There isn't really anything quite so much fun as a 5:30 am wake up call for work on a Saturday.

Even if I did volunteer.

Well, except maybe for a 5 am wake up call. Luckily being a Saturday there isn't any traffic, so I got an extra 30 minutes.

Going to go drink coffee now. And drive to work.

( Fifteen on Friday )

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I made mashed potatoes tonight, in anticipation of cooking roast in the crock pot this weekend.

I've put in a little bit of extra time just about every day this week, plus I'm working a shift (maybe a half shift) tomorrow. We're counting inventory so we can go live with a new system next week. We'll basically go until we've counted everything, so it may take 3 hours, or it may take 6. Mostly it depends on how much there actually is, and how many people come to help. I'm hoping that all totalled I'll get about 8 hours overtime this week. That would just about cover the cost of the home inspection that's scheduled for Wednesday.

Unlike the average home buyer who gets the inspection done after they make an offer, we've of course got to do things the weird way. It's not unheard of, but it's not often done. I was hoping to do it on Monday, but the inspector was already booked. Tuesday would have worked, except that I'm election judging again, and that goes from 7am till 10pm. (Wish the check from that came sooner) So Wednesday, and then an offer after we get the report.

If you were buying a home, and they were looking for $220,000, what would you offer?
Things to keep in mind:
3 bedroom
1 bath
unfinished but full basement
large fenced yard
street parking
divorced/separated owners, husband living alone with his lounge chair and big screen tv.
We're going to be asking for help with the closing costs. Around $7,000 total.

Poll #1135576 What would you offer?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What would you offer?

Books I've completed in January:

….

Ok, I hope you enjoyed the review of all the books I finished last month. As you can see I am well on my way toward completing my goal of 50 books by the end of the year. I'm close to finishing 2 books, but if things continue at this pace, I'll be lucky if I read 25 books this year.

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1. Which open-all-night establishment has been a lifesaver for you?

The grocery store

2. What open-all-night establishment is closest to where you live?

Giants grocery store

3. What nonexistent open-all-night establishment could you really use in your life?

Hobby/game/comic store. Heck, it would be nice if one of these existed nearby even if it wasn't 24hours/day.

4. Which open-all-night establishment in your town is least likely ever to see your

patronage in the wee hours of the morning?

I actually can't think of anything else around here that's open all night.

5. Have you ever purchased anything advertised on television late, late at night?

Never.

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In case you didn't notice, today is Super Tuesday, and also Fat Tuesday. I won't be voting until next week, and I don't expect today to really bring a democratic front runner. I was going to vote for Edwards, but now I'm leaning strongly towards Clinton.

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Once again the temperature is crazy hot at work. 26.9 degrees!! It felt like I should have been wearing a towel while sitting next to a pile of rocks that I should pour water on. Luckily they did, eventually get the things working, and by 3 it was back down to a reasonable 22.6.

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So Lent starts tomorrow. I'm curious what you are all giving up? Of course that only goes for the Christians on my f-list… for everyone else, what would you give up if you had to give up something?

Me? I'd be giving up… Honestly I feel kinda stripped down as it is.

There's a science blog that I read, called Centauri Dreams. Its charter, as taken from the website:

In Centauri Dreams, Paul Gilster looks at peer-reviewed research on deep space exploration, with an eye toward interstellar possibilities.

He usually updates at least once a day, and it's a nice way to keep up on what's being looked at out there. Mostly he focuses on extra solar research, but he does make note of interesting things going on within our star system.

Today he wrote about extra solar terrestrial planets, and it makes me wonder what I'll see in my lifetime. Will I, by 2050, see a picture of an extra solar planet? Will we have launched a true interstellar probe? Or even an extra solar one? To reach even the nearest star, Proxima Centauri, at the speed of the fastest man made object (Voyager 1) would take 74,000 years. That's at 1/16,000 the speed of light. We need something that goes at least 1,000 times faster then that to be at all useful. And even if we had something that would go that speed, how to slow it down so that it doesn't just shoot through the system and keep on going?

So what then, if interstellar exploration will be limited to telescopes within the solar system during my lifetime? Well, there's still a lot of mystery about our own system. We've only scratched the surface of our own little rocky planet, and have at best stirred up a little bit of dust on the other worlds of the Sol system. Mars is still a tempting target, and I expect I'll live to see humanity set foot on it. Exploration of the asteroid belt I'm willing to bet will turn up some unexpected finds. I also think I'll see some international regulation about space trash, after a tragic loss of life from a stray piece of metal. We'll also find a couple of objects that will pass us closer then the moon.

In the last 2 hours of work the temperature climbed from 22.5 degrees to 25.4. I was sitting there sweating. In scrubs! Ug!!

tigergladys actually called out sick today, and went to the clinic! We'll see if the prescriptions actually work. She has bronchitis with fluid in the lungs (walking pneumonia? they didn't test to be sure) and an ear infection. Lucky her, and guess who gets to go to rally tonight. Lucky me.

Just after New Years I will be starting my microeconomics course. Unlike every other course I've ever taken, this one will be entirely online. I hadn't even intended to take an online course, but they cancelled the classroom session a couple of days ago, so I had to go back on campus and sign up. I couldn't do it online. There's a little irony for you.

Work has been busy, especially as I'm taking next week off. I'm trying to get as much done ahead of time as possible so I don't have huge piles to come back to. Also, being the week before Christmas, there is food being brought in almost every single day. Some of it is good, most of it is less then good.

Tonight I did a bit of cleaning, a bit of laundry, a bit of cooking, and a bit of shopping. All in all a productive evening, though I did discover that the Pillsbury sugar cookie dough sheet is crap. I'd have been better off just making them from scratch.

Five on Friday

1. What do you like on a hot dog?

A brown mustard

2. What do you like on a hamburger?

Mayo, cheese, lettuce, tomato, and mustard

3. What do you like on a baked potato?

Sour cream, chives, bacon, and cheese

4. What do you like on a slice of toast?

Honey, or peanut butter

5. What do you like in a cup of coffee or tea?

For coffee I usually take sugar, and it depends on the tea. Chai tea gets sugar and milk (just a bit) all other black teas get nothing.

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1. How do you celebrate the arrival of Spring?

I go hiking! Clean the house!

2. What other holidays and events do you celebrate or mark in the spring?

My birthday, Tigs’ birthday

3. Do you have an interesting traditions that take place during this time of year?

No

4. What colors and imagery do you associate with spring?

Green!

5. What are you most looking forward to about spring?

Sunshine, fresh air, longer days… J

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As much as I dislike coming in early, the benefit (leaving early) definitely makes up for it!!

We were denied preapproval for an auto loan. Mind you, this was not due to poor credit, but rather to the fact that we are considered new to the area. This doesn’t mean we’ll be denied a loan, just that we have to bring them 2 pay stubs and an offer from the dealership before they’ll give it to us. So onto plans B (other bank), C (online), & D (dealership).
Doing payroll (my main job function) gives me a fascinating view into peoples psychology. There are the people that wouldn’t really notice if you took $10 out of their paycheck every 2 weeks, and then there are the people who will quibble if the computer assigns them their lunch break at a time that they didn’t actually take it. Some people get very very anal about it. On one hand it’s frustrating because there is only so much I can modify within the computer, and on the other hand, I want someone who is completely anal about things to be the one taking care of me in a situation that requires me to be cut open.

Speaking of being cut open, last night I managed to slice into my thumb with an x-acto knife while I was finishing up sculpting a new head for an ogre from the old chainmail game. Somewhere along the line I managed to lose it’s head, and it’s been sitting, decapitated in my mini case for years. I decided to do something about it. Honestly, I’m kinda glad I lost the head, cause it was pretty ugly, not that what I sculpted is anywhere near attractive! I mean, it is an ogre! Actually I went more for troll, and in the end it came out looking more like a gorilla/Neanderthal. Well, I’ll let you decide what it looks like.





Poll #918213 What does this look like to you?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What does this look like to you?

( I've also sculpted a hamster.  )

( And I converted this guy to hold a flamer. )

Taking some time out of my busy workday to write a little bit for good old El-Jay. First off, Happy New Year! So far it’s looking like it’ll continue the trend started last year and be a good one, though that’s really hard to judge from just a couple of days. Anyway, here’s hoping that it’s a good one.

On New Years Eve Tigs and I spent between 10 and 2 working up in the craft room. It had quickly become less of a “craft” room and far more of a “stick stuff in there that we aren’t currently using” room. We sorted through our comic collection, which freed up about a short box worth of space. As we put the books back into their boxes we also labeled the boxes, and put the ones with the inactive titles (all my crossgen titles) at the bottom of the pile.

We also did some other general cleaning and organizing. My craft table actually began to have some space where I could sit at it! In looking at what little actual surface space is available on it, we discussed getting a paint rack to put on it. Something that rotates, and holds all the different colors, or at least all the ones I use regularly. Then I can just take some time, even if it’s just 15 minutes to sit down and do some painting, rather then having to take the time to pull out all my paints and set up a place to work. It’ll already be set up so I can just sit and paint!

Even better then getting all the cleaning and sorting done was the fact that Lucy was so freaked out by the whole thing! You should have seen her when we had the comics all spread out and in piles. She had such worried ears.

Later we were invited to Elspeth’s for a party. It always amazes me how closely rural and urban areas can be to one another. Elspeth’s house definitely falls into the rural category, and was a little hard to find. We eventually made it, and then immediately left to go grab some food at a Mexican restaurant. It was good, if somewhat pricey. Utilizing our mad-powerful money skillz we shared a plate of chicken quesadillas, rice, and beans. Have to say it was really good! After that we returned to Elspeth’s house ate some more yummy food including some of Gaer’s famous apple bread, and then went and played Scene It and Karaoke Revolution. We flipped on Dick Clark at about 3 minutes before the ball dropped, and counted down the last 10 seconds, cheered, toasted I kissed Tigs, and then the game was back on! I sang a decent version of Red Red Wine, and sang backup on a number of other songs. We left around 1, and went straight to bed.

New Years Day itself was spent mostly relaxing on the couch, watching the first disk of Scrubs season 3 and the 4th & 5th disk of season 5 of The West Wing. I (while watching) sorted miniatures. Mostly this was unboxing the minis, bagging them in ziplock bags and putting them all in a box. It’s amazing how much space packaging takes up! This freed up even more space and gave me a good idea of what minis I actually have. Now if only I had somewhere to display the ones I finish! Next house… I found a book an Amazon about sculpting that I want to get. I feel like I need some more direction, I need projects, examples, step by step instructions. I need practice doing simpler things then 28mm Space Marines.

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End of the day. So close to being done with the files it hurts. I ran out of the colored files with the labels that I made. I’m short by 4 sets. I’ll be able to whip those up first thing in the morning though. I already have the labels, and the files, I just need to put them all together.

Tonight is puppy class. Actually tonight is the second to last puppy class. I think we find out what the final exam is. Doesn’t matter too much, she can do just about all of it, she just needs more practice doing it in front of the other puppies. On top of that, we start the basic class on the 16th so there isn’t even a week break between classes!

I’m giving myself half an hour at work to update. Exciting hua? So whatever I write over the course of the next half hour will be posted when I get home tonight.

I got my check today, the first check from my new job. I wish this was in and of itself a highly exciting event, but knowing what my hourly pay is it’s not too hard to figure out what my pay check would be, so no surprise. The good news is that we can now pay the car insurance. However before paying it, I’ll be calling them to ask them to lower our rate. Hey, can’t hurt right? And it worked with one of my credit cards! The other one they wanted me to call back in January. Weird, but ok.

This whole week I’ve been mostly working on the employee files. What a mess. And what interesting reading. Part of the reason I’m not further along is that I come across such interesting bits of reading. For instance the person who was always late, and got caught parking in front of the building, badging in for the day, going back outside to park the car, and then going back into work! Or the towel that got left in a person after a surgery, the nurse who got blamed for it, and the surgeon who then came and said it wasn’t her fault. Fun stuff!

It’s traditional to talk about Christmas, you know, after the fact. Lists and all that. I don’t really feel like sharing much of that, but I do want to tell you about the most unexpected gift I got this year; an electronic keyboard. And all the accessories! We’re not talking about some cheap keyboard either, this is a nice one! Now for a while now I’ve wanted to learn to play an instrument. I played violin and cello for a very little while back when I lived in Lancaster, but I haven’t touched anything since, and I never learned how to sight read music. I always felt a little bad about that, and jealous of my cousins who all play one instrument really well, and several others passably. I wanted to be able to play at least one instrument, and do it reasonably well. This falls under the heading of making myself a better person though learning new skills.

So anyway, Christmas evening, we (Tigs, Lucy, and I) are up at my aunt’s house, and there is a pile of boxes for us. One of these is a big box, two are long skinny ones, and there are a couple of smaller ones. I don’t think we conveyed just how blown away we were by the gift. A lot of thought went into it, and it was to both of us! Tigs can’t practice either of her instruments due to rules about it at the townhouse. They provided headphones. And a music stand, and a stand for the keyboard! We’ve since set up the stand, but haven’t plugged in the keyboard yet. It’s intimidating. Not just the whole learn a new instrument thing, but also the whole very expensive keyboard with a whole lot of electronics! We’ve borrowed a “teach yourself to play and read music” book, and we are both going to give it a shot!

In other artistic topics, I haven’t done much painting lately. I think I want to clean up the desk that I’ve got a bunch of minis and crap on so that I don’t have to pull everything out and set it all up if I want to slap some paint on something. I’ve also wanted to sculpt again. I think I’m going to pull out the cheap clay I’ve got and see what sorts of simple things I can do with it, and work up to more difficult items. Maybe I’ll do some animals. Chickens? Something simple anyway, and I’ll post it before the New Year!

Can you believe Monday is New Years day? It’s almost 2007. It shouldn’t be so hard to believe either, seeing how crazy and busy this past year has been! Priya and Lucy came into our lives, and Raoul and Nebula left us. We moved to a new region of the nation, had temp jobs, got real jobs… and that isn’t even counting tons of the small stuff!

Anyway, my 30 minutes is up. I lost some time rewriting the middle bits about the keyboard, otherwise this might be a bit longer. 742 words. Well more now.

What’s your New Years resolution? Mine is to learn to play the piano!

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1. What events shaped your life in 2006?
I think moving to Maryland was probably the biggest event in 2006

2. How about you proudest/biggest achievement of the year?
Getting a permanent job ranks high on the list

3. Did you keep any of your new year's resolutions?
I don't recall making any last year

4. What is your fondest memory of 2006?
picking Lucy up from the airport is one of them.

5. What are you looking forward to most in the new year?
Getting us on firm financial footing.