Thunder of Wade

The Obama infomercial was on last night – I didn’t watch it though I’ve heard it was well done. Still, who was it directed at? The undecided voters? I have a difficult time understanding why someone – even after the inundation of the media – would still not have made up their mind. One argument I heard was that they wanted to have all the information before voting. Well, I have news for you. It’s all lies. Or policital speak that sounds like truth depending on who you are. And as far as not really liking either of them – another argument I heard – well, it’s not about liking them, it’s about picking the one least likely to make things worse. I mean, seriously, make up your mind and go vote.

A few months ago – I guess it would have been sometime in the spring – I built a framework of wood and plexiglass and hung it over the urinal in the men’s room so we could put the twice a week student paper there to read. You know, while we were “otherwise” occupied and standing there.

I made it my job to keep this up to date until the summer when the paper wasn’t published. In the fall, I started up restocking it with new issues – but I noticed that the “old” paper wouldn’t be there when I went to add the new one. It would just be an empty frame. It got so bad that the paper would be gone within a few hours. I decided that someone was either stealing it – which made no sense since the paper is free and easy to get – or they really didn’t like the paper and was throwing it away.

I finally got tired of the futility of keeping it stocked and took the framework down a couple of days ago. The double-sided foam tape didn’t come down well and each time I use that urinal, I take a moment and scrape a little more off.

Kinda disappointing. I dunno who was removing the papers – and I haven’t asked since I didn’t ask permission to put it up in the first place.

Work has been busy and frustrating today. Looking forward to tomorrow to make my annual rounds.

later…

It’s snowing today here in Akron. Not a lot, just a little in the air. I was still okay in my lightweight jacket, but I may have to hang that up soon and switch to my winter coat. There have been a few people I’ve talked to that have been somewhat astonished at the snow – which has me thinking, “remembers last year? when it snowed? It’s just like that.” And seriously, it’s Ohio. If we had a 90 degree temperatures in December in or snow in August, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.

With my video game system back up and running, I’ve been going back through my games and replaying a few. Dawn of Mana didn’t last long before I put it in the “to be sold” pile, but Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones is pretty good. I got stuck last time with a boss battle and lost my patience, but I’m giving it another go from the beginning and enjoying the acrobatics of the title character.

The costumes are essentially done – for both myself and my room-mate. Which means I can reclaim my half of the garage that had been designated as the spray paint area. Which is good since I despise scraping off my car in the winter. I mean, seriously despise. Can’t stand it. Most hated part of winter. You see where I’m going with this. I’d rather drive in a freaking blizzard or shovel snow all day than scrape off my car in the morning.

Well, looks like I’ve got a couple disasters to deal with here at work – better get back to them.

later…

I’m in a better mood today. No headache – and it’s pretty quiet in the office. Looking forward to a long lunch (the boss is out of town).

I updated my fortune cookie webpage today – I was 6 fortunes behind. I think I need to do something different with this page – it has the potential to get very long and unwieldy.

Went for pizza last night at CiCi’s. The food was pretty good – but the place was almost dead. We were the last two customers in there and wondered if they would still announce “Cheese Pizza on the Buffet!” if there were no customers at all. (if a tree falls in the woods…?) It also appears that they don’t always say good-bye to customers with a hearty “CiCi you later!” though all the employees said normal goodbyes when we left.

Not much going on here… later…

Finally got my video game system back up and running. Switched out the TV for my old one – I had been using one that my room-mate got from his dad’s place. I was looking for a new stereo that would do the job of my old one – but they were either too expensive or didn’t have the right connectors. So, ended up using an old audio receiver that my room-mate had. It all works, but it’s not ideal. The DVD player doubles as the CD player. The cable TV sound can’t play through the stereo speakers – it has to come out of the TV. But, I’m playing video games again and that’s the important bit. Besides, who wants to watch TV anymore?

The political ads are getting worse. I saw one the other day that had a single mom begging us to vote Issue 6 – because she was going to lose her current job and her only hope was getting one of the 10,000 new jobs at the casino? Seriously? That’s your only hope? A casino job? Right…

The news clips on the internet are worse. I saw one where a man was losing his job and was going to vote for Obama because he had a better economic policy. His wife was asked who she was voting for and she said “I’m voting for the one with the most faith in the Lord, just as everyone should,”
When asked what if that meant her husband would lose his job, she replied, “the Lord will provide for us,” She also expressed astonishment that Obama’s mother was an atheist – assuming that he should have been disqualified on that alone. I try to keep an open mind about religions and respect people’s beliefs – but isn’t there something about God helping those who help themselves? Or a separation of chuch and state in the constitution? There was more to the clip, but I couldn’t watch it.

Worse still is the story of the girl with the McCain campaign who made up a story about being attacked by a scary black guy that was supporting Obama and carved a letter B in her cheek when he saw her McCain sticker on her car. Totally made up. She faked the whole thing and cut her own cheek (the B was backward even).

Finally, I saw a clip of a family at a McCain rally where they were all chanting Nobama over and over. Then the little girl pretended to be a monkey.

(crickets chirping)

Yes. It was exactly that bad. This election is really bringing out the worst in people – or maybe that has always been there and the election is just making it visible.

My neighbors put up another sign in their yard – “Another democrat for McCain”. I have, thus far, resisted taking it down. Mainly because I would need to take down all the signs in my neighborhood to throw off suspicion. And because people are entitled to their own opinion – even if it’s wrong.

In other news… I’m getting a headache this morning. Might be what’s making me cranky. Can’t tell yet if it’s a migraine. If it does go that way, I’m so out of here. It’s already been a Monday all morning.

Finally, I got a water bottle this weekend. Partly because the water bottle I get from Giant Eagle have been reported to have higher levels than usual of some toxins. It also makes sense from an environmental standpoint. I got the BPA free bottle at Dick’s Sporting goods and while it looks cool, the only way to drink the water out of the spill-proof bottle is to bite down on the silicon end and suck the water via the straw in the bottle. It’s kind of odd. But it works and I was able to drink 24 oz this morning – which means I need to hit the bathroom now.

later…

I just finished going through all the issues on the ballot for this year’s election – as well as all the candidates. I wasn’t as thoroughly prepared last time around and had to fall back on:
1) unseat the incumbent
2) go with the democrat
3) pick the woman (since I know how guys think and frankly, we really shouldn’t be given any more power)

But that method didn’t always work – so, I spent about an hour on the internet going through everything and taking notes. I’m ready to go this time around and should be in and out of the voting booth in record time.

I bought some more spray paint tonight for my room-mate’s costume. I think I’ve put more work into this than he has – but I’ve got more experience and apparently more time. A few people at work are trying to get me to tell what my costume is – but I’m not breaking. They’ll just have to wait.

Finally, got some photos of this year’s jack-o-lanterns. Mine is the lower one – it’s a smiley emoticon. Because I’m a geek.

I didn’t have a lot of time yesterday for my swim, so I hauled ass in the pool. 30 laps, in 33 minutes. I don’t know if that’s a new record for me since I usually don’t pay attention to the time, but it felt pretty fast.

Carved some pumpkins last night. Well, I mostly scooped out the guts and my room-mate did more of the carving. He did a pretty cool vampire face on his – on mine I did a smiley emoticon. It was clever, but not my idea. We tried to get some photos, but couldn’t turn off the flash on his camera – time to read the manual, I guess.

And when I went outside around 10:00 to put something in my car, I saw… something.

There was a bright light in the sky – several times larger than a star. There was no shape to it, just a very bright light and a faint contrail behind it. It moved across the sky in a straight, horizontal line. Very very fast and totally silent. It flew over my head and I had to turn around to see it. And then it was gone.

I tried to talk to my room-mate about it – he’s pretty much Mulder Jr. on the subject of UFO’s – but he was strangely dismissive. Here I was, a Scully who’s trying to believe and he writes it off as a shooting star. Then we got into a minor argument about sonic booms and I dropped the issue. Whatever it was, it was pretty weird.

later…

I was watching a bit of TV recently – which I’ve been trying to avoid until the election is over and the ads are stopped – and while I usually tune out the increasingly strident commercials in general, my attention was drawn to a new migraine medicine. It promised to offer relief – and then went on to list the dozens of potentially serious side effects. The side effects sounded terrible – and what about the poor people who helped test this stuff? I think I’d rather have a migraine.

My room-mate went in for allergy tests – the doctors thought there might be an allergy that is causing his occasional wheezing. According to the allergy clinic, he’s allergic to a ton of different things. And the recommended “treatment” is 5 allergy shots every week for a year. And then five more every month for another year. He said the doctor has to be in the room when they give him the shot since it’s essentially a dose of allergen and the the reaction could kill him. Potentially. The end results – after a couple years and thousands of dollars – will most likely be a lessening of the allergy. Maybe.

Sounds like the doctors and drug companies need to learn how to “help” and not hinder. Granted, hindering is more fun, but it’s also kinda mean if you’re serious about it.

I’m wrapping up my costume – just a couple more details to go. Also, I’m helping my room-mate with his costume again this year. It’s more work, but I can make better use of the ‘dry-times’ by going back and forth. I’m really starting to get into the spirit of Halloween again – bought some candy last night and I think some pumpkin carving is in my near future.

Finally, I left my car out last night and this morning I had to scrape off the windshield. Winter is on the way…

That’s it for now… later…

I swam 45 laps (1.25 miles) today. And I seemed to have gotten some kind of second wind or something because I got faster as I went along. I’m pretty tired, but it was good.

The reason for this longer swim? I had a work issue. I generally try not to talk about work in this blog because that’s one of the many delightful ways to get yourself fired. So, I’m going to be very vague about this.

I had a user that I worked with on a huge project. It’s been well over a year since we started it and our team has put a lot of time and effort into getting the work down. The user seemed to be right there and right on track with us – but things got delayed in an approvals process. I sent a note today to check on the progress and found that they thought the tools we were using were in adequate for what they needed. And were essentially abandoning all the work we had done.

I was really fired up by this – at the massive waste of time. And I figured I could use this to set some new records in the pool. But as the bubbles rushed past my head and the laps added up – I realized that it was a little pointless to be upset by all this.

I didn’t do anything wrong in the whole project, nor did I drop the ball or hinder the user at all. In every case, I worked to make things easier and faster and offered to help at every turn. That the user decided – at something beyond the last moment – to do something entirely different, well, nothing I can do about that. I stand by the work that the team did and I think the user is missing out on a great new site and a new tool to update things. I’m also a little curious as to how they will explain that to their bosses – ’cause this was very much not the plan.

I guess that’s it for now – looking forward to getting out of here and relaxing at home – and maybe working on my costume a bit.

later…

I try, frequently, to not ‘want’ things. A casual association with material possessions seems to suit me better – and it’s got a Buddhist feel to it. That’s not to say that I don’t purchase things that I enjoy, I just try to not get wrapped up in the ownership of them.

There are two exceptions to this – and one of those was completed this weekend. Converse shoes. I’ve long wanted a pair of converse shoes – just because they look so damn cool. But, every time I looked at them and looked at the prices, the sheer impracticality of spending that much money on shoes put me off. This weekend, however, I found that Target had them for $30. And in brown – which I think, as a geek, I can wear with my kaki’s to work.

The other item is a truck. I think at some point in my life I should own a truck. Not really sure why – and that’s a main reason I haven’t bought one yet. What, exactly, does one need a truck for? Hauling stuff. And I don’t do that very often. Even the times where I’ve purchased some lumber or something – well, the back seats of my car fold down and I can put a lot in there.

So, the impracticality of it seems to have stopped me. Along with the price, the fact I don’t know how to drive a stick shift, and lack of fuel economy, size vs. parking issues, and the lessor passenger space.

In other news… I did a mile in the pool last Friday. Not a big deal, I’ve done that before. I think I was a little faster than usual and I felt stronger in the water than I usually do. The interesting part was how I felt after the swim. I felt… rested. Like I’d just had a really comfortable nap. A sort of “slightly groggy happy”. Not what I would have expected after a long swim, but a good feeling.

That’s it for now… later…

I watched “the happening” last night. Mark Walberg… not a great actor. The movie was okay, but a little heavy handed at times. And the ending was a little predictable and a little flat. The effects were okay, so overall it was an okay movie.

Worked on my costume today – made some good progress. I’m helping my room-mate with his costume as well, we got some of the supplies today.

Reading a bit more of a book called “True Enough – Living in a Post Fact Society” – a study on media and information and how pretty much everything gets distorted. Very appropriate for an election time. I’m getting really tired of the ads on TV and the endless signs posted everywhere.

My video game set-up has taken a turn for the worse. The TV is no longer reliable and the picture keeps cutting out on the “more off” side of randomly on and off. And now it seems that the stereo has bought the farm as well. Not sure what my next step is here – I’m considering splurging and getting a new TV and a PS3 all at once. Not very likely for me though.

That’s it for now – time for another coat of paint. later…