this page intentionally left blank

Supermodels with see-through tops!! You call it blasphemy... I call it humor.





Besides, I'm not Catholic.

Today's statement of the obvious:

Taxes suck.

Thank you. Thankyouverymuch.

It's just not right... getting up at five aye emm to go to work on a Sunday morning. Blech! On a positive note, I got my old system up and running again. Take some gutted parts and a new (cheap-ass) mobo... add a splash of electricity... BONG! There you go! I spend a lot of time last night getting my VPN software tweaked into running since our VPN concentrator has such specific prerequisites on inbound tunnel requests. It's all good now. T-Minus 30 minutes before this maintenance window starts and I can replace two edge firewalls in out datacenter. Yippie. Not.

This story about a national guardsman legally changing his name to Optimus Prime is inspiring (link courtesy of Hatley). He even has a weblog... umm... sorta. Yes, I think we should all change our names to some cool fictional characters. What would your name be?

Damn this coffee sucks. You know when you come to work before any good bean establishments are open and brewing, you've come to work much too early. I would even take ghetto diner coffee over this crap. This rivals ship coffee... the squids know what I'm saying.

We got the house.














Word.

Today is starting out to be one of those days... you know... the days when you feel like you have 5 pounds of shit to stuff into a 1 pound sock? I never understood that saying. What the hell is a 1 pound sock? Anyhoo, I have a lot to do today and am not sure how I'm going to slice the next 9 hours to accommodate it. Sean has me hooked on those sour Altoids now. Fucker.

The taste of coffee in a styrofoam cup is what I imagine sticking my tongue in a dog's bung would taste like.

Inch by inch yet miles away. You know, perspective is a wonderful curse. Sam and I had an interesting business meeting this afternoon that allowed me to look outside the box for a moment and pretend everything was different. I think the bridge between here, now, and there is paved by fear and uncertainty... and excitement. I can't stencil details of color explanations right now, but like the words that echo in my head, "this is the time of your life that defines you"...

so be it.

I have a serious headache. WTF is up with that? I've been busy this afternoon and other than an abbreviated lunch with EL, my day has been 100% on the go. I'm waiting on the courier to come take the earnest money and option fee checks to my agent. I had forgotten how much cash up front it takes to buy a home. I haven't hassled with any of that since the mid 90's when I bought my first house. I've been faxing like crazy the last few days... what an antiquated technology. I hate fax machines. All my incoming faxes are delivered to my email in-box and never breath life on paper. Anyhoo, I'm off to configure some PIX. Is it Friday yet?

Update: I just got off the phone with the loan officer handling the processing of my application. She's cooler that the other side of the pillow. I feel much better about this situation now. I forgot to mention the climax of last evenings events... we washed Penny in the kitchen sink. I'm not sure how many of you guys have every tried to bath a cat, but it usually can only go a couple of different ways and almost all of them are not good. She behaved very well considering the circumstance. EL and I escaped with only a minimal amount of water splash on us and the surrounding counter and floor. The most difficult part of the entire ordeal was keeping to the task at hand through uncontrollable laughter at the sounds she was making. There is no sound like the sound of a cat being washed in the kitchen sink. Hell... I'm tearing up giggling about even now...

EL and I have been oh-so-busy. We bought her wedding dress yesterday and spent a lot of time looking for invitations. It was a nice change in pace from looking at homes every night. We ran into Bill and Patrick at dinner. I was constantly interrupted with work calls throughout the evening, but other than that it was a good time. Ben and Deborah had a 6 pound 2 ounce baby girl last night. I received a call from my agent last night to let me know that the sellers were going to accept my offer. Yippie! If all goes well, I should have a contract in hand by tomorrow. Now it's just the bank... hurry up and wait. My head hurts.

The offer goes in this morning. EL and I looked at many homes last night... until almost 9:00 actually. We started to get dizzy from all the comparison and elimination. The string of sanity we clung to throughout was merely a running list of the top three homes... all of which were nicknamed. The "little dog house" has stayed in the number one spot for the entire duration of our search. The "painter cat house" was a firm second. "Built in a Malaysian sweat shop by 12 year olds and shipped in pieces to the US for assembly" never made the running, but the "rooster house" fell in and out of the number three spot as we discussed options. Actually, the "rooster house" would have come in higher if it weren't for some uncertainties about the structure of the home. It had the largest lot of the bunch... it was like 18000 square feet or something... plenty of room for Éclair to run around. So now we wait. We wait to hear from the bank concerning our loan. We wait to hear from the sellers concerning our offer. We just wait. I hate waiting.

Home shopping is stressful. EL and I have very similar tastes in décor and architecture, but our priorities differ somewhat when it comes to deal breakers. We looked at a couple of homes last night. The first home was a 4 bedroom 2 bath that was listed at 2885 square feet. It looked fabulous online and we were really excited about seeing it. We drove around the neighborhood a little because we arrived early... scouting the place out... we also stopped by Sam's house for a visit. When it was time to see the house, I was eager and had high hopes that this was going to be the home for us... it seemed to just fall in our lap. Little did I know that it was about to roll off our lap and onto the floor. I think it's safe to say that this home would be great for us if we had about $20k to blow on contractors to come in and fix the things we couldn't stand... like pink kitchen countertops and pink marble floor in the master bath... and pink paint covering the walls of all the rooms that didn't make me instantly want to gag with their atrocious wallpaper... and the hot tub on the back desk that look as though it hadn't run in 5 years and pigs had been wallowing in it recently... yeah... other than that, it was livable. Fuck. Our agent was great about everything. She came highly recommended and every word spoken about her was backed up by this stellar first impression. She had come prepared to show us another listing that was new to the market and just a few blocks away. We didn't know anything about the house, but were willing to listen with optimism. This second house we looked at I loved. I like the area it's in... I like the curb appeal... I like the approach to the door. I loved the tile in the foyer and the hardwood floors in the dining room. I loved that every bedroom in the house has at least one walk-in closet... most rooms have two. I love the coziness of the den with it's 15c woody feel, recessed lighting, fireplace, and built in wet bar. I love the yard. I love the garage despite it not being attached like I'd hoped. I love all 4 bedroom 2 and a half bath with study and two utility rooms of it. I love the double french doors leading from the effin huge master bedroom onto the back patio. I love the giant master bathroom with deep garden jet tub (with tiles that need to be replaced). I love the twin set of french doors on either side of the fireplace that let the sun into the den. I love the in-ground sprinkler system in the front and back yard. I love the long driveway with the garage behind the house. I love the easy walk-in attic access. I love the oversized double deep sink in the kitchen. The kitchen is a little small. EL thought the dining room a little small. Other than that, I love this house. It is someplace I could see myself living happily. I wonder how much it would cost to remodel the kitchen to make it bigger. It's a home improvement I would be willing to do... shorten the breakfast nook and extend the kitchen to add counter space and maybe a small island. I love that little house. EL and I are going to look at some more this evening. There were a couple we planned on seeing in another neighborhood, but one of them we both didn't like and the other is agreeably more than we want to spend... even though the extended marble entryway and custom, built-in surround system in the great room would be nice... not to mention being able to play a few holes of golf in the kitchen. The property taxes were going to be over $6k and I figure that plus mortgage and home insurance, we'd be funding a third world country every month. So, it's still a toss up... where to live... what to buy... but we're out there looking. It's really a shame that I'm comparing everything to that second house last night. I feel like I cannot make an unbiased decision now... I'm counting on EL to point out the things that my desire to live in the home from last night won't let me see. She's the best ya know... in case I haven't mentioned that lately... she really is...

Well, the day started off on the right foot... as in the correct foot. The manager at Chez Satan recognized me when I walked up as the guy that ordered simple coffee and had it fucked up twice before getting it right last week. In dramatic apology, he compped whatever I ordered... so I got creative. I was sitting in my office sipping my estimated $8.00 beverage, I thought of how nice it would be to leave work and enjoy the beautiful day. The cookies EL made last night lasted almost as long as a injured and bleeding mammal freshly fallen into dry season starved piranha invested waters. The skies blackened and opened just as the cloudy bucket's bottom fell out. Fucking Houston weather. Things were really quiet at work today. It was by no means a typical Monday. No little girls crying with skinned knees about application performance issues over the wide area network or any such usually-never-the-network type problems that have to be proven by Johnny Cochran. The glove don't fit muthafukka! My lease is up soon and EL and I are, as previously stated, looking for new residence. I had an epiphany this morning about my rent and how much I despise giving $1600/month to my landlord every month and having nothing to show for it but a bad taste in my mouth. Sooooooooooooooo, we are going to look at a few homes tonight that are in the "purchase only" category. Ironically, one of them is just down the street from punk-ass Sam. Oh well, this day is close enough to being over that I'm shutting my brain down. <insert whirring down sound followed by some sputters here>

ciao

This time change shit is killing me in the morning. I usually feel a little run down as it is from not enough sleep and a relatively high stress job, but this is ridiculous. I feel like a puppet whose strings aren't taught. I've been awake long enough to shower, get dressed, gather my office accompaniments, and hit the morning METRO toward downtown and I still feel like I just popped a full zanny-bar. With great irony, I sat down in the same seat on the bus that I was sitting in when I lost my digital camera a week or so ago. The lingering details of that sequence of events still burns like fresh lime juice in a paper cut. Notice how there are very few photos on this site these days... hmm... coincidence? EL made cookies for the office again last night. It just might be the brightest glimmer in temporal sight as we navigate this day. Speaking of navigation... we have had the sometimes occasional, but mostly regular visits from bayou rats at the house for some time now. They scurry across the power lines and onto the roof of the garage or house. Then, after playing around and looking for any sort of access into the attic where they can make mischief, they scurry back across the power lines to Ratville or wherever they live. As nasty as it sounds, they're kinda cute. Anyhoo, we had a pest guy come out last week and spray for bugs and whatnot. He just so happened to also specialize in rodent schtuff. EL asked him if he could get rid of the uninvited attic guests without causing any rodent death within the constrains of our home and ensure there would be no harm to our pets. I was at work at the time, but I envision this was the point where he put on his best Amway plan demonstration and made the sale. Now, let me pause for a moment and clarify that in no way do I think that EL was duped by the pest guy... she is one of the brightest women I've known and can smell bullshit pi miles away... however, I do think the pest guy didn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. There is a very distinct smell of rotting flesh coming from the attic. It shifts in locale and intensity depending on atmospheric temperature and whether our central air blower is activated or not. He got a call last night from EL and is coming back today. He'll be leaving with something dead (and the smell) or EL's boot in his ass... maybe both. Through my jarred vision due to the perfectly smooth and polished Houston midtown streets sporting terrain one almost needs a moon rover or monster truck to ensure safe passage, I see the skyline of downtown... the gothic look of the Bank of America building, the twin Pez dispensers in the sky formaerly known as Enron, the indigo q-tip head of Continental Airlines, and more than a dozen more in various stages of recognition... and all I can think about it the spattering of subterranean coffee dispensers waiting to take my money. I love coffee. It might be the only thing that saves me today.

Rainy Sunday.

This weekend was a blur... especially with the change in time. "Spring ahead" sucks when you have to be on the driving range at 6:45 and it’s almost an hour away. Overall, the course was great. The bikes and equipment were relatively new and in good repair. The instructors were fantastic and I would recommend the program to anyone even considering taking a motorcycle out of the road. They focused on valuable techniques that could save your life. It wasn't just another driver safety course... it was very well presented and worth every minute... even those minutes riding in the rain this morning. The class pretty much shot my weekend. I cling to every second I can with EL and we just didn't have many this weekend to fill. The relief I feel from passing my recertification was short-lived and now I'm back in planning mode for how I'm going to pay for this wedding and a move in just a few short months. Maybe I'll get a job working night shift at Whataburger? Then again... there's always a life of crime. I hear that pays well.