Thunder of Wade

Bought an elliptical trainer over the weekend – a sort of an early gift. The sales guy at Dick’s was sorta crazy – he suggested the extended warranty in case I was working out and a piece “just flies off” – and suggesting that with the warranty, I wouldn’t have to pay for repairs. I politely declined.

The assembly went fairly smoothly – though there was one tricky step. No parts left over and the only thing missing was one of the screws to hold the water bottle in place. I’m going to have to position it carefully in the basement – the ceiling is a little low.

The home computer bought the farm again – this time, I think it’s history. So much for the free and somewhat suspicious repairs. Ah, well, maybe I can get a good deal with a christmas sale.

Had a bit of a vain moment this weekend. I cleaned out my closets and drawers to donate some clothes to goodwill and in the organizing and re-arranging, I found an old tank top. I put that on after my shower and noticed that it no longer fit me well. I had, somehow, developed a chest. I actually checked myself out in the mirror for a few minutes until I felt silly. Still, the swimming is paying off. And that’s cool.

The drive into work… (sigh). I live in Northeast Ohio. It snows here. If it snowed in July – no one should be surprised since we get all the weather types that exist. And it changes every 20 minutes or so. There were flurries in the air this morning as I pulled onto the highway – and immediately had to slam on my brakes since the cars in front of me were going – no lie – less than 25 miles per hour. Everyone else went past us at 60+ and it took a while to find a safe opening to switch lanes – since I had to not only change lanes but double my speed. When I got past those three cars I saw that the lead one was poking along for no good reason. They’ll have a cold ride into work today since I blew their doors off- by going the speed limit for the highway!

So, a somewhat cranky start to the morning – but I made it here safely and it’s time to get back to it. later…

Well, I got the speakers working on the home computer. After running through the diagnostics and opening up the box, I finally gave up and tried plugging in the headphones. Those worked fine. I unplugged them and suddenly, the speakers were working. Good, but also annoying.

Day two of the in-house training. Went pretty well, though it was a little too simplistic and at the same time, a little beyond the scope of what it was supposed to cover. I learned some new things and was also a little “pre-daunted” at what is facing the team as far as work-load goes.

Finally, I’ve been putting out fires for the past two days with work issues. I thought I had them all put out – and then I checked my email this evening. Mistake. There was another fire and I can almost smell the gasoline. Makes me cranky. I’ve got a couple of solutions – neither of them good – but at least I’m trying. We’ll see how it goes.

Time for dinner… later…

I’m in training all day today – and I had a pile of work this morning to rush through. Fun, in a non-fun sense of the term.

I picked up the computer yesterday and it booted up normally last evening. Only thing not working is the soundcard – so, gotta dig it in tonight and fix it.

Did a lot of Christmas shopping last night made progress and didn’t kill anyone – so, that was good.

Well, gotta run…

Well, today marked my 1 year in the pool – I did a mile. Which is quite an improvement from my 1/8 of a mile last year. So, that was kinda cool.

I got the word that the home computer is fixed. The tech explained that the memory was in the wrong slots – although how it spontaneously failed is still a mystery. Sorting out the slots made it magically all better. I’m picking it up today after work, but I’m still thinking about getting a new machine.

Two days of training coming up – which would be fine if the web pixies did my work for me while I’m gone. Alas, I suspect they won’t show and I’ll have a pile waiting for me. At least I’ll have a computer at home again so I can log in and try and get caught up.

That’s it for now – later…

I’m not a big fan of the holidays anymore. Christmas gets stressful with the present buying and travel and New Year’s seems arbitrary and wildly anti-climatic. I dunno, maybe I’m just getting old and cynical. And Christmas music? Ugh. Most of what I’ve heard recently is either ancient and dated – or it’s more modern but cloying.

I used to enjoy it. Used to be the “bees knees”. Now, it just makes me tired. Or it could be that I’ve got some kind of SAD or something.

In other news… my room-mate was trying to hang up Christmas lights yesterday evening – in the dark and in the rain. Suddenly, all the outlets in the garage where he had these plugged in went out. Lights, radio, etc. We checked the breakers and didn’t see any correctly marked or blown. I suggested it might be related to the fact that he was standing a puddle of water and the cords were wet -but my suggestions were dismissed.

Note to self – you should get current on your CPR training again.

Not sure why that comes to mind. Maybe seeing someone standing in a puddle of water trying to hang up very fragile lights – with an extension cord in the water as well. Eh, guess I’m just being silly.

I called about the broken computer yesterday. This is the 5th working day that they’ve had it – I’m hoping to get a real answer today. It also irks me just a wee little bit that I didn’t get bumped up in the workflow. We are in the same division and I would have done the same for them.
Eh, not really fair I guess. Student computer issues should rightly come first over staff. Still, I’d really like to get moving toward some kind of solution.

Label this post as Cranky… guess that’s all I’ve got for now…

I visited my parents over the Thanksgiving weekend. Had a pretty good time and ate a lot of food. I helped a little with the lights and the yard work. We tried to go to an Italian restaurant on saturday as a change of pace, but it was closed for a special event. We ended up going to Bob Evans where the food was okay, but the service was really bad.

While I was there, I hung out with the dog, Chloe. I spent a good long time rubbing her belly – which she loves – then sat up and lifted my shirt. “Okay,” I told her, “My turn,”
She hopped up and came over, lifting her paw to my bare stomach. She was trying to rub my belly! I thanked her for the effort, but quickly lowered my shirt before her claws tore me up.

I gave my folks my Christmas list – seems a little silly, but we still do those. And since I had to do one, I insisted that I get one from them as well. Only seems fair. So, I’ve got a bit of shopping to do.

Looking back over my swimming log – I realized that my Year of Water actually began on November 29th. So, this week will mark a year that I’ve been hitting the pool. Kinda cool.

That’s about it for now… back to work…

This is post 400 for me. I think the phrase I’m looking for is woop-dee-freaking-doo – not as exciting as I would have liked. Anyway, here it is.

Swam 45 laps today – that’s 1.25 miles. And I paid for it – got a massive leg cramp at lap 42. Had to stop partway into lap 43 and struggle to get back to the edge. Spent the next few minutes trying to work out the cramp with grimace on my face. I was spared any potential embarrassment since the lifeguard was totally ignoring me so I was lucky there. Seriously, you have one job – watch the people swimming. A “hey, buddy, you okay?” would have been great – I got zilch. Anyway, I got past it and finished my laps.

Talked to my room-mate a few minutes ago. He was sick again this morning, called into work and slept the rest of the day. FYI – he recommends throwing up into garbage cans that have dryer sheets in them – a much more pleasant experience. He also coined the phrase – “puke and Bounce”.

That’s it for me… got a few things to wrap up before I head out.

later…

I heard the Rilo Kiley song “silver lining” last night on the cable music and found it today on YouTube. Really sweet and sad song with a good beat. Listening to it today on repeat.

My room-mate woke me up last night around midnight – he was “horking” into the toilet. Actually both of them – he started downstairs, then thought he was done and went upstairs, where he was proved wrong. He said he’s been this way for about 3 weeks – throwing up 1-2 times per day, but has been both keeping it from me and not doing anything about it.

Once he was as stable as can be, I went and cleaned up the downstairs bathroom (he had better “aim” upstairs) and since he didn’t want to go to the hospital, I went back to bed. I could have been more compassionate, but I was really not at my best. I pretty much ordered him to go to the doctor since my Q&A session didn’t yield any patterns. We’ll see how that goes.

The light under my cabinet in the “cube” here at work had partly fallen down overnight. My attempts to fix it made things slightly worse. We had to have one of the maintenance dudes stop over and use some hammer-based “persuasion” to get it back into place. Weird that it would just fall like that.

Reading a new book called – “The Book of Lost Things”. It’s started out as a sad story, but with adventure right around the corner. Looking pretty cool. Plus, Saint Anthony is the patron saint of Lost Things – so, it should be right up my alley.

Guess that’s it for now. This is entry 399 for this blog, I may write again after my swim today.

later…

In the hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy, there’s a scene where the characters are confronted with a buruacratic line and the hero says, “Leave this to me. I’m British. I know how to queue,”

Well, yesterday I was confronted with an American that didn’t know how to queue. A line was forming at the snack area and both the non-queue person and I were moving into position. I followed the previous pattern of people and the pathway approaching the checkout. He was ahead of me coming from the side and stood at a right angle to the rest of the line. Everyone else in the store formed up behind me – making it clear that he was doing it wrong. I left him enough room to step over in front of me into the line, but he simply stood there, oblivious. Holding his pack of gum.

Now, some would argue that he was looking at things from a different perspective and marching to the beat of his own drum. People that argue that are wrong, sorry.

Once I got nearer the front of the checkout line, I noticed that things were not moving as efficiently as they could be. There were two areas open, but both had issues. The guy at the far checkout was in a massive neck-brace – the kind of thing a Klingon would wear if they had an injured neck. He could barely move in that thing and was becoming dangerous with his quick turn-arounds to see things. The woman that ended up helping me had apparently forgotten her glasses that day since she could barely see and had to bring all the items up to her nose to see them. I noticed one customer use a coupon and then pay with cash and needed change. Might has well have tossed a wooden shoe into the machinery.

I finally escaped after making my purchase – but it was really a summary of how my day went. People in my way, actively opposed to letting me get on with my life. And me trying to stay out of everyone else’s way.

In other news… I filled up my gas tank this morning – almost thirty bucks. And this was with a 1/4 tank left and after the price had “gone down” – whatever that means.

Also this morning, I took a different route to work. It went better and more smoothly than the way I usually go – so, that went well.

Finally, I took my room-mate’s computer to the repair shop here at work. They created a work over for me and said they would take a look. Felt a little funny that I didn’t get a receipt or something, but they did send me an email – so, we’ll see how it goes.

Guess that’s it for now… back to work…

Had a good weekend – a visit from my sister and brother in law. They were in town to meet up with some friends from Cleveland for dinner and stayed with us for the weekend. Had a nice time and played a lot of UNO. They are OSU fans and my room-mate is a Michigan fan – so the game was fairly intense on Saturday. I played my PSP and just kinda hung out since I’m only marginally an Akron Zips fan if that.

It was good to see them and I’m glad they could stay with us.

My room-mate’s computer bought the farm on Friday evening. We took it over to the Best Buy Geek squad and they couldn’t even get it to stay turned on. So, based on previous issues, I suspect it’s the motherboard that is toast. I’m going to see if the crew here can take a look – but I think a new computer is in the future.

Work this morning, on what could only be a Monday morning – has sucked. Glad we’ve got a short week – I suspect there will be at least two more Mondays this week.