My wife got the Monroe.

My wife just sent me pictures of newly delivered furniture today to my phone, which I forwarded to my gmail account, which I used to populate this entry.

The chaise lounge for the library (my fav)



Dining room table and chairs (the wifes fav)



Buffet that accompanies the dining room table

Technology.  I just can't remember life without the internet... and web enabled cell phones.

For any of my loyal followers (are there really any?), I thought I'd post about the house my wife and I are trying to sell.  It's a beautiful home with a great view and built in japanese garden. 

Our realtor, Rich Burns with Remax, created a web site just for it.  Me being the geek that I am, I love it.  You can see more pictures of it and read more about it than you could viewing just the RMLS of it. 

http://www.9211sejohnscourt.com/

Convienently, the url is also our street address.  Sweet.

Brief excerpt from the site:

Great sunset & city views. Better than new home with Hardi-plank siding.  Approximately 2316 sq.ft. w/3 bedrooms, and a Den/4th bedroom on the main. New carpet & fresh paint. Great-room w/gas fireplace. Spacious kitchen w/Maple cabinets, breakfast bar, and large dining area with deck access to enjoy the views.  Open space behind so view will remain. Great location & access to I-205. Fire supression system reduces home owners insurance. Huge master suite with double vanity, shower, jetted tub, walk-in closet, and private deck. 

So, let the bidding war begin.

I saw a funny T-shirt on my drive into work this morning that said:

It's all fun and games until somebody gets hurt...
After that, it's hilarious.

I totally agree.

... I need to blog more!

The boss wants us to leave early today since we worked A LOT in the past week.  Told the wife and we're GOIN TO SEATTLE!

WOO HOO!

It's been about 6 weeks but we're back.  With work and the move, setting up the server has been on the back burner but I was able to set it up this weekend.

I forgot I did this a few months back.  I went to futureme.org and tested it out by sending me the following message that I just got today.

---

(The following is an e-mail from the past, composed on Wednesday, September 20, 2006, and sent via FutureMe.org)

Dear FutureMe,

Hope you have a good birthday.

PastMe

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
delivery brought to you by FutureMe.org
like hearing from your past?
we like donations:  http://www.futureme.org/donations/
(your support helps keep FutureMe free)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  - - - - - - - - - -

Found this on TechCrunch this morning.  Here are my results

SuperHero
You are Green Lantern

Green Lantern 90% Spider-Man 85% The Flash 80% Hulk 80% Robin 75% Catwoman 75% Superman 70% Supergirl 65% Batman 60% Iron Man 55% Wonder Woman 50%

Hot-headed. You have strong will power and a good imagination.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test

Villain
You are The Joker

The Joker 74% Dr. Doom 72% Riddler 71% Apocalypse 70% Lex Luthor 69% Catwoman 65% Magneto 64% Green Goblin 58% Mr. Freeze 57% Venom 56% Dark Phoenix 55% Juggernaut 54% Mystique 50% Poison Ivy 45% Kingpin 45% Two-Face 30%

The Clown Prince of Crime. You are a brilliant mastermind but are criminally insane. You love to joke around while accomplishing the task at hand.

Click here to take the Super Villain Personality Test

Finally!  After years of wanting and always seemingly out of reach, we had DirecTV installed yesterday.  Good bye Comcast... and good riddens I might add. 

First off, let me just let everyone know the one, main question that I had that NOBODY could answer correctly or with such confidence that I would believe them: No, you DO NOT need a phone line to have DirecTV.  Personally, I've asked employees at both Best Buy and Circuit City and all have given me the same answer; "Yes, you NEED a phone line" - WRONG!

After calling DirecTV personally, mostly because of a mailer I received offering a bunch of incentives (way to go marketing department), I got the answer I was waiting to hear; "No, you do not need a phone line".  Straight from the horses mouth.  After hearing that, I promptly scheduled the nearest install date.  Two days later, an installer came out and gave me freedom from Comcast. 

Comcastic?  More like Craptastic.

I'm not going to compare side-by-side but I can tell you that the picture quality is great.  On top of that, the level of service I've received so far from DirecTV has far surpassed my 5 or so years with Comcast. 

Unfortunately, I still have my cable modem.  I love the speed but not the unexpected outages which can last for days.  Calling Comcast usually yields such responses as "have you tried rebooting the modem" or "there is someone working on a line near you, it'll be up sometime". 

I'll tell you one thing, once I'm eligible for Fiber I'm dropping Comcast... for good.

Finally, the big 3 search engines (Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft) have come to an agreenment on indexing sites; sitemaps.  The sitemap protocol is located at sitemaps.org and is already being used by Google Sitemaps. 

Luckily, the engine that powers my site (dasBlog v1.9) has the site map functionality built in.  You can see my current map here.

Without getting into much detail (read the TechCrunch article for more information), the main benefit is that my site will now be indexed uniformly by Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft.  The result; more traffic.  Keep'em coming guys.

Well to be fair, it's not just my blog it's mine and other blogs thanks to the new service hiddennetwork.com.   

 

Basically, Hidden Network - currently in beta (from the maker of The Daily WTF, which I am an avid reader) will display job ad's solely on blogs (tech blogs for now I believe).  Paying per 1000 impressions plus a per successful referrer bonus, makes this service inviting. 

Personally, I don't look for a new job except when I have to.  By doing this though, opportunities that may be better than my current situation might just pass me by.  But if I could see job opportunities from respective employers throughout the day while reading other tech blogs I might be presented with an opportunity that I might not have seen otherwise.  Plus, I would stay on top of job trends, something I could only do when actively looking for a new position.

I must say, I'm anxious to see where this service goes and doubly anxious to get on their blogger network.

Bernadette Baker (shown on right; affectionately known as Bernie), literary agent, small business owner and friend made the local paper in an article titled Bound to books.  Here's a quick excerpt:

“I love Portland,” she says. “For our business it’s a really great place for us to be starting. If we were to go to New York right now, as a business, we would not only have to transplant our whole lives, but we would be competing in an environment that is already really competitive. In Portland we have an edge because there are a lot of creators here but not a lot of industry here. The publishers here are more niche, and it’s a small community.”

Baker believes that Portland and the surrounding area, full of talented, creative writers, is a natural place to develop more of a publishing industry.

Congrats Bernie.

Be sure to check out her site; www.bakersmark.com.

This is a quick test post using Windows Live Writer Beta. 

The blog engine I use (dasBlog 1.9) supports the Live Writer API and I'm liking the interface mainly due to the fact that it looks like I'm composing an email or normal document rather than posting to my blog.  I say this because more times than not, I post during work hours.

Another option I have since I use dasBlog, is the "mail to weblog" posting feature.  This feature allows me to post by simply sending an email to a preset email address that the blog engine monitors and posts when it receives it.  As much as I love this feature, the formatting is a bit off when I use Outlook.  If I had a phone with easy access to email, I would post quick features while on the road.  But for everyday posting its just not robust enough.

Which bring me back to Live Writer.  Along with the slick UI, there is the ability to save drafts and spell checking.  Long gone are the days when I type up a post, copy it into Word just to check my spelling. 

UPDATE: Two thumbs up... way up for this little item.  Not only did it keep the formatting exactly like I entered it but it also uploaded the image above for me.  I wasn't expecting that at all.  When I put it in I thought to myself "oh great, I'll have to upload the image manually".  It's that little touch that makes everything grand.

That's it! 

I've tried to keep the ad's down because I didn't want them to become to intrusive but the small ad at the top was just NOT cutting it.  Since I switched a few months back, my ad revenue dropped dramatically.  Now, after reading a top 10 ten list of google whores I'm changing my strategy -ad's out-the-ass!

Enjoy.

I thought this day would never come (wipes tears from eyes).

Jackass 2 The Movie

What the crap man!  I finally find a wireless network attached storage (NAS) device that I want to buy but I can't find any retailer selling it.  COME ON!  ME WANT NOW!  WTF People!!!!

A little background:

Lately I've been watching It takes a thief on the Discovery Channel and I got me thinking; if someone breaks into our house and steals our computers, we're out some valuable data -both my wife and I.  So I need the following: a wireless network attached storage device.  Now, they do exist and I can find them but they are usually geared for small to large businesses and are expensive.  What I need/want is just a solution for home.  It needs to be 802.11g compatible, stand-alone, affordable with a fair amount of storage (I don't need a 10 Terabyte NAS).

So every now and then, I search for what I'm looking for.  Well, today I found what I need.  Actiontec has a perfect home solution.  Once I found it, I did some more searching to find reviews and/or places to buy it.  Well, I found a lot of the former but none of the latter.  Basically, everyone is reviewing it but nobody is selling it.  Makes you wonder just how in the hell these people are reviewing it.  On top of that, these reviewers are posting prices... and it's affordable but where did they get the prices from?  WHERE?

Now I'm stuck.  I finally found my wireless NAS solution but I CAN'T BUY IT!  WTF!

If anybody out there knows where to purchase one of these OR knows of a comparable device let me know and I'll post it here so others trying to find it can BUY it.  What we don't need are any more reviews.  I've reviewed the reviews, now I just want it.

My mother and step father were here over the weekend and I come to find during their visit that not only are they republicans but they support and LOVE that oaf of a president.  You know, the war mongering, oil profitering, conservative spender (oxy moron alert), National Guard joining-to-get-out-of-serving-in-Vietnam AWOL (pronounced A-HOLE) who lacks an education higher than the fifth grade!  And on top of that, my step father actually said that he's afraid if Hillary Clinton becomes the next president.  Not wanting to argue, I didn't push the subject but WOW!  I don't know what to think of now. 

I guess I shouldn't be too surprised, I basically knew it but I was in denial until I actually heard my mom say it.  And when I made a joke about Bush she actually got offended and DEFENDED the man!  OMG!

Heh, at least they got to see the bumber sticker on my wife's car that reads "The only Bush I trust is my own".  :D

UPDATE: I forgot to add that they both currently live in Florida.  Makes me wonder if Jeb Bush has put somehthing in the water... a pile of shit ought to do it.

I still love you mom.

Say AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Finally, I can stuff a big-assed burger into my face!!! 

Over 30 days after having my partially impacted, lower left wisdom tooth removed from a dentist (which I strongly advise against) my mouth is back to normal... oh, and don't forget the painful after math that lasted 2 weeks (we call this INFECTION)!  The 2 hour agonizing and painful removal (while fully awake, just local anesthetic) is not reccommended.  But I digress.  It's just good to finally open my mouth completely, whether its for stuffing with a big burger, a huge burrito or just trying to eat a fucking bowl of cereal.  Seriously, the act of eating for the past month has been the most frustrating part of my whole experience.  Try stuffing a piece of sushi in your mouth that you can only open half way; it's no fun let me tell ya.

For my last wisdom, a fully impacted, lower right I'm going to the oral surgeon.  I'll be out like a light, it'll take about 20 minutes, and when I wake up I'll be high as a kite... the way our founding fathers would've wanted wisdom tooth removal... and DMV registration, but that's a whole other rant.

This is too funny

http://www.jibjab.com/JokeBox/JokeBox.aspx?Id=99807&JokeId=39731

Yes... My wisdom tooth extraction has developed an infection.  Not that I'm happy about the infection, but I am happy that someone has figured out why the pain has yet to go away and swelling has increased.  All this from the oral surgeon.  My tooth was extracted by a dentist.  My advice, GO TO AN ORAL SURGEON if you want to get your impacted wisdom teeth removed, not a dentist.

For now, I'm taking 2 types of anti-biotics.  This should pass within a few days.

It's been 4 days now since my bottom left wisdom tooth was pulled and, for the love of BOB, it still hurts; when will it end?

The percocets the Dr. prescribed do next to nothing so I end up taking 3 ibuprofen with it to help a bit.  Last night, at my wits end and just wanting ONE good nights sleep, I took a vicodin perscribed to my wife for something she no longer needs it for.  Now, from what I've read, percocet is stronger than vicodin but let me set the record straight... NOT FOR ME.  The little fuckers worked, and worked well.  Not only did the pain go away, as pain killers are supposed to do, but it helped me sleep.

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

Unfortunately though, they do put me to sleep.  That means during the day, I'm on my own.  What do I think of percocets now?  They suck!  Where's my medical marijuana when I need it?

My lower left wisdom tooth was pulled today.  Yes it was impacted.  No I didn't go under, I just used a local anesthetic.  Was it better or worse?  Let me think.... uh, WORSE!  It hurt A LOT.

Face swollen... mouth in extreme pain.

My wife and I are starting to grow... our assets.  We want to get out of the "rat race" and be able to live off of our investments.  Her family is good at it, mine is not.  Her family has been hounding us to read this book Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki. 



Wow!  My wife has just finished it and I'm only half way thru but man is this a life changing book.  Don't get me wrong, it doesn't get into details but it does get you to think differently and that is the first step to financial freedom.  My wife and I are thinking differently now, for the better.

My advice, read it!

My wife went out and got another chihuahua, Prada, and she's adorable. 

It finally happened.  Yesterday the new Barnes & Noble in the Clackamas Town Center opened and my wife and I were there to take it all in.  

<tangent>
For the record, our favorite book store in Portland, hands down, is the downtown Powell’s; they have everything and the kitchen sink.  Unfortunately though, we live out in the suburbs and can’t always trek into town to go to Powell’s.  This is why the new Barnes & Noble opening is so great, it’s right in our backyard and it takes us just minutes to get to.

The Clackamas Town Center is currently going thru and extensive remodel with Barnes & Noble being the first of many new additions.  Like Washington Square Mall, it’s increasing in size and introducing an outdoor/indoor shopping experience.  The artist’s representations they have plastered about the mall of the new look tease us to no end.  One of these additions is going to be a new movie theater which my wife and I are also looking forward to opening and will no doubt be there opening day as well.
</tangent>

But I digress.  Barnes & Noble was everything we had hoped for and better.  The Starbucks inside, which is a short jaunt to the malls Starbucks –always odd how that works, was very nice and offered cheesecake from the Cheese Cake Factory.  Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.  So we got a piece along with our coffee (iced tea for me).  The store itself was a bit overwhelming for the both of us because we didn’t know the layout.  We basically wandered around going into almost every section saving (rather finding) the fiction section for last.  There we each found a new book:

“Paris Hangover” by Kirsten Lobe for my wife



and

“Running with Scissors: A Memoir” by Augusten Burroughs for myself.  



After our find and sitting down to read a few pages we decided to leave knowing full well that we’ll not only be back but that it may just turn into our “home” away from home.

A question arose in our office this morning concerning Social Security Numbers.  Do the numbers ever get reassigned or re-used?  My understanding was that they did not.  A colleague said that they did but 50 years after their death and only if there were no descendents.  This seemed odd to me and, being righteous almost to a fault, I decided to do a quick search. 

Within a few minutes, I found my way to the Social Security’s official web site and searched for “do social security numbers get re-assigned” and found the answer; “No. We do not reassign a Social Security number (SSN) after the number holder's death.”  In fact, not only have they not run out but, according to them, they have “enough new numbers for several generations into the future with no changes in the numbering system.”

Well there you have it, straight from the horse’s mouth.

Well it's that time of the month again.  No, I'm not bleeding -Dumbass!  Dooce changed her mast head.

She does this the first of every month, give or take a week, and they usually make me laugh.  One problem I've noticed in the past is that my browser cache's the mast heads so I have to crtl+F5 refresh it to see the new image and I usually read in one of her entries that it's changed to prompt me to do just that.  Today however I went to her site and saw the following:



Apparently her mast heads are split up but one of the images was in my cache while the other was not.  This hybrid mast head seems to say "Go dooce y'alls".  What that means I have no idea. 

Anywho, I thought I'd share.

Wow!  Fuckin' wow! 

Today I shot my first nail gun.  Today I leave behind the archaic hammer and nails.  Today I entered the world of high-powered projectile shooting of tiny nails.  Today I AM A MAN!  Look out Bob Villa... I'm coming!

All kidding aside, I must say that I love our new pneumatic nailer.  I used it a little while ago to add support to one of our work tables in the third garage (yes, we have 3).  The legs were too far apart for the particle board top so the middle sagged.  Enter two 6 foot 2x4's and the air gun and viola, it's straight and sturdy.  All in less than an hour.

I've been wanting one of these for years (I bet you're tired of me saying that) and I couldn't be happier.  I must admit, my adrenaline was pumping for the first few and I was a little scared but after a few shots I was wielding that thing like I've been nailing things for years (mind out of the gutter please).

Now, I have to think of things to build.  My wife suggested a dog house, hopefully not for me when we "discuss" things, but I'm not sure yet.  Perhaps a bird house, a small shelving unit or an addition to the house.  What ever the case, I have my trusty Red Rider, er um I mean, Porter Cable compressor and nailer at my side to help me do the job.

Last Sunday, my wife and I, after reading the Sunday morning paper, found a compressor with 3 nail guns (a brad nailer, a stapler, and a finishing nailer) at Home Depot for only $300 some-odd dollars.  If you're a guy, you know that secretly you've always wanted one since you first saw Bob Villa fixing up his "Old House".  Well, I'm no different.  I've always wanted one, if only for the racing pit crew sound of an air drill.

Unfortunately, we've been too busy this week to open it up and play with it but I was able to assemble it Friday afternoon after work.  We bought a few attachments; tire connection with gauge and a generic spray nozzle.  What can I say, I LOVE IT.  I've only blown up some bike tires so far but man it is the coolest thing.  I was hoping to use the nailer this weekend but haven't had the chance yet.  Hopefully, I'll be able to set those up and nail something together this week or weekend.  We need legs for a table top to be used as a work table in the garage. 

The same day we also bought a table saw (we wanted a mitre saw but had to back order it, it'll be here in a week).  Saturday afternoon I put that together but I have yet to use it.  For the legs to the table, I need to cut down some 4x4 pieces of wood.  I'll use the table saw thank you.  Mitre saw might be a bit more practical but again, we don't have it yet.

Why all the tools (pronounced toys)?  Well, I like to think I can build things and I love tinkering with wood while my wife has a more practical use; she's going to build her own stretcher bars for canvases.  With the mitre saw, brad nailer and stapler, she'll be able to build canvases for a fraction of the price compared to purchasing pre-made ones.  We like that.

Next on my list will be an air drill and socket wrench so I can work on my motorcycle a bit.  It's summer and I need to get it drivable again.  And yes, I need to have it sound like a Indy 500 pit crew when I'm working.

I've decided to redo the look and feel for my blog.  Because traffic has picked up a bit, I thought a cleaner, more professional look was in order.

What do you think?

If you still see the old look, hit ctrl+F5 to reload the new css and images.

My horoscope for today (from my wife):

Success is also about the long run, not just the immediate payoff. Remind yourself of that when you start getting impatient and are tempted to take shortcuts. You want the real thing, and you want it to last, remember?

Sometimes I need to remember that, especially when it comes to my side projects.  I get discouraged easily.

As many of you know, I have an off-shoot blog counting down the days Bush has left in office.  For the most part, it gets about a quarter to a third of the visitors of xerratus simply because I don't post to it too often nor do I promote it as much as this blog. 

With Bush's declining approval ratings, the never-ending illegal war in Iraq and gas prices at an all time high, I've noticed that the daily number of visits to the countdown increasing.  Today though, the number of visitors to the countdown have surpassed those to this blog.  Although, the day isn't over yet I'm eager to see if the numbers stay steady.  Will the "Days Bush has left" beat out "Happily stressed out, since 1974!"?  This also begs the question; will that trend remain or is it a just a fad?

I have to admit though, a lot of the traffic seems to be coming from this forum entry where the URL was submitted by a fan (honestly, it wasn't me) in one of the comments.  Even though the posting was added today, it doesn't mean that traffic hasn't been increasing before this.  Albeit (my new favorite word according to my wife), the posting has generated a good share of traffic today and may be the reason for the numbers passing those of xerratus.

I'll post the results tomorrow.

UPDATE: And the winner is.... the days Bush has left countdown!

Unique Hits
countdown: 111
xerratus: 91

Searches that resulted in a click-thru
counddown: 47
xerratus: 45

This morning I got paid.  Now that my account has money again, the first thing I did this morning before getting to work was to fuel up.  So I leave for work, a tad bit late but that's normal for me... so technically I left on time.  Riding on fumes, seriously, I pulled into the Fred Meyer gas station at 82nd ave & Johnson Creek Blvd.  My wife and I go there all the time because they have relatively priced gas but we also have the little Fred Meyer Reward cards, which knock off 3 cents per gallon.  These days, it's worth it.  

Already at the station was a large pickup truck with a trailer.  Nothing unusual and the attendant seemed to be talking with the guy and walking around the little office in middle of the station.  So I sat there... waiting... waiting... waiting, occasionally looking over my shoulder to see the attendant rummaging thru the office as if he trying to "find" something to do.  Nothing urgent behind it as if to say "I can't find the key to unlock the pumps" but rather "If I act like I don't see him, maybe he'll leave".  All the while, the large truck seems to be filling up.  

While this was all happening, another car pulls up and waits but not too long.  This driver pulled away less than a minute of waiting.  So, I followed suit and we both went across the street to the Conoco.  There, the nice attendant filled up my tank and had me on my way in less than a few minutes.  Satisfied, and now about 10 minutes late to work, I drove past the Fred Meyer station.  Still thinking that there could have been some trouble that the attendant was attending to I expected to see cars standing idly by as the attendant "finished" his imaginary search.  Low and behold, there were 3 cars (the big truck was gone) and one attendant servicing them.  What the fuck?  People, this is just a scant 4 minutes after I left with no service.  Now he's on the ball?  Come on!

The only thing I can think of is that the pickup truck that was there before me was having payment problems and the attendant was running around trying to either get the payment to go thru processing or unlock the cash drawer so that he could make change.  What ever the case, a nice "sorry, we're having some technical difficulties.  If you could bare with me for a couple minutes, I'll be right with you" would have been nice.  

<rant>
Which leads me to wonder why the hell can't I just pump it myself!  I've only been in Oregon for a few years which, like New Jersey, mandates that only gas station attendants can pump gas into your car.  Personally, I enjoy pumping my own gas.  Every time I go to Washington, I look forward to getting gas because I get to do it myself.  If things were different, I wouldn't have sat in my car waiting like an idiot for someone to help me do something that I could essentially do on my own.  
</rant>

Any who, I got my gas and made it to work only a few minutes late.  Do I have a bad taste in my mouth for Fred Meyer gas?  No.  I'll keep going back despite this little incident.  If it happens again, I'm not so sure though.

We had some friends over for dinner and drinks last night (Ty and Bernie).  My lovely wife cooked up broiled breaded chicken with whole roasted garlic, a side of polenta stuffed with cheese, tomatoes and mushrooms, caesar salad and tortellini soup; it was to die for.  She even got the approval from Ty who’s a chef.  That’s a big thing, like a restaurant getting a good review from a food critic.  No, we are not open to the general public.

Before dinner, Ty and Bernie helped me move the pool table that has been hibernating in the back of my truck since the weekend to a corner of the garage (read full story).  No, it’s not set up yet.  We still need to determine where it’ll go.  For now, we just propped it up against the wall until we clean the garage and figure out where it’s going to live.  Once we find a home for the pool table, we’ll have Ty and Bernie back over for dinner and drinks again … hint, hint (read, “I can’t move a 500lb pool table by myself”).

After dinner we all decided to play Yahtzee.  Both Nikki and I thought we had the game but it turns out that we have Word Yahtzee, circa 1978 (purchased at an estate sale a while back).  We all had fun and it was an interesting game but I think we all like regular Yahtzee better.  After a few beers and some wine, we could barely spell “IF” from the letters “YEFOSID”.  Although when you’re a bit tipsy, the good words come out; “CUM WADS”, “CUNT” and “ME IDIOT” just to name a few.  Not to brag, but I did manage to win.  Which brought back a vivid thought from the depths of my alcohol soaked mind: I’ve never lost at Monopoly!

Yup, I’m undefeated in that popular game of real-estate.  Albeit, I’ve only played about 4 or 5 times in my entire life and the first time I played was only about 3 years ago but that doesn’t change the fact that I have yet to lose.  So perhaps the next dinner, drinks and game outing we all have, Monopoly will have to be played instead of Yahtzee.  Who knows, maybe I’ll be toppled as the Monopoly Grand Champion… or maybe I’ll win again.

To make a short story long, Ty and Bernie are good friends that we need to see more of.  Maybe I’ll just keep moving the pool table to get them to come over more often.  Hell, I just need to answer my phone and return messages in all honesty.  They try to get together with us but my lazy-no-message-returning-ass keeps it from happening more often than not.  In the immortal words of almost everybody on News Years Eve; “I’m going to make more of an effort to get together with friends”.  There, I said it.  Happy New Year.

Four!  Actually, that is all the people we had yesterday to move a pool table from our friends house (which just sold so we had to get it out this weekend) in Seattle.  For those of you who don't know, as I didn't until yesterday, pool tables are heavy... fucking heavy!  Here's a quick excerpt from a pool table manufacturer:

A pool table weight will vary between manufacture, style and thickness of slate. A good rule of thumb is to expect the table to weigh between 500-1000 pounds. This is about equivalent to 4-5 men standing in the same room. Better floor support will enhance the playability of the game. Floors that have minimal support will flex slightly as players move around the room. This will impact with the balance of the table over time.

So how did 4 people move a 500lb (give or take a hundred pounds) pool table?  Awkwardly!  First off, let me introduce the players; Me, my wife, our friend Shawn, and his wife Chrissy.  My wife is a bit under the weather and can't life heavy objects.  So that just leaves Shawn, his wife and I.  The heavy lifting was left to Shawn and I with Chrissy helping in the initial lift and stabilization when we had it standing up straight.

That brings me to how we actually moved it, seeing as we could not lift and carry it.  Once outside (we dragged it on its side up and out the back door) we laid it down flat and, to move it, lifted up one end and laid it down on the reverse side.  Basically, we end-over-ended it all the way to the truck.  Turns were tricky as we had to turn it while it was standing up straight then pivot on one corner.  Chrissy was able to stabilize and hold while Shawn and I lifted and pivoted one end.  All the while, my wife hurriedly moved 2 tarps along the yard as this was all going on.  Picture a large rock being rolled on logs; she was the one lifting up the last log and moving it to the first position.

This concert of awkwardness took about 2 hours and we were able to move a 500lb pool table from the back of the house to my truck.  Luckily, nobody got hurt and it didn't fall out of the truck on the way from Seattle back down to Portland.  Even luckier, it didn't rain; it was actually sunny and nice out.  Why is this lucky you ask?  Well first, it is Seattle and secondly, the forecast called for rain showers throughout the day.  Albeit, we did hit a small patch of rain near Olympia but the table was covered with a tarp and we had sun to dry it once that was over.

Long story short, I now have a pool table in the back of my truck in my garage and I now have to figure out how to get it out. 

A big thanks to Shawn and Chrissy for all their efforts and help.  Thanks to Angela for allowing us to come and take the pool table (for free I might add).  And thanks to my sweet, sweet wife who put all the pieces together and made this "move" more like a nice outing with friends. 

Why you ask?  Because I got this bug up my ass to dig up a tree in my backyard and move it to another location.  Eh, that shouldn't be too bad right?  Did I mention that it was a redwood... a 15 foot tall redwood?

Last year, my wife and I were at Portland Nursery, she looking at flowers and herbs I at trees, found a beautiful 8 foot tall redwood.  After some convincing, I suggested we get it and put it right outside our bedroom window.  Yeah it's a redwoood but it'll take YEARS for it to grow big, right?  NO!  Fucking thing grew a good 7 feet in one year... SEVEN FEET... S-E-V-E-N F-E-E-T!  So, before it got out of control my wife and I talked and thought it best to cut down an old, ugly looking tree right outside our fence and move the redwood there.

So last weekend, with only a tree saw, I chopped down the old tree in the corner.  Yeah, you read that right... all I used was a hand saw (insert dumbass quip here).  This weekend I dug up the redwood and transplanted it.  Now you have to realize that a 15 foot tall redwood is heavy to begin with but the damn root ball with encased dirt around it added to that weight two-fold.  The first day, Saturday, I dug up the tree but couldn't break a few of the last roots.  Then Sunday, I finally broke it free and found out just how heavy the fucker was.

After cleverly devising a lever system I got the thing out of the hole I dug (thought I could roll it out... HA) then, over the course of an hour, rolled, dragged and shimmied the poor guy to his new home.  My wife took pictures... I'm sure she'll post them on her blog sooner or later. 

So what have I learned today?  Moving a fucking redwood tree is a pain in the ass.  If you do it alone, be prepared to hurt the next day... and I mean hurt!

CORRECTION: My wife pointed out that we purchased the redwood 2 years ago so it grew 3 some-odd feet per year, not 7... still a lot though.

Now here's one you don't (and most likely wont) see too often; a Google 404 requested url not found while requesting the default www.google.com page.  Right after I snapped the screen shot, I refreshed and all worked fine.  So, I thought I'd share.

[click image to see the full-size]

A few weeks back, I read an interesting article concerning rumors of Apple's move to using Windows as their core operating system.  Things like moving to Intel-based chips and Microsoft’s declaration that it is not going to proceed with another version of Office for the Mac OS makes it very possible that Apple is going the way of Windows.  Not that there is anything wrong with that, Apple after all touts itself as a hardware company that makes high-end products.  Even as a PC user I know that to be true.  So why not make the switch and give Microsoft the headache of keeping the OS compatible with the thousands of new hardware products that come out on an almost daily basis?  Honestly, the only alternative I see to a Windows based Mac is to license the Mac OS for other PC manufactures to preload on PC's but I really don't see that in the horizon for Apple even with the switch to Intel.

So this morning I go to CNET News, part of my daily ritual, and the first article that caught my eye was Apple: Windows on a Mac is here.  Called Boot Camp, this program allows Windows to run natively on the newer Intel-based Macs; basically dual booting.  The user will get the option to select the Mac OS or the Windows XP OS at startup.  While it's not Windows "shipping" on a Mac, it is a step in the direction of being able to order a Mac with Windows installed.  

And why not?  Let’s face it, I'm a Windows man; I program in .NET, manage Windows Servers, own and administer multiple PC's but I have to tell you, Apple is becoming more appealing if I can run Windows on it.  My guess is that Apple can win over a lot of Windows users and take away a large share of the market from PC companies such as Dell, HP, and IBM.  

Just a few years back, before the iPod, I had my doubts about Apple and the direction the company was headed but now, if things keep progressing the way they are, those doubts are fading.  And who knows, maybe, just maybe, I'll own a Mac before the end of this decade.

While perusing the web this morning, I found this very nice, simple AJAX HTML editor.  Very simple in its design and implementation, I find that I can't stop playing with it (hey, mind out of the gutters!). 

Often, while developing sites or working on projects, I will work on some HTML trying to come up with either a layout or new style.  Either way, I usually create a quick test page, edit my code, and refresh the page in a browser while tweaking.  With this real-time editor, I can see my results as I type.  Simple but very effective. 

So go ahead, try it out... that's right, play with it for a little while but stop if it starts to chafe.

On this April Fools Day, Fark, once again, has been the only sight with the balls enough to change their front page.  Last year, they made it appear that they had been hacked, brilliant!  They actually had me going for the first few minutes.  This year, they're making it appear like you've some how logged in to Drew's 'User Abuse' tool. 

Like last year, every link will take you to the real Fark.com page.  It's just great to see a site as big as Fark poke fun at itself on April Fools Day. 

Fark is again this years April Fools Day contest winner.  Of what contest, I don't know.

UPDATE: Wow.  Check out the April Fools Day Wiki listing the days pranks on the web and radio for 2006.

As luck would have it, a friend of ours, Michael Hogan, owns a couple of race horses.  This past Sunday my wife (her story here) and I went out to Portland Meadows to watch his latest horse, Nova Ice, run.  She's a beauty and won her fourth straight race.  And, to our amazement, we were invited into the winners circle for the post-race picture.

The official picture took in the winners circle.



From left: Jonathon (The Trainer), Mark, Sandy (Ethan's wife), Ethan, Me, Nikki (my lovely wife), Doug (our neighbor and avid gambler), Marie's landlord, some gambler we met, Marie (Michael's better half), Mike (the owner), some strange man making out with the horse, and last but not least, the Jockey Juan.



Congrats Mike and Marie... and thanks for the invite, we had a great time.

When I got home from work yesterday my wife had some news that would make any grown man giddy... well any grown man who's a geek that is.  That afternoon she saw a truck laying fiber behind our house on the main street.  Fiber!  Did you hear me, fucking FIBER! 

WOO HOO! 

Soon we'll be able to drop our cable modem for a real internet connection.