mom home. Driving home from Ravenna at about 5:30, the snow was horrible, there weren't any lanes on the road, I think I made a top speed of 30 mph. Finally got home, trudged my way through the foot of snow blown against my apartment door, dropped my bags, got into my pjs and just sat down and started to decompress. Mom sent me home some irish cream, so I may partake of that here in a few. I'm thankful I've got the day off tomorrow, because I really don't feel like going back to work yet. I need another day of nothing to recharge the batteries.

my new year's resolution

  Hadn't really thought about a new year's resolution until today,
   when it hit me that I should try journaling again.  So, the first
   attempt is going to using the blog as my journal.  My goal is to
   write something about my day every night.  No length requirements,
   just something every day.  I'm hoping that it'll help me work out
   personality trends, help me with my memory, etc.

my recipe

The Recipe For copaX

3 parts Attractiveness 2 parts Passion 1 part Vigor Splash of Seductiveness Sip slowly on the beach

What's the Recipe for Your Personality?

my new album

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first article title on the page is the name of your band.

2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four words of the very last quote is the title of your album.

3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/
The third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4. Use your graphics program of choice to throw them together, and post the result as a comment in this post. Also, pass it along in your own journal/blog because it's more amusing that way.

Amaryllis project day 1

Amaryllis project day 1
Originally uploaded by chrisohio0122

Got an amaryllis from my sister for christmas. As long as I keep remembering ill take a picture of it and document its progress

motivation

motivation
Originally uploaded by chrisohio0122

Steve haz it

Xmas 2007 Pictures

CIMG0461
Originally uploaded by chrisohio0122

Click here to see Pictures from Xmas 2007

Main Page - LOLCat Bible Translation Project

Main Page - LOLCat Bible Translation Project


22. & Ceiling Cat sented them hais, and stuff, so letz u be happy and stuff. & sed all u aminals & burdiez & fishz go has baby aminals & brrdz & fishz & dont worry i wont watch u has sexxes.

FREEBIRD!!! *waves lighter*

Apartment Pictures

The Living Room: I've got two recliners, one I inherited from my great aunt after she passed, and the other I got new. It's got hidden compartments in the arms for holding remote controls and drinks and has built-in massagers and heat. And it's soft and comfy to boot! I'm currently using one of the storage bins I bought to move with as an end table. Once I get my couch in (sometimes after 9/14) I'll get some real end tables and a coffee table.



The Dining Room - Mom got this table for the basement, and had her 4 antique chairs around it, but when I moved out she gave me the table. I bought 4 chairs that surprisingly match it pretty decently. It's a nice table, and sturdy chairs. Will work well if I ever have anybody over for dinner.




The Kitchen - Good sized kitchen. The crock pot's not mine, it contained housewarming food from the Paridon's, and I've yet to get it back to them. In the corner of the counter is the appliance that will be used the most in my apartment, the Toaster Oven. Actually, it's a Convection oven, it can toast, bake, it can cook full-sized frozen pizzas. It's a handy little device, next to the Foreman Grill.



The Hallway - To the right of the Living Room. Kitchen is on the left, not in the view. The "Office" is the door on the right. Utility room is the first door on the left, Bathroom is the door after that, and Bedroom is at the end of the hall.



The Office - Full of unpacked boxes and empty bookshelves for the time being. Eventually I'll put a computer desk and chair in here and turn it into an office. The Office is towards the end of the to-do list.



The Utility Room - New washer and dryer, turns out to be the same control layout as my mom's so I don't have to learn a new set of controls :-P There's a laundry tub hidden by the washer.



The Bathroom - Note the toilet seat. Yes, this is a bachelor's apartment, thank you very much!



The Bedroom - Mom gave me her old bed and dresser. Lots of closet space, and a half bath which is currently housing the box from my new 40" tv from the living room.

So there you have it, that's my new apartment.

All moved in record time

Yay moving

The truck has been packed!

Moving day has arrived!

Ferris Bueller's Day Off and the secret to life

http://blogs.theage.com.au/lifestyle/allmenareliars/archives/2007/07/ferris_buellers.html

pretty interesting read. I agree with the majority of the points made.

"I sort of watched myself from inside. I realized it was ridiculous being afraid, worrying about everything, wishing I was dead, all that shit. I'm tired of it. This is best day of my life."


I think I need to make that my new mantra.

I suck

My blog sucks ass right now. I've been told I'm a decent commenter on other blogs, but I can never find good topics to discuss on my own blog.

Therefore, I'm putting out a request. Maybe like a summons. Ok, I guess maybe it'd be more like american idol. Regardless, give me topics, and I will expound upon them...wait, that sounded dirty. I mean, I'll try to give you my take on them as best as I can and try to make it funny/interesting at the same time. Thanks in advance!

Am-I-Dumb.com - Are you dumb?

Why do the right thing?

Someone dumped a cat off in our neighborhood back before the winter. He started to hang around our house, we fed him, eventually brought him into the garage when the winters got really bad. Over time, my cat allergies never adapted to him, and my mom doesn't want another pet right now, so we're trying to do the right thing and give him the APL or Humane Society. But every one we've talked to so far keeps telling us they won't take him. Portage, Summit, Geauga counties all said no, and probably not for 2-3 months even, and this is after 3 weeks of making phone calls. So, the asshole that dropped him off and didn't care less gets away with their hands clean, and we're left to take care of the situation and for trying to do the right thing, we're paying for it. So, why do the right thing? If you say doing the right thing helps you sleep at night, guess what, it doesn't do me a lick of good anymore. I'm just getting really tired and fed up from having to put forth so much effort to do what's right, only to have some lazy asshole come along, cruise through, and give me more crap to try to make right. This doesn't mean I'm going to stop doing what's right, since it's burned into my dna for life, I'm just very frustrated right now. I realize that expecting to get anything for doing what's right is pointless, it just really irritates me when lazy/bad people have an easier time in life than those of us who give a damn.

bah humbug!

Don't mind me, just needed to vent, I'll be fine.

Jack Copac

Jack had to be put down Saturday morning. His liver had been failing, and his heart had gotten extremely weak. The vet suggested that he'd been throwing mini-strokes which had lead to dementia. He wasn't able to get up stairs, he was barely able to walk in general.

Jack was such a wonderful dog. He was in our family for close to 14 years. He was a gift to me when I was a senior in high school. He grew to become a family dog, though. He wasn't just mine. He and dad spent hours out working in the yard. He was very protective of his family and the household. His worst enemy was the "evil" UPS truck. Whenever he saw one drive down the street he would bark like crazy. He used to love jumping up on the back of the couch and watching the world go by. He'd also sit out on the deck and just smell the world.

He was an ornery son of a bitch too. He was very demanding of our time, and there were many times I yelled at him and told him to just leave me alone. I feel horrible for having yelled at him like that now, since I can't take those words back. He was just a dog for goodness' sake, he didn't know any better. I feel horrible for all the times he would bark at me for attention, and I would ignore him or yell at him.

Even though his last months/years were met with hardships and pain, I miss him so very very much right now. I miss the way he would incessantly (almost addictively) lick my legs when summer came around and I started to wear shorts. I miss how when I used to lay in bed on a sunday afternoon, and he had to be up on the bed with me, and laying across my chest. I miss throwing the ball across the living room and him fetching it. I miss how he would get a new squeaky toy and would play with them so much he'd break the squeaker. Whenever a guest would come over for a visit, if they were "good" people, he'd have to run and get a toy squeaking it incessantly, almost as a way of greeting them. I miss the different barks he had, and how I could tell just by the way he was barking what he wanted, whether it was food, a walk, or just attention.

It's quieter in the house now. Mom and I are able to do things we want to do for longer periods of time without him interrupting our plans. But it's not a good quiet, at least not yet. I miss you, Jackson. You be a good puppy up in heaven. Dad's waiting for you up there, you guys have alot of work to be done in the yard up there.

Movin' out - Part 2

Well, July 12th turned into June 27th. Just got back from walking through a model apartment. I applied for, and was accepted for, a 2 bedroom, 1.5 bath apartment. My move-in date is 8/15. It'll be cleaned, painted, and have new carpeting, which'll be nice. So now I've gotta start packing, and shopping for furniture, and all of that fun stuff :)

New Blog Feature

I've added a new feature to my blog, it's a Google Reader widget (it's over on the right, underneath my ugly mug). I've gotten hooked on reading RSS feeds in Google Reader, and now whenever I see something I think would be interesting to any of my blog reader(s), I can click a button and it'll automagically show up in that little widget there.

Movin' out

I've started the process to move out. My best friend Scott (s-door) lives in Twinsburg in Deer Run apartments. I've gone up there to hang out with him practically every saturday, so I figured, what the hell, I'll get my own place up there. It's a nice area, midway between home and work, all the amenities close by. Not the fanciest of places, but I'm not the fanciest of guys, so what's the point. They're supposed to have one available to walk through on July 12th, so i'll check it out then. 2 bedrooms, either 1.5 or 2 baths, depending on which unit ends up being available. This is something I should've done years ago, but was either too afraid or too distracted by other things to make it happen. Hopefully I see it through this time.

Euler's Disk - fun for the whole family

Truth in advertising!

Razor - Foo Fighters

If I ever, ever, ever get to the point in my life that I can play this song, I will be able to die a happy man.

The 3rd brick building....you know...cause there's only one direction to count buildings

So I had an appointment at the cardiologists office. First off, got a little confused, they moved it from the Ravenna office to the "Expansion office next door" So I called today before I left work to make sure I knew where I was going. Obviously I was a little preoccupied being at work, so I didn't think twice when the receptionist said "You know where the Ravenna office is, right? Well that's the 2nd brick building, you just want the 3rd brick building" Not until I got there and realized "Hey wait...which direction do I count from?" Needless to say I counted the wrong direction, and went to the "1st" brick building, which was the "3rd" brick building the way *I* counted. I'll have to write a letter, get them to rearrange the buildings.
Anyways, got in to the proper building, had an ekg done, talked to the nurse practicitioner or physicians' assistant, whatver he was. He said my echo from last week looked ok, there was mild dialation of my right ventricle, and a few other technical things which he lost me on (pre-load vs. post-load pressures, you'd think I have a hydraulic system in there...oh wait) Anyways, the main thing he said was that there's nothing glaringly obvious that they're seeing that would make them say "Hey! that's probably what caused him to go into atrial fibrillation!" Which is both good and bad. On the good side, there's nothing major wrong with me. On the bad side, there's still the whole unanswered question of "Hey! what caused me to go into atrial fibrillation?" Sleep apnea is still a suspect at this point. And honestly I think I probably do have anea. With my sleep problems, and my lack of energy, the heart stuff, it all kinda adds up.
Which is a perfect segueway into my new life goal. I'm going to weigh 250 lbs within a calendar year. 03/07/08. That's about 50 lbs of weight loss (give or take 5 lbs), which works out to around 4-5 lbs weight loss a month. The NP/PA/WE said in his opinion if I got down to 250 I more than likely could get off the blood pressure medication. And it'd help me across the board. I'm just sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. And I'm getting fed up with these condtions that lead to tests that lead to no answers. Other than I'm fat which is not a good thing to be when you've got the family health history I have. So I'm sure some of you are asking "How do you plan to lose 50 lbs in 12 months?" I really don't know yet, other than I've gotta get more active. I need to walk more, gotta get back into hiking again. After I get back into exercise, then I'll worry about tweaking a diet.
So we'll see what happens. Maybe I can pull it off, maybe I can't. won't be the end of the world either way. At least I've got something in sight to strive for.

Brandywine Falls

Finally got outside for a bit this weekend. Garland, his mom, and I went to the covered bridge in Boston and Brandywine Falls to test out her new camera. I took a few pictures, and made the following YouTube vid of how much the falls was flowing thanks to the thaw. Hopefully spring shows up soon so I can get back out there and start hiking again.

Link to my Yahoo Photos

Another Movie/Radio Show Recommendation

I'm torn with this one. I'm not sure whether to recommend you watch the movie first, then check out the radio show, or the radio show first, then the movie. It's probably best that you check out the radio show to start. Either way, this is a wonderful movie to watch. Robert Altman directed it, and it was his last film actually. It's got a star studded cast, and it really does a great job of portraying the essence of the radio show, and of it's creator Garrison Keillor.


On a personal note, I've been promoted to Programming Manager, as Zak has spread his wings and flown to greener pastures. I've also had to deal with a bout of atrial fibrillation, where my heart just felt it was too good for beating like normal hearts do, and went for more of a syncopated or jazzy rhythm instead. Thanks to the wonders of modern medicine, I was spared having to be shocked to get the heart back into step. At this point, things are still a little cloudy as to the cause. Sleep Apnea looks to be the odds on favorite for the time being, possibly aided and abetted by stress. Any who, I'm doing fine now, save for some nasty blueish/purplish bruises on my forearms due to failed IV draws, and a rather persistent and nagging sense of "When will I go into afib next?". Funny thing, when you go into afib, they tend to like to use large bore needles, something about needing to get the drugs in you that much quicker.

Go watch the movie above (and the one below if you still haven't yet), and we'll chat another day.

Little Miss Sunshine

Everyone needs to see this movie. And if they don't like it, well, then you need some help, I'm afraid.

Hahaha

This is a good test. if there's anybody that can watch this video without laughing....I'm not sure I want to know you anymore LOL

Chancho...

...when you are a man...sometimes you wear stretchy pants in your room....Just for fun