I am getting a sore throat. I have the unmistakable feeling that I am getting a cold. I am not happy. Other than that work week #3 at the new job started off fine!
Personal
BBQ Weekend
This weekend I went up to Jayson & Gretchen's new house for a BBQ. I went up Saturday afternoon so I could hang out and not have to travel on Sunday morning to the BBQ. I am glad I went up early because besides the hour and a half train ride, I didn't realize that the 7 train wasn't running at my station. That meant a 5 minute trip from my station to Grand Central turned into a 40 minute trip. I actually almost missed my train on Saturday because of the MTA's decision to do construction on a holiday weekend. Great job MTA.
Other than that near miss-hap the weekend was great. The weather was fantastic. There was tons of food. I saw a bunch of people I haven't seen in ages. Scott (not me another Scott) was there with his wife and kid. Kai was there with his wife and kid. Ian was going to come but he is expecting a new born any minute so he was a no show. There was tons of food. I am impressed with myself for not drinking that much. I don't drink allot normally but I am trying to cut back anyway because I am worried that more than one or two drinks of alcohol will trigger a migraine. I did mix up two or three Jack Daniel's Lynchburg Lemonades. They are really good.
I was able to get a bunch of photos with the new digital camera. Man that camera takes good photos. They will be up on Flickr soon.
I was originally going to stay over until Monday so I didn't have to worry about taking the train home late on Sunday night, or leave early due to traveling all that way home via public transit. Thankfully two of Gretchen's friends gave me a ride. I am glad they did because I didn't get home until past 1AM. I think it was better to do that than get a not so great night sleep at someone else's house and then still have to travel home.
Overall a fantastic weekend. I had a blast at the BBQ and got to see some people I haven't seen in a really long time!
The Worst Timing
I woke up with the beginnings of a Migraine today. That isn’t good on any day, but is even worse when I am only on my third day of a new job and I have no time banked and no credibility yet. I am just not sleeping. It boils down to that being my problem. I sleep half the night and then I just can’t anymore. So this morning I woke up with what felt like the beginnings of a migraine. I couldn’t chance it so I took an Amerge and went to work. Thankfully it worked and I was tired most of the day, but I made it. I even was able to stay almost an hour later than I had planned.
What is weird is when I get a migraine sometimes I might be hungry because I didn’t eat all day but the thought of eating anything doesn’t do anything for me. I ended up not eating anything until like 2:30 and even then I only had a half a sandwich. Of course I get home and I am feeling better and I am not tired! Go figure. I am hoping I am feeling better tomorrow.
Submarine Shopping
It is hard to find the perfect gift for people. I needed to find a gift for my friends Jayson & Gretchen for their house warming party next week. What do you get? Some kitchen appliance, a painting, alcohol? Who knows. I ended up going with the fun and frivolous gift. They have a pool, so I went searching for a submarine to drive around in it. The selection for remote control subs wasn’t that great but I was able to find something nice on Amazon that got good reviews. I look forward to seeing if the kids can sink it this weekend.
Unemployment, For Two Days Anyway
I am technically now unemployed for two full days. I am finished with my old job, but the new one doesn’t start until Monday. I haven’t done anything today since I was “resting” from going out last night. I didn’t get much sleep last night so it was nice to nap a bit this afternoon. Other than that I really didn’t do anything today. It feels good. I say that on day one of my mini vacation. I know by Sunday I will be begging to do anything at work.
I talked to my sister today. I don’t know what to get Zachary for his birthday. Her response was to ask how much money I want to spend. That is a tough question. I will get him anything he wants, within reason. He is only two. An expensive gift will really not be appreciated by him. Now getting something nice for Morgan if she asks for it would be appropriate! I am stuck. I will wait and see what Carrie thinks of for the little guy. I don’t want to be like my dad and buy whatever he wants for the kid even if that means it is something for a 3 or 4 year old and he is only 2.
I am thinking of getting out a bit tonight. I wanted to do a little shopping but I am lazy. It is almost 6pm,and I do have 3 full days to do shopping. Hmmm, what to do. Let me go ponder that for a while until I decide to sit around and order in dinner and not go out!
Anthro Desks Rock!
On Tuesday I received my new Laptop Cart (its like a mini desk for me). I wanted something I could wheel a computer or TV on that I could keep in my bedroom. I don’t have a TV in there, and there is no fixed spot that would be good to keep one. I figured having something that I can move would be cool. I had been using the 19″ LCD TV I won at my company holiday party on a plastic cabinet that has wheels, but it is really flimsy. I order the cart from Anthro. They are the same company that I got my computer table from. The Laptop Cart even matches the computer table. See mom, I do pay attention. Anthro makes some fantastic stuff.
It took me 20 minutes to assemble the cart. Now I need to setup the TV on it when I get some time. With the cart order I also bought some cable management kits for my computer table. The cable management kits are an idea so simple that I haven’t seen many other companies offer. The desk is modular so it took me 10 minutes to add the cable management. It was so simple and looks so much better than cables tied together with velcro. I love companies that actually make good stuff that works! I would recommend them (and I have) to anyone.
My Attempt At Social Networking
I announced last week that I gave my two weeks notice at work. Lets face it, once I gave notice there was a whole lot less to do at work than there was before. That is saying allot when one of the reasons I am leaving in the first place was I am bored. One of the things I have wanted to do but never really had the time was to sign up for one of the social networking sites (Facebook, Myspace, etc) and search out long lost friends. I have used Linkedin for several months, but that is more for professional use than anything else, so I wanted to try one of the real social networking sites out. If you knew me you would think I would be one of the first people to use a site like that. I am in the technology field after-all, and a fan of the new and interesting. For some reason I have been slow to adopt new online social concepts like online dating or social networking. I think it was because when I was actually interested in that stuff I was so far ahead of my time that everyone I knew would make fun of me about it. Now it is acceptable.
I signed up for the two big sites Facebook, & Myspace. As it turns out I already had a Facebook account that I never did anything with so it was easy to start using. My initial assessment of both sites follows almost exactly a study I read about both sites. It basically did a study of who uses both sites and said that there are distinct general demographic differences between the two. After my brief experience I am believing in what I read. I am not going to get into the details, but I ended up using Facebook. Myspace looked like it was designed by a 16 year old, and was too busy a site for me. It seems most of the people I know thought the same thing. After a brief search I only found one friend on Myspace and that was because I knew she was on it. Within 20 minutes on Facebook I saw like 30 people I knew.
Too me the whole idea of using a site like Facebook is to find friends who I have lost touch with. I had a list of a few names I wanted to look up. I actually suceeded in finding a few people, and in the process found several others I had not thought about. The funny thing about this process is you end up getting invites or hello emails from other people you may not have found, but who have found you. Here in lies the problem for me. I am horrible with names. It is hard to remember a name of someone you knew 5, 10 or even 15 years ago. I have already had to reference my college and high school yearbooks to verify that I knew someone. Sad I know, but it is true.
Six Weeks Wait For a Watch Band
When I turned 30 my dad gave me his vintage 1969 Omega Speedmaster. I haven’t used it much since I have always been afraid of damaging it, even though my dad wore it in surgeries for 30 years. In the few months that I did wear it I began to scratch the underside of the steel watch band. It was scraping against the desk when I typed. I have a similar problem with the Titanium X-33 I use as my day to day watch.
Recently I have wanted to wear the Speedmaster Professional more often, but I don’t want to mess up the original band any more than I already have (I really haven’t damaged it, but with continued use it will be messed up). I decided to go and try to buy a leather band that I can swap for the steel one I currently have. Well that was easier said than done. I went to Tourneau on Saturday and was basically told if they could get me a band it would be 6-8 weeks. I say if because since they couldn’t find the serial number on the watch they couldn’t validate that it was authentic. They claim that Omega won’t let them order anything without a serial number. I informed the lady that watches as old as the one I have don’t always have the serial number on the outside. For some reason I read that older models had the number inside the watch, if at all. She said it didn’t matter. I just shook my head as I provided my contact information in the hopes that Tourneau can order the band. If they can, I have no idea what color it can come in, or how much. I just don’t get some businesses. Is this company thinking in their head and saying lets take a loyal customer who has paid a premium for a product that double digit percentage of the population are stopping from buying (yes with mobiles and other electronic devices less and less people are buying watches) and make it harder for them to pay money for an accessory. It sure feels like that.
Oh and to be clear, I will blame the store not the manufacturer in this case because the sales lady didn’t handle the situation well at all. Places have to learn how to treat their customers better.
I am putting together a desk
Weekend Update
Friday night I went out with a ton of people from work. It wasn’t an official going away party for me, but it felt like it. We ended up at Windfall to start. We hung out there for a while until the crowd thinned out. After that about 6 or 7 of us went to a Japanese Karaoke place. I am not a fan of Karaoke, but I had a good time. I cannot confirm or deny if I sang anything.
We started drinking around 5pm, and I finally stopped around 11:30pm. Starting early like that can kill you. I rested most of the day Saturday because of it. I did run out to do a little shopping. See a future post about the antics involved in getting a new watch band.
Saturday night I meet up with Danny to see Iron Man. I haven’t wanted to see many movies in the past few years, but I have been waiting to see this one. It looked fantastic, and I was also a fan of the comic when I was growing up. The movie was really good. Afterward we went to Heartland Brewery for some drinks and dinner. I shied away from the drink after Friday nights festivities.
Today was a hang at home and relax day!