The Cat's Nuts

Last night Laura, her sister and I went to the Robert Earl Keen concert in Battery Park. Apparently, every Thursday night for a 6 week period they have free concerts in the park. It was really nice. Prefect weather, the music was good and it was a generally jovial atmosphere. Don’t really have much more to say about that. I took some pictures of Laura’s sister for her Match.com profile, but other than that, it was a very mild evening.

Afterwards, we went to Stain Bar. We were told there was a tasting of Sixpoint Craft Beer there, but by the time we got there, it had all been gone through, so that was disappointing. Either way, it was nice to see a bar that was really close to our place. I think it was about 5 blocks away. Not too shabby. They have these weird 5’ in diameter coins on the walls that are very artsy. Not really my scene. I felt a little out of place with a Columbia Athletics T-shirt on, but that’s okay. I often feel out of place in Williamsburg because of my “jockish” look.

So after leaving Stain Bar, we went down to our favorite Brooklyn dive, Barcade. You have to love that place. There’s just so much selection of all good beer. Usually the staff is quite friendly, but they had a girl working last night that’s just a total bitch. Not that she really did anything, it was just the lack of joy she was taking in her work. When you are working in a service industry, such as bartending, one would think that it would be in your best interest to be nice and smile at customers and actually take your time, but no, she was all about just getting it done and not really helping out all that much. I dunno, maybe I just didn’t like the look of her…who knows. Anyway, so we had a beer (I had a Sixpoint Diesel) and headed home.

I installed Photoshop CS2 on my computer last night, so that’s cool. It irritated me that this new version came out like 6 months after the original Photoshop CS, but whatever. Nothing you can do. Supposedly there are a few really worthwhile features included in this version, but honestly, I wasn’t very interested in reading much last night, just getting it installed. Too bad I won’t get to play with it tonight…Laura and I are heading up to my parents house for that Engagement Party. Whooo Hoooo!

I think that this time around, I may actually bring some depositions up with me and do them on the train. It’s getting to the point where I’m really going to be limited in the number of hours that I get in overtime, so I gotta make the most of what I can get my hands on. I have two sitting here, so I might as well do them ASAP. Speaking of money, pretty soon I should be able to find out if I’m going to be getting a job bartending at the US Open. I really need that money for school. Found out that I’ll be taking out another $15,000 in student loans to pay for this last year of school. It’s going to suck, but at least it’s not the full bill. That would be miserable. So getting that bartending gig would be ideal.

For the past two days at work, the internet has been down… well, not down, but running at dial up speed and some pages won’t load. For instance, I can go and read ESPN.com, but I can’t check my Beer Mail on BeerAdvocate.com, so that sucks. Makes for a less enjoyable time at work.

Speaking of beer, I priced out the kegging system, and it’s going to run us about $160 for two corny kegs (5 gallon) and a CO2 tank and all the regulators and that kind of stuff. I am undecided if we’re really willing to put out that kind of money, but who knows. The types of beer that we really enjoy, such as the porters and the stouts, really need to sit and mature for like 3 months before they are drinkable, where as other beers, like bitters, wheat beer, and IPA’s tend to be better if drunk soon after bottling because the hop flavors are still fresh. So those are the ideal candidates for kegging. I am getting more into the hop stuff, so that would be nice, and it’s always nice to not have to bottle and to have your own draft system… so many things to weigh out. We have till Monday or so, so I think I’ll think it over over the weekend and decide then.

So Laura was given the opportunity to concoct a recipe for the next batch of beer. She’s been working on it for like 3 weeks now, and has yet to finalize and order it. I told her today that if she doesn’t have it done by today, then we’re just going to order up a recipe that I made up. Hopefully she’ll get her ass in gear and figure out what kind of beer she wants to brew. I’ve been thinking that we should brew up a very very simple hefeweizen while the summer is still here. So maybe I’ll look up a recipe for that and order that up instead of waiting for Laura to make up her mind.

Anyway, I suppose I should get some deposition stuff done while I have some time to kill this afternoon.

Posted by Michael at 11:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

For anyone that doesn’t know what it’s like in NYC during the summer months, all you have to do is go to your local health club and sit in their steam room. Yeah, it’s really similar to that. Yesterday was so miserable I think the weather guys said it “feels like” whatever the hell that means…105. Yeah, THAT is miserable. It was so humid that even inside, with the AC’s running, I had a bottle of water on my desk at work that was sweating. Miserable.

After work yesterday, I got the chance to participate in a focus group. I thought it was going to be like those terrible ones from Columbia where you go and they have you read passages and then test your memory and all that crap. But no, this one was different. We got to see a new product, then comment on it and make suggestions on how to make it better. Well this product was a projector that was about 6 inches long, 2 inches high, and 4 inches deep. It had a brushed aluminum band that went around the front and protected the lens. Looked kind of like a Canon projector, but we’re not sure. We weren’t able to see the manufacturer. Although it was a nifty TINY little thing, it wasn’t HD, and the contrast ratio wasn’t all that great….meaning that the difference between the whitest whites and the darkest blacks wasn’t as much as it should be… and the bulb wasn’t that powerful. On the upside, it had a battery pack so that you could power it on the go, and it also was about one pound, so it was super portable. I was impressed at the size, but the lack of HD really annoyed me. Although it is going to go for around $800, it still will be awhile before it comes out. It was a prototype model. Anyway.. I got paid $150 for sitting in a group for two hours talking about how to market it, who to market it to, and what we could do to make it better. It was the easiest money I have made in quite some time. Hopefully there will be more of those coming my way.

This weekend is my first Engagement Party for a friend that is getting married. It really doesn’t bother me, because some people, you look at them and you just know that it’s their time to get married. You expected it from years earlier that they would be the first ones to go. Anyway, so that’s where I get to go. It’s a pool party strangely enough, but I don’t know how much swimming I’ll be doing, especially if this “cold front” is still around 

There hasn’t been any more sightings of Princess Jill. It’s pretty sad. I think that after my last intrusion, she was pretty upset. Apparently she’s a little camera shy…maybe it’s because she’s lost her girlish figure because she’s preggers (thanks Laura).

I think my next task for this blog is going to be to find out how to change it up a little bit more. It’s one thing to add in a little comic at the bottom, or add in trackers so that I can spy on who’s looking at the site, but I’d really like to learn how to REALLY change it up. I found that there are template files around, so I think I’ll start there, and see where that goes. Maybe I can find one that had RSS built into it so that I don’t have to mess with all that scripting crap that I know nothing about.

I was just looking at the calendar and WOW… there are only 11 days till the Dolphins play the Chicago Bears in the Preseason Hall of Fame game. It’s going to be ugly, considering how they JUST started practicing. Granted, they are all getting a league minimum of $540,000 a year, so I suppose that warrants being in good shape and knowing the play book. Either way, it’ll be nice to see the Dolphins at least once this year. Because of their sub par performance last year, they aren’t going to be televised all that much this year….not that they were last year either….but anyway.

Last night, Laura and I went and checked out a kegging system that was available a few blocks away from our place. Today I have to put together an estimated cost for the system. I think it would be quite ideal for us, considering how we are so damn impatient when it comes to waiting for the beer to bottle condition. With a keg system you can force carbonate the beer. That’s quite handy because you don’t have to wait nearly as long for the beer that you brewed to be ready. You could brew a wheat beer and have it ready to drink a week after you were done….or so that’s my conception of it anyway. So today, if out internet at work ever speeds up a little bit, I should be able to price out what I’d need. I may end up just calling Northern Brewer and talking to one of their people there. They are a bit more knowledgeable than I am about it.

Posted by Michael at 11:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Okay. I wasn't a freaking computer science major in college. It's true. But I figure that I do pretty well for myself. I've set up this blog, inserted things into HTML without any training in it what so ever. Not too bad. Yes... I'm patting myself on the back. That's what you get to do when you do something difficult. So recently I've had this idea that I want varied content on this Blog witout my having to enter it in all the time. Not that I mind, I mean...hell.. it is a blog, but I was thinking that I could add some RSS scripts (think of it as Tivo for the web) so that I could put a script in and have all the daily comics from "Get Fuzzy" (the best comic in the world if you weren't aware) and have it automatically post.

Anyway.. I spent like two hours tonight looking around for an easy way to do it and I've yet to succeed. Tried a few programs here and there, but nothing really works all that well.

I did find a neat program called FeedDemon that allows you to have RSS feeds go directly into the program, so now, instead of going to Sports Illustrated, Slashdot, Engadget, ESPN, and Beer Advocate I just load up that program and it brings me all the newest content right in one simple window. Saves time. Not that I don't have time to burn, but hell, always gotta be efficient, even if it is an efficient way to burn time.

Poor Laura is sick right now, so she's in the other room chugging Miso Soup and ODing on Orange Juice. I hope that she feels better.

So last night I had an intimate encounter with a woman. Laura wasn't home, and I got home and she was laying out in my back yard. Totally naked. Yeah...that's right...nothing on. When I opened the back door and walked out with my camera to take some snap shots, she quickly got up and darted away. Anyway...here are some pictures of her... after I went in and got her a bite to eat.

Posted by Michael at 11:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So last night, Laura and I were getting back from the movies and taking the L train home. That's about par for living in Williamsburg, seeing as how it's the only train that goes there.

So we get on the train, and we're standing, it's really crowded because they ALWAYS do construction on the L train on the weekends. So that's a pain in the ass in itself. So we're standing there next to tons of other people and there's a middle eastern gentleman sitting there on the seat next to us. No big deal. So what if he's got a huge suit case. So then we're just casually looking around and there's another gentleman standing by the door of the train, about 5 feet from the other guy sitting down. He's playing music from a hand held recording device. Strange on it's own, but he too looks a little off. Looks Egyptian, possibly middle eastern. So normally I wouldn't think anything of those two guys, but they were both looking really suspicious. They were both wearing USA hats. And we're not talking like NY Yankees USA, but just hats that said USA on them. Strange. So we're kind of like "What the hell is going on". The little guy with the bag is looking all around, keeps watching what stop we're at and checking his watch. That's fine, you know, if he hadn't been so suspicious I wouldn't have even noticed. So while we're riding the train, we have to end up transferring. Laura and I transfer across the platform. Both those guys get up, and move across with us. Not too strange. But then they get in the exact same spots and get in the exact same stance. The little guy checks his watch again, and the guy playing the music turns it up. At that point Laura is freaking out, and I'm getting a little nervous too. With the bombings in London and Egypt, how can you not? Anyway, so we got off the train and walked the mile home. Not a big deal. We had been walking all day, so it wasn't like a big thing.

I guess my point of this story is that it sucks to live in NYC right now. I feel like a profiling dirty cop that's just looking around to see who looks suspicious.

I was kind of outraged the other day when they announced that the police would be checking bags. I thought "great, there goes another civil liberty" but then I really got to thinking about it and I said "Fuck it...let them search" I'm not a pot head or carrying bombs onto the subway, and if they happen to deter one person that may be thinking about it, then great. I still think that more people are going to be busted for possession or whatever than bombs, but at least it's out there.

Another issue, is I feel like sorry for those guys. They probably are forced to wear those USA hats so that they can try to blend in a little bit, so that they aren't profiled, meanwhile by doing so they look ever more suspicious. I think a Yankees hat may have been a better choice. Oh well. What are you going to do.

So yesterday Laura and I walked from Union Square up the East side, then through Central park (after making a quick stop at the Guggenheim) and then up and over to our old apartment. The old apartment was where we moved out of after we were told that the building was going to be constructing a 6th floor on the top of our 5th floor apartment. We found that out two weeks after moving in. Anyway. Yeah, there's still no construction. Kind of angers me, but I'll keep checking in on it. I hope that it does start, but at the same time, it really doesn't matter because out place in Williamsburg is 10x better anyway. Speaking of which...

So we have these lights outside the apartment. They go on at 8:13 exactly. Every night. It's three 65 watt bulbs. They stay on for 5 hours every night. So I did a little math and found that they cost us a total of around $50 a month in electricity. That's ABSURD. So I called the landlord and told him that it wasn't acceptable and he agreed to fix it. But being as it is... his electrician is in Italy, so he never got around to it. That was about a month ago, or $50 ago however you want to look at it. Anyway, I gotta go and breach that subject with him once again.

So Laura and I went to see the Dukes of Hazard last night. I liked it, Laura thought it was okay. It was filled with bad acting and fast car chases, and other fun things like that. Not to mention a scantily clad Jessica Simpson, so how can you beat that? They even through in a little bit of Super Troopers there, so I enjoyed it. Anyway, when it comes out for general viewing, it's highly recommended for the male type viewers.

Anyway, gotta get back to work.

Posted by Michael at 11:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So within 24 hours of posting up my Gym Membership on Craigslist.org I had someone call me and want to take it off my hands. So tomorrow morning at 10 I'll be meeting him so that he can enjoy the luxury and benefit of a world class gym membership. I on the other hand am going to be starting my wonderful gym experience at Exodus Fitness which is a few blocks from out place here in Williamsburg Brooklyn.

You walk into the place and it's like PURPLE PURPLE PURPLE!!! EVERWHERE...yes.. they went a little crazy. I don't think they really thought about how dark it would be. The place kind of reminds me of what a club would look like if you turned on the lights. Anyway.... they are really into body building so at least I'll be able to get some instruction to get those guns that I've always wanted ;)

Seven has been a royal pain in the ass tonight. He just cries and cries and when you finally break and give him some food he just cries some more. He just wants to be loved and petted. Oh well. We usually do it and he loves it.

Today it was rather funny. We have these little purple sticks about a foot long and attached to them is a string and some feathers and a bell. We whip it around and the cats go nuts. Well...Seven, having only three legs, can't really swat all that well at the little feathered stick, so he positions himself so that he's almost fully balanced on the side of his gut, so his legs and hip are totally not supporting him. This way he can easily sway one pawed at the cat toy. I'll have to get a picture of him the next time that he does it.

I plan on ranting about the New York City bag checking that they have instituted on the Subway after the second London bombing. Just in case you didn't know what I think...I think it sucks, it's a violation of civil liberties and it's crap. Anyway... that'll be for tomorrow, so check back later and see.

Anyway, Laura and I are going to bed. Gotta get up to pass off the gym membership and we're going to watch "Big Fish" in bed. I LOVE having a TV in there. It's great. Even if Laura does pass out in the living room. :)

Posted by Michael at 11:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So yesterday, I went into the back yard to clip down all the remaining long strands of grass. I walk outside and who do I see? It’s Princess Jill! She’s sitting in the grass in the back yard. So she obviously bolts away from me and runs into her typical cat hiding place. As she’s running away, I see that she looks very pregnant. Tisk Tisk Princess. She’s not even married!! Oh well, looks like we’ll have another chance to capture some kittens.

Oh and whoever is checking my Blog that works at Westminster Securities, please IM me or Email me. You check my blog EVERY DAY, and I’d like to know who it is.  Thanks.

So this weekend my parents are going to stop in to see the apartment for the first time. Should be good. I always like having company because it makes Laura and I clean up the place. It’s really an amazing cycle that we have with our apartment. Generally I would like to think that Laura and I are neat people, and I feel like we would be if there weren’t always shit around . The place will be clean and I’ll throw a shirt onto the couch and all the sudden there’s like 3-4 shirts on the couch. I swear they breed just like princess Jill.

So Tuesday it is. Yes. Tuesday is going to be Poker Night at our place. Laura has been into the whole poker idea since we watched the World Series of Poker on ESPN. Anyway, I’m looking forward to it. Should be a good time if we can get a decent group of people together. So if you’re interested in playing, let me know.

Anyway, I think that it’s time that I stop writing and get something done with my day.

Posted by Michael at 11:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Can't say that I'm actually happy to be back. Before I went to Texas, Laura and a Co-worker were telling me how terribly hot it was going to be. How I would be swealtering in the heat and humidity. So I get there and it's not all that hot and not all that humid either. Not to say that it wasn't 100 in the mid-day heat, but the humidity was low and if you were in the shade (which I was) then it was perfectly doable.
So then I get off the flight (which was terrible in itself) and it's scorching hot and humid in NYC. Fact is, if you look at the averages, it's more humid in NYC than it is at the ranch in Texas.

So after hanging out there for 4 days, I was able to really get a good understanding of how the ranch operates and how that works. There are pictures from the trip located HERE
if you are interested in seeing them.

Anyway, I'm not really into a blogging mood today, so I'm going to just end this one right here. Hopefully I'll be more into it tomorrow and that'll be great, won't it?

Posted by Michael at 11:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well tonight is finally the night. We're heading out to Texas tonight around 8ish. So if you hear that a plane heading to Dallas crashed, say a little prayer.

Cat's have food, water, and I have a friend coming over to change the water 1/2 way though our trip.

Pud is a terror. Still....she got into the bathroom again last night and ripped up a roll of toilet paper...again. I think that's the 3rd or 4th one that she's gotten from this pack alone. Last night before I went to bed I KNOW I closed the door, but she still got in. I don't want to point any fingers, but I have a pretty good idea of who left the door open ;)

Of course, the last day that I'm here before I head out, there's a shit storm at work and all hell breaks loose. Oh well, I'll deal with it as always.

It's an exciting time otherwise...football season is just around the corner. The Dolphins (my favorite team for those that don't know) just had a recent incident where their Tight End was charged with beating his wife (Always a damper on the team spirit) and some comentator made the comment "It's not a good thing when the most explosive action you see on your offence is between your tight end and his wife." I hate the media. :)

Anyway, hopefully I don't get trampled and all goes well. Looking forward to seeing our spreadsheet in action. Enjoy.

Posted by Michael at 11:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's been too long. We haven't brewed in about a week and a half and it's going on two weeks. Laura and I are going out to Texas this weekend so that's another weekend wasted.

Laura really wants to put together her own special brew, but had yet to sit with the lists of available ingredients and put it together....so... we don't have anything to brew. We actually DO have something but it's what we call "Orange Juice" It's malt extract, which pretty much cuts the whole process down to about 2-3 hours. Takes away the whole "grain" (haaha no pun intended) issue. It's pretty much just syrup created with malt and condensed so you can just add it to water.
Anyway, we don't really want to brew that, but we'll see. We may just end up doing it anyway just to have another 5 gallons of beer kicking around.

I put the 5 gallon carboy filled with the 11.4% English Ale into the closet in hopes that it'll just sit there and we'll forget about it for 2 months or so and then go to bottle it. I've read reports that you have to inset some new yeast into the bottling of high ABV beers, so we'll see. That's a few months off from now and I'm thinking that I'll have read up on it a bit more by that point.

As it's looking, I should be able to obtain a job at the US Open and augment my current earnings. Seeing as how CU has graciously deemed me ineligible for any financial aid, I'll be paying full bill for my last year in school. So I can use any extra money that I can get. Especially if it's cash tips from bartending.

Another interesting thing that I've done recently is install a hidden (now that I 'm telling everyone it's not so hidden anymore) page counter / tracker into the blog. So for the past week or so I've been able to monitor who is coming to the web page and also where they are from, what ISP they are using and how long they looked at the site. Also shows me how they found it. It's pretty interesting, besides the normal people that I figured would check it, I had some people that I didn't even know, as well as some people that I didn't think would even care checking it out(like Ex-GF's and various CU people that care little about). It kind of reminds me of that "IM Chaos" program that was going on awhile back so that people could see who was looking at their AIM profiles, except there's no link to click and you can't really hide your information. The only thing that you can do it just not come back :) I feel like a KGB agent or something...spying around and such. hehe..

So on that same thread of topic, I was on www.thefacebook.com and was looking around and Laura was talking to me about one of those people that logged into my blog that I was less than thrilled with...so I looked for them on www.thefacebook.com and sure enough...they weren't there! What kind of person blocks you out on AIM, thefacebook, and any other communication thing, then goes and reads up on your blog? Irritating. Kind of stalker esque if you ask me. Then again, I suppose my Blog is public domain, so it's free to all, but either way, it's still sketchy.
To each his own. Hopefully that person will see this and be like "wow..he's talking about me...don't I feel stupid"

So Laura and I will be heading into Northern Texas on Wed night. I compared the weather between there and here (everyone always badmouths Texas weather, but I don't think that many people realize how terrible it is here in NYC. Brooklyn will have a high on Thursday of 85, while where we are going to be in Texas will be at 95... So 10 degrees difference... Then you look at the humidity and see that NYC will be at a whopping 80% while Texas is at 52%... not too shabby. I think I'll be more comfortable there, or at least I'll sweat a bit less.

So in a previous entry I was speaking about how Laura and I have gotten into this carving stamp thing. Well we did it again last night until way late. Laura's hand ended up going numb but she finally finished her stamp. It's pretty cool. I made a beer mug one that's like ehhh... but her's has a Longhorn on it and block letters. It's nifty. We're going to try to use it on a piece of label paper tonight and put it on our first beer.
It'll be a collector's item one day for sure.

Anyway, now that I've officially made it to lunch time I think that I'll go and heat up my rice and chicken... Which Laura made and it's FREAKING AMAZING.

Posted by Michael at 11:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Oh jeez.. The weekend is over. I suppose it's time to give a little summary of the weekend... Well it was a good one.

On Friday night Laura and I hung out and we just chilled at the apartment in anticipation of going to the beach the next day. We ended up going down to the Jersey Shore to Belmar. Yes, it was a 2 hour train ride but it was a good time.

Laura has a friend (Actually it's an ex-BF) that was trying to qualify to play professional beach volleyball. So we went down to watch the volleyball tournament. It was cool, we got to watch Misty May and her partner (gold medalists for those of you that don't know) put a beating on a pair of ex-college volleyball players... well not like they were slouches either, but it was a great match anyway.

I have a few pictures that are pretty amazing of it.

Today Laura and I really had no plans. We're heading off to the ranch this weekend (in Texas) so that's pretty exciting. I hope that all the work that we did on the spreadsheets really allows the sorting of the cattle to go a bit more smoothly.

So today Laura and I went around the city looking at different things. Really we were just around the NYU area, but we did get some cool stuff. We got these art supply things that you carve our relief images and make them into stamps. I'm pretty excited. I actually made a cool cat stamp. We plan on using them to make labels for our beer. It'll give it that professional look. We'll see. Right now all we have is the cat stamp but it looks pretty cool. It's interesting to make something artsy, considering how I'm the least artistic person that I've ever met...well...not that I've actually met myself but you know what I mean.

Anyway, so it's a three day week so at least I have that to look forward to. Time to go to bed now.

Oh, and look forward to more blogging. I've been delinquent so I'll get back on track.

Posted by Michael at 11:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

(Note: There are no pictures in this entry because this was a transfered entry from the old web page, so I never got around to putting the pictures up. Sorry...Deal. )

Okay... So that's Laura cutting the "Jungle" I'll have to get images of how it looks after a week of rotting in the rain and sun. It's spectacular... Well not really but it's different.

I was thinking to myself today... damn it. We need to brew more beer. Last night I transferred the Strong English Ale into the secondary fermenter so it can sit there and stew for a month or so. I think that I'm going to bring it into the basement were it will be kept cool and away from light, but I just hate the idea of leaving anything in the basement... just think dark, dirty, rat infested (not that there are any rats but it looks like it easily could be) hole in the ground. Anyway, we'll see. Maybe my closet in the bedroom would work just as well.

Been looking into HERMS systems such as this one but am realizing that even though brewing gets my kitchen so freaking messy, it's still better than dropping $800 in brewing equipment...especially with school coming up. Maybe once we move out to Texas we'll be able to build up something like that. I'm sure that my father would be more than willing to lend a helping hand.

It's about a week till Laura and I head out to the ranch to help with the cattle sorting and weighing. I'm looking forward to it if only to get me away from work for a few days. But I think it should be pretty good. Not that I'll have that much fun in the sun sorting cows but I'll learn a bunch I'm sure, and that's always good.

I think that I was finally able to solidify a schedule for this coming semester (although due to CU's stupid rules concerning when I can sign up for classes I have to wait another 2 freaking months....anyway) so if all works out the way that I hope it does, I should have most of my classes in non-working hours, so I'll be able to put in around 30 hours a week. That would be idea considering how I got a massive 0% financial aid.

Yeah that's right. Even though I have been living on my own for the past two years, and am fully self sufficient, I get ZERO financial aid. Apparently you have to be 25, a military vet, be a ward of the state, or your parents have to be dead. Otherwise your parents are EXPECTED to front the cost. Had I known that I would have just gone to a community college and gotten another degree in my time off. Oh well. Hindsight is a bitch. Then again... I could have looked it up two years ago and learned the same thing. Tisk on me I suppose.

Friend of a friend that I have may be able to get me a fairly good job working at the US Open for two weeks that is supposed to pay pretty well, so if that happens, I'll be able to take al ittle time off from work here and make some money to throw at Columbia.

So Seven has gotten to be a royal pain in the ass. I contend that it's really Laura's fault. She smothers the poor little guy with love...ALL THE TIME. I mean now he just expects it. We'll be eating dinner and he'll just sit there and CRY...whining the whole way through dinner. I just ignore the little punk. She always picks him up....she then wonders why he follows her around all the time... her excuse is "ohh..look...he loves me more!" yeah right.. he just knows who the weak one is :o hehe. Anyway.

Pud has gotten to the point where we can't really let her into the bathroom anymore because between tipping over the garbage can in search for Q-Tips (which she devours and leaves all around the house) and tearing up the toilet paper (we've lost probably $30 worth of TP and paper towels to that little beast) she's just a terror.

Thank GOD it's Friday. That's all that I can say. Oh... one more thing. It's exactly 1 Month and 1 Day till the Dolphins play the Chicago Bears in the hall of fame game. Should be a good one. Can't wait.

Here are a few more pictures for your viewing pleasure.

These are some of the pictures that I took the night the little Italian man screamed at us. Honestly I thought that I had too much to drink to really take any good pics, so I was quite pleased to see that many of my fireworks pictures came out so well.

Posted by Michael at 11:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

State: Wi-Fi cloaks a new breed of intruder

I thought this article was interesting in terms of the various things that young people do that are highly illegal and yet we do them all the time. I personally know friends of mine that shirk the responsibility of paying Time Warner for their admittedly terrible service and just leech internet bandwidth from an unsuspecting neighbor. Especially here in New York City, it's especially easy. There are usually at least 10 open wireless networks for the taking. You also have to look at the general populace. When they came up with Wi-Fi the general population doesn't know shit about it. So you are expecting Joe Schmoe to enable security on his wireless network? Hell, he's glad if he can just get the damn thing up and running, let alone stopping anyone else from getting in.

It makes you think about the other things that people, especially younger people do without thinking about it. Just this weekend when all the drunks were on my roof, yelling and screaming, I'm sure that there's gotta be some code that we were violating. I actually think that would could have been arrested for trespassing had the little Italian man called the Police. But we got away with it.

Look at all the people in this city that smoke weed. Any park that you walk into you can find one of those little baggies that you KNOW had weed in it. Many times you'll walk down the street and there someone is...smoking away. I'm amazing. Especially with the way the law is structured. We aren't even talking about hood-rat thugs, we're talking about educated people... people that would wet their pants if they were put into Prison and shared a cell with "Bubba the Lover".

Hell...how about music? Obviously it's become a lot more dangerous to download music or movies on the internet, but I still talk to people that use Limewire, or whatever other programs there are out there. Just one of the herd...they'll never be caught. Nope. I don't agree with that one at all. I don't think that I have downloaded a single song in the past 2-3 years. The risk (average settlements of around $3000) http://www.dailytexanonline.com/media/paper410/news/2004/03/25/Focus/Transcript.Of.Qa.With.Riaa.President.Cary.Sherman-641217.shtml . I just don't understand how anyone in their right mind could think that the risk was worth it.

Okay..software downloads... In the same breath I may be guilty of doing the same thing, I just take my risk elsewhere. I've not paid for a game for the PC... in quite awhile. (Although I do buy them if I like them).But the point remains...There are so many things out there to get you in trouble and cause you serious problems legally and financially. It's a scary world out there, especially with all the technological changes that are going on.

Posted by Michael at 11:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

July 3rd, 2005 will forever be remembered as the day the jungle was destroyed. Laura and I went into the backyard and totally demolished the 3 ft. tall razor grass filled jungle. It took about 2 hours and 6 55 gallon garbage bags full for grass later and we were finished. We put our new little mower into action and now amazingly enough, we have a yard. There are all these little stalks where the tall grass was, but I'm hoping that those either just die and wither away or they get scaled down and grow little grasslings. We'll see.

This weekend, Friday night to be exact, Laura and I went up to my parents house (Sans parents) and hung out up there. After much debate we decided to go camping in the infamous "Brad & Mike's Camping Spot". Always a good time and we've yet to have any problems going up there...even if there are Posted signs up all over those woods.
Anyway... so we go camping up there, bring the usual assortment of goodies...S'More Stuff, hot dogs, a lighter, news paper and other odds and ends, but more importantly we brought the one necessary item for when you are in the woods in mid-summer... Bug Spray.

Or so we thought.

Turns out that the bottle that I grabbed was actually 9 year old Skin So Soft that I think actually ATTRACTED mosquitoes more than it repelled them. So after setting up and getting the fire up and going the little bastards were kept at bay from the smoke, but after the fire went out...round 1:00am, Laura and I turned into sweet sweet mosquito treats. Not a good thing. So we tired to sleep but it was useless, there was no way it was going to happen. So not only did we have little crawly bugs all over the forest floor on us (oh yeah,.. we don't ever use a tent) but we also had those blasted mosquitoes buzzing in our ears. So...we decided that a nights sleep was pretty important to us, so we were going to walk back to the car. Sounds like an easy task, but as it turned out it wasn't. One of the OTHER essential things that we forgot to bring was a flashlight. So... I used the next best thing.. my cell phone.

My cell phone has an amazingly bright screen...for a cell phone. It's a rather lousy flashlight, but it did the trick... or at least till it died 1/2 way through the mile trip back to the car.
Something you have to understand about this whole situation is that we're in the middle of the woods. There's a very steep drop off right next to the main trail that we're heading to, so we are being super cautious about that, but the REAL problem is that there is no moon out, so it is TOTALLY dark in there. Literally you could not see your hand in front of your face it was THAT dark.

So anyway, we also brought along with us one of those handy-dandy lighters that's really long so that you don't burn your fingers. The problem with those as a "torch" is that they blow out every time you start to walk with them. Anyway, long story short we finally made it back to the car.

Moving on... Laura got stung by a Yellowjacket...twice..she had a spined looking little bug bite her and she broke out in hives, then later on found a deer tick on her, so now she's convinced she's got Lyme Disease. Unfortunately, that is a possibility as unlikely as it may be. We'll hope that she's just worried over nothing.

Anyway, so last night we had a BBQ and all that for the typical 4th of July celebration. There were a few people, but nothing crazy.

So last night we decided that we were going to the roof to watch the fireworks. Of course the person next door to us has a 4 story house instead of a 3 that we have, so they were really really blocking our view of the fireworks. So we did what anyone else would do, we brought out ladder up and got on his roof. Well, somewhere in between the drunken rankings of our guests, the jumping up and down and just general misbehavior an elderly Italian man comes walking up the fire escape and proceeds to yell at us in Italian. Don't even know if he understood us, but whatever. I'm just hoping that this doesn't amount to anything. We weren't damaging anything, but whatever. Crazy Italians aside, it was a nice place to watch the fireworks.

So when we moved in, the landlord decided to put up a fence for us (very nice one) and it happens that they had to do some concrete work to get the fence in and they left this huge like 5'x 10' board in our yard that's covered in a thin layer of concrete. Not that big a deal, but Laura couldn't lift it with me so we just never got rid of it. Anyway, so last night we finally put it into good use. It's currently set up as a beer pong table in our back yard. Good times.

I have some pictures of Laura tending to the Jungle that I will post when I get home so that you all can see the massiveness of our weed situation.

P.S. Fantasy Football season is coming. If you haven't signed up for the league let me know, and I'll give you the info.

Posted by Michael at 11:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)