When's the Pep Rally?

The ratio of women to men in the company that I work for is very high. 5 to 1 maybe. I dunno. I say this because it is only in this kind of environment where the concept of "Spirit Days" would be thought of and implemented.

Yes. We spent the last three days (not all day, just a couple of hours each) celebrating and enhancing our company spirit.

Everybody was split into 4 teams each designated by a color and each team member had a bandana that they had to wear of that color. They elected ME team captain. Nice. Thanks. Anyway, we had to make a flag and complete a scavenger hunt and a bunch of other stuff.

To make a long boring story shorter and funnier, each day we had some type of "clothing" we had to wear. Wednesday was sports attire, Thursday was crazy hat day and today was international.

Can you spot me in this picture? Its from Wednesday, sports attire.











Here is my crazy hat that I made on Thursday













On Friday, I was a samurai. Those fake Japanese symbols are hand painted by the way













I have a hard time interacting with other humans sometimes, but I also like to make a fool of myself. So I was equal parts annoyed with and enjoying Spirit Days. It is a little corny though, but it is nice not having to think about work while at work.

Oh yeah, and guess what I won for being an idiot or as they called it, Most Spirited. An iPod Nano. Nice.

Another List....

Skape7 put me up to this.

Ten things you have DONE that you will never ever ever do again. I have a story to go with most of these. Perhaps I will tell them in the future.

1. Wash dishes at a restaurant or old folks home
   
   
2. Ride my ATV blindly over the top of a hill
   
   
3. Call my mother the "B" word (i was 17 and it was the only time she ever hit me)
   
   
4. Work at a Help Desk or any kind of tech support/customer service job
   
   
5. Watch a movie starring Tom Cruise
   
   
6. Willingly drink expired orange juice
   
   
7. Drink beer I found in a parking lot*
   
   
8. Blindly trust another human
   
   
9. Drive 80 miles an hour on a residential street and run two stop signs while unknowingly being chased by a cop
   
   
10. Own a Ford
    
    
11. Consume a 2 liter bottle of soda right before a 2 hour bus ride. A bus without a john. A school bus to be precise.
    

*When I was 19 in the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college I worked nights driving a sweeper truck. We did a lot of the parking lots in this area, Wal-mart, Shop n Save (all of the ones in this area from Dover to Rochester to Wells) and at least once a week we would find a 12 pack with at least a couple of unopened beers left in them.

Congratulations!

Lurleen started going to Weight Watchers a couple of weeks ago. We know when its Weight Watchers night because she has showered and is wearing jeans. So, anyway, Lurleen was ecstatic telling my wife that she has lost .1 pound. That's not weight loss, it's urinating before weigh-in.

Lurleen by Gagknee

What Happened to Lurleen?

She hasn't been around as much because she now has a car. They traded in their Mustang for a Taurus.

Anyway, I remembered something that happened last week that I wanted to post about. When my family was staying at my house during the flood, Lurleen came over one day. After she left my sister asked, "Does she always come over wearing pajamas and a bathrobe?"

Just a Recommendation

Yesterday, I had a block of sharp cheddar cheese that I was going to combine with slices of pepperoni and Triscuits to make a delicious snack. A slight problem with my plan occurred when I noticed the block of cheese was "best used by Oct 11 2005".

Hmmmm.

The package was then opened and sniffed but it is sharp cheddar and its supposed to smell a little funky. A slight oily sheen on the cheese was the only clue that something might be wrong with it but other than that it appeared fine. I decided to go for it.

Half the block was eaten, and I am still alive obviously, although I wish there weren't so many bugs crawling on my skin.

A Man Can Dream, Can't He?

Flashback

Its like the late 70s at Hilltop Chevrolet with 3 1970s Chevy trucks and one from the 60s in their lot.

Twunny Fo

Holy Crap! We have to wait until January 2007! Acch!

I have nothing bad to say about last nights finale, other than what was Audrey thinking wearing a black bra under a white silk shirt? I know I know she was injured and thats probably all she had in her CTU locker. Remember nursery school when you were 4 (or maybe you called it K-4)? You had to have a spare set of clothes that you kept there all year in case you had an accident. They were the ugliest clothes you owned probably. I wouldn't know because I never wet myself.

Oh, and Morris (Maurice?) cracked me UP. I hope he is in more episodes next season.

Things I Would Like to Be

If I wasn't what I am now, in no particular order:

1. GNCC ATV Racer


2. A handy man. You know, some guy who fixes just about anything to do with houses without ripping people off.


3. Owner of a miniature golf course, called Andyland.


4. ATV/Motorcycle mechanic.


5. Sanitation Engineer. The guy who gets to ride on the back of the garbage truck is a lucky man. So why does he always look so unhappy?


6. Cartoonist or comic strip guy.


7. Brewer. Patriot. Like Samuel Adams.


8. Civil Engineer. What boy doesn't want to build bridges and tunnels?


9. UPS Driver. Any job where you get to drive with your door open is cool with me.


10. Late Night Talk Show Host. I could totally do a better job than Jimmy Kimmel.


11. Oops. I meant to keep the list to ten... Major League Baseball player.

Fabulous Movie Reviews

Four Brothers
Four brothers (by adoption) avenge their mother's death. Marky Mark stars as the "head" brother. This is a great movie, although I still don't quite understand why the mother was murdered. The plot moved well and it didn't have (m)any "what the?? thats stupid!" moments. There were some touching moments, some good action sequences, a plot twist, a few surprises and a guy sitting on a crapper, you know, all the stuff that goes into making a good movie. There was occasional overacting by a few of the characters, but nothing that made me cringe.

My wife and I played no games during the viewing of Four Brothers. Sorry.

I give this movie 3 5/8 stars out of 5.


Spanglish
Is it weird to see Adam Sandler in this kind of movie? Yes. I loved Punch Drunk Love, which Sandler was also in, and I loved (well, somewhere between liked and loved, maybe, really really liked) this movie too.

Sandlers character, John Clasky, is a very successful chef with a psycho wife, an alcoholic MIL, two kids, and a Mexican maid who also has a daughter. Hilarity ensues. Oh wait no, DRAMA ensues. Its still a good movie though. It'll make you cry too. No, I kid, although, the sandwich Clasky made at one point during the movie did, because I realized I would never ever be able to eat something so delicious in my life.

Again, no games, but this is good, because I could concentrate more on the movie allowing me to give it 3 7/16 stars out of 5.

Heads of Fiddle

If you are like me, then you have seen these in the stores for years, wondered what the heck they were, but never bothered or forgot to look up what they were once you got home.

The other day my wife and I were walking and I saw new ferns sprouting on the side of the road and I said to her that they look a lot like those fiddlehead thingies that they sell at the grocery store. She, like a lot of the time, had no idea what I was talking about and just humored me. That moment I reached a turning point in my life. No longer was I going to continue through life wallowing in my own fiddlehead ignorance.

Today I looked them up and sure enough they ARE baby ferns. This begs the age old question to be asked yet again, who was the first person to ever eat these and what prompted them to do so?

Next time I am at Hannaford I am going to buy a jar.

Another link

My Fabulous Artwork

Sad Vegan Dog by Gagknee

From the Mountains of Tibet

I saw one of these Kawasaki Sherpas today on the street. I became slightly jealous because it looked like a lot of fun. I've always wanted a dual sport motorcycle because of the ease at which you can go from one trail system to the next or to be able to take a "hybrid" route home from work, half street and half trail.

Yes, Big A, I already know you think dual sports suck because they don't do street or trail riding particularly well.

More VeeDub

Do you know the difference between speed metal, black metal and death metal? No? Well, VeeDub would be happy to explain if only you would ask.

Her favorite band is Manowar, which I find funny because AllMusic.com classifies them as power metal...

Fabulous Movie Review

Ok. Um. Where to begin. If your idea of a good movie is one of Steven Seagal's recent "straight to DVD" pieces of crap*, then you may want to skip this one.

The main character, David Spritz, played by Nicholas Cage, hates who he is, doesn't get any respect and is really quite pathetic. The kind of character Cage plays the best. He spends most of the movie agonizing over how lame being a weather man is, trying to connect on some level with his kids, and pining over his ex wife.

This movie, while not technically a comedy (ok, maybe it is), also made me laugh out loud many times. From the camel toe jokes to Spritz getting pelted with fast food by passing motorists to many good quotes which I will not repeat here.

I'm sure The Weather Man has a deeper "meaning" than what I got out of it. Frankly, I don't care about analyzing the "meaning" of a movie though. Unless it involves Clint, a gun, and a cigar, of course.

In the end, Spritz, after a deep conversation with his dad where dad says, "In this life, you have to chuck some things", accepts the fact that he is a weather man. Which I think is symbolic for another man is sleeping with your wife and living with your family. Or maybe not. The final line in the movie where he comes to this realization is pretty good too.

One of the best parts about The Weather Man is that I beat my wife twice in Battleship. Twice.

All in all, a pretty funny movie which earns 2.834 stars out of 5.

*I probably shouldn't call anything that I haven't actually seen a piece of crap, but I feel pretty safe in this instance using my distinctly human ablities of reason and logic to arrive at this conclusion.

White Water Adventure

My brothers and a couple of friends went canoeing on Salmon Falls Road (yes, you read that right, road) on Tuesday. They capsized and got caught in the current.

My Fabulous Artwork

Angry Vegan Dog by Gagknee

VeeDub's Dogs

She got new dogs apparently. They peed in her bed and she told us that its because they have separation anxiety. I said they are just mean. Later I told Evil One they peed in her bed because they are tired of eating vegan dog food.

Visitors

We have family staying with us, specifically my mother, brother and sister, because they live on Salmon Falls Road in Somersworth which is closed.

Last night as I was falling asleep, I heard what I thought were noises outside. Growling noises I guess. To my overactive imagination it sounded like the bear, Ben, from Grizzly Adams. You know, when they would talk to each other. We've had bears before and I desperately want to capture them on camera.

Unfortunately, nothing was out there when I peered out my window so I sadly plopped myself back down on the pillow.

Later on, I realized that the noise I heard was my mother snoring in the next room.

Not Another Dam Photo

Just a river, the Isinglass where it meets 202 in Barrington.

































And, of course, some videos:

Video 1

Video 2

Video 3

Video 4

Bellamy Dam

Pretty lame considering.

I have a problem

Have you ever had a problem where the more you think of it and try not to do it, the more you do?

Yeah, me too. It involves the English language and if you've read this blog or had the privilege or receiving personal email from me you've probably witnessed it.

I screw up words that sound the same (or almost the same) but are spelled different.

There, they're, their

Where, wear

Your, you're

Even, no and know

Sadly, I KNOW the right way to use each word. I think its just my brain playing jokes on me. Or karma, for making fun of so many people.

Update:

Hear, here
Write, right

5950

Not the name of the new Van Halen album or the title of a movie set in the future where women rule the planet and all men are castrated at age 13, except for a select few who are used for breeding, and forced to work in sulfur mines deep under the earth, but the total cost of the gas I purchased this morning, $59.50.

I was really empty. Really empty. The only gas left in the vehicle by the time I made it to Irving was in the fuel lines, empty. This is proven by the fact that I have an 18 gallon tank in my truck but I managed to squeeze 20.244 gallons into it. Amazing.

In Other News

I also locked my keys in my truck this morning requiring me to excercise my AAA member benefits. This is the 2nd time in little over a month. Tomorrow, I promise that I will march down to the hardware store and request 4 spare keys. One for my wife, one to keep in my desk at work, one to hang on the key rack at home, and one to attach to the truck in a secret location.

The tools that the wrecker guys use to unlock your vehicle are cool too. A wedge, a lever and an air bladder. I have to get me some of those too. The only problem is I would keep them in my truck.

Dam Flood

From your favorite dam photographer.

You can look at pictures of what this dam normally looks like here and here.































And several videos:

Video 1

Video 2

Video 3

Video 4

Video 5

Kip Journal 2/8/1999 and 2/10/1999

Back when he used to work for the geological company, kip used to ride his bike 10 miles a day with 100 pounds of equipment on his back. "YOU WANNA TALK ABOUT BEING IN GOOD SHAPE!"

Back when he was lifting, Kip could bench press more than most people could lift with their legs.

Kip once did 700 pounds on the squatting machine, he would have done more but he couldn't fit anymore plates.

Kip had two roomates in college who were arrested in Jamaica for sleeping on the beach. they spent 2 days in jail, and the american consulate brought them cigarettes.

When Kip first started using the internet, it was nothing but telnet and ftp.

I Love Comics

And for whatever reason, I have had a hard time finding good online comics.

Really, the only ones that I have found (that I like) are Savage Chickens and Andertoons .

But NOW I found Tapestry Comics which is exactly what I was looking for.

Joel on Software

The Development Abstraction Layer

I used to look at this site a lot a few years ago and I just rediscovered it today by looking at Bloglines Top 200 Feeds. I found this article very poignant because it echoes closely what the developers (all two of us) go through here.

Don't get me wrong, I like my job, especially compared to my last one, but is too much to ask that we not be stuck in a room with 9 other very loud customer care people who constantly interrupt us all day with their questions?

Is it too much to ask that the room that we spend 9 hours a day in be kept at a temperature less than 80?

Could we have at least one person who could test our code after we write it? Because anyone who has ever programmed before knows, its pretty difficult to break your own code. Subconcsciously we just can't do it.

The whole air conditioner portion of this article made me laugh because last summer they finally bought us a new window unit, but it was so freakin' hot out we couldn't wait 2 weeks for the maintenance guy to put it in so me and the other guy assembled it and put it in ourselves. It must have been a funny sight to any onlookers on the street seeing me, all arms and legs, hanging out of a third story window, 60 feet above pavement, adjusting the levelers.

The most angry I have ever been, I think, was the day I came in last fall and the maintenance guy had taken the AC out for the winter and I wasn't allowed to put it back in. It actually hit 83 degrees in here one day. In the dead of winter. And I don't think the temperature ever got below 80 until I put the AC back in a couple of weeks ago. We opened the windows every day, but the cubicle walls actually do a great job of preventing air circulation.

And lastly, this is us:

"You've got your typical company started by ex-software salesmen, where everything is Sales Sales Sales and we all exist to drive more sales. These companies can be identified in the wild because they build version 1.0 of the software (somehow) and then completely lose interest in developing new software. Their development team is starved or nonexistent because it never occurred to anyone to build version 2.0... all that management knows how to do is drive more sales."

Yeah. The .NET conversion we had been planning on doing this summer for over a year has now been pushed back. Actually, no, it hasn't been pushed back. We are expected to do both, continued enhancement to the old while building the new and any changes we make to the old need to be incorporated into the new. Redundant programming. Gotta love it.

I am no primadonna and honestly I'd much rather be driving a tractor in the burning sun, but since that doesn't pay well and I am stuck here, is it too much to ask that the room I am in is cool and quiet?

Softball Season

Ok. I take back what I said previously, "This softball season is not going to be as fun as the last three."

I apologize for being depressed and letting my emotions run wild.

Of course, it doesn't hurt that we beat our archrivals last night and our team looks pretty stinkin' good.