Woot, today is Friday. I can't believe it is finally here. You remember
the song "everyone is working for the weekend" by blah blah. Gotta go. I
am getting so busy at work I don't have much time to blog. Ah, the good
ole days when I could spend fifteen minutes thinking of something funny
to say. This weekend should be fun, talk to ya'll later.

Thought of the Day
"Women don't respect salad eaters."
- Jerry, in "The Wink"

Props go out to Mr.T who is now 31. Man we are getting old. I remember in 7th grade, 17 years ago Mr.T would visit me in the school library and see my latest creation on the computer. Usually it was "Mr. Biggles In Space". I would have a little guy walk around get in a rocket ship and then land on another planet. Then he would walk around and get in a boat and go over a waterfall. Then another planet would fire missiles at his planet and blow it up like star wars. It was always fun to make animations on the ole Apple IIe computer. I remember you only had 7 colors to work with and 228 x 128 pixels to work with. I got good enough to visualize the matrix in my head and I could program a whole animation scene without plotting anything down. That was fun. I would use those skills in science class to make learning software for the teachers. I would have the screen draw different species of animals so the kids could memorize them. It was always fun creating software that someone needed. Although sometimes I did have errors. I seem to remember getting called out of class to fix a software bug. Back then we didn't have the blue screen, we just had a line "SYNTAX ERROR AT 20". Ah, the good ole days.

Thought of the Day
"The greasy doorknob, the constant licking of the fingers. He's hooked on this chicken, isn't he?"
- Jerry, about Kramer, in "The Chicken Roaster"

Well, I decided to do something I have been talking about for a while. A
couple of weeks ago the city of Dallas started issuing warnings to
people who are feeding the homeless outside of the local mission. If
they gave tickets it would be a $2000 fine. Anyway, this whole law is
wrong on many levels, so yesterday I called the Dallas City Council's
office. I will now be speaking next Wednesday morning at the Dallas City
Council meeting to get them to rescind their homeless ordinance. I just
can't stand back and complain and not do anything. That is not my style.
I hate complaining, I'd rather remedy the situation. So next Wednesday
morning I will take off in the morning, go to city hall and give a 2
minute speech to them about rescinding the ordinance. It will probably
be fruitless. My hope is to use pure reason to show that the effects
they intended to happen as a result of this law are not happening. I
will probably be the last person to speak at the meeting since I am a
resident of Carrollton instead of Dallas. I might not get a chance to
speak, but at least I will try. Anyways, just wanted to let you know so
that you can pray for me on Wednesday April 5th to say the right things
to get them to change their minds. Wait, this post wasn't funny...
Here's a joke.

Thought of the Day
A doctor and a lawyer were talking at a party.
Their conversation was constantly interrupted by people describing their
ailments and asking the doctor for free medical advice.
After an hour of this, the exasperated doctor asked the lawyer, "What do
you do to stop people from asking you for legal advice when you're out
of the office?"
"I give it to them," replied the lawyer, "and then I send them a bill."
The doctor was shocked, but agreed to give it a try.
The next day, still feeling slightly guilty, the doctor prepared the
bills.
When he went to place them in his mailbox, he found a bill from the
lawyer.

And now for the weekend update. Of note, I finally fixed my blog.
Apparently blogger won't publish when you have used up all your space on
your web server. I had 100mb of website in a 100mb limit. So I increased
my space to 150mb for $.62 a month. That should fix that problem for a
while. Click some Google ads to make up for the expansion. Anyway, on
Friday I went with Holly to meet her friends at a local club. They were
pretty cool. It is weird, most of us went to Texas Tech so we have that
at least in common. On Saturday I played Frisbee golf in the afternoon.
My arm is still sore. If you don't play Frisbee golf in a while you lose
all your muscle there. On Saturday night I went with Holly and her
Sunday School to a Texas Tornados hockey game. They are the local
semi-pro hockey team. Apparently they are good and always seem to go to
the playoffs. I am a semi-fan of hockey. I did go for the Dallas Stars
when they won the Cup. IMO hockey needs more hitting like football.
Sunday I did the usual stuff and now here I am on Monday about to
interview people to come work for my client. Two tips of advice for
people interviewing: know what you are talking about and have a good
attitude. Anyway I guess football and hockey will never be as violent as
baseball...(see thought of the day)

Thought of the Day
"Hey! I thought you weren't coming back 'til Monday!?"
"Well, the camp ended a few days early."
"Why?"
"Well, there was an incident."
"What happened?"
"I punched Mickey Mantle in the mouth."
"What!?"
"Yeah, I punched him and they took him to the hospital and then they
cancelled the rest of the week."
"You punched *who* in the mouth?"
"Mickey Mantle."
"What happened?"
"Well, you know, we were playin' a game and I was pitching and I was
really throwin' some smoke. And uh, Joe Pepitone, he was up and man,
that guy... he was crowding the plate!"
"Wow... Joe Pepitone!"
"Yeah, well, Joe Pepitone or not, I own the inside of that plate! So I
throw one inside, a little chin music... put him right on his pants,
because I got to intimidate when I'm on the mound. Well, the next pitch,
he's right back in the same place! So.... I had to plunk him."
"You plunked him?"
"Oh yeah. Well, he throws down his bat, he comes racing up to the mound,
next thing both benches are cleared, a brouhaha breaks out between the
guys in camp and the old Yankee players, and as I'm trying to get Moose
Skowron off one of my teammates, somebody pulls me from behind and I
turned around and I *popped* him! I look down and, whoa man! It's
Mickey! I punched his lights out! Then Hank Bauer's screaming 'Mickey!
Mickey! What have you have done with Mickey?! You killed Mickey!'"
"So what did you do?"
"I got the hell outta there!"
- Jerry, Kramer and Elaine, as Kramer describes the fun he had at camp,
in "The Visa"

This morning I had a fake conversation with a recorded message. I seem to be doing that alot this week. I think it is because Peetey always says the same thing. Every night he watches 2 episodes of the Family Guy and plays computer. He then puts me on hold and then tells me that he picked up an Acura with navigation system that the person owed $13,000 on. Then he screams "WAKE UP" and I hang up the phone and fall back asleep. It is that pesky subconscious thing again. I guess since in the back of my mind I know it is a recorded message I don't take it seriously, even though I am talking to a machine. So I usually get to work around 10. I guess being the boss is cool. Today a recruiter is taking me and some coworkers out to a steak lunch so they can get our business, as my client is hiring people. I think if the steak is good I just might get my hiring done from them, only if the steak is good of course. Something about business I have learned is that not everything is logical, alot of it is determined by how you feel about things. I guess that is why in dealing with bosses it is best if you catch them on a good day. It is like all of those old psychological tricks of childhood become useful again. "Yummy, this steak is good.. Don't you want to hire my people..Have another bite..."

Thought of the Day
"You know what they say, 'You don't sell the steak, you sell the sizzle.'"
- Kramer, in "The Bizarro Jerry"

And now for the weekend update. Let's see, this weekend was good. On Friday I went to UTD to feed the international students with the singles group, I have no idea why I did this. Later that evening I went with Holly to go bowling. My scores were really bad. I don't think I broke 100 once. However, I switched hands to bowl with my left hand because my right hand was getting sore. I knew I would need it to play guitar the next couple of days. I of course always talk about when I was on the TX Tech bowling team and about how I know what to do to get a strike. Problem was, I never really implemented it right. The ball usually hits the floor with a "thud" whenever I bowl. We went back to my place and watched "Bill and Ted Excellent Adventure" and "Enter the Dragon". They were good movies. On Saturday I actually spent it alone, but it was needed. I cleaned up my place, setup my guitars and practiced some new Christian songs I had wrote. I also hooked up a new toy called a "Slingbox". Basically it enables me to control and watch my TV and DVD player over the internet. It is pretty cool. I am really not using the internet capabilities but rather the windowed view so I can watch TV and surf at the same time. On Sunday I did the usual, but on Sunday night I had my class come over for praise night, where I played my new songs for them. I had them all singing along. It was pretty cool. How was your weekend?

Thought of the Day
"It's just a movie."
"Just a movie? You don't understand. This isn't Plans One through Eight from Outer Space. This is Plan Nine! This is the one that worked. The worst movie ever made."
- Elaine and Jerry, in "The Chinese Restaurant"

I've been in meetings all morning. I have now jumped from coding to
design and analysis. Basically that means I sit in rooms and talk about
what I am going to do. Then I get to make pretty diagrams to show
everyone. I also have a meeting with my financial advisor today. I remember when I first
got him. I was working at that networking company and we had just tried
to get the upper management fired and had pretty much succeeded. I was
in the team that did it so I didn't have to worry about my job, but the
rest of office all the way up to CEO was worried. The problem was that
the other teams were so slow that nothing got delivered on time and it
would've affected the whole company. So we all got together and were in
cahoots with the parent company to enact change from the bottom up. The
stress levels at that office got so bad the parent company had to send
an HR person from California in to talk about everyone's feeling. We all
got sheets of paper with crayon's and got to write our concerns on the
sheet of paper and then the office got in a conference room and all of
the sheets of paper got posted. It was the fruitiest example of
corporate therapy I have ever seen. Anyway I was still stressed at the
whole "leaving the management around part" so when the corporate guy
came to me personally to ask what I could do to make things better I
said," Well I can quit." and took him off guard. I already had a job
offer and was planning on doing it that week. So the parent company
decided to buy us out and give us all cash for our stock options. That
was when they said, "Have your financial advisor look over it." So I go
through the trouble of getting an advisor and he pretty much said,"
Well, you can't really do anything about the rate so sign it." It was
then when I learned that financial advisors have a really narrow field
that they can work in. For instance they can't do taxes or offer
business advice. They pretty much stick with financial planning and
investing. Which is good since I need it. I still think back to those
days sometimes, wondering how it is possible to enact such change from
the bottom up that it changed the whole company as I knew it. Really the
most amazing thing about it was that I got cash for my stock options,
which is unheard of since the tech crash. And now for the rest of the
story...

Thought of the Day
Brick Tamland: I ate fiberglass insulation. It wasn't cotton candy like
the guy said... my tummy itches.
Anchorman

Some days it is hard to find things to talk about. The old standby is of
course, the weather. Right now it is around 65 here. I have enjoyed not
turning on the heat or the air conditioner. It is a little cold in my
place, but that is good sleeping weather. I have discovered a secret
about weather forecasts. Basically they always undershoot the temp of
the day. It is like if it is going to be 70 that day they will say it is
going to be 65. There must be some kind of rule about how bad it is to
forecast hotter weather than reality. I also notice the banter on the
10:30 news and how our local news casters vocally mess up at least once
a show. It reminds me of the Anchorman movie where they insulted each
other as the news was fading out. I am also reminded of the movie where
Jim Carrey is god and controls the voice of the guy doing the news. "In
today's news, jabadahighdaji, fwebububub."

Thought of the Day
Ron Burgundy: I don't know how to put this but I'm kind of a big deal.
Veronica Corningstone: Really.
Ron Burgundy: People know me.
Veronica Corningstone: Well, I'm very happy for you.
Ron Burgundy: I'm very important. I have many leather-bound books and my
apartment smells of rich mahogany.
--Anchorman

"You want to work out, You want to work out." says my subconscious. "No
I don't," says my conscious. "You only want to eat vegetables and
fruits.", says my subconscious. "No I don't" says my conscious. And thus
my foray into hypnosis ends with a realization that I don't have to
listen to my subconscious. I suppose it was bound to happen. It feels
kind of like that movie where all the patients were comatose and then
they discovered a new drug and they all awoke and danced to 1920's music
and then when the pills wore off they became comatose again. However I
do have some effects that will hopefully last: I am eating more fruit,
and I started liking tomatoes and onions. Even though I was eating
lettuce I still never liked it, but I can eat it. I am still watching
what I eat, I just don't keep track of anything. So it goes. Maybe I
will try weight watchers next, but I seem to think that it is mostly a
girl kinda thing. It seems like it is a "biggest loser" kind of place. I
just don't know if I can cry like they did on TV. However, I am going to
do something, because the second you go "off" diets you end up gaining
it all back, so I will stay "on" and do something else. Maybe diet
pills? I can become an addict like Donna from 90210.

Thought of the Day
"Hey, I'll tell you what, chubbs, if that yogurt has fat in it, I will
put myself on an all-yogurt diet for a week."
"Well, let's start the insanity."
"Mmmmmm.... giddyup!"
- Kramer and Jerry, in "The Non-Fat Yogurt"

And now for the weekend update. This weekend saw dates galore. On Friday it was up to me to pick the stuff to do so we went to a restaurant called "Obzeet" here in Dallas. I found out the word Obzeet is African for "groovy". Their lasagna was pretty good. The music was some old guy playing his guitar and singing old country and classic rock songs. I said to Holly," That'll be me in 10 years." Anyways, then we went roller skating. Luckily we only had an hour to skate before they closed. You know, I find you end up doing stuff you would not normally do when you have a girlfriend, which is a good thing. I am pleased to say I didn't fall once. But, if you were there you would see me going 1 mph on my skates and trying to balance the whole time so I didn't fall. Fortunately I had Holly, who is a great skater, to hold me up. On Saturday we went to the Dallas Aquarium, another place I had never been. It was pretty cool. There was this sloth there in a tree that reached out its head and stared straight at me. That was cool. They had a cool shark tunnel where all the sharks would swim by. It reminded me of Jaws 3 where they were all in the big tunnel and Jaws comes flying through the glass. Saturday night we went to her Sunday School party at a new house. We got lost, but luckily I had my internet phone and was able to look up the address. Sunday I did the usual and today the buzz around the office is at how fast the new system is going to be. I am estimating we can get a normal 8 hour process to complete in 5 minutes. It's all good. How was your weekend?

Thought of the Day
"So how are the eggs?"
"Eggs are eggs."
"Eggs are eggs. That is very profound. By the same token, couldn't you
say fish is fish? I don't think so."
- George and Daphne, in "The Stand-In"

It's concert season again. I just got 2 tickets to Joe Satriani/Eric
Johnson coming in April. Then I got 2 tickets for Bob Dylan coming in
April. That should be so cool. I can't tell you how many movies I have
seen where they give credit to Bob Dylan for influencing their music.
Jimi Hendrix movies always talk about Bob Dylan. The new Johnny Cash
movie mentioned Dylan. I think there was a Beatle movie that mentioned
Dylan(Peetey?) I am pretty sure the Doors movie mentions Dylan. There
are lots of others. Like the Byrds and Eric Clapton and over 8000
separate covers of Bob Dylan tunes. The one thing I have never seen
though is a Bob Dylan movie, except for documentaries. In other news
last night I had my quarterly meeting at Saltgrass(Sorry Mr.T). It was
good, but the steak was not as good as other places. We are sitting next
to a rowdy table and Peety scoots his chair up and makes a noise and
then this ole lady looks at Peety and says something and then Peety
says, "It was the chair." and they all start laughing. I could believe
ole ladies could crack fart jokes in a steakhouse. Live and learn.
 
Thought of the Day
"I was looking at my chart and it said that I was difficult. Why would
they write that?"
"They've gotten to know you."
- Elaine and Jerry, in "The Package"

I'd like to welcome any new visitor's to this website. <Holly ;-)> Let
me describe it for you. Every day during the week I usually post a
paragraph about anything and that is on this page. I also have others
sections of this site that I haven't updated in a while like the images,
resume, music, and misc sections. You will also notice there is an
archive on the bottom right of this page that has the month's posts in
it. Also the Google ads on the right side are there for clicking and it
gives me a penny every time someone clicks them. But Google only gives
out checks if the revenue is over $100 and so far in 2 years I just have
$20 worth of click. The real bread and butter comes from the Amazon.com
search engine. If you do all your searches and buy something through
Amazon through this website I receive about 4% of the value. I usually
get about $14 a quarter. Really I don't make any money from this site as
it costs more to operate, but I do it because I love blogging. In other
news, today is my company's board meeting. One of the things about being
incorporated is that you are required to have a board meeting every
quarter, even if it is with yourself. Talk about weird. I second that
and I third it. All who agree say "eye". "eye!". I am the secretary and
president and janitor. So I figure I will take my potential investor's
to dinner tonight and discuss the future of "Motivium Consulting" as a
board meeting. I think though Mr.T can't make it cause he is in Wichita
Falls for spring break. Really it is just an excuse to take everyone to
dinner and talk about my company. Anyway, in other news I went to the
doc's the other day to finally find out why my eyes have been
sporadically blurry for the past 4 months. I went through all of the
diseases mom has and they did a test for lupus the other day as well.
Turned out negative, so they said it was ocular rosacea. I guess that is
why my face gets a little red as well. But it is so much better than
having diabetes or lupus. Really, I just wanted my vision to clear up,
so they gave some steroid eye drops. My eyes can now lift a truck.

Thought of the Day
"You've got your shirt in my oven?"
"Well, I didn't have enough quarters for the dryer, but this is better
anyway. And it's more convenient."
"Oh, for both of us."
"Yeah, and I have a lot more control. I got a shirt going for ten
minutes at 325."
"What's wrong with your oven?"
"I'm baking a pie."
- Jerry and Kramer, in "The Calzone"

Well I got in late today, and that is to be expected. This new wake up
call service is so bland. Peety made my wake-up calls last and actually
made sure I got up. Today I pickup the phone, listen to "Happy Days" and
fall back asleep. I think over the years the wakeup calls had a format.
It started off with me answering the phone going "hhhheeellllooo"zzzzzz.
Then Peety would be like,"Wake Up" then I would hit the conversation
snooze by saying "What did you do."zzzzz.  Which was basically asking
the question of what did you do the other day. So he would go into a
couple of minutes of talking and allow me to sleep some more. He knew
what I was doing. After that he would reverse it and ask me "What did
you do." So I would have to wake up a little to talk.  Then I would go
into the second stage of grief about waking up "anger" and start with
the movie quotes. "Sure say for wonka, cost him a fortune in fudge."
When I was really tired I would just say "fudge". Or "I don't want to go
to school, I want to stay home and bake cookies with you." or just the
word "cookies" if I was really tired. At the end of the call he would
know whether I was away and sometimes said," get up and put your legs
out of bed." Sometimes if I was still mumbling he would call 5 minutes
later to see if I was still asleep. I guess I should record Peety saying
those things and have that in my wakeup call. Hmm, that just might work,
except when I ask the question "what did you do" he will always be doing
the same thing.
 
Thought of the Day
"I don't know my alarm sound. I'm not tuned into it like it's my son."
- Jerry, in "The Alternate Side"

I am too busy to post today so here is a joke:
 
Three patients in a mental institution prepare for an examination given
by the head psychiatrist.

If the patients pass the exam, they will be free to leave the hospital.
However, if they fail, the institution will detain them for seven years.

The doctor takes the three patients to the top of a diving board
overlooking an empty swimming pool, and asks the first patient to jump.

The first patient jumps head first into the pool and breaks both arms.

Then the second patient jumps and breaks both legs.

The third patient looks over the side and refuses to jump.

"Congratulations! You're a free man. Just tell me why didn't you jump?"
asked the doctor.

To which the third patient answered, "Well Doc, I can't swim!"

 

This weekend saw me making a trip to Wichita Falls to see my mom for her
birthday. I took her to McBride's steak house. The steak there was
pretty good. You know I am famous for being a hamburger connoisseur but
I also know my steaks. This was a pretty good steak. I would give it a 9
out of 10. Sometimes I am pleasantly surprised by some of the small
steak houses in Texas. I remember when I was at Tech there was a little
restaurant in Guthrie, Texas halfway between Wichita Falls and Lubbock
that had the best steak around. It was next to the famous "6666" ranch
and I am sure that whenever someone ordered a steak they had a cow out
back to slaughter. It was the cheapest best steak at $8 for a rib eye.
The best steak in Texas IMO is a $50 steak at 3 Forks. I had a rib eye
there one time that was like eating butter, and you know how much I like
butter. In other news I did a "Meet the Parents" this Friday with my
girlfriends mom. She was nice and they cooked meatloaf, which I enjoyed.
I brought them both flowers as well ;-) I then watched "Walk the Line".
It was pretty good although the whole time I kept on thinking "When are
they going to bring up the 'Ring of Fire' song." It was slow in parts
but I do like movies about musicians. I know I can never be a famous
musician cause I don't have a drug habit. I suppose that happens after
you become famous. In other news my wakeup calls have now finished.
Peety got an email from his boss on Friday that said "You are on our top
5 list of phone calls. You talked for 6.5 hours to this number this
month." and it was my number. So no more calls from Peety. Keeping in
mind that I need a wakeup call I signed on to iping.com. Basically you
get setup and can specify what is on the wakeup call. Right now I have
the theme song from Happy Days waking me up. I am sure to have that song
memorized by the end of the month. The problem is that the computer on
the other end doesn't know if I am dozing. I guess I'll find out if it
works. So far so good. So how was your weekend?
 
Thought of the Day
"How do you oversleep at the Olympics?"
"Oh, I know. I know."
"I mean, it's like the biggest event of your life! You'd think you'd
have, like, six alarm clocks, paying off little kids in the village to
come banging on your door."
- Jerry and Elaine, in "The Hot Tub"

Here is a quick post today as I am knee deep in coding bugs. Last night
I made the leap and got an elliptical machine to work out with. It is
pretty cool and Thanks go to Mr.T and Peety who put it together for some
favors. Congrats go out to my mom whose birthday is on Saturday. My
house is littered with boxes and the like. I got a cool programming book
and a Star Wars book on CD to listen to in the car. We went to Chili's
and I had a big juicy burger. I also got a scale and discovered that I
haven't lost a thing in a week. I guess the food is the reason why.
Since I have added lettuce, tomatoes and onions to my diet it really is
just more calories. Now that I am exercising the pounds should melt
away. I guess I should now say farewell to my gym membership as I don't
need it. Goodbye $33 a month for 3 years and only 3 months of real
working out! Heh, I should've done this a while ago. Have a Good
Weekend.
 
Thought of the Day
"Why do they call it a wedgie?"
"Because the underwear is pulled up from the back until... it wedges
in."
"They also have an Atomic Wedgie. Now the goal there is to actually get
the waistband on top of the head. It's very rare."
"Boys are sick."
"What do girls do?"
"We just tease someone until they develop an eating disorder."
- Elaine, George and Jerry, in "The Library"

So yesterday it was 93 degrees here in Texas, on March 1st, a record. I
heard it even got up to 97 in a nearby town. Sometimes I wonder if this
global warming thing is for real. I always thought there was a 1 in 3
chance of it being for real. It can either be global cooling, global
normal, or global warming. I figure scientists selected one of them and
figured that we had better odds of that happening. I remember back in
high school how we were told there was global cooling and another ice
age coming back in the 70s. Then there was that ozone layer thingy.
First they said there was a hole in it and we were all going to die,
then they said it had closed up. Now it seems like it is open again. In
reality it could be anything. I think the big thing is that scientists
are still studying it and don't know anything for sure. However, on both
sides of the political aisle they use whatever information they can get
to support whatever causes they believe in, when the reality is no one
knows for sure. I think I am in favor of a little bit of global cooling
right now, so I am going to go for that. Then when it is 72 degrees
everyday I'll stop being in favor of one of them and go back to global
normal. The solution, as we all know, is to build a global air
conditioner. Who's with me?
 
Thought of the Day
"Oh, one more thing about the car. Let it warm up for a minute."
"That's a tough minute. It's like waiting in the shower for the
conditioner to work."
- Jerry and George, in "The Busboy"

Greetings world. I am wondering how my readers are doing. Anything new?
My sister is going to have a baby girl in June. I think the current name
is Allison but I am not sure. My company is going well. I haven't heard
back from Baylor, but I am not holding my breath. My quarterly meeting
will take place next Thursday night. I will take my potential investors
out to dinner even though my stock isn't for sale. I will probably take
a vacation in the summer, but I don't know where. More than likely it
will be to visit the new baby. I might stop by the ole Ripper reunion up
in Hillville, Pa as well. Hillville is a cool place. I remember as a kid
visiting the grandparents, exploring the forest, visiting neighbors,
swimming in the Allegheny river and exploring the ruins of an old house
and an old cemetery. My cousins used to come down and have fun with us.
I remember we had problems with boats sometimes and "sheared a pin"
once. Then we were way down the river and got out and explored the area.
There were humongous green rocks littering the forest. Apparently they
were from a previous ice age or something. I guess since I went there
during the summers it makes me a Hillvillian? A Hillvilly? A Beverly
Hillvilley? A Hillvillite? Hmm, more tests. (10 points)
 
<b>Thought of the Day</b>
"I did this thing on the Ottoman Empire. Like, what was this? A whole
empire based on putting your feet up?"
- Jerry, after a good standup routine, in "The Non-Fat Yogurt"