tsuehpsyde.com

Yes, you read right, healthier. As in, being more self aware of my choices. It’s new and not normal, but I’m surviving. Try not to be too shocked.

So basically, here’s the run down. I’d been feeling sorta blah in general. Hard to explain, but blah none the less. Didn’t feel like doing much, but I knew I had to. I’m 23, going on 24 here in a handful of months, and if I’m going to get into shape again, now is the time. As many of you know, back when I was 19, I dropped down from 270lbs to 180lbs in about 3 months. I did this the ‘really bad way’, by basically not eating. Marlboros and bottled water were my diet for almost 90 days, and it did indeed get the intended results. I leveled off about 205lbs and was happy there, and I stayed there for awhile. I was at 210 or 215 when I moved out of my apartment due to reasons out of my control and moved in with my grandparents for, oh, I want to say 3-6 months. I don’t remember, but in that time I was up to 235lbs (Grandmas have a way of insisting you eat way more than you should). At this point I was still pretty mindful of my portions, but my Grandma sort of helped me break that habit. Damn you, delicious Grandma food!

The nail in the coffin for me was moving to Texas. I moved down here, had home cooked meals, and had a decent job for the first time in, well, forever. I was able to eat out regularly and I took full advantage. Also, being busy as crap with work, I’d eat fast food WAY more than I’d like to think about. Breakfast (on the way, waking up late), for lunch obviously, and for dinner since I worked 12 hour shifts. The long days made it rough to get actual meals in, and shopping would sometimes go to waste since I’d never get around to eating before it would spoil. All the more reason I didn’t shop.

A year and a half later, and my ass was up to 280lbs again. Yikes! People always say I don’t “look the weight”, and I hear it a lot, but I’m not sure if it’s something they tell the fat guy to make him feel better. I may hold my weight well, I may not, but I gave up my concern for other peoples’ notions of what I looked like years ago after being a skinny guy for a good year+. If that experience taught me anything, it’s that your weight really doesn’t matter as much as you think it does. It still does ‘hold some weight’ (pun!) on how people look at you, but not the majority. I just want to be happy with how I look and feel about my current situation.

I decided that I was not happy and needed to do something about it.

Also, these decisions are always hard to make. It’s easy to stand on a rock and say “I am man, hear me roar!” but when you fail to roar and let out more of a meow, people are quick to remind you of this. AKA, when you try and fail, it sucks when people remind you. It sucks enough when you visit your family and all they can do is remind you of how fat you’ve gotten in Texas. Yes, I know, I thought about it the entire time before I came to visit, no, you’re not the first person to tell me. Amazingly, my family were the only people to bust my chops over gaining weight in Texas (No, ‘everything must be bigger in Texas’ is not original, nor witty, try again). All my friends were just glad to see me. Ahh, how nice that would be to feel welcomed home for me and not my appearance.

Anyway, I basically started being more healthy and didn’t try to hide it. Generally, when I go for a new venture, I try to go about it solo and not tell anyone, just in case I revert (back to the whole told ya so stuff). However, when people see you abruptly change habits, it’s hard to explain past saying you’re changing your habits. Like, for example, I started back up smoking again in Texas. Stress mixed with extra money is the main culprit to that nasty problem, but I decided awhile ago that I was going to quit again, and this time not let excuses be the reason I start up again. I’ve always turned to smokes when I get blisteringly stressed out or pissed to calm me down, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to learn to deal with things on my own and not through cigarettes. I think I bought a pack over some stress maybe 3-4 months ago? I dunno, but I remember saying “You know what, no more.” and I threw the pack away. I think I smoked 2 cigarettes from the pack. I haven’t had one since, and this blog post is really my first big “woot” about that really. I know Donnie from work asked me if I had quit on Saturday when I was by the office with Ralph, but I hadn’t really thought about it. Either way, I’m back to the point of ‘ugh, cigarettes smell like garbage’, which is where I was the last time I’ve quit. I’ve had some stressful moments and gotten over them by either working on something else, or going for a walk. For those interested, you’d be surprised how going for a walk helps calm you down/help you not want a smoke. Also, walking after a meal (usually dinner) has the same calming effect as an after-dinner smoke. I can once again breathe in a full, deep breath and it not hurt, so I’m pretty sure my lungs are happier now (if you’re a smoker, try this, it’ll hurt). The biggest step to actually quitting, especially when you work with smokers, is turning down the offer for a free single.

So smoking is out. Waste of money, jacks up your lungs, makes you smell, yeah…I heard all this before but never really cared until recently. Funny how that works.

So, the next step in this mantra was giving up soda (pop to those of you reading this from the great, white north). Soda is bad, bad bad. My God I hadn’t realized how not good this crap was for you until recently. So, I started going after what I ate and I didn’t care about ingredients, carbs, etc., I just looked at calories. Nice, easy number to go buy. Like MHz on a processor, it’s not all the same, but it’s a good reference point for someone who knows very little about nutrition. 150 calories per can. 150! I usually drank like 2-3 cans PER MEAL in a day. So, maximum enjoyment, that’s 900 calories from Dr. Pepper or Coca-Cola alone. Again, holy crap! For the record, you want to aim for somewhere around 2,000 calories in a day. It differs depending on your height/weight and if you’re trying to lose or maintain weight. Your body burns X amount of calories a day, so you want to eat less than that to lose (obviously). But holy crap, that plus whatever I was eating for lunch (fast food, burgers, chinese, etc) we can see where the ol’ belly came from. Jeez! So I figured step #1 was cutting out soda 95% of the way, and allowing it like once a week or something on special occasion (like an outing to an excellent burger place on a weekend night or something).

I won’t lie, this wasn’t easy at all. I grew up with soda (yes pop, shut it lol) in my house my entire life more or less. Always soda, always in cases, never ran out. It was like a magical soda machine, that fridge. So, I grew up with soda as a staple, when others were used to juices or water. Water! Hah. The water in the house where I grew up tasted like ass. Ugh. I can say that if I actually sat down and figured out how much I actually drank water at home, it’s probably a frighteningly low figure that I don’t even want to think about. Almost never comes to mind. So, milk was my breakfast staple (or anytime really, <3 the milk) and soda went with anything lunch/dinner related. Burgers? Soda! Chinese? Soda! Pasta? Soda! My palette was trained to have soda with everything and the thought of only having water seemed foreign and down right kinda gross. I always thought people who got water were just cheap. And they may be.

However, I did it. The first week was just….strange. I had to force myself to do it to be quite honest. I wanted to grab a soda so bad during my lunch breaks at work, but I persisted with my ice water, and eventually pulled through. Oh, and for the record, we have free soda at work, so this is also a contributor to the ‘ol belly. But now, I actually prefer water with my meals. Imagine that! Certain stuff I totally want a soda with (burgers and steak, primarily), but home made food or pasta, chinese, etc., I enjoy a nice glass of ice water. And once you’re past the soda funk, water is actually way more refreshing. Who woulda thunkit.

Also, beyond the soda being cut out, I also now mind my portions. I eat breakfast every day (because if you don’t eat breakfast, your metabolism is slowed for the rest of the day, bad), but it’s a healthy breakfast. Usually plain Cheerios or Kix with 1% milk, maybe some OJ if I have it. Lunch, unless I go home and make a sammich, I’ll get like Panda Express and just have a normal double entree with rice and water. Or if I go anywhere and get food, I get a normal sized thing. No triple entree, no super size, no biggie, none of it. Just the base size will do just fine. Dinner I try to eat at home, generally turkey/roast beef sammiches, chicken, whatever. Mixed with Sun Chips or 100-150 calorie pack of doritos maybe, depends. Usually down it with water, or if I want something more flavorful, Fresca or Gatorade (Gatorade isn’t great for you, but better than soda).

So where has it gotten me? I started the food thing about, oh, 3-4 weeks ago maybe? I really don’t know. But I’ve dropped roughly 8-10lbs I think, and yesterday morning I clocked in at 272 lbs. Woot! It’s nice to see actual results in the form of the scale. I also think my belly looks a little better, but that could also just be my mind, dunno. I don’t think atm I look ‘fat’, just bigger. But if I keep this up, I should be down to my target weight hopefully by year’s end. if not, I should at least be slimmer.

Benefits so far? I’ve been walking Lee (Barbara’s dog) on occasion for her and before this, it was surprising rough on me the first few times. Not even a long walk, but it kicked my ass a bit. I think the Texas heat has something to do with this, but not entirely. Now, I can walk Lee and I don’t think about it like ‘wow this is rough’, it’s just walking, like it should be (like it was not long ago). I also actually enjoy walking now, I find it relaxing. Smoking smells like complete shit and I have no desire to do that, so that’s a plus, and I’m able to manage my stress a bit better. I’m still me, still bold, still too much of a mouth on me for my own good sometimes, but I can deal with stress w/o the Marlboros. And when it comes to eating, well, I had Whataburger today since I was in a rush and it was a rootbeer + burger and fries and my God, it kicked my ass! My system was not happy about that at all.

Barbara also helped kick start this off, and no, not because I want to slim down and be ‘the mega sexy’. I already have heard you people saying this, not true. She’s actually a good inspiration because she herself is a bit of a health guru and has all sorts of ideas/recommendations to replace things with, and so far, they’ve all been good. I’m trying some more of them tomorrow morning as a matter of fact, and we’ll see how that goes. She cooks a lot, and avoids certain ingredients, and has a lot of substitutions for things to help you stay healthier. She also loves outdoors stuff and biking, so again, great influence there. I may try to get a bike again for that very reason, since I’d have someone to bike with and I really do miss bike riding (but I need to trim up hardcore before I try that again haha). But I have a new iPod Shuffle to walk with, so I’m going to try and walk daily if I can, even if I don’t have someone to walk with. Hopefully that’ll eventually turn into bike rides (some nice back roads around where I live currently for this).

Okay, so this is way longer than I expected and I need to shower/pass out. I just thought I’d post up here so everyone knew that I was on the warpath to drop the belly again. However, this time I’m doing it the healthy way, so hopefully it pays off. I’ll try to update as the scale gives me a lower number.

So, another weekend, more chillin’ with friends and just hangin’ out. It’s nice to be able to relax after a long week’s work. There’s always stuff that needs done at work, so it’s good to put in 100% while I’m there, then get to go home and just disconnect and relax/get stuff done. I try to keep up with the menial crap during the week now that I get outta work around 6PM (usually ends up being 6:30PM) and can check my mail, organize, go shopping if need be, etc. Before, when I was in DCO, I’d work until 9PM or midnight, so that pretty much killed your day. I must say, I very much prefer my current schedule.

So this weekend started out fairly normal. Friday night I got a call from Barbara saying that her and Holly were going to be watching the first Chronicles of Narnia and wanted to know if I wanted to come over. Like you have to ask me twice. =P I brought over my laptop since it’s widescreen and the speakers are louder and we enjoyed that into the wee hours of the night until the girls crashed and I walked back over to my apartment. I think we squeezed a show or two in there before calling it a night.

Saturday, I got up and headed off to get my hairs cut. I’d decided that I was tired of the spike (I’ve had it for a long time now, not sure exactly how long, but at least 4 years or something, probably more) so I went for the shorter, thinned out forward facing hair again. While Simone was choppin’ up the hairs, I got a text from Barbara asking if I was awake (lol), followed by a text telling me that Seinfeld was coming to town! w00t! We’d talked about this a good long while ago…she mentioned that she was watching friends on DVD, and I mentioned that they were good, but I never watched them since I was more of a Seinfeld person myself. She was like ‘omg me too!’ and she went on about how she saw him downtown a number of years ago. I told her that if he came into town again, we’d both ahve to go and see him. Talk about good timing. So I got home from the hair cutting and tried to track down ticket locations/pricing online. I didn’t have much success, so I called up Barbara who either called or ordered on the phone (not exactly sure), and managed to snag us three tickets sitting together (Holly, Barbara and I). We still have no idea where we’re sitting, but we have tickets!

After that, I came home and chilled for a bit, and Barbara text’d me saying she’d invite me over to hang and watch The Office, but she hadn’t showered and wasn’t presentable, etc. After calling her bluff, I went over and chilled for the better part of the afternoon. She didn’t stink, btw. We ordered Chinese delivery (this is the definition of vegging, btw, Chinese + The Office) for lunch and all basically enjoyed ourselves until church @ 6. After church, we made plans to go to the ‘ghetto theater’ , which is sorta ghetto-like, but not too bad. All of the movies are $2, and on Thursday I think they’re $1. Ridiculous! It was the only place in town still showing the new Narnia, and it was mega cheap. Note that Holly had not seen the 1st one, so that’s why we saw that on Friday. Before going to the movies, however, we decided to go to the Longhorn Care on Blanco.

Now, I had heard of the Longhorn Cafe for some time, but never went there. My God, the food is ridiculous! It’s great, but wow, you’d better come hungry. I was still feelin’ the Chinese from lunch, so I couldn’t finish my food. Lee got the left-overs, so it wasn’t a lost cause, but I’m coming hungry the next time. Protip: Order the small tater tots. Seriously, the large is enough for 3-4 people. I got it so me and Barbara could split it, but yeah, we didn’t even eat half of them.

So after tapping out at the Longhorn Cafe, we caught the late showing of Narnia. It wasn’t too crowded and it wasn’t loud either, so all in all I’d say it worked out rather nicely. I also found out that I have a small brain and am ‘narrow minded’, hence why I do not like ‘chick flicks’. I’d have to disagree and simply state that my narrow field of vision simply stays on the correct path, and I just don’t waste my time on the frivolous ones with poopy movies, but Barbara strongly disagrees. Imagine that.

And Sunday, well, typical Sunday. I cleaned, went and washed the Volvo my hand (automatic car washes only do so much), and researched ways to dry my car. I want a genuine chamois, but I can’t track any down locally. And no, the “Absorber” is not the same, I’ve used them, do not like them. I also need to find something to clean my wheels with, since this car’s wheels get dirrrrrrrty. After cleaning the car, I did laundry for the week, ate something @ home in there, and went through the big ol’ pile of clothes beside my bed. Since I moved to Texas and got comfortable (read: got big), I basically decided to outgrow my clothes. Stupid Texas sized portions. Anyway, I had a bunch of clothes just laying around that were doing me no good, and even though I’m eating better now and slowly losing a few pounds here and there, I’m not like in mega-turbo-drop-weight mode (I’ve mainly started eating slightly smaller portions and cut out 85% of my soda intake). That said, I figured I’d just drop off my clothes at some place that takes clothes for people that need them and call it a day. I figure if I lose weight, I can celebrate by going on a shopping spree (always fun when it’s for smaller clothes, sadly I’ve only had that joy once). I managed to give away two full trash bags of clothes (hoodies, shirts, etc.) and I think four pair of pants. I forget the name of the place, but it’s up on Bitters and Huebner. Barbara recommended them as the Goodwill places apparently are the name brand of ‘give away stuff’, and usually have more than enough stuff. I woulda just thrown the stuff away, so as long as it went to a good cause, I didn’t much care. And no, I didn’t need a receipt to show I did a good thing. :p I’m a Democrat, I actually help people without requiring a tax break.

And after running that stuff down, I grabbed a coffee and the two of us hung out for about an hour and a half going over pictures of her mission trip down in Chiapas, Mexico. It’s definitely like a totally different world down there, and I was glad to see the pictures and hear the stories from when they were there.

Oh, and my good friend Ralph from the Air Force came in Town Saturday, and we were going to hang out on Sunday, but he had to report in on Sunday. He thought he had some free time, but apparently not. No worries, however. He got ahold of me on Sunday and let me know that he was going to be at the airport early next Saturday, and that I could swing by and get him, and we could chill for a little bit, then I could run him back before he had to leave. I just found out today that he should be in around 7AM and has to fly out around noon, so I’m looking around for something for us to do. Either way, it’ll be good to see him before he leave for Iraq.

Well, off to get some more relaxin’ in before tomorrow. At some point I have to attack this stupid filing cabinet, but mark my words, I’m going to kick that thing’s ass. It’s the last thing I have to do to get things presentable. Well, that, and go through my closet and decide what boxes/things to throw out to free up some room so I can use my closet for clothes and towels, etc. instead of using my loveseat for such tasks.

Ahhh, yes. Sunday. The day of “I don’t have to do anything” and I am trying to maximize that as much as possible. I’ve been running around a lot lately, so I got the stuff done that I needed to get done early so I could enjoy the latter part of the day and do nothing. I may go disc golfing tonight if I get in touch with Nate, but meh, we’ll see. I’ve got a CamelBak now, so nothing can stop me now!

Oh, so yeah, it has been a good while since I updated, so what’s new with me? Lots really. A few weeks ago I finally did something I’ve been wanting to do for a looooong time, go hiking. Yes, I know, I hear the groans and sighs already. I’m a big guy (again) and yes, big people aren’t exactly the ‘hiking type’, but I LOVE the outdoors and always will. I don’t really have it at my disposal as much as I did up north (my Grandma Bair’s house has a great woods/river area behind it, park in Greenville, lots of areas to just explore, friends with quads and woods, etc.), but I do enjoy the quiet and beauty of the outdoors. That, and you generally only run into similar individuals when hiking. Of course, Barbara is super outdoorsy, so she’s the one who got me to go. She also got me a CamelBak so I wouldn’t die (you rock! dual use gifts rule! boomerang or not ), and I had a lot of fun. The name of the park we went to escapes me at the moment (she can comment it if she ever figures out how to haha), but it’s out by the Paladium by I-10 and 1604. Barbara, her friend and I (proper grammar!) all hiked it and had a blast. It was everything I could hope for. Lots of up and downs, saw lots of big people there too so I didn’t feel weird, and we even saw Randy from the trailer park boys! Celebs even need to work off those cheeseburgers. Afterwords I believe we went to Chester’s for burgers? Regardless of where we went, they were delicious.

Oh, and to bounce back a bit since my mind is jumping all over, speaking of the Paladium, it is now my new favorite place to see movies. Why you ask? Well besides getting a picture of Barbara intimidating The Hulk there, and it being an iMax theater, they have a bar on the second floor! So needless to say, when I went to see Wall-E with Barbara, I sorta got a little drunk lol. Good times. Apparently I missed some cute part when my bladder got the best of me. Oh well, just an excuse to see it again when it hits the dollar theater. Then after seeing Wall-E, I went to Clicks across the street, which was fun. Barbara knows one of the ladies there and she used to bartend herself, so I guess I felt more comfortable there with someone who knew the atmosphere well. I guess I avoid situations where I know I’ll stand out like sore thumb. We played pool, and Barbara completely kicked my ass. I was drunk, which totally didn’t help, but I was trying and failed miserably. Game, set, match. Then we went to another place called Charlie Brown’s to eat and get more drinks, and sing along to some songs. All in all, I had a blast, and it was a great way to turn around what would have been a horrible weekend. Barbara’s good at doing that.

The fun continued with the week after that when we had a Product Engineering summit at work. Basically, all of the people from PE at Peer1 stopped by San Antonio for a week to go over various stuff (something we generally do once a year), and it was a huge help for me. I was able to put faces to names, and learn some peoples’ personalities first hand. As Barbara says, we were ‘pampered’ since we basically had dinner downtown two nights in a row, one of those nights we went to the Blue Star to get drunk, then went downtown for Paesanos for dinner haha. Pampered, yeah, I suppose, but that word sounds too foo-foo. Taken care of is how I would word it. Then our two remote team members from ATL and MIA stayed an extra week so we could go over some stuff and present some powerpoint presentations about various systems we work on (NDA, no info for you!). During their stay, we all got together and did what Texas men do: We shot guns! Three of us brought our handguns and Joe brought his rifle, and we all had a blast. Kelsey even managed to convince a guy at the range to let him shoot his musket lol. I’m sure that’ll be some amusing story telling when he gets back to Atlanta. Also, they reminded me about how awesome breakfast tacos are. I remember being as excited as they were when I first got here. They truly are an amazing thing if you’ve never lived with them (as my PA self can attest to).

So hmm, for today. I had to get some errands done, so I went ahead stopped by Petsmart to find biodegradable doggy bags (which I found! second time’s a charm!), then to HEB to get some groceries. Then, I rounded up the trash and took that out for the day. I’m debating getting my car washed, but meh, I might just wait until next weekend. I think I’ve decided that automatic car washes just aren’t doing it, and I don’t have the patience in this Texas heat with no shade to try and wash my car in the apartment complex’s parking lot. I also don’t really trust any of the local ‘drop your car off’ places, since they generally do a ‘meh’ job from what I’ve experienced. I may just go to that one carwash on Blanco that just opened and use their self service stuff (vacuums and wash wands, etc) and go that route. And again, I may or may not go disc golfing, depends if I feel motivated. Part of me just wants to not do anything today, lol. It feels like Saturday, but sadly, it’s indeed Sunday.

Well, time for me to go veg out. Also, and new pictures on my Flickr, so go check those out. Hope everyone’s summer is going well.

Well, it’s been a year, but I managed to get back out again for awhile. I only got out of town for 4 days, two of which I had to fly in/out on, but it was still nice to get out for a bit. I had to check luggage for the first time ever since flying, and that was a bit nerve wracking. I had to take a suit with me since we were going to a wedding, and I wasn’t about to wear it out there. The only real options to fly with it (since Southwest doesn’t have a place to hang them up for you) is to either roll it up and take it as a carry on, or to buy a folding garment bag (luggage, but made specifically to hold clothes). I already had two carry ons I needed to take for my normal clothes and all my electro-gizmos, so checking a bag was my only option. On the plus side, I was able to take my hair care products with me since I didn’t have to deal with the silly 3oz plastic bag rule. I mean seriously, that’s stopping terrorism? lol, please.

So I fly out, and I thought I had a non-stop flight. Nope! I had no *transfers*, but the plane itself stopped in the middle before taking me all the way to San Jose. Boooooo. Two landings in one day makes for a sad Jim. My stomach doesn’t play well with landings, but I survived. When I got into SJC, I only noticed two of the luggage pick up areas, and not the other two (figures). After fretting about where my bag went, I walked over and saw the other area, with my bag waiting on me. Not losing my bag ftw! I checked into my hotel room, which was pretty good (nothing fancy, but in good condition), and unpacked and checked email, etc. Barbara wasn’t in yet (she was out of town the previous week and had to fly in a day later, but offered that I fly out a day early to hang out with everyone), but that night I met three of her sisters, her one sister’s husband and kids, and her mom.

We all met up at this small authentic Chinese restaurant. Seeing as how it was pretty much all Chinese in the place, I could tell good things were to come. I guess Steve (Mary’s husband, Vietnamese himself but a Chinese cook at one time) found the place online and there were rave reviews about it, and this one dish was apparently world renowned or something. I saw General’s chicken on the menu, so I knew I was good to go. I mean it’s one thing to have Americanized Tso’s, but it’s another entirely to have honest to goodness stuff. We had a TON of food there, and it all went on this rotating table top thing in the middle of the table. Basically, you take what you want, put it on your plate, and the next person that wants whatever spins it and takes what they want. Bonus points if you orient it in a way that two people get what they want at the same time. I don’t know what half of the stuff was, but it was all fantastic. Dinner conversation was good, but the place was small and LOUD so it was hard to hear, heh. I don’t remember the name, but yowza, good stuff.

Sunday, we picked up Barbara (who somehow managed to sneak past me at the security area), and basically everyone hung out that day. We got her stuff to the hotel, then me, her, and her two sisters all went out and had lunch with the rest of the family, then we all went shopping for various stuff. After that, a group of us got together and headed to San Francisco so those of us who hadn’t seen the bay area could see it. I was happy to say I’ve been there now, and been on the Golden Gate Bridge! We sorta got lost a few times, but it’s a small city so if you drive straight long enough, you figure it out. Having a GPS helped a bit too. We stopped in the bay after taking some random exit road (which was windy and steep, but totally cool), and found some parking to walk along the bay. After taking some pictures and wandering around some boatyard, I showed Barbara the art of skipping stones. :p I guess I made it look easy, but eventually she got one to skip, and was extremely excited afterwards. We then walked down the bay some more, then made our way back up ‘zomg steep’ hill, and went back over the bridge and through San Fran. We were going to stop at the bridge to walk over it and take pics, but the traffic was so bad, we were shoe horned into going in one direction. It was nuts.

Later that night, we had dinner at another Mexican place (first lunch, then dinner, ay dios mio) and the men got a pitcher of beer, which I was volunteered into helping them finish off. Three or four pitchers later, we were all doing pretty well. The girls had some mixed drinks and well, the whole family was chillin’ out maxin’, relaxin’ all cool. There was no B-Ball outside of the school. We then went out and got moar (yes, moar) beer afterwards at a local 7-11 and went back to my room to kick it (this time, just Barbara and two of her siblings and me).

The next day was the wedding, and this place was OUT THERE. Wow! The roads were something else to get to the place, but once there, it was gorgeous. From the road it didn’t look like much, but the woods were just amazing. Redwoods everywhere, walkways through the forest, a pond, waterfall, beautiful landscaping, the building for the after party was great looking and spacious, the whole thing was planned excellently. Then we ate, drank, and danced the night away, every so often stepping outside for a walk. I can say it was the best wedding I’ve ever been to. Lots of funny moments, and I never felt left out. Considering I only now just met Barbara’s entire family, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I mean, we’re just friends, but you never know what to expect as far as feeling welcome or not. I definitely felt welcome and had a blast. After leaving, we wrapped the night up by stopping at an “In-N-Out Burger”, which I guess is a sorta big deal in California. It wasn’t bad, but not amazing. Reminded me of Sonic, but again, I was blown away the first time I had Sonic in Illinois, so I guess I’m just jaded to good fast food. :p MoMak’s in San Antonio is still the top burger I’ve had recently (which I had the day I flew back, incidentally).

The final day was pretty uneventful. I rode in my first cab ever to the airport with Barbara and her mom. We got there in plenty of time, and we were able to cruise the net and drink some Starbucks while waiting. It was nice flying with some people I knew, since the last few times I’ve flown it’s been by myself. I found that during the flights back, I really didn’t get sick at all. Maybe 5% sick compared to my usual 60% sick or so. Even during the longer flight (connection in San Diego), I wasn’t sick at all. A nice change of pace. I can only assume having people to talk to helped take my mind off of flying.

So we connect in San Diego, only to find out we’re at Gate 1, which is at a different section of the airport. How do you get there? Not by tram, no! That would make sense. We had to go back through security. :rolleyes: Blah. The line wasn’t long at least, but it still was annoying. Barbara’s Mom was getting picked up by one of Barbara’s brothers, so we went outside and waited with her until her ride showed up, then we went back through security to our gate. We then watched trailer park boys, then got on the plane, talked it up for two hours during the flight, then she passed out while I listened to my iPod. I ended up passing out shortly thereafter as well, waking up during the landing into San Antonio. My luggage found it’s way home, so I guess checking luggage isn’t all that dangerous. I also learned that you need to tie stuff onto your bags so you can tell it apart easier. Barbara gave me two LED frogs for my bags, so those are now part of my mandatory travel stuffs. You live and learn, I suppose.

All in all, the trip was great. It was busy, but not hectic. It was relaxing and nice to get away for awhile. On the plus side, no one called or bothered me either, which was a relief. I’m going to have to try to do this more often, time permitting. I guess my Dad wasn’t lying when he said to make sure I take a vacation. If you want to see some pictures, check out my Flickr on the right side of this page under “Personal Stuff”.

Now, I have to figure out how and when I’m going to get back to Pennsylvania to visit. Part of me wants to fly out, and another drive out. I really don’t want to deal with the drama that has arisen since I moved here in the family, but I have a feeling it’ll be in full effect after a day or two of being out there. But, they are family, and there’s no getting away from them, like it or not. Hope everyone’s summer’s going well! How I yearn for the days of old, where summer meant three months of ‘do absolutely nothing’. At least as a grown up, you can take a week here and there. And you get to drive Volvos.

Hmm, sure has been awhile since I posted in here. Dunno who all’s reading, but I’ve been mega busy. And there’s no signs of it stopping. Oh well, it could be worse.

So I go to print out some reservation papers and remember, oh yeah, I need some ink for my printer (HP Photosmart C3150). The colors are fine, but the black is toast…I’m sure the colors aren’t long for the world either. After taking out the ink and seeing the type I needed to find (92 and 93, it would seem) , I jump in the Volvo and off to Wal-Mart I go.

Surprisingly, for 10PM, it’s packed. Oh well, it’s not too late and I only need one thing, and it just rained so it’s cool out. Walking a little longer in the parking lot won’t kill me. I walk straight back to where I need to go, and find out that, interestingly enough, the ink is locked behind glass like video games.

lolwut?

I mean seriously. $15 packages of ink are seriously stolen THAT MUCH? I can see video games ($50+), and even movies and CDs since they can be opened and have the disc taken…but ink? For one, you only buy ink every three months max, and two, it’s not easy to open (tearing open cardboard ftw), let alone quietly, and it’s still rather bulky once freed. Did I mention this stuff is only $15? When did ink become such a hot item? I saw a few higher dollar cartridges, but that’s just ridiculous. So now I have to go bother an associate. I walk past them and see two of them chatting away, so I figure I’ll go walk over past the Nintendo DS games, as I’ve been meaning to pick up Brain Age for mine. I’ve been sort of him hawing around about it, but since I’m flying out this weekend, I figured I needed something to entertain myself with while waiting at the terminal. Not only do they have it, but they have a second now too. Hmm. In usual style, I got #1, since skipping #1 and getting #2 feels like cheating, and I at least know I like the 1st one. And I guess mine came with Sudoku as well? Call it a win.

So I get my ink and my game, and off I go. I head back to the apartment and plug in my DS, since it was in need of a good charging. It took me a minute to find the power button, so I felt pretty special there for a few minutes after that charming display of techno wizardry. I then laughed at how much packaging came with such a tiny cartridge. So while that started charging, I decided to install the new black ink cartridge and leave the colored one sealed up, since the old one was still working fine.

Then, my printer became possessed.

It just started printing a page for no reason. I think my reaction was along the lines of “Hey, what are you doing? I didn’t ask for that. And why are you trying to eat it? I’ll pull it out, I swear.”

Basically, it started printing (dunno why it didn’t ask me in a dialog about the matter) and it was printing, then sucking it back in and examining the lines (apparently an HP thing), and printing some more. At the end, it showed be a bird printed twice, with a before and after calibration thing. Pretty snazzy. Still, it did surprise me a bit.

And yes, I finally took some time off from work for the first time in, well, probably a year. A friend of mine’s brother is getting married, and she invited me to come along. I agreed, so now it appears I’m flying out to Fremont, CA to a big family wedding this 4th of July weekend. It’ll be nice to ‘get away’ for a bit, and to see new people and places. Always a good way to refresh a bit. And I somehow managed a non-stop flight to CA on the way there. Now I just need to figure out how the parking system at San Antonio works since I was just dropped off and picked up the last time I flew outta SAT. I’ll be sure to take lots of pictures, I’m sure me in a suit is an amusing sight to see. Time permitting, I’d like to swing by and hang out with Marshall and possibly see our Peer1 offices in LA, but we’ll see.

And speaking of work, I got a promotion at work. And I couldn’t be happier! I’m now part of the Product Engineering team, and my title is “Quality Assurance and Implementations Engineer”. What’s that mean? Basically, I setup hardware implementations for the company, and when the engineers release a new product, I’m in charge of making sure it works right. Looks like filing all those bugs worked out in the end! But I get to work with hardware and software all day, every day brings new challenges, and I’m lovin’ it. Hoping to somehow sneak a Gentoo install in there, but we’ll see.

Hope everyone has a fun and safe 4th of July! It appears there’s a no burn rule in effect down here, so no fireworks it would seem. Kinda strange, being as it’s never dry up in PA…

Well, I never updated about it, but they ended up fixing my bathroom at the apartment. I sent some emails to the corporate address and I think that stirred some cages, as I got a call early Monday after I sent my second one from the new manager here that transfered over from another property in town (same company). She’s been with Equity for like, 6 years I think? So at least I don’t have to worry about this one leaving (I hope). She apologized about the long contact time, admitted they were wrong (gasp!), and had it fixed as quickly as possible/repaired the ceiling, and even gave me a gift card to Wal-Mart. I’m still set on moving, but hopefully the end of my lease will be a bit more pleasant. We’ll see.

Next on the agenda, was the S60. Been running great, no problems, but I figured I should probably get the oil changed (1500 miles on it, dunno when it was last changed, looked pretty clean though), get a new filter if it still had the original one, fix the headlights (not even), and get the transmission flushed out since I’m sure it’s never been done, and every 40K is a good time for that. Also, I put coolant in my car last week after I had it topped off when I bought it last month, so I figured they could look it over for leaks.

So I take it in, and after I sit down, the service guy I talked to came over to tell me that apparently just before my car went onto the market, they had serviced it and changed the oil and air filter, so those two were fine. He said some absurd number for the # of miles you can do between oil changes due to it using synthetic oil, but even if I half’d their number, I wasn’t even close yet. So be it, save some money there. Trans flush and headlights it is!

So a few hours pass, and the guy comes and says that they looked it over and noticed I needed the radiator replaced as it was leaking. Cost to me? $0! Yey for having certified pre-owned! That repair alone (which cost like $760 parts and labor) has pretty much paid for the CPO on my car. And I still have two more years to cash in on it. Nice. So I told them to go ahead and fix that, I can wait a few more hours. So a few more hours later, I got my car back, washed, fixed headlights, new trans fluid, and a new radiator/coolant. And they didn’t charge me for the headlight adjustment, so all I paid for was the trans flush. Not too bad. And pretty much everything I wanted to get done on the car is now done, so I can just sit back and enjoy it. They did move my seat though (as every freakin shop does) and I apparently did not save my seat’s position, so it’s all goofy now. I’m going to read how to save it, and save it here shortly so that doesn’t happen again. But I didn’t know that they washed your car if you took it in, so that was an added bonus (it needed washed again). So…

-Confirmed Oil/Air Filter are new
-Fixed headlight alignment
-New transmission fluid/filter
-New radiator/fresh coolant
-Washed outside

All for the price of the transmission work and a good part of my day off. Not too bad. And at this point, I should be set for normal maintenance of tires/gas/oil for awhile, which is nice.

And now to go try and be productive for the rest of the day. Yeah, right.

So what’s new? Sadly, more of the same. I woke up last night at 8PM (mid day naps on the weekends ftw!) to a dripping sound.

Yep. Water has infiltrated my apartment yet again.

This time it was a sinfully slow drip that was hitting the side of my tub, and therefore splashing all over the damn place. If it was like, two inches closer to the tub, the water would have been contained and been much easier. Of course, that would be too easy and wouldn’t be nearly as amusing. So I zip upstairs to talk to the guy, and for the first time, he actually answered the door when I knocked. *shock, awe* He looked half awake and all the lights were off. As soon as I said water he said “Oh wait lemme check” and ran off. A few seconds later he said that the AC was leaking and got onto the floor, hense the drip, and that he had turned it off and called maintenance. Confused, I went back downstairs. I cleaned up the water and sanitized everything, then went back to sleep a few hours later. I woke up to water again and the dry wall from the ceiling now laying on my floor. How cute.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, I had called maintenance myself as soon as I got back downstairs (roughly 8PM) and of course, I had not heard anything. I called again at 9PM, then at 8AM this morning when I woke up, then at 9AM. I then fired off an email to Equity’s main office and about an hour later, I finally got a call. The guy came over and looked at it, and picked up the main piece of drywall as he walked out the door to go knock on the upstairs neighbor’s door (for the second time, first time no answer). At least this time, I guess they turned on the AC and looked and saw it drip so they ran a tube into the tub to keep it from running down the wall and onto the floor. You see, there’s this pipe on the other side of that bathtub across from where the shower head is. I thought it was just an old shower head pipe that was defunct, but I guess it’s a run-off for water build-up from the AC. Meh, at least that answered that question.

I will say, on the positive front, that maintenance did confirm that it was the AC and it was the buildings fault and not the tenant above me. This is at least refreshing as it’s different, and at least they FOUND the problem and were able to fix it, so I shouldn’t be getting any more water (but I’m not holding my breath).

That said, I’m dead set on moving. Preferably sooner rather than later, but I am out of here. i don’t care how much it costs me or what I have to do, I’m gone. Now, I’ve been picking through my lease and found some clauses that out me from the contract that I’m going to kindly try to coax out of the office management. I’d rather go peacefully and get the fuck out of here rather than go down there screaming and them saying “lol diff problems don’t count contract still here we win”. Of course, they wouldn’t say that, but that would be the 4chan summary. So I’m going to see wtf I can do to get outta here, and at the very least, I’m stuck here until the end of this year. If they won’t let me out, I’ll be sure to pass the word along online about how bad they’ve treated my tenancy during my stay here where I need to. I’d rather it didn’t come to that, but we’ll see. I already have the spot picked out that I want to move to, so I guess I’ll have to make an appointment to go see their place and check availability.

/RANT

Alright, now that that’s over (and the bathroom has been cleaned again, praying it stays that way), the brighter points of recent. I’ve taken up the activity of “disc golf” with one of my co-workers from The Beach, Nate. I’d heard about it, and went along jokingly as it seemed a bit silly, and I can use some new social interaction. So I went, and I was surprised to find out that I actually quite enjoyed disc golf. On my first outing, we did 21 holes in around 5-6 hours, some of which were soulless holes of death (some really goofy uphill curved shots, etc). Plus there’s the risk of losing your discs, which run like $6 each, depending on the type and brand (and there are multiple brands, as well as types, and even various models of those types….it’s ridiculous). Currently I only own one disc, and it’s treated me well. Nate also hands me a driver and putter as applicable, so it works for me. I may pick up a driver at some point, due to a few holes down in Live Oak that are ungodly long and require the driver style disc to go anywhere. But, it gets me out walking outside of the office, which can’t hurt. I need to focus on getting back to my preferred weight of ~210ish instead of the big ol’ belly Texas has so lovingly provided for me. I may look into signing up to a gym as well to help shed the pounds. I just need a personal trainer if I want to do that to help keep me on course (which won’t come cheap, I’m sure).

On the car front, the car’s been fantastic. It’s been about a month since I picked her up, and I still find reasons to go drive when I really don’t need to. I still walk out and look at her and go, with a big smile “Heh, that’s my car.”. I’ve also officially made my first car payment. And it was done without any physical paperwork, thanks to e-bills from Volvo finance. Gotta love that (I hate writing checks). It gives you a nice summary of how much is due to ‘buy out’ the car, as well as your next due payment and your last received payment, etc. Technology is a wonderful thing.

I picked up an Escort 9500i for the S60 as well. I did this for multiple reasons, the least of which is so I can drive like an idiot, heh. As many of you can attest to, I’m a fairly conservative driver. Well, a large part of that was due to the fact that my car was OLD and didn’t want to risk breaking anything or blowing anything up, as I needed that car. I figured, easy on the suspension, regular oil changes and keeping the revs low unless I needed to get out of troubles way would keep anything from going boom. Sure enough, it worked, minus the occasional issue here or there that would arise from the body rust on the poor girl. Well, that issue is gone now, as I now own a car 14 years newer with no rust, and about 70 more ponies under the hood (probably more considering the Cadillac’s age, I doubt it had all 180HP). Not to mention the S60 is roughly 100lbs lighter as well and corners leagues above the Cadillac. Needless to say, my driving style has….adapted a bit. I’m still conservative, but I’m a bit more aggressive now. The S60 has shown me how important cornering is in a car, how fun it is, and how ungodly boring domestics are when driving aggressively. A straight line can only take you so far, and this car has definitely shown me this. I fear what Ford is going to do to the next gen S60, as it’ll be their first real major change to the car since they bought Volvo. It’s probably going to be terrible. I have a feeling I’ll have to go BMW or something on my next car. *sigh*

Now, back to the 9500i. I grew up in a small, small town (Greenville, PA, look it up). The police there literally had nothing better to do than pull people over to bother them. I’ve been pulled over twice that I can recall for doing nothing wrong other than being a young kid. Once was for doing “75-80 in a 45″ when I was doing 45 (and I did not get a ticket, so that basically explains how full of shit he was) and the other was for me matching the description of someone peddling for change (lol, right, I was wearing my business suit and had my briefcase sitting beside me at the time too, I literally laughed at him). The first one, I dunno what happened, the second one I stared down some cop that was being a dick and was pulled over shortly thereafter. So yeah, I’m used to pigs and not police officers. That said, I’m unhealthily paranoid about police when I drive. The S60 blends in A LOT more than the Cadillac did, so I guess I don’t worry as much, but I still am paranoid about the police. With a radar/laser detector, it almost always (unless they don’t have their gun running) goes off when a cop is around, even before I could see them with my eyes. This has proved invaluable for me in the capacity of just being able to drive and relax. It has also shown me some speed traps that I would have never noticed before (and pointed out cops that I wouldn’t have noticed either). Also, the 9500i has GPS integrated into it, which brings three awesome features to the table:

1. Location + frequency lock out. We all know that you will find false positives daily driving around if you have a radar detector, depending on the filtering of the unit and it’s general sensitivity. Well, if you constantly hit one and you know it’s a false, you can lock it out with the 9500i. This is HUGE for me as I don’t want to hear falses at all, and secondly, if a cop hides in one of these areas to get people who ignore the warning, it still goes off. Since the cop will have a different frequency than what’s locked out, I get an alarm. This, to me, is invaluable.

2. Automatic speed-based sensitivity adjustment. As the unit has GPS, it can automatically increase it’s sensitivity from city to highway based on the speed it has. This means it configures itself on the fly without me having to fiddle with the buttons. A+ if you ask me.

3. Speed displayed on warning. Again, since the GPS knows your speed, when the alarm goes off, it shows your speed in the display immediately, then kicks back to showing you the band type and strength (while it says the band type out loud). Since the unit garners my attention first, the fact that it shows my speed also is a big help as well. Sure I can look down at my speedometer, but my first instinct is to look at the unit.

It also has all sorts of other cool stuff with it that makes it, in my book, worth the extra coin. If it saves me from getting nailed in one speed trap, it’s paid for itself. It also does stuff like auto-adjust the volume of the unit based on ambient noise, auto adjust the LCD screen, auto-muting after the tone has been going for a few seconds, and GPS marking of various locations as speed-traps, speed cameras, et cetera. Again, I like knowing when an alert is present, but I don’t want it screaming at full volume while I’m stopped at a light, so when the tone is steady and it drops down to a subtle tone, that’s a big plus too. The only thing it doesn’t have that would be cool are the directional arrows that the Valentine1 comes with. However, that unit has way too many falses as it is (too sensitive or bad filtering, you be the judge) and no way to lock anything out. Yes, once upon a time the V1 was the king, but it’s been a few years and a lot of companies have matched or exceeded it’s ability to pick up on things. I did my research and I know what the other offerings are, and I got exactly what I wanted. I’ve wanted one for as long as I’ve been driving actually, but nothing ever jumped out as what I would consider acceptable. The 9500i was the first one to stand out as “Oh yeah, I want that.”. And since I got financed for my car, I wasn’t as worried about charging up some goodies.

Speaking of which, I finally picked up an XBox 360 (gamertag: tsuehpsyde). I’m still not a big console gamer like I once was (prefer PC gaming any day), but certain stuff is just easier on consoles. Also, some stuff is exclusive to consoles (like GTA IV and Halo 3, both of which I own now) and PC gamers have to take the back seat for a year+ waiting to get it, which I personally think is crap. Also, it’s really easy to match up with friends on XBox Live and just play games and not worry about finding good servers, etc. Hosting my own game servers for well on three years now, it’s a relief to just jump into the XBL dashboard and just *play*. And XBL’s network for the most part appears way better than PS3’s, and development on the 360 always seems to come out better as well. I’ve played the PS3 and it’s got great potential, but the community appears to be around the 360 and the developers seem to like it better, too. So far, I only have three games (Tom Clancy’s Rainbox Six: Vegas2, GTA IV, and Halo 3) but they pretty much hit all of the genres that I wanted. Also, Vegas2 has opened my eyes to a new style of FPS that I had not yet played, and I have to say, I like it a lot. I find myself trying to cover up in CS:S and I get miffed when I remember I can’t do that. I am now starting to see how CS:S is showing it’s age, even though I still enjoy playing the game. It does remind me, however, how insulting it is that VALVe continues to degrade the SoureDS performance considering how old it is, heh.

And I think I’ve hit a new plateau that I saw other people on before, that I never really saw myself doing. I corrected someone’s cron command in a mailing list. It wasn’t a huge deal, but after I did it, I realized so many people I talk to regularly that I look up to do the same thing. I guess it’s a sign of getting better with Linux and system administration in general. Some user said to use an rm -f `find -args` command to delete certain files via cron, and I responded with “Why not use the -delete action instead of using rm as well?”. A common case of RTFM, but idunno, it just stood out pretty clearly to me, but is hard to describe. I’m starting to draw the lines of what to do and what not to do, and I think it’s because I actively ask so many different people for their input on scripts or projects I work on. I can only hope this is a continuing trend.

Okay, that’s enough blogging for one day. I have laundry to do, a car to wash, and probably some grocery shopping too. Happy Mother’s Day all, and hopefully yours is going better than mine started. =P

Okay, new to me….but still pretty darn new. My choice? A 2004 Volvo S60 T5. For those curious on the tech specs, here ya go.

Pictures!

Bleh, posting those reminds me I need to move my gallery over to this domain and make it public.

Any who, the car is exactly what I wanted. Even down to the color. Considering I got it pre-owned, that’s a pretty good accomplishment. What did I want?

1. I wanted an S60 2.5T or T5 (T5).
2. I wanted a 2004 or newer (2004).
3. I wanted 1-owner and low miles (1-owner, 37,000).
4. I wanted Certified Pre-Owned (which it is).

I wanted various other stuff that just happened to be there as well. It has leather, which I really wanted. It already had it’s windows tinted, which was a plus. I really wanted a moonroof, which it has. It also has the Geartronic option as well, which lets you change over to semi-automatic, where you shift the gears yourself without a clutch. It’s really just a fancy way of holding the gears in or down shifting, but still, it’s fun. I’d love to learn manual past what I’ve been taught, but I’m not learning in San Antonio traffic, heh. One big surprise was that the T5 (I assume standard, but maybe an option?) comes with an eight speaker sound system which has really good depth and range. Surprising even, considering I wasn’t very impressed with the previous sound system I heard in an ‘01 model. The gas mileage in this thing is excellent (slaughters my old Cadillac), and having four wheel discs is nice. All in all, the only option my S60 *doesn’t* have is the heated seat option. In Texas, not that big of a deal, but it would have been nice. And the back seat’s head rests drop from a push of a button up front, which Tito used to whack my manager in the back of the head when coming back from lunch. I almost had to pull over I was laughing so hard. At least he laughed about it after it and was a good sport about it. I have a feeling he’ll get Tito back later.

The only weird things about the S60 are the brakes and the turning radius. The brakes work great, but you have to ‘get into them’ for them to engage…which is entirely different from pretty much every other automaker. I’m getting used to it, and I sort of like it, but man it was weird at first. The turning radius in this thing, however, is lol @ best. It’s not a deal breaker, but it is pretty lame. I mean seriously, my freaking Cadillac DeVille had a better turning radius. And I’m not kidding. However, there are problems with stock 17″ wheels when you turn sharply, which is documented everywhere (and I’ve seen first hand myself). Researching online, it appears Volvo equips wider 17″ wheels than the 16″ ones. Why they opted to make them wider (better power transfer in dry weather, easier to hydroplane, etc.) is beyond me, but I’m glad I don’t have to deal with the inner wheel well rubbing (16″ on mine). If I go up to 17″ wheels, I’ll be keeping the width thinner to avoid the issue.

Past the tech specs, the entire experience is awesome. I love this car. It looks MUCH nicer than my old Cadillac. Granted, I drove that Cadillac for 5 going on 6 years, and it took me from PA to FL to Vegas and back to PA without an issue. It took me to Texas and drove me around for well over a year. The car had nothing to apologize for, but it was time to change out. The seats in the Volvo are mega comfy. It grips the road great and has minimal body roll (the T5 does have a slightly more tight suspension though) but isn’t abrasive when going over bumps. And it’s just *really fun* to drive. I mean, the car wants to go way faster than I do, haha. Time to get a radar/laser detector. It’s also funny that somehow, it still has the ‘new car smell’ in there too. Not sure if they sprayed something in there, or if it was really well kept. It has low miles and only had one previous owner, so it’s entirely possible. Hell, all of the stickers were still attached to the car. But everyone keeps mentioning that when they sit down in it.

All in all, it’s a loaded, single owner, low mileage S60 T5 in great shape, inside and out. Pretty hard to beat. I have to take it back to Austin (got it at Roger Beasley’s) and get it detailed and pick up the plates. They weren’t able to get it detailed when I picked it up, which was fine by me. Gives me a reason to get outta town and get it cleaned up. Also, I can get the plates put on at the same time, and get the floor mats as well (they forgot to put them in, oops!). Not a big deal since they have plastic on the floors still, but definitely need to get those.

Now I can drive back to Pennsylvania and visit family if I want without worrying about my car. I could fly, but meh, I prefer being able to drive around and not flying. That, and paying for a rental is outrageous. Now to see how fast I can pay this thing off.

To those of you celebrating, Happy Easter. I didn’t do much but hack up a new script and be sick today, but hopefully some of you enjoyed it, preferably with family.

Well, this weekend was my long weekend, so I was looking forward to enjoying it and getting some cleaning done around the apartment. However, I woke up Friday to a somewhat puffy right eye. Hmm.

You see, on Wednesday, I was running wiring at work under the floor, and well, the pressurized air tends to cause particles of matter to come flying in your general direction after popping it open. Why my tile is any better than the countless tiles with holes in them is beyond me, but they do seem to enjoy my tiles. Anyway, I got smacked in the right eye by something (and I wear glasses, thanks a lot spectacles). I blinked/rubbed it off and didn’t think much about it, as it happens more often than not. Fast forward 5 hours later and my eye (the top/back area, like inside the socket) was sore. It was the end of my shift, so I didn’t really think about the connection between the two. But it was sore, like someone had popped me in the eye, without the shiner. Strange.

The next day, it was in and out throughout the day, but not too bad. I checked on my eye throughout the day, expecting to see it turn bloodshot, or puff up, or something. Nope. Just a normal lookin’ eye. I figured I’d sleep it off and have it looked at if it got any worse. I guess Friday morning heard that, since I woke up to an eye that, well, didn’t want to open all the way. I ran straight to the mirror to see Franken-eye in full effect. It wasn’t full of puss or anything nasty, just…bigger. And a bit uncomfortable. I called up my eye doctor and they were able to sneak me in later in the afternoon. 15 months in Texas, and this is my first ‘doctor’ visit for being sick or not well in some way, shape or form. It appears my luck had ran out.

Since it was my day off and I didn’t have anything to do until 3, I figured I’d go out and check out some LCDs again (had a few days before). You see, ever since I got my Macbook Pro, I’ve realized:

A. I like widescreen LCD panels.
B. I do not have one at home.

It’s been, good lord, well over a year and a half since I bought anything for my desktop. My desktop has basically been in the same shape it was when I moved to Texas (I had to RMA my memory last year, but I got the same model of RAM in return, so really nothing has changed). And while my LCD isn’t terrible (19″ Sony), it’s definitely aged a bit. There’s some noticeable backlight bleeding (which has honestly been there for awhile, but only noticeable in dark gaming areas/movies) and you can see some either color banding or general unevenness to certain colors (the Windows XP with NT style login blue background, for example). It’s been in service for well over three years now, so there’s no shame for it. And what can I say, I want a 16:10 aspect screen and I want a higher res than 1280×1024. Namely, 1920×1200 @ 24″s.

So after deciding it was time to spruce up the desktop, I then had the painful task of delving through all the different types of TFT Technologies available in LCD monitors. Suffice to say it’s long, comlicated, geeky and boring, but you have your basic three:

TN film (Twisted Nematic): Cheap and fast, viewing angles are bleh. If you look at your LCD from the side or botton and it turns black/green/whatever, it’s TN. Considered the ‘gaming’ panel since it’s the fastest response time, but also the most common since it’s the cheapest panel to make/buy.

IPS (In Plane Switching): Best viewing angles of all panels, and best color reproduction. Slower than TN, but final overall response (input lag) differs from panel to panel. Considered the ‘best’ LCD panel type, and you pay for it too (usually $1,000+ for 24″).

VA (Vertical Alignment): Considered the best all around panel. Better color reproduction than TN, not as good as IPS. Much better viewing angles than TN, but IPS is still technically better. Higher contrast than both TN or IPS. Slower than both TN and IPS.

Now, if you think that’s confusing, it splits even further. :p There’s also S-IPS, MVA, P-MVA, PVA, and S-PVA. Sheesh. And that’s mixed in with overdrive stuff that lowers response time but degrades color reproduction.

Basically, the general overview is, there is no ‘perfect’ LCD that has 100% everything. You have to pick and choose what you want and decide accordingly. For me, I personally hate the viewing angles on the TN panels and always have. It’s downright annoying, and on a 24″ widescreen? Forget it. Chances are, 85% of the LCDs in-store you see are TN. If you want to know for sure, get down below the monitors and look up at them. It’s pretty apparent which panels are TN and which are VA/IPS real fast. Also, I needed good response time since I play games. And the advertised response time on the LCD? Yeah, that doesn’t mean hardly anything either, as ‘input lag’ is what you want to look at. The total variance between say, an LCD and a CRT. I’m not sure what exactly degrades this (I’m assuming the internals that scale images accordingly, outside of the panel refresh itself), but it’s a number of factors that affects this on different panels.

Okay, so now that all of that is out of the way, I went with the LG L246WP. Mark had got the same monitor a day before and loved his. I was worried about the advertised 8ms response time, but I figured meh, if it sucked I could return it. That, and Mark assured me it wasn’t bad for response times in games. All of the research in general made the task daunting to say the least. But after finding a Best Buy that had them in stock (first one didn’t), I picked one up and took it home. I must say, this thing is HUGE. But I <3 it. Any input lag is not noticeable at all, and I want to get a CRT so I can take some pictures and see what the overall input lag is. From what I gather online, it’s really low on this LCD. And considering my old LCD was 12ms, it’s definitely a lot faster, and videos in general are smoother and more fluid. The backlight is even throughout the panel, and it pivots vertically! All in all, I’m very happy with the beast. My old (read, two year old) video card still runs CS:S like a champ, even at max settings and max res on the new monitor. Newer games, however, struggle…and I subsequently bought a new video card that will be here later this week. :p I know that a ‘new’ card is coming out later this week, but bleh, it’s damn near the same thing as they already have out. nVidia is currently in this ‘rehash the same crap’ stage, so their new flagship 9800GTX is going to be painfully similar to their G92 refresh of the 8800GTS 512MB card (both have the same G92 GPU core). The only real additions on the GTX are faster memory, Tri-SLI support and, well, that’s it. :p Core is a pinch faster stock, but most G92 GTS’ ship at 675 anyway, so it’s moot. And considering the GTS is ~$100 cheaper right now than the MSRP of the upcoming GTX, I’ll take the slightly slower, much cheaper card thanks.

So after splurging on my new toy and getting it all setup (still trying to figure out how to use this on my desk without looking silly), I got my eye checked out (surface area, under the lids, etc) and somehow it got infected. They put me on antibiotic/steroid eye drops, which go in four times a day. And I’d like to report that I suck at self administering eye drops, as I usually miss the first one, but I have been getting better. I hope the drops last until the 10 day mark. Oh, and then somehow, I got a cold on Saturday, so I’ve just been laying around feeling like crap between having a cold and a googly-eye. I’m sure I look handsome. At least I’ve been able to play with my new monitor and enjoy the new workspace on it, heh. Has made the weekend somewhat bearable, thankfully. And I will say, writing scripts on a widescreen panel is much more enjoyable than a standard 4:3 aspect screen. I hacked up another script I’ve been meaning to do for awhile. Basically, I setup a php script on one of my static servers that spits out the client’s IP and nothing else, and I setup a bash script on my fileserver to check that page via cron and compare it against our known IP. If changed, update our known IP and email me. My IP hasn’t changed in God knows how long (partially due to setting my current IP as the requested IP through the WAN’s DHCP), but if it does, at least I won’t be out in the cold if I’m at work. Oh, and I finally noticed that something I setup that never worked in DD-WRT v24 beta, started automagically working now that I had it flashed back to the current stable v23 SP2. I was checking my system logs for stuff and noticed a shitload of remote syslog msgs from my router. Neat.

Okay, back to being sick.

http://www.ksat.com/weather/15636542/detail.html?rss=ant&psp=news

And here I thought Tay Zonday was making this stuff up. I was heading out to hang out with a friend last night when one of my neighbors says “You’re not gonna be happy when you see your car!”. My first thought was someone had done something to it, but I turn the corner as she mentions that it rained mud on everything.

Erm, what? Did you just say rained mud?

Sure enough, there was my car and it looked as if it had been sitting there for weeks, covered in dust, then it had rained. Only, it was rather clean this afternoon…and every other car/truck in the parking lot (and subsequently, on the road) was covered in this crap. A quick Google brought up that link, which pretty much summed up what my Dad thought might be the cause of it (when anything related to cars comes up, even if it involves weather, for some reason I call him…probably the same reason he calls me for computer stuff…his guess was dirt in the atmosphere from a dust storm down here).

So there you have it. First it started with “thundersnow”, and now we have mud, err “chocolate” rain. All I can say is, God must be pissed.