is a geek

Well, they painted the bottom 4 feet of all the wood in the house green (to protect from termites) and finished the plumbing. Other than that, not much new.
I'm finally going to see Kill Bill 2 today after work!! Yay!
I also spent some time last night throwing a website together for my dad for some SBCs (single board computers) he has been working on. Supposedly, most eval boards for embedded processors are very basic and very expensive. So he made some with abunch more features for alot less. Seems like a bargain eh? Anyways, check it out if you are into that type of stuff. If you had questions on the domain name... arm is a type of processor. Other than taking new pictures, stylizing the entire site and rewriting everything it should be done! :-P
Anways, back to sleep....zzzZzz

Posted by chris at 08:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

I jetted out of work early and hand delivered the check to them and everything should be good. Whew... Other than that mishap, the house progressed abunch today. Plumbing is almost done. They moved the kitchen island to where it should be. They completed the roof. They sorta leveled the lot. They added the sidewalk and driveway forms. Yay! It's so cool to see how fast things progress. I hope they keep it up. The house behind me had its' yard really leveled, and they starting putting in the fence. Neighbors!

Posted by chris at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just got a call from Brandon the builder. He noticed some of the modifications that we added to the house (ceiling fans, a few extra outlets, etc) and didn't see a work order associated with it. So he called up an let us know that he wasn't going to do it untill he got a work order and that he needed it today if we were going to do it. WTF, we told them at the pre-build meeting that we wanted that, they said ok, its on the blueprints yet somehow they didn't know? Do we need to go to the people the pre-build guy was supposed to contact and make sure they know too? Why can't people just follow up on their damn responsibilities and let my blood pressure go back to normal? So, I called the sales guy... and sure enough, he doesn't work today. URGH! So, I talked to another guy who was going to call the sales guy .... blah blah blah... so I have to leave early, pick up the checkbook, and run over there to pay them so they build the house the way we asked them to. GRRR. No wonder people said building a house was soo stressfull. You need to checkup on everyone to make sure they are doing their job right.

Posted by chris at 11:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Christine told me that her mom has offered to pay for part of the wedding. Normally, this could be considered good news, but as usual, I was skeptic. Previously, her mom had offered to pay for the honeymoon, which is way cool. After further investigation into the news, I found out she was wanting to help with the wedding instead of the honeymoon. Either way is cool, I suppose.... I just don't want her to think that she can have any say / sway in what happens with the wedding (any more than normal). Maybe I'm just being an ass, but I just don't want anybody to screw up the wedding except for Christine and I. That being said, we have no idea what we are going to do for honeymoon or anything else. However, we did finally sign up for all the darn classes that allow us to get married in the church. One of the sets of classes is on Friday nights at 7. Ick!

Posted by chris at 09:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

They added windows, finshed up the siding, and completed the roof yesterday!! The electrician is supposed to go out on Thursday and hopefully I will be able to meet with him to make sure everything is perfect. The next 2 weeks will be darn busy. We are abit ahead of schedule (the one in my head), so I'm thinking I will be in for the 4th o July!! They messed up again, though. We had asked for the kitchen island to be moved 8 inches into the kitchen (so stools at the coutner wont be on carpet), and they didn't have the brace in the right place. Funny thing is, it was written in red on the blueprints and we had gone over it with him as well. Ughh.

Posted by chris at 08:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Saturday, Christine and I went over to my parent's place to cook up 32 pounds of crawfish. Albertsons, at this time of year, has 1 pound of live crawfish for $1. So, I called ahead on Friday and reserved some. Saturday, I got there and they didn't know anything about my reservations, so they just decided to give me one. The seafood department guy put a sticker on it behind the counter. When I got home, I found that he charged me for 36 pounds when it was only a 32 pound bag (someone had thrown 2 other bags (36 &l 35) in the box as well), and about 1/4 of the crawfish were already dead. I wasn't too happy about that. Anyways, we spent an hour or so, cleaning, sorting, etc.. the crawfish and I soon realized we were without 1 major ingredient: beer. So, I ran off to Walmart and ran into my highschool AP Spanish teacher, Mrs Klein. It was pretty akward, because I was abit of a troublemaker in highschool but she let me off with a 'its expected from children at that age'. Ya, I was still annoying as heck, though. :-) So anyways, I got the beer and cooked up more than enough crawfish for 5 people. We spent another 30 minutes afterwards just shelling the leftovers. Soo yummie!

Sunday, we took Christine's mom to church and to the house with us. Even though it was raining very hard this weekend, they managed to put plywood all over the roof. Soon they will shingle it, and the inside will start. We are thinking of having them make part of the driveway level, so when young-uns play basketball, it doesn't go rolling down the street. (which is why I never really enjoyed basketball, hit or miss I would have to chace after it). Also, soon (within 2 weeks) I will need to do some clandestein wiring and isulating. Everyone get their all black outfits and staple guns ready!

Posted by chris at 08:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yay! They found the floor!! And we met some soon-to-be neighbors who are building down the street as well.

Posted by chris at 07:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Anther day drips away...

We went by to see the house yesterday evening... It seem as if they forgot the game room option that we are paying for.... Atleast we caught it early!

Spent some time with Christine last night deciding when we wanted to take all the wedding related classes. I'm surprised how few weekends I now have free between now and Oct 30th. It's not all that surprising, I suppose, when you factor in the moving, classes, preperation, everyone else getting married, etc... But it is still scary. Basically, I won't be able to sleep in till sometime after Christmas... 2005! ;-)

I had some excitement at work yesterday morning. It seems that the MySQL DB died after our nightly backup. It was a mixture of a little too aggressive configuration, the number of people on at 3AM and the queries they were doing, and the compressing on the DB dump immediatly afterwards. It was interesting, becuase I setup some graphs for system load, etc... System load was at 116 ... the previous high was just 14!

Posted by chris at 09:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

All I can say is wow!

Posted by chris at 01:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, yesterday morning we talked to the priest, filled out a scantron-based questionare to determine compatibility (FOCCUS) and got a list of 10 or so dates that are available this year as well of a list of things to do before the wedding. For lunch, we went to a small sandwhich shop in downtown Wylie and our waitress looked surpirising like my aunt in Montanna. The food was great! (L&L I think...). Later that evening, we went over to my parent's place for dinner and talked about which day is best, then went over to her parents place, and talked about what day is best, and after ALL that, it came down to what Christine's Mother's Friend said was the best 'energy day' for having a wedding. :-P That day is... Oct 30th! So, this morning we checked with all of our wedding participants for compatibility, and fired off an email to the church! Yay! As for church restrictions, no strappless or spagetti-strap dress and no alchohol. Ohh well, I guess I'll wear a tux.

On another note, I was awoken at 12pm, 4am and 6am by Zephyr playing with things. I couldn't find anything to throw. Grrr... Anybody want a cat?

On an up-beat note, I got a check for my deductable from my insurance company from when that Jaguar-lady ran into my car and claimed she had no insurance! W00+!!1 (that 1 is there on purpose).

On a off key note, I re-discovered Infocom games (completely text based games (Zork)). I played them as a kid. I fondly remember calling up my dad's friend all the time to get help! hehe! I'm using Frotz. What rekindled my interest in the game was a AIM frontend to classic Infocom games, that I saw off of Slashdot. This all ties in nicely with a project I'm working on at work that uses an perl/AIM bot to notify agent's of special events on the system. I found Net::OSCAR to be WAY better than Net::AIM as it uses the more feature rich protocol for the AIM network.

Finally, they started framing the house!! I went Sat/Sun and it was foundation. I went Tuesday morning and they had almost finished the 1st floor. I went this afternoon and they are almost done with the 2nd floor! Awesome!!

Posted by chris at 05:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I think its pretty damn ironic that many of the spams I have been receiving recently are for spam filter software. Atleast I'm not alone.

Posted by chris at 08:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We tried again to carve our initials in the foundation, yesterday. As I was pulling into our new neighborhood, I noticed several cement trucks leaving the neighborhood. My hope soars! Untill, I round the corner and see no changes for our house. I wait for 30 mins for Christine. Just as she pulled up, a cement truck stops next to our lot, the driver pops out and starts taking down the fence. Our hope soars! Untill, our builder pulls up in front of him and directs him to pour the back porch for the house behind us. But..... he did say they will pour ours today!! Yay!! Finally!!
Later, we stayed up late after making a brocolli / mushroom / caseroll, watched 'Kill Bill' for the first time (it was awesome) and talk about our wedding plans. We are kinda wanting Jan 1'st (just so its easy to remember), but we shall see whats avail. As I was getting ready for bed, my cats were being silly. Ashey jumped from the bed to atop the TV (which is ~2 ft from ceiling), and then Zepher took off, running around the room for awhile untill he suddenly stopped behing the scratching post. All the sudden Kama comes in from from the side and wacks him and the make a fw circuits around the room. The Zepher jumps to the top of the couch and sits, untill Kama comes running up behind him and rams her head into his butt, pushing him off the couch. The for the next few mins I see Zepher's head pop up behind the couch for a split second as he repeatadly tries jumping to get over it. I finally got to bed around 1am and slept like a rock.
I awake to my alarm clock. I hit snooze. I awake to my alarm clock. I hit snooze. I dreamed that all the emails we send for our company's website are bounced back because of server misconfiguration. I awake to the alarm clock. I hit snooze. I dreamed the it was pouring rain and I was on a median between a several lane highway and a several lane railroad track. It was urgent. The trains were flying by, and suddenly one derails and slides right past me. The another train does and I have to hop to miss it as it slides by and into the highway, causing a series of wrecks. It progressivly gets worse as more trains derail and get progressively closer to killing me. Finally, one comes too close. Its headed towards me, carnage is everywhere and I awake to my alarm clock. I get up.
I take a shower and notice how I'm sore all over from playing soccer. I find the cleanest smelling clothes and forget my lunch as I head out the door. Someone rear ends me on the way to work. They don't even bother getting out of their car. I get out and see no damage on either car and leave. I hate talking to people before I've had coffee.

Posted by chris at 09:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hrmm.... so the foundation wasn't poured (but they did cut out the curb for the driveway), and we went to the church. We waited for 20 or so minutes. We walked around and couldn't find an open door and Christine's bladder was bursting. So I called up Adam and had him check my email.... we were supposed to meet in 2 weeks! Ugh... wrong date...

So Christine went home because she had a headache, and I went shopping and picked up 'Kill Bill'. Now I have to wait till tomorrow to see it with Ting... which REALLY sucks becuase the presidential new conference is on almost every channel (in spanish too!!). So... Ranger's game or Tree Hill/Everwood/some show I don't know the name and don't watch. Hrmm.. maybe I'll read instead.

In other news, I submitted a patch to Apache::Gallery to sort directories by create time / mod time which you can do with files already (which you can see working with my House pics). Anyways, I submitted it an someone else had sneaked their patch in just before me!! Foiled again!!

Posted by chris at 08:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I did a major update to our DB today and figured I deserved a little R&R. So, Adam and I went outside to play soccer. Lets just say we need more practice. We eventually had to go get the football to knock the soccer ball out of the tree. Heheh :-P

Posted by chris at 02:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

On a side note, yesterday got worse before it got better. Christine was working extra late so I had to wait a long time for my hug. I tried changing the bed and ended up bending one of the overhead fan blades. I tried washing the sheets but found out my drier is dying.... it takes several times through the drier to dry anything (and it's on the correct setting). However, Darcy did enlighten me to the way of the cowbell. "I have a fever and the only prescription for it is cowbell." (SNL skit)
Today, they pour the foundation. We are hoping to run out there this evening and scratch our initials someplace... mabye the front porch or the driveway. I went our yesterday and they had just passed the first plumbing inspection. Yay!
After the defacing of our foundation, we are meeting with the priest to talk about the wedding. It's pretty cool, becuase I found the church (Saint Anthony's) online, looked through the site and sent off an email to Father Morris. A couple hours later he responded. It's great that churches have online presences, it makes it abunch easier for geeks like me!

Posted by chris at 08:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

It was a good day untill:

• I get a note from my bank letting me know that the changed my bank account to one with less features because I dont have a direct deposit from my place of employment (they are changing vendors). Ughh
• I walk into my room a see that one of my cats had thrown up AND left a hairball on my bed. Ick
• NEW * Cats act like butt weazles on crack running around so much that they throw up food on the carpet

I need a hug.

Posted by chris at 05:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hrmm... this long weekend was pretty short. I made several vege, fruit, and cracker party trays for Lilly's wedding shower. I think they were beautifull. I blew up 40 baloons. I went to the house 6 times. Went to brunch on Sunday at a country club with my family (in the afternoon.. so was it linner?). Went to an impromptue wedding shower for Christine's coworker whose soon to be husband is being sent to Turkey for the military tomorrow. I went to a soccer game, but it started raining. I made fried mushrooms and fried shrimp on seperate days. I got tired.

On a heart-attack related note, I was awakened quite suddenly this morning. So person regularly walks their dog early in the morning, and doesn't keep it on the leash. Every now and again (and this morning), I am very abruptly woken by a loud bang on the window, immediatly followed by alot of barking outside, and hissing growling cats inside. For all of the readers who might be unable to picture this in your mind, try this:

• go to sleep
• get comfortable
• get cozy
• have someone bang many pots and pans together right over your head
• Have heart attack

It really opens your eyes.

Posted by chris at 08:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Stupid drivers.... Older people should have to take regular test to ensure they are still able to drive. Everybody should be forced to take regular tests to learn how to stay within their lane while turning. And what the hell is up with people shaking their heads at you when they are the one's who screwed up? GRRRR... Not to mention the bastards who cut you off so they can turn in front of you (instead of going behind you). What bothers me, is that the people don't even realize they did something wrong. I wish I could get out of my car each time and tell them how they were wrong so maybe, next time, they wont do it again. Its noon and I already need a margarita.

Boss called last evening at 5... told us we had today off!! Yay!! So I slept till 9, then I got called by Ting, then I went back to bed and awoke to a loud beeping noise. Beep Beep Beep grumble grumble rattle..... (Automatic cat feeder at 10am)... Finally got up, sent my taxes, took pictures of the house (getting ready to pour concrete... lot looks like an inverted waffle).

I already want to go back to bed!

Posted by chris at 12:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I sent in over 30 rebates about 2 weeks ago. So far, almost 1/3 of them have been denied in some way or another. The cite many reasons...missing reciept, duplicate submissions, altered reciept. What gets me, is on most of the rebates, the rebate is the actual reciept. You fill in your info, you cut out the UPC and you mail it to them. I think they just randomly deny ones just to piss people off. Good thing I made copies of everything (even the envelope).... bastards....

In similiar news, I've finally finished my taxes. I only owe $1009!! Wow... isn't that swell. Grrrr... What pisses me off even more, is that if you want to submit electionically, it costs $15. What the hell?!? It is much more convient for both parties, but they decide to charge anyways... grrrr...

A few weeks ago, I got an idea stuck in my head. I was to become rich as an Ebay expert. I would buy low, sell high, and I would be rolling in money!! Yesterday was to be my begining. That is... untill I checked into how much the stuff I have laying around would sell for. I was gunna sell all my old crap to start out. Yup, you guessed it... most stuff costs more to ship that its selling for (good thing shipping isn't included in the selling price). Anyways, I think if I sold all the small stuff I was trying to get rid of, I'd be $50 bucks richer, but it would take 5 hrs of my time to do it. Its been a long time since I made $10 / hr. Ughh.

However, I did give some guy's car a jump start this morning. Maybe I'll become rich by doing good deeds. Wait... whats that saying? No good deed goes unpunished?

Posted by chris at 01:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Daylight savings time has me all screwy. I'm going to bed 2 hours late, waking up 3 hrs late, and eating 2 hrs later than usual too. Lets see... get in at 10, take a 1.5 hr long lunch, leave at 5:30... sounds about right. The wierd thing is, Ting is now getting in early (8ish), but leaving really late (7ish). ?!?!Confused?!?!

Posted by chris at 10:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Well, Brandon the Builder called today and told us that he can't put a safe in the foundation. :-( Not super happy about that, but what can you do? He said that they stopped doing that after liability issues arose from owners in similiar situations. Ohh well. We talked about a few things and he said he hopes/plans/expects to be done in June. Only 1 month after my current lease ends. So that means I will only be violated for 1 month instead of the 2 I expected. He was a pretty young guy but he seemed to know what was going on, so everything looks good I spose.

In other news, I'm playing with a script to make a calendar, that lets me browse my pictures based off of the exif date. I'll let you know when I have something for you all to play with.

In other other news, I got my first chance to take pictures 'professionally' for a group.... Sartaj asked me to be an event photgrapher for a camp this weekend, but unfortunately its 3 hrs away and its all day Fri and Sat. I work Friday, and I feel uncomfortable driving 3 hrs there and 3 hrs back and unsure if I get paid (they pay for what they like). If it was alot closer or I was guarenteed more payment than cost of gas.... Hopefully another opportunity will pop up soon.

Posted by chris at 06:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think succeded in importing all my old entries.... didn't do anything with comments yet, though. Might just leave it alone. If you find any entries that are REALLY short, same text as the title, or look like they are really comments, let me know and I can fix.

Posted by chris at 07:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I judged a competition for children all day Saturday. It was long and stessfull, but worth it. In my problem, there are various aspect of the presentation to be graded on, and we split up 4 judges such that everything aspect is graded atleast twice. Then we average the scores.
One of the teams decided to put on a skit about old people. They poked fun about their fading memories, sagging bodies, etc... just general stereotypes. The way they portrayed the elderly wan't necessarily demeaning or vicous, it was basicaly equivelant to dumb blonde jokes. After talking with the team, we found thay they were portraying one of the kid's grandmother and friends, and grandmother & friends loved the presentation. It was intended to be light-hearted, but sometimes it can be taken the wrong way.
Unfortunately one of the judges did take it the wrong way. She said she worked with the elderly and was HORRIBLY offended. She was wanting a unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, as well as grading them INCREDIBLY low on many parts of the presentation. None of the other judges took offense to the skit, but we could understand (not necessarily agree, though) why she was offended. She was so emotional, she couldn't grade anything else for that team objectively (as she should). After trying to calm her down, and trying to explain that they weren't trying to be mean, etc... she still refused to change her scores. We had to pull out the rulebook to force her to mark something there (that was there) but she insisted she didn't see. Eventually, the state coordinator, and various other high-up people had to override her score, but the damage was already done.
Then, the team came to pick up their scores and even less fun ensued. They said they didn't intend it that way and they presented it at a nursing home and they loved it. Eventaully, they went home crying.
I was very bothered by the whole situation. Someone was offended for something was wasn't supposed to be offensive and refused to listen to any explination, or give any benfit of the doubt to a team that had worked months on a problem. I understand the issues from the team's perspective and the judge's perspective. There was no way anyone can win. I felt bad that the judge was offended, I felt bad that the team's chance of going on was completely ruined, and I felt bad I couldn't do anything to make anyone happy w/o making the other party feel worse.
Political correctness is going crazy abd ruining this country... You can't disagree with a person in the minority without being racist, sexist, bigoted, pick-your-offense.... I'm not saying that actual racist... remarks are acceptable, just think before the knee-jerk reaction. I guess I am horribly offending people who cant drive worth a damn everytime I bitch about them. Every team that competed somehow used a stereotype in their skit... should we penalize every team? Or just the teams who use a stereotype that one of our judges takes offense to?
I'm just so frusterated that I can't structure my thoughts coherently.

Posted by chris at 01:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What the HELL is the matter with people? A 4 way stop means STOP. You don't run the sign so you can cut people off who actually obey the law (what a novel concept). Also, try fricking SLOWING down in parking lots.... especially around blind corners. I got my mail, got in my car, looked both ways, slowly and carefully pulled out and some fucking bitch came flying through the parking lot and almost hit me. Then she starts laying on the horn. I resist urges to flick her off, etc... and start driving down the parking lot. She tailgates me, honking and waving her hands around. What pisses me off, is I looked. I checked... I was looking when she came speeding around the corner. There is NO WAY it is my fault at all, yet she has the nerve.... I wanted to get out of my car and start smashing windows! GRRRR

Posted by chris at 04:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

They put pipes in the ground!! W00+ w00+

Posted by chris at 01:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was chit-chatting with Katrina today and she is a little frazzeled between getting ready for her wedding / showers / recently moving / etc...

Here is a snippet of our conversation (edited to protect the guilty and for coherence):

KAT: i think i'm going to go to subway and grab a sandwich
ME: alrighty!!
ME: I wish you the most 'best of luck' that I can while still being appropriate
KAT: still being appropriate?
ME: yes.... just didn't want to go too far...
ME: it would be uncomfortable
KAT: oh ok
ME: for everyone involved and 3 people who aren't involved
KAT: three people who aren't involved?
KAT: i'm confused
ME: ya
KAT: what?
ME: it would be uncomfortable ... for everyone involved and 3 people who aren't involved
KAT: who are the three people who aren't involved?
KAT: and what aren't they involved in?
ME: dont know... they aren't involved.... but I'm sure they would be uncomfortable if I wished you more 'best of luck' than was appropriate
KAT: i'm so confused?
KAT: did i forget to invite someone to something?
ME: is that a question?
ME: yes, you are so confused
ME: hehe
ME: :-P
KAT: ummm
ME: I'm being odd
KAT: hehe
KAT: ok
KAT: i'm sorry...
ME: take that into account
KAT: my nerves are kind of shot these days
KAT: when i read that. i actually got a jolt of anxiety
ME: it was supposed to be funny.... but you made it 'so not funny' and now everyone invovled is slighty uncomfortable and 1 other person who is not involved at all is now uncomfortable too
KAT: hehe
ME: :-)
ME: better?

Posted by chris at 11:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)