Today has been an interesting day at work. I've managed to get absolutely nothing accomplished. I've been kind of drifting through the day just skimming from item to item, but never really finishing any one thing. It's nice to have an off-day like this every once in a while. At my old job, days like this used to stack up one on top of the other. After a couple in a row, you run out of things to slack with. Today, I've puttered around all my usual haunts and even caught up with a guy I knew in college. Turns out one of the girls I work with has known him since 4th grade. So, that killed a little time going back and forth on an e-mail string talking about people in common.
And, in a manner of speaking, I caught up with someone that I haven't talked to or thought of since high school. So, it's been an interesting day to say the least.
The AP wire had a story about a mother who was arrested for giving her 4 year old son crack. Yes, that sentence said exactly what you thought it said. Crack to a 4 year old. To calm him down no less. How does giving a drug that's listed as a stimulant calm a kid down? And with that bit of logic thrust aside, how whacked out on crack do you have to be before you decide to give it to your 4 year old kid? It's stories like that that make me sit down and start writing the inner dialogues that I'll one day have to impart to Gage as "parental wisdom". Now I have one labeled, "Don't give your own kids crack, son...it's bad mmmmkay."
Anyway, tomorrow I plan on attending a lecture at the local museum given by a favorite author of mine. Katherine Paterson will be speaking. She's a young adult book author. She wrote one of my favorite books from that period of my life. Bridge to Teribithia. Excellent book. Short, easy read, but well worth it. In fact, that could be the "B" book for Bill's Blog Book Bonanza. The "A" book, for those that missed the comment, was The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo. Another very good book. Now I guess we're up to "C". Nothing immediately jumps to mind so once again I'm open to suggestions. Maybe by the end of 2005, I'll have covered the alphabet and discovered some wonderful new books along the way. I could even re-cap the alphabet for the occasional reader, if there are actually people outside of my own little group reading this blog. And, if there are, introduce yourself. I'd love the chance to visit your pages and discover new things.

Here's a link to the Darth Tater that will be a little more stable than an AP link. I think I need an i-pod so I can take part in all the great lyrics games that are going on. I'm always finding the current round just a little too late. I still manage to get one usually, but it's getting harder.
Anyway, one of the other things that I wanted to mention yesterday, but didn't get a chance was about Drea de Matteo. She turned 32 yesterday. I know that she's supposed to be all made up like that for Joey, but even at live events, I would have bet money that she was on the downslope to 40. Hell, Matt LeBlanc's 37 and I would have bet money she was older than he was. Oh well, can't wait to see her at 50. She can play the oldest living confederate widow.
I also vaguely remember some incoherent thoughts about independent films, but those are gone. I've replaced them with some espresso brownies that a woman in our office made. I'm typing pretty quickly today.
To clear up some things from yesterday, the funeral viewing wasn't for anyone in our family. One of the women that Terri's mom goes to church with lost her mother. So we went down to put in an appearance. We also stopped off to see my parents since my father had hernia surgery yesterday. When were they going to tell me about it? They weren't. Nice, huh?
Oh, and the reason I was comparing Punch Drunk Love to Napoleon Dynamite had something to do with the independent film thread that I can't remember. I will say that I heard good things about both movies and I like one, but hated the other. Hated the other so much it might as well have starred Ben Stiller.

Well I had a great big post all worked out in my head full of newslinks to various idiots and neat things, but today is almost over and I'm not going to get a chance to log on at home due to a funeral so you'll have to deal with a couple of rambling sentences and very few links.
I saw this movie last night. Odd, but interesting. Nowhere near as bad as this piece of crap. I think it had something to do with the fact that I like Jon Gries. He played the Uncle Rico character. He was also in The Pretender and Real Genius. And he had a pretty good characterization down.
If you get a chance, search for the Darth Tater. It'll be well worth it. I'd throw up the link, but it's an AP link and it'll probably be dead before you read it. Anyway, I'm sure there are other things bothering me, but like I said...short and sweet. Though not really sweet. More like mid-length and mildy bitter.

To comment on a comment, I have no problem having this turn into Bill's Blog Book Bonanza. Although I think Michael Landon may have to decline being as how he's dead and all. And, speaking of dead (oh that was almost as bad as Tom's 1984 joke or Susiezy's hair joke) Ruth Warrick died. Now, I know most of who have no idea who she is, but she was the reiging matriarch of All My Children. Yes, a soap opera. Oddly enough, although it doesn't happen very often anymore, but soap operas seem to respect the elder generation. Now, I didn't watch All My Children, but I had seen enough articles in Soap Opera Digest to know who she was and how much she meant to the show. On my own shows, Anna Lee was a cornerstone for General Hospital for many many years until she passed on early in 2004. And, Frances Reid has been on Days so long, I'm not even sure if she remembers when she started. These women (and in most cases their now deceased on-screen husbands) formed the basis for a genre that, although shrinking, still manages to draw millions upon millions of viewers each and every day. And, I'd be more than happy to put up their talent against some of the morons that are considered Hollywood's up and coming. No real end to this rant, just another sad passing of one a genre's legends.
My parent's babysat Gage yesterday since his daycare was closed for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and both Terri and I had to work. So, Terri went down after she got off work to pick him up and bring him home. That meant that I had no reason to rush home, since the house would be empty, so I headed straight to Rite-Aid to print out pictures from the latest disc from my digital camera.
Most of the pictures were from Christmas and other assorted-related activities. I have a shot of an adult (though I use that term loosely) receiving a child's toy that she requested. I also have a shot of me putting on my new (and I use that term loosely as well) license plate. So, I placed the order, about 150 pictures in all, and the saleswoman asked if I was going to wait. They've got a new souped-up machine and big orders like that only take 15 or so minutes now. So, I decided to browse around the store.
I picked up some random items; candy bars that were on sale, a Vanity Fair with a Star Wars article, some disposable bibs for Gage. Then I started to walk around the big selection of Valentine's Day candy. I wasn't feeling like I needed to rant about it since it is now less than one month away. I'm sure they've had it up since New Year's, but that's a different story. Anyway, I walked around to the other side of the aisle to more candy, bears, etc. I saw something that scared me pretty badly. It was a huge chocolate heart with a big 24 stamped right into the middle of it. Yes, apparently Jeff Gordon and Nascar want you to be their valentine. They also had Tony Stewart and several other drivers. So, I'm standing there shaking my head and that's when I noticed the "adult" section. They had fuzzy dice that had "kiss" on one side, "rub" on another side...you get the picture. Spencer's has always had a selection of stuff like this. Things you might pick up as a gag gift for a bachelor/bachelorette party. Now, these dice weren't quite as explicit as the ones in Spencer's, but I was in a Rite-Aid. Then I noticed the "love-cuffs". Yup, cheap as hell tiny red plastic handcuffs. I couldn't help it. I started laughing. Thankfully my pictures were done and I was able to get out of the store with most of my dignity intact. And, I got a nice bonus. The cashier, a younger girl...most likely high school, rang in the coupon wrong. So, instead of getting my first 5 pictures for one dollar, I get each set of 5 pictures for one dollar. Yes, she rang in the coupon 30 times. So, I saved a crap load on my picture developing yesterday evening. Almost enough to make me go back and buy the "love-cuffs".

Today has been one of those days where I've been working and moving non-stop all day, but I can't really give you a good description of anything I've gotten accomplished.
This weekend, which was supposed to be full of activity, dwindled to sitting in the house attempting to stay warm. Last week, I walked from work to the 7-11 and back (a little over 1/2 mile), in just jeans and a polo-shirt. No jacket, no gloves, no hat. Today, I made the same trip, bundled in a winter jacket, hat, gloves and a hood and I was still cold. It was single digits here in Pittsburgh today. Last week it was almost 70. That's not a good swing, unless you're on the other end. I wouldn't mind waking up to 70 tomorrow.
Anyway, I noticed in my last post about books that there were some really good suggestions. I'm always open to book suggestions and if I had more time, I'd probably be in a book group or two.
Not much else is going on in Pittsburgh after the huge collective sigh of relief from the outcome of Saturday's game. I believe I saw the Jets Kicker's resume on Monster this morning. And, if things had gone the other way, it probably would have been bundled with Jeff Reed's resume.
Not that I really care. Only about a month or so til Nascar starts up again. This week Pennsylvania is the football capital of the world. The Steelers are hosting their division game and the Eagles are hosting their division game. All eyes are on the Keystone state this week. And with the potential for a turnpike superbowl (although with the game in Florida, I'm not sure how that's possible), I'm sure the Governor is readying some sort of speech. Although within moments of the end of the games, regardless of the turnout, no one will be looking at Pennsylvania for anything.

For the past several days now, I've keep forgetting to blog about the fact that I finally finished Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Now, just to give you a little background...When I hit college and started looking around and comparing myself to my supposed peers, I felt that in my chosen field of writing/literature/english/communications, etc. I was vastly under-educated throughout my life to that point. So, I made myself a little promise to go back and read some of the books that I wanted to read, should have read, or thought I should have read. Now, granted...I mix them up. A classic here, a Stephen King novel there, a thriller, a Danielle Steel novel, another classic, etc. I don't think I could handle straight literature over and over. Anyway, as soon as I graduated I had a job downtown and I ended up taking the bus back and forth quite a bit. Well, the best thing to do on the bus is read...or count drunk people, but that doesn't take too long. So, I started with Moby Dick. That almost killed the whole thing right there. The short story is that Moby Dick is crap.
Anyway, I finally finished Uncle Tom's Cabin and realized that Stowe was a bit of a racist herself. Perhaps not in a strict black/white way, but she tended to glorify the slaves that were of a Christian persuasion and marginalize those that were not "God-fearing". I was also under the impression that the gist of the story was that Tom was a slave with a well-to-do family who treated him well. The family hit financial trouble and had to sell Tom down south. He was bought by Simon Legree and basically beaten and tortured to death slowly and inhumanely (although torture and death are rarely humane) throughout the rest of the book. He didn't even meet Legree until 300 pages into the book. Hell, up until that point, he was having a better life than I've had. So, another work of enduring literature that I didn't really care for. One day I'd like to find one that is worth giving a good review. One perhaps that I might recommend or even re-read in the most extreme cases.
Anyway, to kind of cleanse myself I read The Five People You Meet In Heaven that I borrowed from Susiezy. It was a quick read so now I've finished two books in the first two weeks of the year. I like it.
The Albom book was enjoyable and in some ways thought provoking. It kind of makes you think about life in general. I wasn't all that impressed with the neat, tidy wrap-up, but it's a happy-feely book so that's ok.
Tomorrow if it isn't too cold to breathe outside, we're headed over to our friend Robin's house to watch the playoff game and visit.

Well, we did it. Took all five programs live. Felt pretty good about it too. Now that's over, and I have another desk full of stuff that need to be done.
I also got a little filing cabinet that I had ordered to try and keep my desk in a slightly neater state. I have to find the time to put it together. That should make for an interesting time filler at some point today or tomorrow.
It's a good thing I waited til this afternoon to post. I learned something today that chilled me to my very soul. All this time that I've known Susiezy and she has never, I repeat NEVER, seen any of the Die Hard movies. NEVER! EVER! How is that humanly possible? That's like someone our age saying they've never seen the Star Wars movies. (Don't laugh, a girl I worked with at Lycos had never seen them.) Scary stuff. Although it goes a long way to explain things.
Very little is going on around here. Although we were fighting with our insurance company and our pediatricians office. In the months leading up to having Gage, our insurance sprung on us at the last moment that the deductible was per calendar year. Since we were pregnant August-May everything paid August-December didn't really count toward the deductible. So it started all over again in January. So, I started investigating every little contingency that might come up. Knowing that a baby can't pop out into instantaneous insurance coverage, I called Terri's doctors, the University's benefits office, and my insurance who all said the same thing. A newborn is covered under the parent's insurance for the first 31 days of life. Why then, if everyone knows this information, did we receive a bill for $325.00 for visits to Gage as a newborn in the hospital? Because no one knows what the hell they are doing apparently. The doctor's office tried to bill Gage's insurance who, after 4 months, told them that was a mistake. So they tried to bill my insurance who, after about 4 months, told them that was a mistake as well. A newborn is covered under the mother's insurance. Everyone seems to know this, but they still screwed it up. I just don't get it. It's beyond me apparently. My world revolves around some semblence of logic and their world apparently doesn't.
I guess that's the end of the saga for today.

Today has been pretty busy. We have a potential to take 5 programs live today just from our group. That's a pretty good record around here. So far, we've got four out of five and I've been going back and forth with the client trying to get the fifth one ready.
This weekend marks the beginning of the playoffs for the Steelers. I hold a mild interest in the playoffs for football simply because of the Superbowl party we host every year. I know, why do I host a party for a sport I don't like? The short answer is...because I could care less about the game and I'm a better host because of it. The long answer is...well too long. Ask Tom maybe he'll tell you how it all started.
There are only two days left before a potential cancellation of an entire hockey season. I just can't believe that that might happen. I can't believe they would be that dumb. Somewhere in that league, someone with power must actually still give a crap about the game itself instead of the paycheck.
I'm considering both of these devices. The music one basically so I can participate in all the song memes that are going on around me. And, I would love to have a Mac again. Mac was my first computer and I do miss it so.
As noted yesterday we did end up at the Warners' house for dinner. Katie is very cautious in her walking so a lot of the time she'll just crawl because it's faster. Now I know how that attitude makes it to adulthood. You know the right way to do something, but you always take the shortcut or the easy way out because it requires less energy and you already know how to do it.
Dinner was delicious as always and we got to spend some time with friends we don't get to see a lot. I can e-mail or IM them pretty much everyday, but actual face to face time is rare. Hopefully we can change that in 2005.
And, we celebrated Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Or Martin Luther Jr King day as it almost was.

Well, I did end up having a little extra time here at work today. So, I'll use that to throw up a short post. We're headed to the Warner's house tonight for dinner so I won't be home much of the evening. I'm told Katie has taken some steps so we'll see how well she's walking this evening. She's between 5 and 6 months older than Gage so it's interesting to see the differences between the two right now. Then in a couple of years, those gaps will close to almost nothing and you won't even be able to tell there is an age difference.
I'm trying to figure out why I spent all that good money on a formal wedding with family and friends in attendance. I could have just went to Vegas and got married by none other than MC Hammer. Don't believe me? Check this out. All I can say about that wedding is, Can't touch this. I wonder if he made everyone call him Rev. Hammer?
Speaking of weddings, we dismissed a lot of the things considered "traditional" at weddings that we've attended, dj'd, sung at, etc. Terri and I had been to enough weddings and planned long enough for our own that we were able to personalize almost every aspect of the service from the selection of her dress to the personalized wedding favors and crayons for the kids. This story puts a whole new slightly "creepy" spin on the personalization of things. It bothered me more than a little, mostly, because I've actually put thought into my own...um...ending. Being very pop culture minded, I've scripted most aspects of my life including the end. Now, apparently I can make it happen just the way I want it to. I shouldn't have that much power after I'm dead. I think if they just want to throw me in a box and set me on fire, they should be able to. But, hey...that's just one man talking, or in this case typing.

Busy weekend. Friday night I went out after work to celebrate the launch of a huge project that I only had minimal dealings with. It was interesting. This is the first time I've been out socially with my new office. Now, not everyone went, which is a good indication of certain behaviors to begin with, but those that did go, I can now see in a whole new light.
I found that my work has greatly improved and they are very happy with me, thus far. Which means that I might actually become a better employee and stop slacking off so much. I've actually been meaning to find time at home to update instead of doing it at work. Don't get me wrong, I have no problems with doing it at work, but there are a lot of interruptions. Although, there are a lot of interruptions at home too. Such is my life.
Saturday we had to go out and get some shopping down since we were down to very little food in the house. So, we headed out and ended up hitting two bookstores, a mall, Costco, Best Buy, and K-Mart. Good day all around. Long, but good.
Saturday night into Sunday, Gage didn't sleep well, which meant we didn't sleep well. I woke up feeling a little congested and we rushed around trying to get ready for church. Gage was crying and being generally fussy and by the time we drove up to the church we were already 10 minutes late and we ended up simply skipping church altogether. I know it's not a good thing to do, but it doesn't happen often.
So, we drove around for a little while til Gage got settled down. Then we headed to one of those starving artist shows that you see advertised on TV all the time. It wasn't worth it. I thought they would have an interesting selection, but a good portion of the pieces were basically the same and by the same I mean crap.
After that was so unsuccessful, we had breakfast at the hotel where the sale was going on and then went home to see if we could nap a little before heading down to see some friends of ours.
Terri got to nap and Gage got to nap. I didn't get to nap. I think we need a bigger bed. So, after a couple hours we headed out to run a few last minute errands and then head down to see some friends of ours to exchange Christmas gifts. Wendy and Chris have two kids, Bela and Evan. Bela is 5 and she is adorable. I don't envy Chris when she comes up on the dating age. It's a good thing he has a lot of guns. Evan is almost 3 and boy is he lightning fast. I hadn't even set the present down in front of him and he had opened it, assessed it, and moved on to the next thing. And, he's not only methodical, but very anal about cleaning up. He made sure all the wrapping paper was thrown away and all the toys were put away. I'm thinking of paying him to give lessons to Terri and Gage.
So, after his sleepless night on Saturday and the big day of activity on Sunday, we figured he'd drift off easily and sleep most of the night. Ha! At a little after 4, I finally took over for Terri. Now, I'm accustomed to being awake for long stretches. I once went from Friday of truck weekend to Sunday of race day with only 3 half-hour naps. So, I calmed him down and finally got him to sleep next to me on the floor in his bedroom for a couple of hours so all was not lost. And, he'll probably spend the entire day playing at daycare with no naps and be fine this evening. Terri will be dragging and I may need an extra cup of coffee to propel me through the afternoon. Ok, that's enough for today I guess.

Today is kind of dragging at work. I certainly have enough to keep me busy, but I'm just not in the mood to do any of it. Now, this feeling certainly isn't new...I used to deal with this every day at the University I worked at. Here, it's a rarity. I think it's because of the dreary nature of today. Although at the moment it isn't raining. Which is a good thing since it's started flooding in places again.
I found several things during my normal daily activities that I think I'm going to share.
This scared the crap out of me. Is there anyone who didn't get one of these albums? Nelson's career spanned a total of 3 albums I think. And only one had any hits on it. Although I guess if you count this one, it will be four albums. Ok, let's back-peddle a little. I decided to pause and look it up just in case. Nelson has made 7 albums PLUS the 20th Century Masters. Although I was correct in the fact that really only one of them had hits come off the disc. Either way, I don't think they need a Masters disc.
I also saw this little list. I'm not buying this as an accurate depiction. No where on the Harris poll does it have a choice for sex. Which I'm guessing would take precedence over several of these other activities for a lot of Americans. I'm just sayin'.
And this just pissed me off. Nevermind the fact that as a little punk kid he probably shouldn't be driving period, but the quote at the end should be enough to have the keys removed from his hands for life. And, if he must drive, he should be behind the wheel of a four cylinder ford escort or something similar. And, before he gets the keys back to anything, he should be beaten severely for the cloths in that picture, and the hat, and the fact that he's related to a backstreet boy, and just a good ass-kicking in general.
I guess that's enough for today. I keep getting interrupted and I really do need to get some actual work done.

Thought this seemed like a good way to kill a few minutes and recall some wonderful song lyrics.

Bands // Song Titles
Created by BourdiezFreak and taken 18250 times on bzoink!
Choose a band/or artist and answer only in song TITLES by that band:	Barry Manilow
Are you female or male:	I'm Your Man
Describe yourself:	I Write The Songs
How do some people feel about you:	Last Duet
How do you feel about yourself:	Ready To Take A Chance Again
Describe your ex girlfriend/boyfriend:	When I Wanted You
Describe your current girlfriend/boyfriend:	Can't Smile Without You
Describe where you want to be:	Somewhere Down The Road
Describe what you want to be:	Looks Like We Made It
Describe how you live:	The Kid Inside
Describe how you love:	Beautiful Music
Share a few words of wisdom:	Even Now
Create a Survey | Search Surveys | Go to bzoink!

And I liked the first one so much, I did two.

Bands // Song Titles
Created by BourdiezFreak and taken 18248 times on bzoink!
Choose a band/or artist and answer only in song TITLES by that band:	Billy Joel
Are you female or male:	An Innocent Man
Describe yourself:	The Ballad of Billy The Kid
How do some people feel about you:	Angry Young Man
How do you feel about yourself:	Summer, Highland Falls
Describe your ex girlfriend/boyfriend:	Christie Lee
Describe your current girlfriend/boyfriend:	I've Loved These Days
Describe where you want to be:	Scenes From An Italian Restaurant
Describe what you want to be:	Big Shot
Describe how you live:	My Life
Describe how you love:	Honesty
Share a few words of wisdom:	Miami 2017 (Seen The Lights Go Out On Broadway)
Create a Survey | Search Surveys | Go to bzoink!

Yesterday at the end of the day I had a little time to kill so I decided to try a little experiment. You'll notice that in the upper right hand corner of this page, there's a little button that says, "Next Blog". Now it's not the same blog attached to that button everytime and it's pretty random what you're going to end up with, but I decided yesterday to see how many clicks it took to get to a site with porn on it. It took...one! Yup, one click took me to this site which if you venture there yourself you can see is dedicated to adult themed entertainment. It's actually a pretty decent site. So, although it didn't take the amount of time I thought it would, my little experiment was a rousing success.
This article, which I lifted off of Tom's site sent me into a nice foul mood this morning. I can't believe the outright hypocrisy of the Catholic church sometimes. Especially when it manifests itself this blatantly. If Catholics took the time to actually read the Bible (you know, the book your faith is supposedly based on) they would notice that in John 8:7 it plainly says, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her." I would like to know how many children enrolled at that particular Catholic school come from divorced parents, parents who practice birth control methods other than the natural ways approved by the church, and people who weren't married in a Catholic church. I'd also like to sit down with Monica Sii (after resisting the overwhelming urge to slap her in the face) and ask why she enrolled her children in that school. The common answer from the Catholic schools around my hometown and current residence is "a better education". Not a religious education per se, but a better education. Most of the public schools are a haven for drugs, crime, etc. and parents see this as a better education alternative. I personally know several sets of parents who joined the Catholic church, sent their children to Catholic school, had their children graduate, and then left the church altogether. Most Catholics gather once a week inside their church because they have to. Religion should be about wanting to. God wanted to give humanity a savior. God didn't "have" to send his son, he did it because he wanted to. I hope that one day Monica's mind will open just a crack to let in the thought that maybe these two gentlemen love their sons as much as a "Catholic" parent and simply want a better education for their them.
Sorry, I didn't mean to rant for so long. It's not good to get me started on the whole Catholic thing. If having gay friends and relatives and accepting that part of "our" yes "our" culture means I'm doomed to spend eternity in hell in the eyes of Catholics then so be it. God and I know better.

There's not much going on today. Terri and Gage were rushing out of the house as soon as I woke up so that he could go get the other half of his flu shot. It's been raining since, well actually...it has rained every day this year. I didn't get nearly the amount of things done yesterday that I wanted to get done. We also witnessed the little one grabbing onto the railing in his crib to try and sit himself up. That means I need to add one more project to the list and lower his mattress so he doesn't hoist himself right out of bed one day. I'd hate to see him trying to hobble around on tiny little crutches.
Today will be the first time he has a non-family member babysitting. Well, ok, without counting daycare. My ex-girlfriend's sister works with Terri and she's going to take the little one for a few hours before I get home while Terri is with her client this evening. I'm sure he'll do fine.
Everything has been rather dreary to start the year and I guess since I have the excuse, I'll blame it on the rain. (Wow, that phrase brought back some weird flashbacks.)
I'll end the post a little early today since I have nothing constructive to say. Maybe you have something constructive you'd like to say to me?

Well, I know I said that I would look up the information on just how long I've been waiting for the license plates to arrive. Last night I actually remembered. I wrote a check to Carnegie Mellon on September 6th, 2002. The license plates arrived at my house on December 29th, 2004. 2 years 114 days after I signed the check. At this point, It's only been 2 years 84 days since the wedding. I still have a month left before the time even begins to equal out. I did put the plate on the car on January 1st, although I haven't taken the time to see what we need to do about Terri's plate yet.
My hope is that I can get home tonight and keep my motivation at a high level and finish a good portion of the small nagging projects around the house. I would like 2005 to go much smoother than 2004 did. We were caught with too much to do, not enough time or resources to do it, and the stress that went along with all of that. So, hopefully we can change that incrementally throughout 2005. Although, at some point in the future I expect mass chaos for the whole house thing. But, it's possible that won't occur til 2006, I guess it all depends on how 2005 goes.
I'm also thinking about tackling five other big projects that I've put on hold a little too long so maybe I won't have any motivation when I get home tonight. Sometimes the thought of all that's looming just serves as a demotivation tactic.

Well, I finally finished watching this. I was a little disappointed in the last two episodes. I get the fact that the show was cancelled and everything can't be wrapped up in a neat little tidy bow. However, my biggest complaint was the fact that you could see the big reveal coming from the first planting of the seed. I did like the wrap-up in the control room, but other than that it was very sub-standard writing compared to the rest of the show. Anyway, that little comment aside I was very impressed with the show as a whole. I'm not sure how I would have liked it with commercials and a week's break in-between, but you never know.
I'm trying to figure out why crap like Survivor, Fear Factor, Punk'd, The Bachelor/Bachelorette, and Wife Swap stay on the air and garner ratings and advertising money when smartly written, entertaining shows that actually make a contribution to mankind (other than wanting to sterilize all of the people on those shows to make certain they can't reproduce) can't seem to last more than a season or two. I often wonder how some of the long lasting shows from the past, M*A*S*H, Cheers, I Love Lucy, All In The Family, etc. would do nowadays.
Oh well, I hope everyone had a decent new year. Gage woke up about three or four minutes before midnight so we got to ring in our first new year as a family.
I did get some interesting news. Terri and I had a wedding in 2002. We had it out of the town we lived in so all our arrangements had to be made long distance. Terri and I did lots of travel and made lots of phone calls. Everything at and around the wedding site went beautifully, arrangement-wise. The few arrangements that we made in Pittsburgh seemed to go ok with one glaring exception. Wedding World. I won't go into any kind of rant about them mostly because I'd still be here typing next new years. They were the worst service oriented store that I've ever dealt with. They were horrible. And, with karma doing it's thing, they have declared bankruptcy, have court hearings pending, and lots of legal problems and all of their stores have shut down. What a wonderful holiday present. I don't want to wish ill things upon them, but this they brought all on themselves.
Oh and a couple of parting shots before I sign off...1) Hopefully the U.S. can pull a bronze medal out of the World Junior hockey tournament after failing to successfully defend their gold medal performance from last year. 2) And, when you are reading (or in some cases re-reading) your favorite author this year, remember that there are better authors available...both published and unpublished and they'd love a read through too. You may discover that you have a new favorite or even better a good book to recommend to a friend. Here's to a more literate 2005.

Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence

You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well. An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly. You are also good at remembering information and convicing someone of your point of view. A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary. You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

There are rumors flying that we might get out of work early today. That would be a nice bonus. I could deposit my check in the bank, get my hair cut, clean out my car, and relax before starting into the evening's activities. Wouldn't that be a nice bonus headed into the new year.
One other chore that needs to be accomplished soon is something that I've been waiting to happen for a long time. I have to check some records to tell you exactly how long, but it's been a long, long time. After having me rant about all the other specialty license plates that are floating around Pennsylvania, I wanted to know why Carnegie Mellon didn't have one of their own. Then came the opportunity to order an alumni plate. So, I ordered one for me and one for Terri. Time passes, more time passes, more time passes, time passes, more time passes, "Dad if you don't know what a purple nurple ping pong ball is, I can't help you." more time passes, time passes, more time passes, we get pregnant, have a child, celebrate the child's first Father's Day, more time passes, celebrate the child's first Fourth of July, more time passes, celebrate the child's dedication, more time passes, celebrate the child's first Halloween, more time passes, celebrate the child's first Thanksgiving, more time passes, celebrate the child's first Christmas, more time passes and then lo and behold...like a forgotten memory, the plates arrive. Of course, they arrive about two weeks late for Terri who just got a new car, so now we'll have to call the DMV and find out what we need to do to update her car and registration, but it arrived. Of course, it looks nothing like the original plate that they offered us. This one has some sort of digital photo on it, but it's here. Finally. It has arrived. Just in time for the new year to begin. In fact, maybe that's when I'll make the change on my car. January 1st. A new plate for a new year.
I can't believe that 2004 is over already. A lot happened within the year, but it still feels as though it went by too quickly and not much got accomplished. Oh well, here's to a better 2005 for all of our friends and family. And there's only 360 shopping days left til next Christmas. I believe I just got a flyer from Target about pre-holiday sales.

One thing that I forgot to mention from the Christmas holiday with my family is the lesson. When my Grandmother was put into assisted living and we were told that she was never going to be able to live on her own again, my mother and uncle made the decision to sell the house. They went in and got their stuff, and my brother and I were able to take anything that we wanted. The rest was sold at an estate auction and the house was sold. My uncle Bob had pretty much the same situation with his mother. He and his brother went into the house and took what they wanted, sold the rest and sold the house. One of the things that my uncle Bob ended up with was an upright piano that his father had restored once. So, Bob was all interested in restoring it again. He had already started restoring it before Christmas and had it put back together when we got there. However, after my parents and grandmother had left, I expressed an interest in both the restoration and actually owning a piano. That turned out to be the best Christmas present that we could have ever gotten Bob. His eyes lit up and he proceeded (with a little help from me) to dismantle the upright piano. I learned more about pianos on Christmas day than I think I'll ever need to know in my lifetime. However, I guess for his next project he was looking to buy an older piano, possibly a grand piano and restore it, but he didn't know what he'd do with two pianos. Now, his mission is to buy the piano, restore it, and give it to Gage. I sure hope Gage is interested in music.
Not much else is going on. I completed phase two of the tetris moving last night. All that's left is to move the stuff out of the library back into the guest room and we should have everything ready for any exercise that we might complete.
The new year is already filling with stuff we have plans for or would like to do and we haven't even hit January yet. Hopefully at some point our schedules will slow down, otherwise we'll have to self-impose some sort of exile just to catch our collective breath.
I've started watching what little coverage they have of the world junior hockey games. I've seen the two U.S. games that they broadcast. Not bad, it's a shame that Montoya is going to the Rangers. He's playing like I expected Fleury to play when he arrived in town. Fleury disappointed, Montoya doesn't.
I guess that's enough for today. Oh, and I'll wish a quick Happy Anniversary to Terri. Today marks 12 years and 3 months.

I know that this is going to be another abbreviated work week, and I do like that, but after two straight weeks of having Friday off, that first week in January is going to suck.
It's an interesting phenomenon to see how big the draw is to "finish what you've started". I have projects in various phases all over the house, hell...all over my life. One thing that has lagged on for almost a year now is the fact that I've been steadily acquiring classes and credits at a local community college for an accounting certificate. Yes, you can re-read that sentence. I said accounting.
If you aren't a regular reader, I'll recap. The university that I worked for said they wanted to promote me and fast-track me into a management role. In order to make it all legit, they wanted me to have the Supervisor's track completed in HR courses that are offered for staff development at the University. That was 6 courses of learning things like time card management and university perks, which was their way of explaining why the university paid like crap. So, I finished that and in January of 2004 I started working towards the certificate which was their other requirement. It takes 10 classes to finish up a certificate. To date, I've finished 6. I took two in the spring, two in the summer, and two in the fall. I'm registered for two more in the spring and one more in the summer leaving me just one class. One flexible accounting class. It could be any accounting class I want. And the only three offered over the summer, I've already taken.
Since my former employer did nothing but jerk me around and string me along, I'm not sure why I even care about finishing this stupid certificate. I'll most likely never use it. And, I doubt I'll even list it on a resume, unless I have an extra line open.
Which means that I just rambled on for several sentences with no intention of wrapping it up other than to say, there is a mighty big draw to "finish what you've started".
We took all of our Christmas decorations down last night. Our house is almost back to normal. It's pretty small and we're damn close to outgrowing it with Gage and all related baby paraphernalia. It's like playing a big game of tetris. This stuff has to be moved and this room clean in order to move stuff out of a second room to clean there so that a third room can be taken care of. Last night we moved all the Christmas stuff out of the living room. We boxed it up and took it to the guest room where it's stored in the "offseason". That meant that after I got all of those boxes stored away, I could clean up the guest room and take all of the stuff that normally resides in the living room back downstairs. That meant that I could go into the library and move all of the stuff back that normally belongs in the guest room. So that I can clean up the library and get my work space back. Which also means the living room will be put back together so that our treadmill will function again, which means that the guest room will be clean enough to use the exercise equipment stored in there. All of this just in time to make that mandatory new year's resolution of, exercise and weight loss. So, I spend two or three hours getting the house back into shape and moving tons of stuff around and up and down stairs, just so that I can exercise and get back into shape. Ain't life a bitch?

Well let's see what went on this weekend. I got out of work a little early on Thursday so I took that opportunity to go home and try and sort everything out for the next couple of days. On Friday we headed down to Terri's parent's house for their day of "Christmas." Now that we have Gage, we've ended up splitting the holidays by two days instead of splitting one day into two. So, we spent several hours at their house and then headed over to Tom's parent's house and visited with them for an hour or so. Gage was content to bang on his little congo drum that Tom bought for him. It's odd to hear the children's song "Bingo" played in a calypso style. Then we headed back to Terri's parent's house. By this time, her uncles had shown up and we started to hand gifts back and forth. Amazingly enough, I actually got decent gifts this year. It took 13 years, but it finally happened. We finished up too late at their house to surprise my mom at Christmas Eve service at church (which is where we would have been every other year) so we just headed home. We attempted to put Gage to bed close to his normal time, but apparently Christmas, Santa, Presents, and Excitement are all hot-wired into little kids. He was so wound up and just wouldn't go to sleep. We finally got him settled down after 11 and we headed to bed. Or at least Terri did. Unbeknownst to her, I had played Santa on my own. We had actually agreed that we weren't getting Gage anything this year since the grandparent's were already going insane. But, I couldn't resist. So, I went downstairs to get everything out of hiding and wrap it all up and get it under the tree.
Christmas morning we got to sleep in a little by bringing Gage into bed with us and getting him to take a little nap. Then when we headed downstairs, Terri and Gage were surprised. So, I actually got out the video camera (which hasn't been used since about 10 minutes after his birth) and taped him opening presents up. Which caught a nice shot of him getting hold of the cat's tail and giving it a good yank for Christmas. And, as we discovered, if you're going to sneak around and play Santa, make sure you check to see whether batteries are included or not. I really want to go back to the Toys R Us and get something for free. They used to run a promotion that awarded something to you if the cashier didn't try to suggestively sell batteries. I know this for a fact because of two occurrences. The first one, I was buying legos (which only need batteries if you're buying the train set). The cashier asked me if I needed any batteries with my purchase. I picked up the box of legos, shook it, and said, "No, I think I'll just make the noises myself." The cashier then apologized and said that it was a store policy that they had to ask with every purchase, regardless of what it was. So, the next time I was in, I ended up not finding what I was looking for, so I just bought a candy bar. The cashier didn't ask if I wanted batteries and I got a free drink to go with my candy bar. Anyway, then we all got showered and dressed and headed over to my Uncles' house for my family's Christmas.
Thankfully my Grandmother was well enough to make the trip. So, we had everyone there and we had an excellent Christmas dinner and then Gage fell asleep on my Mom's lap. My mom, who had been pretty busy this year, didn't actually wrap most of the presents. So, the Leap Pad that they had gotten for Gage was just sitting there. My uncle David proceeded to open it up, put in the batteries and start playing with it. Between him and my parents, they've played with it more than Gage has. As soon as my Mom got there, she took Gage (as per her norm) and they went upstairs. They came back later and were very mysterious about it. Well, my mom was, I don't think Gage knows what mysterious is yet. So, as we're passing out gifts, my mom hands Terri and I a box and launches into a story about the day after Thanksgiving when she and my dad watched Gage while Terri and I worked. They took him (against our wishes) to a portrait studio to have Christmas pictures taken. They even bought him a little outfit especially for it. Turns out, a couple days after they took the pictures, the studio called my mom. Gage was chosen as "kid of the month" and they wanted to know if they would sign release forms so they could hang his picture in the studio. My mom panicked. She didn't expect anything like that. So, she called my Uncle who just laughed hysterically. Between the two of them they managed to get the studio to hold off until after Christmas when Terri and I could call and authorize the whole thing. I found out this morning that the studio isn't open til Wednesday, so I'm sure they'll be more on that later.
Anyway, the festivities were wonderful at my Uncles' house and we made plans to see this just after the new year. Then we headed home and Gage once again wasn't ready for bed. He finally fell asleep and we cleaned up some of the post-Christmas mess and headed to bed ourselves.
Sunday morning we slept in (we aren't sure if we actually missed church or not) and had a leisurely morning awaiting Joe's phone call. He and DEK were tailgating before the Steeler's game and we were going to meet them at Damon's to have lunch and watch the game. Which turned out to be a good experience all around. We got some pictures of Gage with both of them, they got to see Gage flirting with the waitress and the food wasn't bad. We also got our annual dose of the holiday baking frenzy that is DEK's mom. MMMM, I was happy for those last night when I was prowling around for a snack.
After we got home from watching the Steeler's game, Tom called and stopped by on his way home from the Steeler's game to drop off some more stuff for Gage that his brother and sister-in-law had got for him. So, Gage did pretty well this year. We only have to catch up with a few more friends and this year's holiday experience will be over. Thankfully.

I had planned to start off this post with pepperoni cheese, but that will have to wait a paragraph or two. I'm now fully convinced that the radios that have been in my cars have been haunted in some way. We knew the one in the Cavalier was. There was no doubt about that. It sensed when certain people were in the car and only played certain songs. Where is all this headed? Breakfast at Tiffany's. The song was a minor hit in 1995. Almost a decade ago. Now, two straight mornings I've heard it on two different Pittsburgh radio stations. Maybe I should just buy the DVD and get it over with.
Now, back to pepperoni cheese. If you don't know what pepperoni cheese is then shame on you for six weeks as Mike Lange would say. Anyway, every summer when I was kid I would stay at my grandmother's house for a week or so. Usually multiple times a summer. My grandmother had a pretty set routine. Up early, read the bible, read the paper, breakfast, clean, walk up the street to get the mail and groceries, watch the Price Is Right, make lunch, watch the CBS News, watch the Young and the Restless, clean, watch Guiding Light, clean, make dinner, watch church programs, go to bed. Pretty steady day in day out. Well, when we would walk up the street for mail and the groceries, the grocery store was a mom and pop operation. No Foodland, Shop N Save, or Giant Eagle. It was a little store where pretty much everyone in town had a tab. So, Grandma would usually shop one day at a time. When I was there, I would get to pick out some lunch food, usually lunch meat, cheese, maybe soup or something. The deli had pepperoni cheese (which is cheddar cheese with chunks of pepperoni in the cheese). So, I would usually get salami and pepperoni cheese. That was my staple at Grandma's house. And, looking back on it, I'm trying to figure out how I don't weigh 400 lbs now. Anyway, on and off, ever since I moved out on my own I've kind of scanned deli counters and cheese sections looking for pepperoni cheese. I've always come up empty. I just assumed that since it wasn't the healthiest of foods it went away. So, the fruitless search continued...until last night. Susie came over to exchange gifts and pick up the Vader mask for her nephew. And I hit the jackpot. A five pound block of pepperoni cheese. All for me! Merry Christmas! Of course, I cracked it open right there. One taste and I was nine years old on my grandma's sofa watching the Daddy and Patti show again. It's absolutely amazing how certain stimuli, a smell, a taste, can trigger such powerful memories. So, thank you Susie. Perhaps my heart didn't grow in size and a blanket clutching youngster didn't fully explain it to me, but my holidays did brighten and commercialism can't kill the pepperoni cheese.

Long Live The Pepperoni Cheese!

Oh yeah and Terri and Gage got really cool stuff too.

Quick post today...lots to do this Christmas season. Although the majority of the things that I have to do have nothing to do with Christmas or the holidays.
Anyway, yesterday in going through my regular rotation of CDs and I hit the album by Deep Blue Something who had a hit with the song Breakfast at Tiffany's in the mid-90's. Then last night, I put Gage to bed since Terri was working late and I was flipping through the channels and there was Breakfast at Tiffany's. I had never actually seen the film and since I had heard the song earlier that day, I thought I'd give it a shot. It wasn't bad. Now granted I had only seen George in his tough-guy roles, most notably with this and this, but I enjoyed the film. And oddly enough, I find that now that I've started posting regularly again I keep finding bits and pieces about writers and writing. I had no idea through my various trivia knowledge of the movie (never actually having seen it) that Peppard's character was a writer. Very interesting. There were only two things that struck me about the movie as a whole. One, it was kind of jarring to see Audrey with a cigarette in her hand all the time. I'm not anti-smoking, but it just looked wrong. The second thing was this. How do you cast the all-American white boy as a little old Japanese man? It was very interesting and I'm sure that Blake had a ball with those scenes. It certainly seemed to be a lead-in for future Panther movies. And, to top it all off, this morning on the way into work I actually heard Deep Blue Something's song on the radio. Very strange juju.
Anyway, not too much else. Although Gage woke himself up last night and when I went in to check on him, he was flat on his stomach. That means, whether he did it intentionally or not, he actually rolled all the way over. He's been very frustrating in that department. He'll roll most of the way over and then flop back over on his back. He doesn't like being on his stomach so I'm sure that plays into why he hasn't taken the time to learn rolling over, but it's kind of exasperating for those of us on the sidelines.

Well I got hit with a little bit of work this morning, so I didn't get to blog right away, but never fear...here I am. Well it's only 4 days til Christmas. Has my attitude changed any from the constant nagging of people like Susiezy? I don't know. I certainly know what the spirit of Christmas is, but commercialism is doing it's part to kill it. Well, maybe the arrival of Santa at my household for the first time in probably 14 years might make the difference. We'll see.
And speaking of Susiezy she can't wish for something like goodwill or peace on earth or even winning the lottery. No. She had to go and waste her powers on this. Yeah, the underdog won and that's all well and good, but in the grand scheme of things, what did it really accomplish? She could have used her powers for good and wished me a lottery win (I would have cut her in). Oh well, I guess that goes along with the whole spirit of Christmas and not having it be all about one's self during the holidays. Even though it should be like that throughout the whole year. Maybe she should give the spirit of Christmas lecture to the guy who flipped me off in the tunnel this morning.
Anyway, she also got a nice Christmas bonus wish in the fact that JK Rowling finally finished the 6th Harry Potter book and set a release date. Now I'm sure that some parent's took notice and mentally reminded themselves that they should probably find a way to pick it up so the kids don't have their heads explode from waiting. However, did they take vacation time, clear their entire calendar that weekend, and buy a new bookshelf in honor of the book? I know someone insane enough to do that. If only the spirit of Christmas were as addictive as the spirit of Harry Potter.
Anyway, I guess I should stop making fun of Susie since a) she knows where I live and b)is actually planning on stopping by this week.
So, if I don't talk to you personally over this mad rush of a holiday season, here's wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas (or Happy Hanukkah for the Jewish constituent) and a Happy New Year (or profitable New Year for the Jewish constituent).

This weekend went by entirely too quickly. I think Terri and I have realized that our "Christmas" cards are most likely going to be post-Christmas cards. Although she was intent on getting the first wave out the door. You never realize how much your friends and family move around until you have to send out invitations or Christmas cards. Then it becomes a little game of tracking them down and getting a physical address. There are a ton of ways to communicate nowadays. E-mail, voice-mail, phone, cell-phone, IM, text messages, pagers, etc. that having an actual brick and mortar address often seems superfluous. It's odd to think of such a concept, but actual pen-pals (the paper letter variety) are kind of becoming obselete. My cousin Cindi and I used to write to one another at least one or twice a month through my first year of college. Now we chat on the phone every couple of months and try to catch up. I think after the first of the year, I'm going to attempt to write some actual physical letters and see how many get answered.
Although, I'm sure that ambition (like most of my others) will simply get tossed aside into the larger pile of "stuff that needs to be done" or some other aptly named pile.
This weekend I spent most of my time babysitting since Terri was on call. Being on call for Terri isn't quite like a doctor, but you do get random calls at all hours. She also has to work the weekend that she's on call. So, the little one and I spent most of the weekend hanging out in our pajamas trying to get stuff done around the house. On Saturday we headed down to see my Grandmother and we all went out to lunch for her 84th birthday. Nowadays I'm so torn about seeing my Grandmother it's causing me guilt. I love my Grandmother, but it really does hurt seeing her in so much pain and confusion. Her birthday celebration was wonderful and she got to see Gage which always brightens her day.
On Sunday, we were flipping through the channels trying to find something halfway entertaining to watch when we saw one of those commercials for the latest CD's. This one was hawking the newest Toby Keith CD, Greatest Hits Volume 2. It was making such a big deal out of the fact that there were 11 hits, plus 3 new songs on this CD and not only was it a Greatest Hits, but it was a Greatest Hits Volume 2. They made it seem as though he was a prolific artist that couldn't be stopped. GH1 had 14 songs total and even if you count the new songs (which shouldn't appear on a greatest hits album and I don't even want to ramp up the rant on that one) the new one has 14. That's 28 total for the math impaired. That's basically just over half the number recently released on George Strait's album...50 Number Ones. Fifty! And they were all number one on the country charts. And, since they released his newest single on that album as well, it has since gone to number one. So, technically you are getting 51 number one hits all by the same artist. I think they should hype Toby Keith when he makes it that far. Because his latest batch of stuff, (shamelessly promoting his daughter's wannabe career, and "Stays in Mexico"), isn't going to keep him around long enough to hit 51 greatest hits, let alone 51 number ones.
I guess that's all for today. I haven't seen anything else new on the hockey front which probably means I won't see any live Penguins hockey this season.

I was thinking about my post this morning on my way into work and I had decided that I was going to attempt to stay away from the morning radio, music in general, and Christmas. Then I realized I didn't have much else to talk about.
So, upon entering the office I was going through my e-mails and I came across an e-mail containing a Q&A from one of the ESPN announcers for hockey. Now, if you look back through the blog...I don't like the ESPN announcers for hockey. However, being so starved for anything ice related (we've actually instituted Jersey Fridays in our office) I scanned down through the questions. Most were about the player's union, CBA, and owners. However, one stood out. A fan asked John Buccigross about the civic arena (now the Mellon arena) in Pittsburgh. I thought it was actually a very intelligent answer...which the announcers so very seldom give. So, I decided to just paste it right in here, it's a little long, but oh so worth it for Pittsburgh fans and hockey fans in general.

John,
I was wondering what you thought of the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh? I feel that is one of the best places to see an NHL game today. I mean who else can say that Gretzky, Lemuiex, Lafleur, Roy, and Orr all skated on the same ice as in use today? It will be a sad day when the Pens get a new arena. The boxes are located way up high leaving the fans seats closer to the ice.

Mark Savannah

The first NHL game I ever saw in person was at the Civic Arena. It is an awesome place to see a hockey game. I remember sitting in the last row for a game and, you are right Mark, it's a great seat. The NHL should use all the muscle they have to keep the Penguins in Pittsburgh and help build an intimate and as brilliant a venue as the Pittsburgh Pirates play in. This is a special franchise with a significant history. One of the three greatest players of all time is playing there. What is Mario Lemiuex's legacy if the Penguins leave? He'll have no uniform. I was watching a Penguins Classic game from 1991 on DirectTV the other day. What a team! What a power play. Lemieux, Stevens and Recchi in their primes, and Coffey and Murphy on the point! Bob Johnson coached in Pittsburgh. Scotty Bowman coached there. Mike Lang, Jaromir Jagr, Joey Mullen, Craig Patrick, Tom Barrasso, Ron Francis, two Stanley Cups ... and it says here they get Sidney Crosby in the next draft and the cycle of greatness will return.

I miss hockey.

I was listening to one of the local country music stations and they had an announcer voice-over promo come on and the guy says, "Do you remember Smokey and the Bandit, BJ and the Bear, and the Duke boys? Then you're going to love our way back airplay." Then they proceeded to play a song from 1999! Smokey was released in 1977, BJ and the Bear was on TV from 79-81 and the Dukes of Hazzard ran from 79-85. I expected to hear a country song from 1980ish give or take a few years. They played a song from 5 years ago. 5! That's not way back. That's not even back. That's like the rock station going, "Do you remember The Beatles, The Eagles, and Bob Dylan?" and then playing Britney Spear's first hit. I certainly don't own my own radio station or announce at a radio station, but I think the first thing I would do if I was trying to sanction an entire day for listening pleasure is make the damn promos match the music. Blows, I tell you.
Yes, you can call me Bill Scrooge if you like. Perhaps I am. However, there's one big difference between the Dickens' character and myself is that there is no redemption in my future. At least none that I'm aware of. Ghosts that visit me aren't going to revive my holiday spirit unless they start pulling commercialism out of the picture. Toy manufacturers start a campaign in late October and early November to build up that year's "must-have" toy. Then they start short-shipping them to stores to build up frenzy and demand. One of the must-have toys this year is the Spongebob Squarepants Krabby Patty Grill Set. Don't ask how I know. When inquiring about it at a local Toys R Us, the manager said that they weren't slated to get any more in because they weren't a big enough outlet. It's a shame that some executive decided that Pittsburgh kids don't need the toy that they deemed the must-have toy of the year. I hope the kids in New York and LA enjoy them between visits to the nanny's house and boarding school. Ok, that's a little off base, but these toys are singled out and then who goes and buys them up? Middle-aged men. What do they do with them? They list them on E-bay and make a tidy profit off of some poor parent's desire to bring a little happiness to their child to make up for the fact that they have to work 60 hours a week to feed, clothe, and pay for daycare for the child. And to top it all off, it's a FREAKIN' PRETEND FAST FOOD GRILL! What the hell is that teaching the kids? So, pardon me if I'm not all "deck the halls and fa-la-la."
Enough of that bitterness. Here's some phenomenal news from the job front. For the first time in 4 years...I got a holiday bonus. I've been working for this company for...one month today. And I got a holiday bonus. Granted, it wasn't overwhelming, but it was a bonus. Damn, it's good to be appreciated.
We also had our holiday party last night at Dave and Buster's. Free appetizers, dinner, dessert, and open bar...all night long. In addition to all of that, we got power cards with 100 chips apiece on them to play games. (This breaks into weird parent mode, so you can skip to the next paragraph if you'd like) You should have seen Gage's eyes trying to follow all the lights and sounds in the game room. He played a couple of games with Mommy and Daddy. We have a great picture of him riding on the motorcycle game with me. It's very hard to steer a motorcycle one handed.
Ok, weird parent moment over. And, that's pretty much the end of the post too I think. Although I'll lament the fact that the NHL's season is pretty much over since the union rejected the players' offer and the players rejected the union's offer.

Ten days til Christmas. Instead of seeing the anticipation for the holiday build throughout the month of December, commercialization has kind of plateaued. So, now...when kids should be perfect angels in hopes that Santa is coming are kind of blase about the whole thing. When I was a kid, Christmas anticipation started about the second week of December when all the holiday specials started to air and all the stores were completely decked out. Now, in order to keep up with everything, people are shopping in August for early presents and they put up the big tree in PPG place in downtown Pittsburgh around the end of October. I feel bad for kids nowadays. You can't have excitement build for two and a half months and expect the same result. I have no idea how Gage is going to react to all the hype, but hopefully Terri and I can level him out to understand that Christmas doesn't actually come earlier each year as the media hype would make you believe.
Anyway, I heard a nice comment about the glut of reality shows. While being asked about the show, "The Biggest Loser" the interviewee simply stated, "Isn't it ironic that a show all about striving to lose weight causes you to sit on the couch every week and do nothing while watching?" Nice.
Work started off with an hour long meeting as soon as I walked in the door and will end with the holiday party at Dave and Buster's tonight. It will be interesting to see how my new co-workers react to Gage. Most of them don't know that I'm married let alone have a child. I haven't had much time to decorate my office space. I've only been here about a month and it has been one crazy month. Oh well, hopefully Gage is up to meeting lots of new people.
Congrats to Joe for overcoming procrastination long enough to take a law final or two. And, I know that there are quite a few people who are pulling for the Pittsburgh interview.
One nice thing (and potentially a bad thing) about listening to my cds in order is the multiple discs by the same artist. Always a good thing if you enjoy the artist, but there are several sets of multiple discs that always drag. However, the past two days have not been dragging. Work is always so much better when set to the music of "The Dead Milkmen" and their unique stylings. And, there are at least nine more albums of theirs in the queue. Oh, happy day!

Well, we're about 89 1/2 days into the lockout. And, I'm pretty sure that the Bettman party is going to end up pissing away the season. A story broke this morning saying that the owners are going to reject the player's offer. So, much for negotiation.
I may actually end up going to watch local high school hockey just to get a fix.
You'll never hear me praise football in any capacity, save one. I don't understand why the NHL can't look over at the NFL and say...wow, those guys have a cap and they're doing alright. It hasn't hurt the game, it's helped the game. The players are still filthy rich and most of the teams are competitive. Oh well, when the league folds, there will be plenty of people in line to say, I told you so.
I was reading an AP article the other day that struck me as kind of funny. Apparently due to the coding system in some hospitals, yellow is the color bracelet for a DNR. So, all these patients showing off their "Live Strong" bracelets to support Lance Armstrong and his charity had to have their bracelets taped over to avoid potential mistakes and lawsuits. Yeah, 'cause taking them off while you're in the hospital clearly isn't the answer.
I found this article rather interesting and I hope to have some more time to visit this site and possibly even get myself listed. Although what specific Pittsburgh content I carry, I don't know.
Well, to that end...I'll talk about this. Walt Harris. As referenced above, so not a football fan. But after working for Pitt for almost 3 years, you can't help but have stuff like that seep through. I mean, 7 people in my office had season tickets. Anyway, Harris, who won coach of the year, a big east title, and is going to the Fiesta Bowl, is leaving to take the coaching job at Stanford. Do I care? No. Do other people care? Well, it's been the lead story for several news shows in the area and the papers are certainly hanging on every word. What I don't understand is, if you are a player in the Fiesta Bowl and your team is down by a couple of points late in the fourth quarter, where do you find that extra grit and determination to win for your coach who, technically, isn't even your coach anymore? Just curious.
Anyway, enough with football and Pittsburgh relevant topics. Unless you'd like to talk about the fact that Pittsburgh driver's can't handle snow. No, that's another two or three hour rant.
And, to end on good news...Season 1 of this comes out in late January. Hmm, maybe I can have a party for that instead of that stupid football game that always comes on in late January/early Feb?

Nothing overly exciting going on in my world today. There are two other people besides myself who do the same work at my new office. Both of them seem to be off today. I hope there are no pressing projects. I was kind of hoping just to slide through the day pretty much unnoticed, go to class, grab my lecture notes and review sheets, head to the store, fight off a horde of people, come out with the last 3 1/2 gifts that I need to get, go home, and relax.
Somehow, I'm sure that's not really going to happen that way.
On Saturday we picked up Terri's new car. This is what it looks like. It's berry red and seems to have improvements over her last car. The two things that I'm concerned with are the electrical power steering and the car battery in the trunk. Other than that, it seems like a good car.
We also did 97% of our Christmas shopping on Saturday. We were gone for twelve hours. Maybe there is something to be said for starting early. Although, I did manage to find the Darth Vader voice changing mask. So, that's something.
Friday night I went to my old office's Christmas party. Most of the core group that I hung out with were there. Everyone was excited to see Gage. I also got pretty solid confirmation about the "resigning" of my old supervisor. It's a shame that stuff like that has to happen and it's more of a shame that they allow stuff like that to go on to the point where that needs to happen. Anyway, the party was pretty good, although they underestimated the amount of food that they would need. It didn't matter too much though. The smaller group of us headed to another restaurant for dessert (they also didn't check on the available time and we got kicked out after 2 1/2 hours). But, it was fun. One more holiday party to go this Wednesday and then hopefully we'll have some evenings to ourselves.
Anyway, not much else is going on. I think I'll just cut it short for today and try to get a jump on my own work, just in case I'm going to inherit everyone else's.

I was driving into work this morning and a mini-van pulled into the lane right behind me. Not a big deal, he wasn't honking or swearing, but as we neared my office, he pulled into the passing lane and started to pull ahead of me. That's when I noticed that the Chevy Venture Mini-Van was...are you ready?...a hearse! Yes, a hearse. The car that carries the dead people to their final resting place. I swear, if I'm goin' out, I'm not goin' out in a mini-van for Christ's sakes. I can count on one hand the number of times I've actually ridden in one and I'd like to keep it that way.
Anyway, I guess I struck a nerve of the children of my generation. Amazing how a song from a TV show adheres itself to your brain, but you can't remember the 17 rules for inserting a comma into a sentence. I'm fairly certain that someday soon, there will be in-utero television with, obviously, surround sound. Gage loves to sit and watch television. I don't know if it's the moving picture, the color...he'll strain his neck to see it from wherever he's at. It's certainly curbed our own television viewing. I don't need his brain leaking out through his ears before he's old enough to talk.
Oh well, time to get back to work so I can leave work and go to my old office's Christmas party. This one should be interesting. I left the office a month ago. Since that time, they've replaced me by hiring one of the temps, but didn't replace the temp. So, they are still a person down in the office and don't understand why they are getting behind. And, they had a supervisor "resign" or whatever terminology they are using for it. So, it's going to be all kinds of fun tonight.

Wow, no comments for a long time and then wham! I don't know why you would worry about seeing Valentine's stuff. They put that away last week. I started Easter shopping last night. At this rate, I can be done with Christmas shopping for the decade by about mid-2007.
I've decided to attempt to alleviate my cranky mood by doing something kind.

Let this notice serve to all who read it that Susie has been officially forgiven for missing our wedding*

I also discovered that when you have two stations that are approximately the same genre, it is a) really cool when you finish a song you love on one, flip to the other and get to hear it again. b) really sucks when you find a song you can't stand, flip to the other and there it is again.
One of the radio stations that I would turn to when I couldn't find any music is a local morning show that usually has some fairly interesting conversations going on. This morning they were talking about Mia Hamm and her retirement from the world of soccer. I, like most other soccer loving Americans, bought tickets to see the farewell game when it came through Pittsburgh. Mia, Julie, and Joy are all retiring together and I thought it would be fun to see them play live one last time. So, I bought tickets for our 12 year anniversary, we got a babysitter, and headed down to Heinz field to watch the game. Turns out, Mia had another charity event in another city and didn't even show. I wasn't thrilled. At least I got to see a victory and a dominating US team. Also got some decent pictures from where I was sitting.
Anyway, after the morning radio show (yes that was the start of the ramble), finished talking about Mia they proceeded to trash soccer. They called soccer the sport of the future...and that's where it will remain. Now, I wasn't the most gifted athlete (although I did win a bench award, and was right in the middle of a bench clearing brawl, broke an opponent's leg, called a ref a jackass, and got a pocketful of yellow cards), I did really enjoy my time on the soccer team. And, with the exception of men's professional soccer, I like to watch anytime I get a chance. I spent quite a few lazy Saturday afternoons watching the WUSA games on Pax for Christ's sake. Then they start talking about this moron who writes for Esquire and how he calls the somewhat popularity of soccer explainable because soccer is an outsider sport. Parents move their kids towards soccer because you can hide in the pack and not need to be singled out. What a load of crap. You get burnt as a defender (and I have been), you miss a penalty shot (and I have), you don't get enough distance on a goal kick (and I didn't) and you are pretty much in the spotlight. The same holds true for the forwards who score goals and burn defenders, etc.
Blows. Blows. Blows. And no, I will not actually pay money to listen to the radio. This from the man who listens to books on tape!
I also found out some other good news. In just under two months, I'll be sitting in my living room watching this on DVD. Well, ok...it'll be in my living room, but who knows when I'll actually get around to watching it. But at least it will be out.

*Of course, this doesn't mean that I won't still take every opportunity to make fun of her, but at least she's forgiven, right?

One thing I've noticed, now having to drive myself into work everyday, is that radio in Pittsburgh in the morning...blows. I know, I know. I have about 2,000 cd's why don't I listen to those. I don't listen to my cd's on my commute because I want to at least make the attempt to keep up with the new music and artists coming out. Although at times that gives me more of a headache than it's worth.
When I was a DJ, not only could I give you the top ten songs at any given moment on pretty much every chart, but there was a good chance that I owned at least 6 of the 10. Since the weekend BEFORE...yes before...Thanksgiving, one radio station in Pittsburgh has been playing nothing but Christmas music 24 hours a day. I think there should be a national ban on playing Christmas music on the radio until December 13th, at the very least. That's 12 days before Christmas...you can even link it to a big promotion and kick-off the holiday season by playing...The 12 Days of Christmas.
I have 12 presets on my car radio. Three of them are now solely Christmas music and have been since about Thanksgiving. That leaves me with 9 stations to choose from in the morning. Two of the stations have morning shows that are nothing but talk. Down to 7. Now, like all morning radio, each of the remaining seven have a morning team and you'll be lucky to hear 4 songs an hour. However, I used to be able to surf around and catch a pretty good stream. Well now, 3 of the remaining 7 are mixing in holdiay songs and two of the remaining 4 have cut out some of their music in the mornings and are gravitating towards all talk. That leaves me with two stations. One is the alternative music station and the other is the local hip-hop station. I'm not especially enthralled with either one, but the alternative music station has plummeted in both the quality of the music and the depth of their selection since their decision to remove the Howard Stern morning show due to offensive material. So, I'm stuck with hip-hop/pseudo rap and they, being the local teeny-bopper station nowadays, have the exact same rotation day in and day out. So, by Monday's arrival at work...I've heard their morning show for the week.
Just one more good reason to dislike the holiday "season".
On the good music front...I'm glad to see that Rascal Flatts has a talented person choosing their songs. Bless the Broken Road has been around for a long time...from what I understand, it's first incarnation was simply called The Broken Road and it was recorded by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (country) in 1994. I came across Melodie Crittenden's (country) version from 1998. Jamie Slocum (a Christian artist) redid the song in 1999. Until now...the most popular version was Melodie's, thanks in part to the fact that, although the show was full of crap most of the time, Dawson's Creek also had talented people picking music. The song aired in a Season 2 episode in 1998.
Why such a background on one song? Because I chose the song to use as part of the music in my wedding because of the lyrics and significance of the song. I'm glad to see that even though it's not my favorite rendition of the song, Rascal Flatts will give the song a wider exposure than it had previously and introduce it to many more fans. One fan of Rascal Flatts, who shall remain nameless, could have heard the song years before she actually did just by accepting an invitation that was extended to her.

I was watching The Life and Death of Peter Sellers semi-biopic on HBO on Sunday night. It was interesting to see Rush pull off the different portions of Sellers life convincingly. Now, considering Sellers died when I was 5...obviously most of my knowledge comes from post-death viewings. Although, I am fairly certain I saw Revenge of the Pink Panther in the theater. I will admit that I haven't seen Dr. Strangelove yet, but I'm looking to remedy that. There are quite a few movies that I somehow, missed, due to my upbringing. Although there aren't any Shirley Temple or John Wayne movies on that list, that's for sure.
Anyway, I was also reading the review of the Sellers pic in EW and I agree with the sum up at the end of the article by Gillian Flynn. "For Sellers the perfectionist to be played so flawlessly, what satisfaction. For Sellers the cipher to be so specifically, indelibly detailed, what horror." Through various articles that I've read about Sellers and my own little knowledge base, I think that's a fairly accurate sum-up. I guess I'm kind of drawn to the whole genius in torment genre.
Terri's holiday party went well. We ended up getting a room and Gage spent his first night in a hotel. Once he finally went to sleep, he didn't seem to care. And he loved the big king size bed, even though he's still not mobile enough to get the hang of rolling over. One day.
This Friday is my old office's holiday party. In talking with Craig, the office atmosphere is pretty much the same as it normally is around holiday time. They like the idea, then they don't like the idea, then some do and some don't, etc. Although I did find out this year that no supervisor from my old side of the office will be there. Mostly because they fired one and the other has some sort of conflict. He doesn't socialize within the office much anyway. Unless you pretend to be interested in one of his stories...then you lose about a half-hour of your day. I guess I'd be the same way with the abject lack of responsibility for most things. That's the beauty of academia, it runs pretty much the same as the government. Always pushing for results, rarely changing anything, and in the end...status quo.
Oh well, I guess that's enough for today. Unless anyone happens to see the Spongebob Squarepants Grill Set or the Darth Vader voice changing mask. Let me know as these are apparently the "it" toys this year.

Wow, two posts in the same week. Must be some sort of record. I'm supposed to be pulling graphics for a project that I'm working on. There are over one hundred phrases on the papers that I have in front of me. Unfortunately, these aren't easily matched to graphics. "The pharmacist needs to speak with you about your prescription." Every stock photo site has tons of occurences when you type that phrase into the find box. Thankfully, the designer and I came up with a way to shortcut the project and recycle quite a few things from previous endeavors. It still doesn't change the fact that I have to copy and log over a hundred images, but I'm putting that off for the moment to type this.
Not a whole lot of new things going on in my world today. Although last night we did discover that my son has his first tooth. We kept waiting for all the crying and screaming that we were told to expect, but to be honest, we're not even sure when the tooth broke through. He didn't cry about it. And if Terri hadn't been looking down when he was sitting on her lap babbling and talking, we still might not know about it.
It's things like that incident that make me re-think the whole even numbered kids thing. (Yes, I said that we had to have kids in even numbers. We both want 2, but if something happens and we get a third, we'll have to have 4. That way they have the potential to pair off evenly in their sibling wars...I know, you can have 3 on 1, but 2 on 2 is more likely and it would always be 2 against 1 with 3 kids) Anyway, that's just more of my own particular ocd leaking out. What I was actually going for at the start of this rambling is that Gage is so close to a perfect child with his even temperment and compliance with our needs and wants as parents that I'm positive lightning won't strike twice. The second child will end up being Satan's minion and shattering any kind of peace we might be able to experience.
One thing that's keeping me sane during this lockout season (79 days and counting) is the fact that Fox Sports Pittsburgh is showing classic Pens games every Wednesday night. What I learned, through having a satellite dish and Fox Sports channels from all over the country, is that Pittsburgh seems to be the only city that chops the game up and edits it down to a 2 hour length. Everyone else seems to be showing the games in their entirety. I was so desperate for hockey one night, I watched a Florida Panthers/Pittsburgh Penguins game from the mid-90's. What's wrong with that, you ask? I watched it on Fox Sports Miami so obviously the Pens didn't win. But, I still got to watch them play.
I've also watched a lot of the movie Miracle (as it's currently being shown several movie channels). That is the mark of a great sporting event. I know the outcome for every game, but I still watch with interest. Oh well, I should get back to work I guess because once work is over, I get to rush and change clothes in time to make it to Terri's holiday party, which is always a formal event. At least there will be some alcohol there (they limit the number of drinks that they pay for). So, it won't be all bad.

There are a lot of things swirling around in my empty head that should probably come out through one form of writing or another real soon. I'm not even sure where to begin this post.
I will say that I'm sad to see Ken go. It was an undeserving loss. He says that the law of averages finally caught up with him, and maybe so. However, the woman that beat him...Nancy Zerg...(remember that name, it'll be a question in various trivia forms for a long time to come) most likely won't win a second game. She was the recipient of a champion beating himself. She only dealt the final blow by getting the final jeopardy question correct. I know, she played the game the way most people play the game; she answered the questions that she knew and didn't attempt anything that was out of her knowledge base. Playing that way, you really do need more luck than skill.
I'm just going to drop that rambling incoherency. I'll just leave it with the fact that it won't be quite as much fun anymore to watch Jeopardy.
The new job is going well. I got my first paycheck yesterday. It made any nagging doubts vanish in a puff of dollar signs. Sure, it probably makes me a whore, but damn I'm a well paid whore.
Ironically enough, a couple of people from my old office sent me the job posting for my old supervisor's position whom they ousted slightly after I left. So, upper management finally got their wish. They started out with two mostly inept supervisors and managed to hound them both til they left. Although the popular opinion, smart money, sure bet, or whatever cliche you like says that they were given the choice...Resign or be fired. They asked if I was going to apply for the position. Not even a glimmer of a thought of that has crossed my mind. I liked the people, but hated the politics. And, since it's unlikely that I'd be able to go in and clean house to clear out the dead wood, what's the point? I'm happy where I am and here I'll stay. For a little while anyway.
Not much else is going on. Somehow I ended up with 3 holiday partys this year. And, the three combined are only going to cost me $10.00. Bonus.
Okay, I guess that's enough for today. With the holidays fast approaching, I should be spending some free time trying to figure out what I'm going to buy for people and more importantly when I'm going to find the time to go pick it out.