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WIDLM

WIDLM: Dancing

Pat got married, for any of you don’t know, and I was at the wedding. There was no dancing at the wedding. Well, actually, I take that back. There was a little, if you use a broad definition. At the reception afterward, though, there was much dancing. Luckily, I didn’t have to participate hardly at all. Me having to dance is the kind of dancing I most despise. I don’t really care if other people do it. I just don’t really get it.

People say it’s liberating or freeing or whatever, and I can sorta see how that could be true. I don’t think I need to be much more liberated than I am, though. I’m pretty sure I’m immobile in my most perfectly free state. Perhaps that’s not true for everyone. I don’t think it’s really all that liberating anyway. It’s true that you’re not constrained by the normal societal rules, but you enter into a new set of rules. You’re supposed to move much more than normal, but it’s not as though there are no limitations or judgments made. Maybe in modern dance class, but not in the normal world. *shrug*

Personally, I just can’t get into dancing, so I can’t really do it. I can do it for like 5 seconds as a joke, but I’ve got nothing sustaining it. It is an emotion based activity, and my emotions are pretty limited, or absent, or constrained, or something. As a result, when I have to do it, it’s very unpleasant. Hence the WIDLM.

Anyway, I’m glad Lauren didn’t make me dance. That was nice of her. I hope everyone else that was dancing was having fun at it. Seemed like they were. Good party Pat’s wife’s dad.

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WIDLM

WIDLM: Reality TV

First, a few updates from WIDLM of the past. My second(?) WIDLM was about WordPress itself and my poor experience with it’s CSS on my monitor. I’m pretty sure that it had fixed that main issue I had with it by the time I posted the next week. I regret that I forgot to mention it until now. Anyway, that’s fixed now. Regarding last weeks WIDLM, I have found an acceptable solution. I have added the shortest “tail” to my cursor with the trailing cursor options available in Windows. I can’t even notice the tail most of the time, and it fixes the glitch. So yay for that. On to the hate.

The inspiration for this WIDLM comes from Pat’s bachelor party, during which one party member went on a somewhat lengthy rant about his distaste for Whale Wars. I don’t think I’ve actually seen Whale Wars, except in parody on Southpark, but I doubt I would enjoy it much. I hate reality TV in all it’s forms… unless you count Mythbusters, which I don’t, but someone somewhere did, so I mention it.

I haven’t watched very much, but that is because they so quickly nauseate me. Oh, I hate them so, let me count a few of the ways.

1) They are not in any way real. It’s edited, prompted, researched, pain-stakingly manipulate in every way. I know everyone knows this, but I dunno how much they know. The people are screened from thousands of candidates by psychologists to make a mixture that will be entertaining on TV, assuming it’s not one of those “celebrity” versions, in which case they’re all trained entertainers anyway. Then the “contestants” or whatever are asked pointed questions and coached on how to respond. Then the answers are edited and deleted to the hearts contents of the soulless producers. Romances are suggested, lies are told, votes are forged, nothing is genuine even slightly. They pull leaves off of trees and spray paint the ground to make it look like time has passed when it hasn’t. Soooooooooo… lame.

2) They pretend to be real. It’s fine to be fake, that’s what TV is, but don’t act like you’re something you’re not. Well, that’s sorta what TV is, too, but, ya know what I mean. Normal TV asks you to willingly suspend your disbelief together with the actors and show creators for fun and frivolity, possibly education and emotional exploration. Reality TV asks you to suspend your disbelief in order that you accept what they shovel at you as true, because if you didn’t, you’d think it was really, really boring TV. Disgusting.

3) It’s bad TV. They’re not even good at what they claim to be good at. Well, I dunno, I’m sure they’re doing the best they can with what they have, but compared to traditional TV production methods, the entertainment value is very, very low. Jokes suck, plot sucks, characters suck, concepts suck, sets suck, everything about the shows suck. Their only appeal is to people who let themselves believe it’s somehow true-ish… which I can’t do, and I think is a mistake.

4) It is irredeemably corrupt. Nothing good can come to society from such a dishonest and manipulative venture. It is like advertising between the advertisements. Even the “positive” reality TV, where they build a house for a poor person, or whatever, is so shallow, disingenuous, and false, that it doesn’t make up for it. They would bulldoze the house as soon as build it, if they thought that would bring in a more lucrative demographic. Instead of spending 1% of the budget on a ridiculous mansion for a few families and 99% on marketing and cameras, they could just build enough homes for the entire countries homeless population. But what would be the fun in that? The corruption will spill into the rest of society as well. A segment of the population will always feel cheated that they aren’t famous just for being their ridiculous self. They’ve been making loud, public, poor decisions their whole lives, and never got anything. How can it be? Think of all the talented people who aren’t acting or writing but are forced to sell their souls and work on the manipulative drivel in order to get a job in TV. Or are waiters… or lawyers. It’s just sad.

In conclusion, only you can prevent reality TV. Stop watching any you find, write your congressmen, and if you’re ever face to face with someone involved, make sure to punch them really hard before and after you explain that you’re doing it so they’ll quit making that crap.

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Update

Gifts

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Uncategorized

Mario

I bought the New Super Mario Bros. Wii last week. I was planning to get it eventually. I was sorta waiting for summer so I’d have Lauren to play with, but I found a deal and got it a bit early.

We played some last weekend. Mother played with us, as well, and I played a bit solo after Lauren left. I haven’t played enough to give a detailed analysis, but I enjoyed all the play experiences very much.

I get a great deal of nostalgia joy out of the game, since Mario for the NES and SNES were ever favorites of my youth. Plus, the game is just well made. It has enough new stuff to not feel dated, at least to me, but it has so much good oldie feeling to it.

I think the multiplayer along with features they implemented will give the game a long life and good replay value. It is a bit tough, I think, for the people I generally associate with, which is a bit of bummer. I hope other people like it enough to want to play it with me some. Even if they don’t, though, I’ll have enough fun playing it by myself to make the purchase worth it.

I’m trying very hard not to over play it when nobody is around to join me. I have only played maybe 1.5 hours alone, and most of that was trying crazy things on the first few levels trying to find secrets and such. So… I’m not practicing a lot. When you come over and see me, I’m just that good naturally. Don’t feel bad, I’m sure you have a talent, too.

I think I have a copy of Mario Galaxy 2 headed my way soon (thanks Pat), so I’ll use that to distract me if necessary. I hope to have fun with that Mario game as well.

I know I’m a bit late to the party, but just in case anyone was waiting for my stamp of approval for New Super Mario Bros. Wii, you have it.

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Uncategorized

Dark Tower

I just finished the last of the Dark Tower series. I read them cause Pat seems to love them, primarily. And they were available, that’s a big thing. I have some problems with the work. In the following discussion there will be some spoiling, but I don’t think there will be anything too grievous. Still, if you are worried, u can just skip this post. 😀

I understand this series is well liked, but I can’t figure out why exactly. Although, generally, it seems those works that hold wide public acclaim get none from me. I site Harry Potter and Twlight as the most obvious examples, but also nearly every “classic” ever forced upon me and Anne Frank’s Diary. Don’t make me remember.

I didn’t read these books as they were released, and I think that that might be part of my problem. Not a big part, but I can see how the hype would help. Especially waiting for the next book and whatnot. I didn’t do any of that, though. I read the whole series in the last month or two. Also, I’ve never read any other Steven King, so it occurs to me that I might just not like his writing. /shrug Still going to write my critique. Onto the big complaints.

The smuttiness. Mostly this occurs in the first book, but it is still annoying throughout the series. I don’t normally mind smut, but in this case it just seems so wanton and extreme. It also seems purposeful and forced, like King thinks he’ll score a few points every time he strays from strictly “appropriate” subject matter. Each time he did it it took me from the flow of things, and it seemed to paint a world where it was normal to think in such terms, which maybe he was trying for, but I doubt. It seemed to me like he was trying to say to the readers, “See, I’m just like you. I know you all think about farts all the time, and you think the pompous of normal writers not to drop it into their paragraphs at least sometimes.” Which was annoying, cause I don’t think that, and I really don’t think that many other people do either.

I also don’t buy the whole thing about him not being in control of the story. I mean, the meta aspect is kinda cool, but it got old after a while, and seemed more like a crutch, and an excuse for doing such a bad job, rather than an interesting aspect of the story. He kept making the story more and more obviously contrived, using deus ex machina more and more obviously, that it became clear that he had to call himself out, or everyone else would. I mean, at first it’s just a guy who’s really good with guns. Then he has feelings and intuition. Then there are doors to other dimensions. Then there is psychic communication among friends. Then there is just general psychic’s everywhere. And then, finally, at the very end, there’s that new special kind of magic introduced just for Steve to write himself out of his final corner.

I also don’t like the meandering tone of the novels. I just think he didn’t know what he was doing long term, which he professes he didn’t. He started out with a gritty westernish thing, kinda making his own feel. Then he tried to expand it and got lost. Then he tried to make it a deep series commenting on the craft of story telling, and referencing many of the great stories. He fell down there by having to explain every minute reference. Then he hit on calling himself a great story teller, and the meta thing came to him. And he ran with that to the end. Except for not really, cause he hates endings, so he wrote like 3 endings. /shakes head

The characters were all right. I mean, it’s not like it’s the worst book ever written or anything. And the characters we likeable, which is more than most authors can claim. But he used them annoyingly on occasion, too. Like, Eddie, was clearly his cliché crutch. At first he just had Eddie being comic relief and using all the cliché lines, but after a while Eddie’s absence didn’t stop him, he’d just boiler plate in “as Eddie would say” somewhere in the sentence.

I’m not really going anywhere with this. I just was so often struck with this complaints during my reading, now that it’s over I had to voice them.

I guess I’d like to say that the story was pretty ok to read. It was kinda fun. Kinda different as well, if you’ve read tons of sci-fi and fantasy, it had some newness in it. But I think you’d be much better off if you spent your time reading Otherland or Ender or the Frank Herbert Dune books. I just expect more from my books. I’m picky.

Edit: Oh, also, at one point Susanna “leaps to her feet.” I mean real Susanna, not possessed of magic demon feet Susanna or anything. /shakes head

Categories
Update

PAX and stuff

I recently completed the first day back from a 4 day weekend. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were pretty much exclusively taken up going to, attending, and returning from, PAX. The nerd conference/expo of choice for the Pacific Northwest it seems. I went w/ Pat, and we stayed at my uncle’s, so thanks uncle. Keston was also there, so I spent some time hanging out with him and his companions from Intel. The experience was much as years prior, only bigger, so fun and entertaining and expensive parking.

PAX is one of those things that is difficult to explain to people. People always ask what you do there, and when you answer the question literally, you say something like, “walk around and look at video games that are going to come out, and go to panels about video games and stuff, and sometimes play video games that haven’t come out yet.” But that’s not really what PAX is about or what’s cool about it. Part of what is cool is taking what is generally a isolated minority, nerds, and making them an overwhelming majority. Putting 50,000 nerds into one building has a strange effect. Everything kinda goes backwards. Like, you get peer pressured into playing Magic or D&D, and if someone finds out you don’t know what keyboard cat is they laugh at you. It’s a good change of pace from real life. So I’m going to say that this upside down social world is the real reason to go to PAX, and there are panels and video games as bonus. So PAX was a success. I mean, Pat had never seen another gphone in the wild, and I musta seen 20 @ PAX w/o even looking.

Pat was pretty sick on Sunday, so that sorta sucked, mostly for him. I’m told he feels mostly better at this point, and I still feel fine so I think I’ve resisted infection, so those are good things. News is out about a confirmed case of swine flu at PAX and a whole website has sprung up to report confirmed cases and what flights you were on and stuff, so if you went to PAX and you get sick, go to the doctor.

Monday, day of labor, I pretty much just watched Mythbusters. It’s a pretty amazing show. For me it’s a show I watch w/o really knowing why I like it. Although I have identified one aspect, and that is the actual building. I have very little experience, and, I think, probably, very little skill in the area of mechanically building stuff. The mythbusters are really good at it, and the show presents rapid fire problems and solutions in an interesting way, so I like that aspect a lot. Plus, I think I like guessing the outcomes of stuff and almost always being right, but not always always.

I also downloaded and watched the pilot of Leverage, which I didn’t really know anything about except all my celebrity nerd friends on twitter are talking about it, and Wil Wheaton is somehow involved. Anyway, it looks kinda cool. I have to watch more before I can really comment.

Yeah, so life is good I think. My newest pay check indicates that the amount I’m losing to taxes and other automatic subtractions is 3% greater than previously estimated, but that’s not very much. 😛 Closer to what I expected anyway. Lauren is starting school in Spain in about 6 hours. Everythings pretty standard and genial. ttfn

Categories
Update

PAX and stuff

Tomorrow is PAX! Big times ahead. Pat’s coming down today, and tomorrow morning we’re gonna head over the mountains and enjoy the nerdfest. The show is completely sold out in all it’s forms, and they bought the whole convention center and increased hours this year, so it should be crazy. I’m probably most excited to see Jonathan Coulton and the CO-OP and TRS shows, plus all the demos of video games to come.

In preparation I’ve already purchased many snacks while at Costco last with my parents, so I’ve gotta figure out how I’m going to carry all of that w/o smashing/melting it. I got PuzzleQuest Galactrix so I’ll have something to play while I wait in lines. I also want to buy ear plugs, cause I’m not into hearing loss. I’ve gotta get our sleeping arrangement figured out a bit better still, too. And possibly see if I can meet up with the folks and get the GPS and stuff like that.

Now that I’ve written all of that down I’ll probably remember to do it. What else? Pat and I might camp after PAX w/ his folks for a day, although I don’t know the odds of that since I haven’t talked to Pat in a bit. He’s always sleeping, or working. He apparently doesn’t get chances to chat much at work. /shrug

K, so in work related news, all the other interns left last week, so for this whole week I’ve had the biggest office in the building. People are circling, though, so I think others might be moving in soon. I’ve been told I’ll be moved out at the beginning of October, though. I’m getting an office with a window, and an officemate, but just one. Her name’s Cara. She seems acceptable.

I got my picture taken to be put in the records. I’ll be up on the wall and in the memory game soon, apparently. I also have to write up goals for the next FY soon, as the current one is ending. Not sure how I like the non-coding aspects of work, but it seems like they’re unavoidable.

Last post I mentioned I didn’t think I’d get to see Lauren again before she left, but I did. Mother was kind enough to find and excuse to drive me over there for the weekend so I got a good couple days to say goodbye right before she left. It was all good. I think she’s got herself aligned properly and she’ll be fine over there.

Also saw my cousin’s new baby. Mother and Aunt took many pictures with it stuck in my arms like a prop, so they might show up on the internet soon. I’ll stick in a link maybe.

Home life stuff… Aaron mowed the lawn, which is nice. (I’ll mow the lawn if you guys keep it clear of dog feces, ffr roomies) He also bought an aerator for the faucet in the kitchen so it doesn’t spray water everywhere. Kim and Kelsey paid rent early, so that’s going well. We still haven’t gotten a utility bill, so that’s a bit concerning. I think I’ve done all I can to try and get things set up, except possibly the check-up nagging. I really don’t see how society developed to require such nonsense, though. Seems like we should try and evolve past the need to nag.

Oh, also last post I said the aquatic ape theory discussed on that TEDTalk was probably bogus and to let me do research. Well, I didn’t have to, cause the Skeptical Rogues did it for me. Here‘s the episode of interest. The specific chunk is from about 29:30 to 46:10, but you should listen to the whole thing. 😛

Categories
Update

♫This is a title ♫♪♫ I’m being so, sincere, right now ♫

Ok, so there have been some grumblings (from ex gfs) that I should post. So I will.

Lauren came and visited, like I said in that last update post. Sidney came the next day. We pretty much just hung out at the new house. We also did some food shopping. Twice. Girls like food so I think they enjoyed that ok.

The first day, when Lauren was here and Sidney wasn’t, Lauren helped my mom clean out the garage and clean the new house in general. They got the garage clean enough to park Pat’s car in there. He has to store the ol’ I-Rock, iRock, irock?

Aaron’s got the band stuff pretty well set up in the basement, I think, because they practiced over the weekend. Most of the time the girls and I were taking Ace for a walk, so I dunno how loud it was really. I dun think it’ll be too annoying, though.

Sidney’s car battery was acting up, so we spent some time jumping and idling and stuff like that. She made it home easily enough on a jump, but I think her battery is pretty shot. She shouldn’t care though, she’s going to Korea in a few days.

Besides that we did a lot of just hanging out and watching stuff. We watched all the new episodes of Bullshit! we were behind on, and also UHF randomly. I think it’s pretty funny, but I dunno if the girls quite appreciate all the subtle genius.

So, they left too early on Sunday, and I can’t think of anything much that’s happened since. Yesterday, on facebook, Emily Anne Geddes took some husband quiz thing and it said I was the #1 husband for her. I told Lauren and she got all upset so she took it too. Turns out it’s a 1 question survey asking only for the gender you’d like. Anyway, I was her #1 as well. And Pat was #2. I wonder what the odds are of me being randomly selected in both cases. Seems kinda strange to me. /shrug

I’ve been biking to and from work every day this week, except mom gave me a ride one day cause they showed up at the house earlier than I left. Going to work seems to be harder than leaving. It takes me about 30 minutes, 25 today, and I seem to average like 12 MPH. Going home takes about 20 minutes and I average like 14.5 MPH. There was quite a bit of wind one morning, so I think that was the slowest day, kinda makes me think of it as harder than it really is. It must be uphill a bit, since it’s up river, and I think that can account for the discrepancy. Bob, my boss guy kinda, bikes to work and says he averages 18-20 MPH. He might be in a bit better biking shape than me… maybe, but even still, I gotta think most of that is from road bike vs. mountain bike. I was going to try mom’s hybrid bike today but the tire was making strange sounds so I deemed it too risky. Anyway, like I said on twitter, I might have to try a road bike.

The biking itself is quite enjoyable. It’s kinda a hot and sweaty affair sometimes, but that’s cause I push myself for no reason basically. I bike on a path through a park pretty much the whole way, so I get to see all the happy Richland people doing their strange things. Playing volleyball and doing yoga, and jogging with babies and such. It’s really pretty active during my biking time. This morning there was a baby bunny on the side of the path. I dunno if it was a baby baby, but small, like the size of my fist.

Regarding this morning and wild life, there’s a small anecdote. So this morning I ate breakfast and wandered around and gathered stuff I need at work and then headed out back to get the bike. I had stored it out there for the first time last night, since Aaron is pretty much moved in now and we don’t have as much space in the middle of the living room anymore. Anyway, so I had just left my helmet on the ground out there with it. I was sorta morning groggy so I put the helmet on with the chin strap crossed so they didn’t work, so I took it off again and fixed it and put it on again and it felt like something spiking hit my head, or more likely Velcro pulled a hair or something. I took the helmet off again to check for anything that would lead to lasting discomfort and happened to notice this huge spider just chilling in one of the helmet holes. I kinda instinctively blew at him and he fell from the helmet and was never see again. I just thought it was kinda odd how I looked at the helmet at least once before and didn’t notice, and how I almost rode off with that spider on my head. I wonder if he woulda started crawling around and caused an accident or something.

I plan on leaving early  from work tomorrow so I can get over the mountains. Mom and I are going to go to Lauren’s sister’s wedding on Saturday. We’re also gonna grab Yusuke on the way and take him to the airport so he can get back to the land of the rising sun… and swine flu paranoia… and giant robots… and tentacle rape. We’re driving the truck so I can bring back the huge lounge chairs Mr. and Mrs. Carr have generously offered me for the new house. I was thinking of repaying them by stealing their youngest daughter while I was at it. They don’t want her hanging around anyway. 😛 K, probably won’t actually do that.

I just looked it up and according to earthtools the total climb from home to work is about 40 feet. Doesn’t seem like much. Guess it’s not nothing.

That’s about all the news for now. Sorry about the sparse posts. I am just too busy to put as much effort in as I was before. I am getting caught up again, though, I think. Maybe in another month or two I’ll be back to bored enough to post more frequently and diversely.

Categories
Update

The last few weeks in a nutshell

So, this is the big update post I promised. We’ll see how it goes.

I’ll start way back 4th of July weekend at Sidney’s. I told you I was going to go, but sorta skipped talking about being there. It was as expected, so pretty cool. I got tons of food, and got to hang w/ a Pat and Sid and Lauren and Yusuke, so the best people basically. I got to go inner-tubing a little bit, although not enough. And I, of course, got to see some fireworks. They were pretty up close and personal in this case, which is fine, I guess. I’m not a big fireworks person either way, so whatever.

Moving on. Umm… new internship thing. 7 days. 1 full week that I spent almost no time training on. I’ve gone to some meetings, looked a bunch of code, written some stuff. I’ve got a lot of stuff to catch up on. It’s hard to understand all the stuff they wrote already, and know where to find stuff, but I’m getting there. I feel I was actually pretty productive Friday, so that’s good. The situation is pretty relaxed. Come in when you want, breaks when you want, leave when you want, within certain restrictions, obviously, but it’s all good. I’m hopeful things continue in a vein similar to the first week, just with me getting more competent.

The other news is that I’m renting a house in Richland with Aaron. It was really messed up when we saw it, but the rent is cheap so we went for it. Mom and Dad and Aaron and I have all put considerable hours over the last week and a half cleaning it up, and it’s to the point where it’s livable, at least mostly. Internet is going to get installed next week, supposedly, so once that’s there I could definitely live there. It’s within biking distance of work, so that’s much preferable to the current 30 minute drive, so I plan to get in as soon as I can stand it there. (meaning there’s internet)

So that’s the gist. I’ve been very busy. I spend most of my free time corresponding w/ my lovely gf, because I like her and we’re far apart. She’s gonna get to visit on Wednesday, though. Sidney, supposedly, is gonna drive over that same weekend or Thursday or something. So, Yay!

In the mean time Yusuke’s came and visited this weekend. He forgot his macbook power cord so he’s been using mom’s netbook all weekend. And we’re doing wii fit. We have to work on our posture. Pat’s around so we went swimming in his pool today instead of working on the house, which I think is a good weekend move, but the decision was made by Pat and Yusuke, they’re the drivers. 😛

So that’s a good update, right? You feel caught up?

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Uncategorized

NEWS! From the world of ME!

I went to Cheney, again, if you didn’t know.  After waiting so long for PNNL to call and tell me when I should start interning I gave them a call.  That’s what all the people said I had to do.  I was like, “Whatever,” but they were all like, “wooo hoowoi,” so I was all like, “Fine.”

Anyway, PNNL said they were waiting for Central to send them confirmation that I had graduated.  I called Central, and they said they were waiting until after July 2nd to send the confirmation because that’s when degrees get processed.  Armed with this knowledge I knew I would be safe coming to Cheney to hang out with Pat another week, and to facilitate quickly getting to Sidney’s for the 4th of July party.

So… Monday, in Cheney, I got a call from PNNL.  That call when they tell me when to come in.  The one I had been waiting for but had recently determined couldn’t possibly happen until July 6th.  Yeah.  Luckily they didn’t want me to start until July 9th, so the fact that I’m in Cheney was not a problem.  However, this does underscore the problem with calling people to get information.  The information makes you think you know things, but you can never known anything when dealing with bureaucracy.  One should always act like an animal, on instinct.  The illusion of knowledge will just get one into trouble.

Yeah, so that’s all settled.  I have to show up at 7:45 in the morning for orientation.  I love morning!

Pat bought a new mountain bike.  Like, it’s his and not his mommy’s.  We went riding on a gravel trail thing for like 12 miles.  I got a flat that pretty quickly drained my tire… so the last mile was a bit rough.  Pat’s bike is fast.  He let me ride it for a bit, and life is easy with a bike like his.  Fancy.

Today I went to a bike shop to get my tire fixed.  It took me like 30 minutes to walk to the place cause I am a meander-er, and I kinda went past it a couple blocks.  Then he said it would take him about an hour to get to it, but he didn’t know, maybe more. I decided to just hang out in “downtown” Cheney since I’d have to turn around right away if I went back to the APT.  I went to this thrift store that had amazing quantities of junk.  It had a book called “False Myths of Same Sex Love” or something like that.  I thought about buying it for Aaron, but then I didn’t.  I didn’t want the owner to think I was gay.

I wandered back to the bike shop just when he was about to call me, so I have good timing, I guess.  He said he found a tiny thorn in it, which is lame.  I mean, who puts thorns out in the middle of bike trails?  Intelligent design.  Phooey!

We’ve yet to try Pat’s bike on a real mountain biking trail… with rocks and tiny paths and sharp turns and stuff.  I’m pretty sure Pat has plans to try it out soon, though.  So that will likely be an adventure.

Oh, and I watched the entire first season of 30 Rock.  Yeah.  It’s a funny show.  Very funny.  Like, way more funny than modern stuff is, normally.  It’s odd.

Pat and I did that crazy ab workout thing that Dan taught me.  I still lose at the face up part.  I don’t think it’s fair, cause my tail bone is jamming into the floor and it’s very uncomfortable.  I think I’d do better with one of those gym mats or something.  I have a bony butt.

Thursday is when LAUREN! and Yusuke come to get me on the way to Sidney’s.  Pat has Friday off, so he’ll just drive up after work, I guess.  I tried to make it so we all went in one car to save gas, but apparently that’s super confusing and impossible.  Should be a pretty awesome weekend.  I’m very much looking forward to seeing Lauren… I mean everyone.

You know what’s cool about Sidney’s house?  You can eat dinner, and then, when you’re done, you’re full until dinner the next day.  Efficient.