'Well thanks for waiting this long to show yourself...'

Well I just got back from a six day vacation in San Diego yesterday. Had an excellent time while I was there. Most of the time there we just relaxed by the pool, but we took a little time out to drive around a bit and took some pictures which you can see here. We stayed at Matt's uncle's house in Rancho Sante Fe, which is just north of San Diego, and is a really high-dollar area as far as mortgage rates go. Matt and Ketti were watching it for him for a few weeks while he was on vacation in Europe with his family.

Going to watch Wall-E this morning with Daniel and Alicia and their kids. After that, hang out at Dennis, and sleep. No plans for the weekend just yet, but I should find out today if I have a date this weekend or not. It was Mike's birthday yesterday, so we'll probably celebrate that this weekend as well. Have no clue what to get him... Tami's birthday was on Tuesday, and I'll give her her gifts tomorrow.

It's Sam's last day at work tonight. I'm going to miss her quite a bit. She's been an awesome friend the last year or so since I transferred to conversions, and helped me get through some really rough times. She's going to be an elementary teacher, and I wish her all the best in her new career.

'the more I scream, the more it seems, that now I'm through, with the new you...'

Well the last week was fairly uneventful, as is this weekend so far. Most of my time is spent at work, or at home watching movies, and playing Oblivion or the Civilization: Revolution demo. I'm at work right now, bored as hell, and hope to get off in about an hour. Kaylea invited some people to hang out at her place tonight, so I'll probably stop by there and hang out for a couple hours.

It's Father's Day tomorrow, and Dennis' birthday, and somehow I'm going to have to find time to sleep, hang out with Dennis, hang out with Mike, and call my parents, all before going to work by 10pm again. Also need to pick up a copy of Metal Gear Solid 4, which came out Thursday. The reviews for it look pretty good, so hopefully it'll be something I can get in to.

50 more minutes... Yeah, I know you're not supposed to watch the clock... but there's literally nothing else to do right now... thank god I don't have to be here the full 8 hours...

Edit: Ugh... it seems they're not letting any of us go early :(

'I could never be the one that you want, don't ask. Well, here's to living in the moment, cause it passed...'

So vacation's been great so far. The day after Mike and I arrived, we took a tour of Whidbey Island where I grew up, along with my brother and Sabrina. To get there we took the ferry to Clinton, then drove north through Clinton, stopping off to get Pete some baking powder for heart burn, and getting some hot chocolate at a drive-in coffee house. We then drove to Greenbank Farms so my brother could pick up some wine. When we got there, we noticed they had some kind of swap meet or something going on in one of the buildings. We went in to check it out, and while looking around I spotted a tiny violin on one of the vendors tables. I went and grabbed Pete to show him, and he found out it was only $25. That was a steal, and he thought it looked pretty cool, and Sabrina used to play violin when she was younger, so he decided to buy it.

We left the farm, and headed north to check out Fort Casey. We walked through there a while, with my brother and I talking a little bit about the fort, and taking a few pictures here and there. After Fort Casey we drove toward Oak Harbor, taking the back road around by West Beach, and passing the most recent house that our parents and us had lived in before we left Oak Harbor. Driving downtown we passed our church and the first apartments we'd lived in when we first moved there, which at the time my dad only paid a mere $80 a month for a three bedroom, two bathroom, two story apartment. Then we drove down Pioneer Road downtown and decided to stop in at Mi Pueblo for lunch. It was dark and empty inside on the first floor, and I almost thought they might actually be closed or something, but we walked upstairs and someone who looked like he was about to fall asleep at the table he was sitting at, jumped up and helped us. The food wasn't bad. Your basic Mexican restaurant stuff.

After eating we went up the street to a house we'd lived in for a number of years which we refer to as 'The Big White House'. The house is well over a hundred years old. I think it was probably one of our favorite places to live just because it was kind of unique. We have a lot of good memories of living there. The compost bins my dad built were still in the back yard, though the apple tree looked like it had been recently trimmed back. We left Oak Harbor and went by Christian's Auto and Metal Recycling, where my brother and I had both worked at one point, though at different times. We drove by the Naval Base, then turned around and headed to Deception Pass.

When we got to the bridge, Sabrina stayed near the parking lot as she's afraid of heights, while Mike, Pete, and myself walked out on to the bridge and over to Canoe Island which is between the two bridges of Deception Pass. On our way across the bridge, Pete noticed a giant splash in the water below, and thought someone had just jumped off the bridge. Turns out there as actually a number of Sea Lions swimming directly below the bridge, and one had jumped out of the water and cause the splash. At first we thought they were seals, but they were much too large. After watching them for a bit, Pete decided to turn back and stay with Sabrina, while Mike and I walked down on to the Island. We took a few pictures and tried to get a better look at the Sea Lions, but we couldn't really see them from the angle we were at. We headed back to the car, and drove over the bridge to Fidalgo Island, and on to Mount Erie. When we got to the top, it was much too cloudy for a good view of Puget Sound. We took a few pictures anyways though. Finally the tour was over, and we headed back to Seattle via the I-5 freeway over the mainland.

The next day Mike, Peter, and myself headed to the Cascade Mountain range, while Sabrina stayed in Bellvue to pack and do some cleaning. We drove up to a campground that we used to camp at frequently called Colonial Creek Campground, which is next to Ross Lake. The campground had changed quite a bit since I'd last been there, but most of it was exactly the same as it had been for decades. We left and drove up to Washington Pass to check out the snow. None of us had brought any boots or anything so we couldn't really go in it. That was the end of the trip though, and we headed back to Seattle.

The next morning I got a phone call early in the morning from my parents. My dad said that they were out of power because it had started snowing the day before around noon, and hadn't stopped since. At the time of the phone call they were up to six inches, with no sign of stopping. This is pretty much exactly what my brother and I had hoped for, minus the lack of electricity of course. Still, I wasn't that worried, as we had at least a nine hour drive to their house in Hamilton, Montana, and we weren't even planning on leaving Seattle for another three hours or so. My dad recommended I get chains for the rental, so while everyone was still sleeping, I drove to Les Schwab and picked some up, making sure I'd be able to return them if they were never used. Filled the car up with gas, and went back to Pete's house. We packed up the car, hit up McDonalds for breakfast, and were on the road by 9:30am. The mountain passes were all clear, so the chains stayed in their bag. Only a couple miles from Hamilton there was a bad accident and we had to turn around and take a different, much slower route. We stopped in at Hamilton to pick up some things for my mom at the store, and made it to their house by 9:30pm MST, so all in all, an 11 hour trip.

When we got to my parents, the power was still out, and it stayed out all until the next morning when finally it came back on. The rest of the week went well. Most of the time we stayed inside, with temperatures constantly dropping, at one point even hitting 0 degrees Fahrenheit during the night. To keep entertained we watched movies, TV series on DVD, played video games, and even did some snowboarding on the hill next to the house. Thanksgiving came and my Uncle Jim and Aunt Gidget came to have dinner with us. That Saturday we took a tour of my dad's new workplace at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) in Hamilton. Finally on Sunday it was time to head back to Seattle. The trip back didn't seem to take quite as long, I think only 9 or 10 hours. The passes were a little more icy than they were the first time through, but there was still no need for the chains, and I returned them the next day before taking the rental back. Speaking of the rental, we'd tried to get a discount on it by going through our friend Justin, who works as a concierge at a local hotel, but when I returned the rental, it apparently didn't get applied, and it ended up costing me nearly $500 for 10 days. Still, that's pretty much what I'd expected to pay going into it, so no big deal.

It's now been about 5 days since we got back. Much of the time has been spent at my brother's house playing Guitar Hero 3 and Assassin's Creed, though I did manage to go out to see Beowulf 3D at the local IMAX along with Clarence and his girlfriend Niessa, which was pretty interesting. Monday before Mike went back to Phoenix, we went downtown and walked around Pike Place Market, and later that night when Sabrina was driving me home, we got into a car accident when her car was rear-ended. Thankfully nobody was hurt, and the girl that hit us actually stopped, and had insurance. Also ended up playing pool at a dive bar up the street called Piper's a couple times. This weekend I'll be heading to Sabrina's parent's house while Pete is introduced to them. They're having enchiladas apparently, so I'm really looking forward to it :P Sabrina and I went Christmas shopping today. I didn't buy anything, just came along to get out of the house and keep her company.

Yesterday my dad called and said my mom was going in for open heart surgery today, which took us all by surprise. Apparently she hadn't been feeling well, and her temperature had risen to 105, and heart was beating very fast. The doctors discovered a hole in her heart, with an infection nearby, which had spread into her blood. The surgery was successful, and they replaced one of the valves in her heart. She'll have to be on IV antibiotics for the next six weeks.

That's all for now, other than Niickiey text messaged me a couple times. Once the night I first arrived in Seattle, wishing me a fun vacation and happy Thanksgiving, and another on Thanksgiving, saying Happy Thanksgiving. I didn't reply to either, as much as I was tempted to. At first I was angry, then the same old thoughts of wanting answers came up, but I ignored them as best I could. If she wants to talk, she can apologize first, then I'll think about it; but honestly, that's not likely to happen.

Pictures of the vacation so far can be viewed here.

'I'm holding on a rope, got me ten feet off the ground...'

Wow, these entries are getting few and far between. Well I've been doing really well the last couple weeks. Money's starting to trickle back into the bank thanks to a month and a half of working without a day off, until this last weekend, where I was mere hours away from losing my virginity when I decided not to go (completely) through with it, and instead to wait until I was sure I had a meaningful relationship with someone, whether it ends up being the girl I'm seeing now, or someone else later on down the road. More than one person has criticized me for making this decision but I think when it comes down to it, it's the right one for me.

But enough about that. Last Saturday I went to Dennis' youngest son's 7th birthday party. Had a great time swimming, eating pizza, and hanging out. Then on Sunday I went to the zoo with Stacy, and her friend Ally ended up coming as well, to my surprise. I never wrote about Ally, but she was at Stacy's birthday party last June, and long story short, she was quite attractive and I mentioned to Stacy later on that she should hook us up.

So anyways, when I heard she was coming I was pretty excited about it, but things didn't quite turn out the way I would've liked at all. To me, the day turned out fairly horrible as far as making an impression. I was tired from having worked the previous night; it was hot and humid as hell, even at 8:00 in the morning; I barely said a word the entire time we were walking around the zoo; and a lot of little things, that, to my constantly over-analyzing mind, just made the day seem to get worse as time went by. After we'd left the zoo, I was riding back with Stacy and told her all of this and she said she thought things went just fine, and they probably were, I just tend to stress out too much sometimes.

Here are the pics. Many of them didn't turn out as well as I'd like. I think this is mostly because I only brought my short lens, and most of the animals were a good distance away.

Got my vacation approved for this holiday season. I'll be flying up to Washington on November 16th, along with Mike who finally decided to come up with me. We'll be staying a couple days at my brothers, then the three of us will rent a car and drive to Montana on the 19th for Thanksgiving with my parents and other family members. Then we'll head back to Seattle on the 25th, and Mike will fly back to Phoenix the next day. I'm going to stay for another two weeks to celebrate my brother's 24th birthday on the 5th, and fly back to Phoenix on the 10th. All in all it comes down to 3.5 weeks of vacation, which is the longest I'll have been out of Arizona since I moved here 7 years ago, so I'm really looking forward to it because I hate this f'ing state.

No plans for this weekend just yet other than a Diamondbacks game, which I'm still not even 100% sure I'll be attending. Probably be signing up to work the weekend again.

'I got my head checked, by a jumbo jet, it wasn't easy, but nothing is, no...'

Woo hoo! Moving day has finally arrived! Well, ok, it's not until tomorrow, but seeing as my PC will be disconnected tomorrow, and won't be back online until at least Monday, I decided to write this today, even though I should be packing and cleaning my apartment.

So anyways, started cleaning a couple days ago and discovered that half my belongings really belonged in the trash, and that's where they're headed. The hallway leading from my front door to my bedroom is piled high with shit that needs to go down to the dumpster. Should make moving a lot faster, and a lot of it is shit I've held on to for some stupid reason or another for the better part of three to five years. Unfortunately the office to my new place doesn't open until 9am, but that will give me time to finish throwing things away or do any last minute packing. I don't know when I'll be able to get the U-Haul truck tomorrow either, which I'll need for the large stuff at any rate.

On a side note, I went to an airshow at the local Air Force base this last weekend, and spent five hours under the Phoenix sun. The result was not in my favor. So now I'm dealing with the consequences. Thankfully most of the pain has gone away, though the skin is now cracking and peeling. It's not a pretty sight, but it could certainly be worse. Hopefully it'll all be done in the next week or so. Once I get some time, I'll post up some pics from the event.

April has also (almost) arrived. This could honestly become the best month of this year, due to a number of things, most importantly being that Rage Against the Machine will finally reunite and headline the Coachella Music Festival. My brother's coming down for the concert as well. We may also be going over to California for a few days before the concert to visit a friend of ours that recently moved there to continue his education as a helicopter pilot. I've also purchased tickets to see Static-X next Wednesday, and Sevendust two days later. Should be a great start to a potentially excellent month. Hopefully the weather stays (relatively) cool.

Now back to packing...

'Come on over, roll on over, I just need to feel you breathe...'

Had a good weekend. Bought Chevelle tickets on Saturday at a mere $25 each for myself and DJ. That night I went with Dennis to see the band "Hurt" at the Marquee Theater. They put on a great performance. I think they sound better live than their on the CD myself. Especially liked when he broke out the violin for the song "Danse Russe". Always cool when rock bands break out instruments normally not used in rock. Korn and the bagpipes, for example.

Tickets were cheap, like $17 after taxes and 'convenience' fees, etc. That's the least I've paid for tickets so far next to the $12 P.O.D. tickets. Got to love Marquee Theater. Cheap tickets, and it's standing room only, so you're pretty much guaranteed a decent seat. Especially because there probably wasn't more than 100 or 150 people there at best. I noticed that the lead singer of Hurt really looks the part of a rock musician as well, in the same way that Sully from Godsmack does. They both just really look like they were 'born to rock' if you will. The band stayed after and signed autographs etc. I should've bought a CD and had it signed. Oh well...

Sunday I didn't do much during the day. Mike called in the late afternoon and invited me over to his place. Tiffany was going to be studying all evening, so we decided to leave her to herself, and drove out of town to some hills to the west of Phoenix and hiked around a bit. I should definitely get out hiking more; I just hate going by myself. While there we had a good long talk about relationships, etc. After talking to him about Brandee, and explaining why I was so confused about the situation, he brought up that basically something I might find intimate might just be a 'Hallmark Card' to the other person, and while this wasn't totally new to me to hear, putting it with my recent experience gave me a different view of it, though still didn't quite answer my questions. He did remind me that relationships are mostly a 'total mind-fuck', which is certainly true...

After hiking, he asked if I had any plans that evening. I'd originally had plans to have dinner with Stacy, but she had to cancel so she could study for a test. I'd thought about calling in to work to see if they needed some additional help, but decided against it. So instead we decided to barbecue over at his house, so we went to the store and got some steaks and a few other things, then went back to the house and he cooked them on his grill. It was some damn good food. Certainly beat whatever I would've got on the way home if I hadn't eaten there. It's too bad I'm so lazy, or I'd cook for myself more often...

So I went home and surfed the net a bit, then fell asleep listening to music. Woke back up around 2am because the music was still playing, and decided to play Tekken 5 for a few hours, and then went back to sleep.

I can't wait to finally move out of my apartment. I should start packing things this week, and throwing stuff away. I imagine I could probably get rid of half the stuff in my apartment just by throwing things away that I've kept for years, like the three or four computers sitting in my closet, and clothes that I never wear. I need to contact SRP and set up my electric at the new place, as well as call Qwest about getting the internet set up. I'm holding off on getting any kind of TV service until I get moved and see how finances go with the added expense of a bigger place. I never watch TV anyways, so the $40+ a month could probably go to better use.

'I cannot believe we'd ever die, for these sins, we were merely freshmen...'

Well, it's been sort of a roller coaster of a weekend for me. It started Friday night, when DJ got a call here at work around 3am from Dennis, that his (Dennis') dad had stopped breathing. He'd been in the hospital since before Christmas due to his foot being amputated because of diabetes, and his health had progressively deteriorated since then. Dennis was on his way to the hospital when he called DJ, but not long after, he called again to tell DJ that his dad didn't make it. Both of us were taken completely by surprise, as I'm sure Dennis and his family were as well. Although I knew his dad was in bad shape, I never thought it was anything the doctors didn't have a handle on. I took my break about half an hour later, and called Dennis, but all I could say was that I was sorry. It was really hard for either of us to talk, so we kind of sat in silence for a bit, and eventually he told me that they weren't letting them see his dad yet. After that he told me that he'd talk to me later.

Saturday was a lot better. I'd originally planned on going to dinner with a friend, but those plans pretty much fell through, so I decided to go to a birthday party for Stacy's sister, as she'd invited me a few weeks ago. I'd only met her sister once, like four or so years ago when I'd been living with Stacy and Stefanie, but I had nothing better to do, and at least I could hang out with Stacy for a while.

So I got to the place where the party was being held. It was called the "F.O.P. Lounge", and basically its a bar for police officers (F.O.P. standing for Federal Order of Police). When I got there, everyone was sort of standing around talking, waiting for Laura (Stacy's sister) to arrive. Once she got there, we all quickly moved into a back room until she came in, and everyone yelled 'surprise', but she'd already figured it out after seeing her dad's SUV in the parking lot.

For the next hour Stacy, her dad and myself just sat and talked and watch people sing karaoke. We also looked through the song book to see what they had available. Stacy was planning on singing a couple songs, but karaoke isn't for me. After a while, Stacy got a phone call. When she hung up, she told me that Brandee had just got off work, and was going to try and get a ride to the party. I wasn't too thrilled about this at first, as I hadn't shaved in a couple days, and I don't do very well around people. Stacy tried to reassure me that the 'rugged' look looked good on me, and that I probably didn't have anything to worry about anyways, as she probably wouldn't be able to get a ride...unless I went and picked her up.

Well, after a few minutes of thinking about it, I tried calling her, but no answer. So I text messaged that I heard she needed a ride, and would be willing to pick her up. She replied asking if I was serious, and that she'd feel really bad, but I told her I didn't mind at all, and was on my way.

So I left the party and headed to where she works, though she was actually at a bar next door. I picked her up, and she asked if we could go by her house so she could change, as she was still in her work uniform. So we drove to her house, and then back to the party, talking quite a bit on the way. So, to make this already long story a bit shorter, I didn't talk much to her while at the party, partially due to the noise; however, I did end up singing karaoke , without even getting pressured into it; though it was partially in an attempt to try to get Brandee to sing something, which failed . I know you're all interested as to which song I sang, so the song is 'The Verve Pipe - Freshmen'. I actually submitted another song to sing, this time 'Linkin Park - Papercut', at the time, not remembering how crazy fast it is, so I'm glad we ended up leaving before my turn came up, lol. Because my voice is so deep, Stacy and her sister wanted me to sing 'Crash Test Dummies - Mmmmm Mmmmm'. I haven't heard that song in years though, so another good reason we left

Brandee's sister had called her and told her to come over to her new house, so I drove her there, and on the way we talked a lot more, about all sorts of things like music, food, etc. Stuff I probably should've saved for Wednesday when we go to dinner (the previous date didn't end up happening), so better think of other things . Turns out we have really similar tastes in music, which didn't surprise me much until she said she was into electronic music as well, and had even been to some of the same shows I was at, such as when Paul Oakenfold played at the closing day of Club Freedom downtown. She's also a big fan of World of Warcraft and Diablo II, though not a hardcore gamer or anything. She also loves breakfast, so, providing there's a second date, I'm thinking of going to breakfast rather than dinner, since we're both more available in the morning anyways.

So I dropped her off at her sisters and drove home, and then browsed the net and played FFXII until five in the morning when I went to bed.

Sunday I went to lunch with Mike and Tiffany, and then we went and saw the film 'Smokin Aces', which I liked quite a bit. It's a really crazy film that you'd probably enjoy if you like films such as 'Snatch', etc; though it's not like Snatch aside from the violence and the number of characters in the movie. After the movie I went home to get a couple hours of sleep in before heading to work.

I filed my taxes last week, and should be getting about $1,000 back from Federal, and $1,500 back from State. $1700 or so will go to Dennis for the PS3/Wii/HDTV, and the rest will go to my escalating credit card debt (about $6,500), in an attempt to try and get rid of it by the end of this year.

Sorry for the length

'Our hopes and expectations, black holes and revelations...'

Just got back yesterday from a four day trip to California, or, more specifically, Disneyland. My best friend and his girlfriend were going, and had asked if I wanted to come along for a few days. I hadn't been to Disneyland in like 8 years, for my sister's 18th birthday, so I was pretty excited. Plus, I don't get to hang out with them enough, so it'd be good to spend a few days hanging out.

They were going to stay until Friday, but I was going to only stay for a couple days, and leave Wednesday in time to make it back for work that night. I didn't have any paid time-off anymore, so not only was the trip going to cost quite a bit for the hotel, tickets, gas, and of course, food, but I'd be losing money not working for a couple days as well. So we decided to take separate cars, but drive together. I technically could've taken a plane back, but I love driving, even if it's by myself, for six straight hours of nothing but desert.

So anyways, I won't write down every detail of the vacation. We all had a great time though. I've never walked so much in my entire life, and I used to walk everywhere before I had a car. My legs were completely shot after two days of walking through Disneyland, Downtown Disney, California Adventure, and to and from the hotel, not to mention walking along the beach, and around the shops, etc. We went on a lot of rides, much more than I went on the last time I was there, including Space Mountain, Splash Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, the Haunted House, the Matterhorn, Indiana Jones, California Screamin', and lots more. I was a little wary of riding the roller coasters (of which most of the rides are), but once I rode them at least once, it was a lot easier, and I ended up enjoying them quite a bit.

We stayed at the Anaheim Hilton and Towers hotel, which was pretty nice, especially for the low $89 a night price. They even accidentally threw in a free mini-fridge as well, but I didn't end up using it because I was never at the hotel other than to sleep.

The only bad part about the trip was that there were three of us, which meant on rides that only sat two people per seat, I was by myself, which wasn't very fun at all. I already knew that would happen, but it didn't ruin the vacation or anything.

So now I'm back in Phoenix, and frantically trying to balance my finances, and who's going to get what for Christmas, and if they're even going to get it by Christmas, or if they're going to have to wait until I get more money. Mostly I'm focusing on getting everyone here in Phoenix their gifts by Christmas, and I've done surprisingly better than I thought I was going to do (which doesn't really mean much). I still have quite a few gifts to think of and buy though, and that will probably all be done today, or this weekend, which I actually took off for once, not only because of the holiday, but because Stacy wanted to hang out one night, so I promised her I would.

So, now for the pictures! Some of these turned out really well, and I can tell I'm getting more used to using my camera and it's different settings, particularly the aperture and shutter speed settings.

As always, you can view them with comments here.

'und keine eier...'

Well, I think my streak is wearing off... This weekend had the potential to be great, and it ended up only about average, though I did have a lot to do, so I suppose that's better than just sitting around all weekend.

Saturday I went to softball practice in the morning. Yeah... decided to play softball, which is like the first sport I've played in at least 15 years or more. I need the exercise, and it's something to help get out of the house, etc. Practice was ok I guess. When I first got up to bat I was actually hitting pretty good for the first 5 or 6 pitches, then I just kept missing them one after another. I'm not sure if I got too cocky or was just trying to swing harder or what.

Later that evening I went to see Tool play at Cricket Pavilion. Tool has been one of my favorite bands for years, so I was really looking forward to this concert, but unfortunately, was disappointed in the end. We got into the venue just in time for Tool to take the stage. It was just me and DJ this time. Dennis was off in Flagstaff for his and Nicole's Anniversary. Anyways, when Tool came out on stage, I was pretty hyped up, along with everyone else, and then partway into the 2nd song some idiot threw a plastic water bottle and it hit Maynard right in the head, and he walked off stage. The band kept playing though. I don't even know if they were aware what had happened actually, except they must've known something was up cause he wasn't on stage anymore. After they finished that song (which I believe was "Forty-Six and Two") they started the next, even though Maynard was still off stage. Didn't matter much to the crowd, cause they started singing it themselves! Anyways, on the last verse of the song, Maynard came back out and started singing again, which was a big relief cause I thought for sure they were going to stop the concert for a second there. Even though he came back though, I never really got hyped up the rest of the concert because they kept playing songs with long instrumentals in them, and/or songs that weren't really big hits. In fact, I don't think they played any songs off their first two albums at all, even though they played for two hours.

The next day I hung out with Mike & Tiffany. Went to the mall for a little bit, then Chipotle for lunch, then back to Tiffany's parents house for a little while. Wasn't there for very long before I had to go pick up DJ for softball. Didn't do terribly bad for my first two games. Hit the ball 3 out of the 5 times I was at bat, though two of them were caught, but that's still better than striking out, which is what I was pretty much expecting to do.

Yesterday (Monday) I pretty much just sat around watching movies and playing Oblivion. Got a registered letter from the IRS telling me I owe them money, and they're going to repossess my car if I don't pay them $1.5k in the next 30 days. Thankfully I just happen to have some extra money. I was kind of hoping to be able to hold out until February, and just have them take it out of the taxes they're going to owe me, but I guess I won't get that lucky.

Stacy called in the afternoon to say hello, cause we haven't talked in a while, and as per usual, she didn't talk much. Even when I was telling her what I'd been doing lately, she didn't really sound interested in continuing any conversation I tried to make, which is why I wonder why she bothers calling to begin with. Talked to Stefanie again as well, albeit through text message still. I wonder how long she's going to keep this up... maybe she's wondering the same thing about me, heh...

'so fall into my eyes, and fall into my lies...'

Well, I had another good weekend. They seem to be happening quite often actually... that's kind of odd. Anyways, Saturday was DJ's party. There wasn't too many people there, but I remember DJ saying he was only inviting a handful of people this time. Just to hang out at his house, eat pizza and cheesecake (yumm), etc. Sunday I hung out with Mike and Tiffany. Went to Arrowhead Mall and walked around a bit, then dropped my car off at her parents, and headed over to Chili's for dinner. They've got pretty decent food there.

After that we drove to downtown Tempe, which is where ASU is at, and all many of the bars and clubs, etc. We were going to a club called Margarita Rocks, but it wasn't open for another 20 minutes or so, so we went next door to The Tavern, and they had a few drinks, and we talked for a while until the other club opened up. It was pretty dead for a little while, but picked up soon enough. An older hispanic lady tried to get me to dance because she thought I looked bored, but I wasn't going for it. Not enough alcohol or self-esteem for that type of thing (probably doesn't help that I don't drink, heh). Lots of great looking women at the club, which makes sense, seeing as ASU's practically across the street. Left there not long after midnight, picked up my car, and went to bed.

The next day I headed up north to check out some landmarks in Arizona that I haven't been to yet. I drove up to a place called Tonto Natural Bridge, which is essentially a short, but very tall cave that goes through a cliff, forming a natural bridge. Hiked around there for a while, then drove up to Winslow to check out the Homolovi Ruins. I thought they'd be more well preserved than they turned out to be, but it was interesting just the same. Got stopped by a Park Ranger while up there, cause I forgot to put my pass in the window. After that, I drove back to Phoenix, and over to Dennis' house. Watched "Firewall", then went home and to sleep.

Got up early today to go to work. I'm working days this week to get additional training at work. I hate driving in traffic. It's so different than driving at night, where there are little to no accidents, and the freeways just move along without any problems at all. Coming home was even worse. Took me an hour or more, when it normally takes 20-25 minutes.

Anyways, here are some pics from the weekend. The dogs are from Tiffany's parents house, the middle one being Tiffany's dog Rowdy. The rest are from the Tonto Natural Bridge, and the Homolovi ruins.

'Calm down, come down, cold resides with me...'

It's been a couple weeks since my last entry, but a lot has happened since then. Went to the Red Hot Chili Peppers concert on the 21st. Had an excellent time, and I'd probably consider it one of the better concerts I've been to had they played more well known songs, but i suppose that's partially my fault for not really listening to all of the songs on all their albums. Either way, they played a ton of music, so that made up for it. Even when the band left the stage after playing for probably an hour or more, the stadium was nearly pitch black, and deafening with the roar of the crowd for a good ten minutes or so, they came back to play at least another five songs or more, starting out with my personal favorite, "Under the Bridge". I've posted a few pics below, along with the live video of "Under the Bridge", including yours truly in the background. Please don't hate on my voice =P

The next weekend was Dennis' youngest son, Dennis George's birthday. I'm pretty sure he turned six. I've yet to get him his gift, which will probably be New Super Mario Bros. for the DS, since he just got a DS Lite. After the party I went to see a monster truck show with Mike and Tiffany thanks to some free tickets Mike got from his employer, who sponsored the event. We couldn't have bought better seats. We were right up front, and could see the whole event fairly well. I enjoyed going, but was a little put off by the amount of talking the presenters did, and the lack of stunts from the motocross guys, who were also there. The trucks themselves got pretty messed up though, one of them crashing right into the wall of the brand new Cardinals Stadium (video and pics also below).

That Sunday I caught up on some sleep, probably more than 14 hours in all, after which I headed over to Macayo's downtown for a birthday party for a bunch of people from work. A lot of people showed up, and everyone had a great time relaxing and talking to people outside of the work environment.

This weekend is going to be a three-day weekend thanks to the holiday (Labor Day). I plan on cleaning my apartment (yay) and hopefully taking a little road trip up north, probably on Monday.

Note: The videos below are extremely poor quality, particularly the RHCP video, as I was using a cell phone, it was very dark, and I was about 100 yards from the stage. On the other hand, they are also fairly small. Also, the RHCP video has about 2 minutes of just showing the crowd, or, more appropriately, the black where the crowd would be. I didn't remove it just so you could see how crazy it was before the band came on for the encore.

Monster Truck Crash - 560kb - 0:27

RHCP: Under the Bridge - Live - 4.79MB - 5:31

The images below are also available with pointless comments here.

'I hate you so, but love you more I'm so elastic...'

Well, I've now been working seven days a week for over a month, and will be working every day at least for another week, if not the week after that as well. Still managing to hang out with friends though, or at least trying to. Have a busy weekend ahead of me. In between sleeping and working, Friday I'll be heading to The Family Values Tour, featuring Korn, The Deftones, Stone Sour, Flyleaf, and a bunch of other bands. Saturday I'm going to see Pirates of the Caribbean. Sunday I'm going with some friends to take a tour of the new Arizona Cardinals (NFL) stadium. I guess the tickets for the tour were free, which is pretty cool. Hopefully I'll be able to check out a game this year as well, as I've never been to an NFL game (or NBA, for that matter). Hopefully either Saturday or Sunday I'll be able to make some time to hang out with Mike and Tiffany as well, as we haven't hung out in a long time. Monday is the Red Hot Chilli Peppers concert. I also have to re-sign my lease this weekend. I didn't really want to, but I'm not really sure where I want to move yet either, so I'll sign another 7 month lease. That should give me enough time to look around some, and it'll be cooler temperatures by the time I move.

Put some subwoofers in my car the other day. Dennis had a Kicker 120w amp, and three MTX 10" subwoofers in a box that used to be in his Cavalier. When he traded in his cavalier, he didn't really have any use for them anymore, so I bought everything off him for $100. We installed it ourselves, and it went fairly easy, as the previous owner of my car already had the car wired for subwoofers, so we just connected the wires, and it worked. OK, well it sounds simpler than it actually was, but it wasn't too difficult. I need to do a little better job at connecting the wires together though. Right now they don't have the strongest connection, and are sort of just hanging around. The box is also about 1.5" too long to fit all the way in the back of my trunk, which sucks, but it fits, and I can still fit my toolboxes back there, as well as a few other things. Here are some pics if you want to check it out. 120w doesn't sound like much, especially when split between 3 subs, but it sounds damn nice, so I'm happy, especially for a mere $100.

John's car get's an unwanted paint job...

So, this isn't exactly what I wanted to blog about, but as it just happened, and I'm still a bit annoyed by it, I will. Got off work early tonight to come home to cracking sounds right outside my car as I'm driving up to my apartment complex. At first I thought some idiot threw fireworks in the road and/or at my car, but once I was parked, and went to look if any damage had been done, I was unfortunately, or fortunately, wrong. Turns out some idiots thought it'd be funny to shoot paintballs at passing cars in the alley behind the complex. They're idiots because it would've been quite a bit smarter to do it where you don't live, or even better, do it at random spots where your continually moving, and thus, harder to find. After getting a bucket of water, a couple wash clothes, and a towel, I went down to quickly wash off the yellow paint that was splattered all over the passenger side of my car. I'd only been directly hit twice, and I'm pretty sure at least one hit the street in front of my car, as there was paint splattered all over my front bumper as well. The paint came off surprisingly easy, which leads me to think that the companies that manufacture paint balls thought ahead and made it more of a thick colored water rather than actual paint. Either that, or after a number of incidences similar to mine, they changed it from standard paint. Anyways, I probably looked like an absolute idiot, washing my car at 2:30 in the morning. Took about 30 minutes to get all (hopefully) of the paint off. Right before I'd finished, the complex security officer rode by on his bike, and I waved him down and let him know about what happened. He went and checked it out, but didn't see anyone, but let me know the cops had been called.

Bad luck didn't stop there, however. I went back to my apartment to find the door locked. It's been broken for months, and I was just in my apartment 30 minutes earlier, but now all of a sudden the lock is working, and of course, I don't have my house key. So I call up the office, which is just voice mail at this time of night, and left a message that I'd been locked out, and then I waited for someone to get a spare key to unlock it for me. As the guy shows up about 10 minutes later, the security officer comes by and tells me another car just got hit right in front of the police, but of course, they didn't see it happen, or who did it. Even so, as I waited to get my key, I saw two cop cars driving around the parking lot, and all of a sudden about 5 or 6 shots could be heard. The cops stopped and got out, and it looked like they were looking around, but I didn't bother to go and see if they'd caught the people or not, for fear of retaliation if the idiots found out I'd reported them, and who I was; particularly since I'm pretty sure they live here.

Anyways, here are the pics of the damage, which was a lot worse than you can see here, as there was paint all over the side, and front of my car. You can only see where the balls actually hit in these pics though, as they were taken with my phone's camera, which lacks flash, and obviously isn't going to be the greatest at taking pics in low light. It completely skipped my mind to grab my DSLR... oh well, next time, LOL.



So, on with the rest of what's happened since my last blog entry...

My vacation's been approved, and after spending somewhere around $1,100 on repairs for my car, it should be ready for the trip. My bumper "still" has not been repaired, and I'm extremely annoyed that it's taken this long to get fixed. I'm going to call the body shop this week and try and find out what the hell is going on, but at this point, I'll probably have to wait until after I get back from vacation to get it fixed. My brother will arrive on Thursday, and we'll leave Friday, though I'm not sure what time yet. At first I thought it'd be best to leave at night, so we wouldn't have to deal with the Los Angeles traffic, but my dad said that since we won't really be driving "through" LA, I shouldn't have a problem at any time of the day. Night might still be a good choice, as we'd be going through the hottest part of the country without the sun beating down on us. Anyways, I imagine we'll figure it out by the time my brother gets here.

Lots of birthdays this month. Stacy's was the 8th, Dennis' was the 15th, Angi's was the 10th (I think?), Tami's was today, and Mike's is on the 26th. With all the birthdays, car repairs, and a very long road trip ahead of me, not to mention I haven't worked overtime for months until tonight, my bank account's looking a little thin, and my credit cards are maxed. Not a good position to be in. Sure, the trip is unnecessary, but I got the car all fixed up because of this trip, and I'm really looking forward to it, so I don't have any plans on backing out unless something serious happens in the next 6 days.

I've been sort of avoiding the girl from work a bit since deciding not to date her. We still talk when we see each other at work, and we've gone to a couple Arizona Diamondbacks games together, but haven't gone to dinner or anything like that. Stacy says I'm being a bit of a dick by not telling her that I don't want to date her, but in my opinion, as the idea of dating was never discussed in the first place, I don't really feel like I'm obligated to say anything. That'd be like having to tell every girl I started hanging out with that I didn't plan on dating them, which is ridiculous.

Been playing a bit of Battlefield 2 lately, and doing quite well at it. Playing on an unranked server, I was able to get the 2nd to top spot, and the game after hit the top almost immediately, and stayed there for the rest of the game. Because of it, I've decided to play on ranked servers in order to improve even further, as I'm sure those are more challenging.

On another note, I was recently able to get a hold of Stefanie. I'd text messaged her one day when it was raining a few weeks back, about how I loved rain, and she replied with "me too". We texted each other a few more times, and I found out that she was actually moving that day into a new place, so the rain wasn't really helping. She said she'd have to invite me over once she was moved in, but I took that part with a grain of salt. Still, I was thrilled to finally hear from her after 8 months or so. Hopefully I can salvage this friendship after all.

'Emotion fills the sky, Erosion clouds my brain...'

I really don't feel like blogging, but I'm f'ing bored here at work, and I haven't been blogging much lately, so...

Last weekend was...different. Saturday I went up to Flagstaff. Dennis and his family were taking a mini vacation up there over the weekend, and I decided to drive up for the day to hang out. Ended up meeting them in Sedona, and spent most of the day there, checking out shops and sights, etc. Went to an estate sale and ended up finding a Pioneer turntable and equalizer for a total of $30. Found a matching turntable on Ebay for $20, so once I get that, I just need to find a simple and cheap mixer, and I can start mixing. Just for fun of course, always wanted to give it a try. The turntable and EQ are in prime condition, especially for being nearly 30 years old. I was really tired that day, as I'd worked Friday night through Saturday morning, and then left for Flagstaff only a couple hours after work. Drove home later that night with the help of loud music and energy drinks. Would've been a lot funner if I'd had someone with me on the way up and back, but everyone was working, or, in Dennis' case, already in Flagstaff.

Sunday didn't go so well. It started off ok. Went to lunch with Mike and Tiffany at Garcia's Mexican Restaurant. We made plans to go to see "Inside Man", at the 4:15 show. I had to go to a baby shower first though (explained in a bit...), but I said it probably wouldn't take long, an hour, hour and a half at most, so should be out of there by 3:30 at the latest. Unfortunately things didn't quite turn out that way.

So yes, I went to a baby shower. Many of you may know that only women go to baby showers, and I tried explaining this to DJ, who already knew that, but he kept crying about how he was going to be the only guy there (as it was for his soon to be born son). So Dennis and I agreed to go and hang out for a while. Well, Dennis didn't even get back from Flagstaff until 3:00, so we didn't even make it to the shower until 3:30. Mike called me not long after I got there, and I told him what was going on, and so he said we'd go to their place and just watch a DVD or something. I got a bit pissed at him, because we could just go to a later showing, but he just made excuses about having to drive to the theater, and how he had to work tomorrow etc. I wasn't really as pissed off about going to the movies as I was that the whole baby shower thing had f'ed up my weekend because I hadn't planned on going, and really, I wasn't even supposed to be there in the first place because I'm a guy! Dennis being late didn't help either. I would've gone earlier, but I didn't know where it was at, and DJ wouldn't answer his phone, as always.

Anyways, Mike ended up calling back and said we'd go to the 7:00 show at a closer theater to his house. I apologized for being an ass and said it wasn't necessary to go, but he said they really wanted to. I called Stacy, because we were supposed to hang out some time that day, but she didn't pick up. I left her a message telling her what time the show was, and to call if she could come. That was 1.5 hours before the movie. Right when we were walking in, at exactly 7:00, she text messages me saying "What time?", even though I'd told her what time on the voice mail. That's women for you... I told her we were already there, and asked if she wanted to hang out after, but she said no, so I pretended to get pissed off, and then told her we'd hang out some other day then. The movie was good, just as I had heard, and they both liked it as well, so I didn't feel guilty any more =P.

The rest of the week went just as any other week until Friday. There's a girl at my work that had talked to me a couple times in the past few months, and I'd been considering trying to talk with her more, hoping something would come out of it. I never got around to it though thanks to low self-esteem, and giant schedule differences. She works 2nd shift, and I work 3rd, so she leaves right when I come in. One time we passed each other on the stairs and I didn't even look at her, and DJ gave me all sorts of shit about it because I didn't even say hello, lol. Anyways, Friday I went up and started talking to her. She'd talked before about becoming a typesetter (my position), and so I started talking about that, and asked her when she was going to start training, etc. We must've talked for like, 10 minutes or more, but I told her I should probably get back to work before they start yelling at me. Anyways, hoping to talk to her more in the future. Not sure if I should just ask her out to dinner at this point or not. Any thoughts? Dennis says I should just ask for her number but I hate that shit. It's too f'ing typical, and too many jackasses do it. Better for me to ask her out to dinner, and if she says no, then tell her maybe some other time, and give her my number, yes? Fuck if I know...

Speaking of women... Stefanie's apparently looking at houses and engagement rings with her boyfriend. No, I still haven't talked to her yet. Dennis called her last week and talked to her about various things. She asked how I was doing and he got on her ass about it, saying she should just call me and find out, and she said she couldn't call me, as it'd been so long (well over 6 months now).

My apartment needs cleaning... bad... I've been slacking a lot lately. Keep telling myself I'll do it on the weekend, and then the weekend comes and goes, and still, nothing gets done. My cars dirty as hell now to, thanks to the brief rain we had, ending our 150+ day drought. Arizona's probably one of the few places where rain actually makes your car dirty, rather than cleaning it...

Yesterday I went over to Ron's house to help him fix his computer. He called me before I left my apartment. Apparently he'd been up all night, and was walking home from the west side of Phoenix (he lives over on the east side, in Tempe). His car was on the other side of town, as he'd been hanging out with some friends that night, and they'd ended up going to someones house after hitting the bar. He was still half drunk when I picked him up, which was kind of funny. He was all sorts of pissed off about some girl. We ended up going to eat breakfast at IHOP before going to her place for him to vent, and then heading to his place to fix his computer. Got it up and running...sort of. It POSTs at least. Didn't even boot before. I can't quite remember what fixed it... probably a couple of things. It was a good team effort though, and had fun doing it.

Didn't do shit today. Called Mike, but he said they weren't going to do anything, so I just slept, played some Oblivion, watched a movie, talked to my mom on the phone, and then headed off to work again, and here I am, on overtime, making $32+ an hour to write this giant blog entry... now to surf the net...

'Listen to the boulevard, listen to the fallin rain...'

I bought a scanner the other day so I could scan old photographs onto my computer. Sent a few to some friends at work, and decided to upload them here as well.


This is me when I was around 3 years old or so, living in a trailer in Fairbanks, Alaska.




I was probably about 10 or 11 in this pic. My brother is on the left. Taken in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State.




This is me when I was around 12 years old. It was taken at the Stanley Stamm Summer Camp the first year I went there. I continued to go there for three more years, at which point I was too old to attend as a normal camper.




The same camp, but two years later. Some girls I was friends with put rubber bands in my hair.




A bunch of old friends, and some current ones as well (and me of course). This was taken at the apartment I lived in about three years ago.




Taken probably sometime around 2002, from left to right is Dennis, Mike, myself, and Dennis' oldest son, Dylan. This was taken in one of those little picture booths you see at malls, Wal-mart, and arcades, that take a bunch of pics and print the out on a little strip.

'You see my wrist, I know your pain...'

Only a couple days until I leave for Houston. It seems I'll be working in the afternoon/evening, from 3-11pm, which is pretty nice, because I don't have to worry about getting up early and rushing to work. Apparently their job site is a lot smaller than the one here in Phoenix, and there might not even be any supervisors for my position there, and if so, then I'll have to call back here to Phoenix just to get help, so that should be interesting.

Christmas was fun. I went to Church on Christmas Eve with Mike and Tiffany, for a candlelight service. Christmas day I spent the morning at Dennis house, opening presents and eating breakfast, etc. Then just after noon I went to Mike and Tiffany's house and opened presents with them and Tiffany's family. We went to her grandparents for dinner, which was really good. They had the standard Christmas dinner of turkey, mashed potatoes, veggies, cranberry sauce, etc; but they also had chicken and dumplings, which I haven't had in years, and it was extremely good stuff. For desert they had three different kinds of cheesecake, and ice cream.

For gifts this year I got a Linkin Park hoodie, and a Boondock Saints t-shirt from Dennis; a Tool hoodie from DJ, a Fantastic Four DVD from Stacy, Mario Kart DS from Dennis' parents, Battlefield 2: Special Ops from Issac (which I exchanged for Battlefield 2, since Special Ops is just the expansion, and I didn't yet own the game), a Bentley BMW Owners Manual from my parents, a $25 AMC Movie Theater gift card from Tami, and a Bible from Angie (she hasn't yet given it to me though). Mike still hasn't given me his gift yet. I asked for a watch, but I don't think he want's to spend that kind of money, which is fine with me, but that's all I could think of at the time. Not sure what he's going to get me though, and I don't think he does either, which is why it's taking so long.

Gifts I bought for other people include a Creative Zen Nano Plus 1GB MP3 player, and an Atari Flashback 2.0 game system for Mike; a 512MB PC2700 SO-DIMM RAM card, two Denver Broncos hats, and a Denver Broncos magnetic dart set for Dennis; a Kodak CD40 digital camera for Stacy; a $50 Hollister gift certificate for Tiffany; Age of Empires III for Ron; a Makita 18V Drill and Flashlight set for my Dad; pearl earrings for my Mom; a Motorolla Bluetooth headset for my brother; Bubble Bobble GBA for Issac; a "Chocolatte" hot cocoa maker for Dennis' mom; an ASU zip-up hoodie for Dennis' dad; Gilmore Girls Season One for Nicole; a Reggie Bush jersey for DJ; a shirt, remote control car, and Power Rangers SPD toys for both Dylan and Dennis Jr.; a musical walker for Marisa (Dennis' daughter); and the same walker, a blanket, and some car window shades for Anna (Stacy's daughter).

Bought myself a gift today to; an Olympus E300 8mp DSLR digital camera kit. Got a pretty good deal on it for buying it at a retail store to. It came with two lenses, one for close shots, and one for shots that are farther away. I was looking at a couple other cameras as well, but Fry's Electronics happened to have this one on sale for quite a bit less than the others, and I wanted it before I leave for Houston, which ruled out ordering something online. I told Dennis about it on the phone and he gave me a bunch of shit for being interested in photography and spending so much on a camera, so I gave him shit for buying an $1800 washer and dryer set, and he tried to blame that on his wife. He mentioned that I could've built a new computer, but the computer I plan on building is going to cost around $1500. This camera should last me for years though, and it'll never really have to be upgraded. I'll probably still end up building a new computer around February anyways, as long as I don't owe too much in taxes to the IRS since I've been claiming exempt for six months or more.

Played a bit of Battlefield 2. Seems like a decent game. My computer's still a bit slow in running it though, even with the GeForce 6600GT I just put in it. This of course is due to the old ass processor and slow RAM in my PC. A 266FSB only goes so far... I can still play at 1024x768, but only with all the details set to low. Mario Kart DS is awesome though. I already beat the Classic cup, and about half of the other one, both on 50cc. Seems pretty damn easy to play, but then, it's only the 50cc races, so I'm sure the 100 and 150cc will be quite a bit harder. Looking forward to unlocking more characters and cars though, which is definitely a nice feature that wasn't in the SNES and N64 versions (never played the GCN version). This is one of the few games I bought my DS for, and I'm definitely not disappointed.

Well, that's all for now. I'll post again from Houston, hopefully with some pics from my new camera!

'And every time it rains, are the angels crying...'

I think I slept through over half the weekend. I'd wake up, and try to think of anything I could do that day, and nothing would come to mind, so I just fell back asleep. Only hung out with Dennis for a couple hours on Saturday. Called Mike Sunday, while waiting for one of my tires to get repaired. Apparently his g/f Tiffany had been in the hospital for a couple days, and she was getting out in a couple hours. Said he'd call me if they ended up doing anything. No call came, so they probably just went home and rested. I doubt she was in the mood to be doing anything. I really want to start hiking in the morning again though, so I'll have to give him a call this morning and see if he's up for it sometime this week. The weather's been great here in Phoenix the last week or two, now that it's cooled down. Usually high 70's to mid 80's. A couple people have asked me if I'd taken my car on any trips yet, but I haven't, mainly because I don't really want to go by myself.

Watched "Jarhead" on Friday, which was a pretty cool movie. There wasn't much action in it, surprisingly, seeing that it takes place during Desert Storm. I won't say anything more than that though, as it might spoil the movie. Also got that Blockbuster movie deal where you can rent unlimited movies a month. Already rented four movies, including "Donnie Darko", "Be Cool", "The Amityville Horror", and "Suspect Zero".

Only one more week until I go on vacation! I can't wait to get out of Phoenix. It seems like forever since I was up in WA, and I was just there in August! Three weeks of vacation should be really nice though. Apparently we're going to Montana for Thanksgiving to visit my grandma as well, which should be fun. I love going there in the winter, especially if it snows.