Natural Born Storm Chasers

As I posted yesterday, Janine and I visited my parents. We had not been up there since our engagement, and it's always good to see them. We all had a good time and dad made barbecue ribs and homemade mashed potatoes. Can't get better than that.

That afternoon it started to get dark and windy. We both remember our younger days on the eastern shore and figured we were in for a whale of a storm. It blew over pretty quick, but the rain was falling sideways, trees were leaning over, it wasn't a pretty picture. So Dad and I do what we normally do when this happens..

Turn into a couple of Lookie Lou's!

Our neighbor lost a big tree. In fact he almost lost his new car if another tree didn't support the uprooted oak. The roads were covered in debris, and it looked like a small tornado hit, but there were no calls of one, and nobody had any damaged property that we could tell.

So we headed back home thinking the worst had past. After unwinding for a couple hours we went to bed and I almost got to sleep when BOOM, thunder started rumbling and I woke up to find the room in a steady flash of light. I think for a straight hour we had an intense rain and electrical storm rivaling only one other that I had experienced in Lynchburg several years ago.

The noise, the rain, along with the loss of power kept me up all night. I'm functioning today but barely. I can remember living off three hours of sleep in college. There is no way on earth I can do that now. We both made plans for tonight. Eat dinner then go straight to bed!

Crab Cakes and Crab Grass

So what's new?

Nothing's new. It's summertime. The past few years, Janine and I work through the summer in anticipation of taking a week around Labor Day. While we both work, our schedules keep us pretty much at home. So there really hasn't been anything worth writing about unfortunately. The days we're both off are spent recharging for the next work week, or going into town. We are still so excited about how nice things are in north Richmond/east Henrico.

I am taking enjoying my time in the kitchen more. I'm thinking about posting some of my creations on here or on my YouTube page. I haven't decided what yet. I'll post more about that later. I really should be focusing on the yard work, but I have pretty much given up. There's still too much catching up to do from the years of neglect, so I'm going to hire a landscaper to get me to square one. I have nothing but dead leaves, moss, sticks, dead plants, and the only green I have is the crab grass.

We both begin weight loss and wedding planning in earnest starting now. We set a date in October, 2010. It seems far off, but it will come quickly and we need the time to prepare. I'm really looking forward to finally being able to find that peace of mind that comes with finding your soul mate. I couldn't be happier. I feel really fortunate and blessed.

I'm looking forward to spending the day with my parents. The drive isn't bad at all really. It's good to see miles and miles of countryside now and again. The urban jungle is still for me, but one has to escape it once in a while and Warsaw's about as quiet a place on this planet as any.

I'm working on an article that I'll be posting this week, so keep an eye open, especially if you, like me are in the market for a smart phone.

Late to the Technorati Party

pmv3xhwbfd is a code of righteousness required by Technorati.

I've had my blog since 2004. I never really cared to see how it fared in the bloggersphere, but I figured now is just as good a time as any. That's all, nothing else to see here, unless you want to entertain me by leaving a funny comment or anecdote.

Or send money. I like money. Who doesn't like money?

Leveraging Six Out of Seven

I decided months ago, that I wanted to catch the midnight early showing of the new Harry Potter movie. Not so much because I'm some crazed fan, but I wanted to see it with people that were.

I'm learning that half of the movie going experience for me is feeding off the audience around me. What made The Dark Knight such a great movie last year apart from it being brilliantly played was the enthusiastic audience.

So I decided to take the day off so Janine and I could catch the midnight showing. It's funny when I realized as I predicted that we would be surrounded by teenagers that have grown up to this series. I was reminded how I grew up watching the Star Wars series in my youth. It's funny watching these kids now. They network in  more diverse circles, they utilize tech to some degree mostly via texts and Facebook. I remember having a telephone in my room.

The movie was really good. It's way too early I think to give any kind of spoiler free review, but I would give it 3 1/2 out of 4 stars. It was almost perfect. Almost, I'll discuss where it fell short at a later time.

Another reason for taking the day off besides desperately needing a break from the mountain of work is to catch Leverage tonight with Janine. If there was one show made for her, it's Leverage. The good guys are bad guys that bring justice to good guys by getting even with the really bad guys. That has to be one of the better made shows on cable and also recommended.

So that's my summer entertainment wrap up and advise. If it's a good enough movie, go watch it with the crazy die hard lunatics, they're just more fun.

Our New Toy

My desktop computer was going on nine this year. If anything she was a rugged machine, sputtering with it's 1.0 Pentium 3 processor, 512mb of memory. I can remember not too long ago it was top of the line. I thought I was awesome with my 17" CRT monitor.

Janine and I agreed we needed something with a lot more horsepower if we're to play games, do proper desktop computing, and we needed a new and stable hub for our photos, videos, music, etc. I also wanted to get a computer now so I could take advantage of the free Windows 7 upgrade this fall and try out Vista while it still exists. One day I know it will be a thing of legend and I wanted to be a part of that.

So we decided to go ahead and purchase an HP similar to the picture. It's got features that we need like a 500gb hard drive, 5gb memory, Vista 64 bit OS, and a 2.8ghz processor. I'm still most impressed with the monitor. It's a fully HD ready 24 inch monitor. We're both still "wowing" the real estate we have on this screen to open a browser, open a media player, and still have room for the sidebar if we need it.

It's a sweet machine. I can just imagine having something like this 10 years ago! So I'm very happy and very thankful Janine helped me get it. Half the fun for a geek like me is transferring files and trying to break the operating system. So far Vista has run flawlessly for me. I've been able to attach all my old hardware with no problems and I'm yet to experience a glitch, crash, or have to reboot.

Except for updates, that will probably never change, but when rebooting takes as much time as leaning over to pick something off the floor, I don't mind a bit.

Lame Pick of the Week

It looks like everyone's gotten the word and have moved to Facebook. Even the dim witted, poorly educated, masses that turned MySpace into a den of stupidity have made their way over.

I try not to judge and I try not to lose faith in humanity, but Lamebook is one of those sites that make it very difficult to have a positive outlook on our upright fellow citizens. Lamebook allows users to submit their friend's poor grammar, lack of good common sense, or just good old fashioned trailer park trash behavior.

The most ironic feature of all is that it's user submitted. So often times the poster is just as 'lame' as the postee. But it's one of those sites where you laugh and you feel that we're doomed all at the same time. Isn't that what the internet is all about?

July Around the Yard

 

The crazy peeping cardinal is back!

 

He's got reason to make noise though. Upright, walking cats.

 

First 4th of July at the house. Hope everyone has a safe and fun holiday.

Hate Speech 2.0

I don't get on my political soapbox very much and mostly because my circle of friends and I don't agree much in this realm. I've always been a 'live and let live' kind of person especially when dealing with such a dirty and unfair topic.

No one at this point really knows why Sarah Palin has stepped down at this point. There could be looming political scandal, she could just be a quitter, she may have aspirations to run for federal office and need to begin the daunting task of unseating someone who knows he can do no wrong by 60% of our population at any time.

I know Palin is a polarizing figure. Everyone has a strong opinion on her and where she stands. So with the new and exciting, up to date, real time news breaking from social media, I thought I'd take a visit to Twitter to see what people are saying. Let's take a look (I am not giving these people the dignity if revealing their names..just cutting and pasting their posts):

Sarah Palin is a moron.

Just leave and shut up!!!!!!!!!

 What a maroon.

Sarah Palin, the moral matriarch moron...

 Sarah Palin decision not to seek re-erection as guv of Alaska

Sarah Palin can resign from the human race as far as I'm concerned...

too bad she dumber than a cocaine dealer on acid.

SARAH PALIN IS A GOOFBALL!

That woman is inept and inhumane.

GOD she's a dunce!

It does seem though that the prevailing opinion is that she's a relief from the endless Michael Jackson coverage, but that's just plain understood just by watching any of these media outlets on television. But that's another topic to be covered by a million other people, at any given time.


I tend to take the fourth theory as to why she's resigning. Intolerance and hatred. She had hinted that she's tired of constantly having to defend her family from cruel remarks to them or even her youngest child who suffers from down syndrome. We as Americans claim to have taken so many steps towards progressive politics and equal rights out of one sides of our mouths, but then turn around and spill hatred, intolerance, and ignorance towards someone of a different political standpoint with the other side of our mouths.



The day is done when this intolerance will be seen as cool or acceptable. It is time that we all, no matter what our stance is with our political leaders, to state our differences in a mature manner and stop resorting to vilifying or demonizing people just because they have traditional conservative beliefs. 

The same goes for chastising someone for being a progressive thinker. I think all this green talk is a waste, for instance, but I won't call a person that believes in it as a moron, or stupid. We are all Americans and we are all citizens of the world and we all have a right to disagree. So I guess I really just have one point:

Grow up and learn some respect.