First of all, if you borrowed an Office Space dvd from me, please return it.

I just finished my end of the quarter, and it was a rough one. New vows about not procrastinating have been taken and are being taken more seriously.

My phone has been sketchy lately. It's been turning off in my pocket, and twice I've been clicking through the menu and it has shut down in my hands. So I'm getting a new one. Not the iphone because I don't like it. And not the Palm Pre because they're not planning on releasing the SDK any time soon. Instead I ordered a slightly older HTC Fuze. (I always thought it was pronouced "fuzz" but I just watched a video and they pronounced it "fuse".) It's gotten some mediocre reviews because of the AT&T bloatware, but I plan on removing all of that and installing a custom ROM as soon as I get it. It runs on windows mobile so there's a pretty wide selection of Apps available.

I can also get the phone without having to get a data connection, so that will save me $30 a month. I figure I'm online all day anyway, there's no reason to double my phone bill just to get the internet in my pocket. Pretty much everything I can put on there from my computer or write myself a note to do later at the computer, and there are GPS apps that don't require data connection. Maybe I'll have it push emails when I'm at a wifi but I doubt it.

Yesterday two trains collided on the dc metro up past fort totten. The national transport safety board is now "revealing" that one of the trains was old and should have been replaced. News flash: All the trains on the red line are old and should be replaced. For some reason the red line is where all the old decrepit trains go. Riding in it you can tell it's dingy and old, and you feel like you're in a third world country. I bet 75% of the train malfunctions happen on the red line.

That's all for now. Oh and I fixed my KVM switch. And by fix, I mean that I re-plugged and restarted everything and now it's working again. A little frontier medicine. It's a relief, it was quite the pain swapping USB cables manually.

Gene: My family tells stories from the great depression that you had to keep your dog close. If your dog left your yard and went wandering he'd likely end up shot and never return. People were literally hungry all over the world. This does not touch that. We are all still fat.

My KVM switch stopped working today. I'm not sure what the issue is. For now, I've disconnected my regular computer. It's nothing but work from now on, which might help keep me from wasting time by fidgiting with music, etc. (Note to self: it might have just been the work laptop's software just being finicky. You didn't try restarting the OS. Try plugging it all back together and rebooting next time.)

My landlords have built a new back deck. Kate was pretty amused to discover that it goes right above my kitchen window. Actually, it wouldn't be very noticable from inside except that they put a wooden fencing around the base of the deck to keep animals from living down there. And that goes right across the front of my window. No more morning sunlight. I guess I never really lingered in my kitchen to enjoy it anyway.

Today, on a whim, I used water from my britta to make coffee. There is no discernable difference in taste.

midnight edit: I'm eating some Ben & Jerrys cinnamon bun ice cream that Kate suggested I buy. Super sweet, but delicious.

(from a citibank stock forum. There's a lot of passion on these boards.)
arat: I just wanna sell this garbage called stock.

I was trying to make two turkey sandwiches for lunch today, but I discovered that I had only enough turkey for a single sandwich! I didn't want to go to the store, and besides I had already put mayo or mustard on all 4 slices of bread. Instead I split two hot dogs down the middle and fried them on the griddle to throw into my second sandwich. It's ingenuity like this that caused the industrial revolution.

Somehow I kicked my ottoman and bent my toenail in half. It doesn't hurt too much, it's just pretty uncomfortable. I guess there won't be any running today. I put a bandaid on the thing but I'm guessing chances are good that half of it will blacken and fall off. Gross. I've seen other people loose nails that way, but it's never happened to me before.

Some recent family drama. My mom's cousin John is planning a family reunion in July, and requested RSVPs from all the households as to who is coming. I told my mom I was going long ago, but apparently (as she told me on the phone last night,) she didn't RSVP for me. Because I don't qualify as a dependent for her taxes, she figured I was my own household and should rsvp for myself. WTF. Anyway, now I've emailed John, but it's after the RSVP date, and he sent out about a dozen RSVP reminders. (Though no listing of expected attendees or anything to indicate who has responded.) I'd be surprised if he replied with "too late" or "Damnit I asked for RSVPs a dozen times!" but if he does, f*** it, I'll stay here. You kinda feel obligated to go to a family reunion when there hasn't been on in 10 years, but it's probably not going to be fun. Sacramento in July is burning hot. And since when is one person a household? I still don't think I am at fault here. The more I think about this, the more annoyed I get. Time to do some work.

(Walking back to the metro after the Rent show. Joe almost bumps into a girl standing on the sidewalk)
Joe M: Oh, excuse me.
Joe M: (loudly to us) I just almost ran into a prostitute!
(Joe waited about 2 seconds, the girl was maybe 5 feet behind us, and she probably wasn't a prostitute. It's almost like Joe was drunk, but we hadn't been drinking.)

I saw Rent with Kate, and my sister-in-law-in-law Whitney and her fiance Joe. It was a great show! I'm a pretty big fan of the movie soundtrack as opposed to the broadway soundtrack, but when watching it live the message machine songs and the other little jingles didn't bug me at all. And the two tracks I always skip: "Today for you, tomorrow for me" and "Over the Moon" were much more entertaining than they are on the soundtrack. Good performances all around, with the possible exception of Mimi and Joanne (Mimi was good about half the time (she's no Rosario Dawson), and I thought Joanne overacted most of the time.)

About 1/3 of the way through the show I figured out that I really had to urinate. And my seat was almost exactly in the middle of my row, so it would have meant climbing over 10-15 people. Definitely not ideal. I suffered through it instead. Probably the last 3 songs before the intermission were spent with me thinking "Hurry up and get to the intermission!" I enjoyed the second act much more. Kate was super cold through the show (they were pumping the ac enough so you could feel a constant breeze), but I spent the first act sweating in concentration, and didn't notice it too much during the second act. Joe, who hadn't seen or heard much about the show beforehand, thought it was going to be a tragic play where the characters are killed off by AIDS as it progresses. (Maybe he watched Team America, with their song "Everyone has AIDS") Then he had a little difficulty following the storylines when they were advanced by mid-song events, which is understandable. Before I saw the movie, and had only heard the soundtrack, I thought Angel was two characters, a woman and a man. What can I say, it was confusing when some lyrics referred to Angel as "her" and some as "him". BTW, Angel was super good in this production. Definitely a good show over all.

I've been investing in stocks lately. Well, maybe investing isn't the right word.. I've been slowly trading in stocks. There are lots of articles on MSN money and yahoo finance about building a portfolio, and each one is more full of crap than the last. Diversify your stocks, diversify your mutual funds, diversify your portfolio into markets/bonds/cash, and then don't forget to dollar cost average it in case you're in an upswing in the market. Wow, talk about hedging your bets. Is it just me, or is this like going to the race track and, instead of researching anything about any of the horses, putting a bet on all the horses to show? Or taking a blackjack cheat sheet to a casino so that you know the statistics for maximizing your odds at each combination of cards (ie. a cheat sheet so you win 49.5% of the time). It's a strategy for losing money more slowly. Micros is my stocks buddy, and I've been pretty successful just occasionally bouncing ideas off him. I have a lot of strong opinions about investing, and maybe I'll write more about it later. Actually, at one point I was thinking of starting a separate blog about it because I find myself reading and disagreeing with so much common market sentiment, but that would be too much work for now. I'm pretty busy with my real work these days.

Mitch Hedberg-
If you find yourself lost in the woods, f*** it, build a house. "Well, I was lost but now I live here. I have severely improved my predicament."

Memorial day today. It's gotten nice and warm in my basement this weekend. Currently a beautiful 79 degrees in here, which is almost borderline too warm for me. It's a little humid in here too. The humidity mostly only bothers me because it makes my cold beverage drip all over my desk.

My landlords are on their honeymoon this week, so it's nice and quiet (besides some contruction going on in the backyard). Should be good for getting work done, which is something that I need to do. I am behind, but not unmanagably so. I only need to do about 200% this month. Tonight I am going to make a detailed schedule and then stick to it like it's the bible. I'm not too worried.

Yesterday I wrote up a post about Street Fighter 2, but then didn't post it. I'm not sure were it is now. I've been playing Street Fighter 2 on my ps3 because it's on the hard drive and it only takes about 10 minutes to get a game in. The problem is, this version of street fighter (it's the HD remix) is so damn hard. I'm pretty decent at street fighter but this game kicks my ass. On easy mode, I can get all the way up to Saget, but then he kicks my ass for the next 5 minutes. Super frustrating too, because his flying knee goes way across the screen to knock you out of a jumping attack, and he'll back up and rain fireballs on you all day if you let him. I usually end up cussing out the television and wanting to break my controller. Supposedly SF4 is better. I should just uninstall that game (I think it was only a $10 download). That's probably the cause of my high blood pressure. (Though I went to a doctor last week, and he said my bp was fine. It was probably because I had been shaking Kate out of frustration and was all riled up before taking the blood pressure test at Giant)

(Mick56 quotes a corporate report that implies that the number of outstanding stock shares is higher than estimated)
padddyh13: Hey Mickey Mouse...don't you know bashers never provide links? Is there a basher parade now at Disney World?
sidslids: Go to the g-damn corp website and look at the form. I bet you pour hot water on your cheetos so you don't have to chew. And here i am using my jaws like a sucker.

(originally written 5/8/08 but unpublished)

I'm watching 300. Don't ask me why. This was such a great comic book, and they made it into such a ridiculous movie. I hate the poetic narration and the narrators annoying way of speaking. There's over acting all around. I don't think the king in the comic yelled this much at all. In fact the line "this is sparta" (which the king bellows) doesn't even have an exclaimation point.

Also the king tells the hunchback that he can't fight with them because he wouldn't be able to raise his shield to protect the man next to him in the phalanx. Then in the battle it's the loosest phalanx you'd ever see where each man just shields himself and has a nice little gap between himself and the next guy. That's when they use the phalax at all. Most of the battles are just every man for himself. The battle scenes were better when set to NIN like in the film's preview. Courtney probably wasn't thrilled when she and I went to see this in the theater in texas.

(talking about the new wii punch out game)
me: the new punch out game looks like it might be good.
dan: punch out will suck
me: punch out will be awesome. I was born to be a boxer.
dan: if the new punch out is (from what i hear) exactly a remake of the first one just with wii controls as an option, then who cares, play the old one. by the by you my friend were not made to be a boxer.

Kate's gone to california this weekend, and I haven't shaved since wednesday. I don't have a real beard or anything, I just look like one of those scruffy guys you see hanging around the laundromat. I did shower for some reason this morning though. I feel guilty if I go a day without doing that, almost like I'm devolving as a person.

Wednesday I saw the Thermals with Rachel. It was fun. We tried to skip the opening bands and then didn't wait around for the encore. It was an efficient concert, which I appreciate. Waiting around for an encore is sooo often not worth the effort. You have to wait 10 minutes until the band's ego is sufficienty stroked, and then they play 3 more songs while you're thinking about how badly your feet hurt from standing so long and you wish you could be sitting down listening to it on your stereo instead. The new thermals album is too repetitive for me. They have that song "we were sick" where they say that line at the end of every verse and chorus. Boring. And their song "Now we can See" has a chorus that's just "oh way-oh oh" repeated over and over. Bleh. On the other hand, their drummer at the concert was immensely entertaining. He had a huge grin on his face the whole time, sorta like my cousin Brian does when he drums. And when a part of a song didn't have any drums he would stand up and pump his fists like AWK. I bet I'd be a good drummer. I've got rhythm in my soul, I just need some practice. The first step, of course, would be buying Rock Band. I played some at Kate's sister's apartment and it was pretty fun. I'm just not sure I want all the rock band gear sitting around my apartment.

"If you prefer your games fast and flashy, you'll hate Dominions 3. But if you're the kind of strategy gamer who revels in hunkering down with a highly complex and deep game with a phone-book sized manual and a steep learning curve that really makes you pause, ponder, and think, this is definitely the game for you."