my life, as far as i know.

how could i forget.. congratulations to thomas and michelle schlachet.

i’ll post some pictures in my photo gallery once i get some scanning done.

no gfx here for a while. here’s an old self portait i took a few years ago. i took it with my old color quickcam. the camera was slow to adjust to new light conditions. i happened to snap this one during an adjustment. the effect is pretty cool.

my laptop broke some time last week. i placed a service call just before i left for utah. that turned out to be a mistake. what happened was banktech (dell’s support outsource house) ordered the parts. they weren’t able to get ahold of me so they cancelled the support case and sent the parts back. i do remember telling dell i’d be out of town. too late to fix now. so i called back today. i was on hold for most of the hour i spent on the phone. but now i have a new case number, a new dispatch number, and a new appointment window. tomorrow, 9:45am-12:45pm. they’re replacing everything else in the laptop. last time i had work done, they replaced the lcd panel and keyboard. this time, it’s the power brick, the motherboard, power supply board, and even the power button. so we’ll see.

i’m anxious to get the laptop back so i can let gabe use that, then i can rebuild my desktop. the desktop’s explorer has been slow/sluggish which is very annoying. why can’t things just work?

i’m finally caught up in work. i worked only normal hours yesterday, which was a good idea for me to mentally get back into things. working late tonight.

just before i’d left for utah, i worked until 3am working on a tape/san issue. we never fixed anything. we ended up instituting a work-around which has been in place since. everything else is broken, but at least the system is back up. well, tonight we’re moving forward on a possible fix. crossing fingers. it sucked getting home at 3am to wake up at 6am and fly to utah for the wedding.

i always get crazy when things aren’t working well. my main machine (offramp.org) has been rebooting. it seemed to reboot more often when i was out of state. i suspect the ups is at fault. so i need to pick up a replacement battery or a replacement ups. havent decided which yet. frys sells the batteries. but i dont want any guesswork.

i’ll try and do the ups thing tomorrow, assuming i dont work crazy hours. who knows at this point. i hate making plans that could be in jeopardy. indefinite plans make me go nuts.

so we’ll see.

relaxing a bit after lunch with some music. im gonna try to sneak away from work at 4 to get my utah photos back and get back to work by 5.

need film developed.

i take my four rolls to wal-mart. i ask the guy how long it will take. he begins to tell me about other options, such as photo-cd and internet stuffs. finally he says, “wednesday afternoon”. screw that. i check out the drop-off forms. they only do 4×6. getting 5×7 prints is a two-week turn-around!! double-screw.

i take my film to wolfe camera. they’re closed, but the woman lets me in since i’m just dropping off film. i hand the guy my four rolls. tomorrow after 2. that’s cool. he asks if i’m a “member”. uh, no. the membership costs $14.99. i just want my prints, thank you. but you can get a second set for free with a membership. no. he then tells me about the cost of doubles. the membership fee is about the same. i dont want a membership. finally, i raise my voice. i just want to get prints. just give him the prints, a coworker tells him. so he prints out four receipts. i notice there’s already a price– he hasn’t asked me what size, finish, etc. i want 5×7. he asks his coworker, 4×7?? no, 5×7. then i ask for matte print. he writes “matt” on the receipts. then the coworker says they can’t do matte in 5×7. give me my film back. i snatch them out of his hand. screw this.

i try another place– closed. i give up.

so i’m on a short, short fuse today.

dinner at boston market.

chai at starbucks.

retail therapy at tower. paul simon’s graceland? only enhanced. wal-mart? no. target? only if it’s musica latina. most of the music discs at target are out of order. they seem randomly stuffed onto the shelves. i did a quick sweep of all discs in search of my paul simon album. never found it. the latin music section is chock full of discs, every artist is represented and everything’s in order. it seems unfair, biased.

my list from tower: sting: ten summoner’s tales (dts), essential billy joel (two disc collection), essential earth/wind/fire (two disc collection), robbie williams: escapology.

more later.

getting ready for the wedding. fires burning at work. and this stupid project manager getting in the way. things were building up. then i hung up with one of our vendor’s support guy.

i put on my headphones.

helpless child
they invite your hands to fill their needs
will you be the same
shameless smile
to steal from you the innocence that bleeds
will they feel your pain

she keeps holding on
holding on to you
let her breathe the air
don’t wanna be alone
where do you belong
anna lee..

and suddenly i feel better. i really like dream theatre.

ok, well another incident. my house guest broke a glass on the kitchen floor and didn’t sweep up enough. a piece of sharp glass cut into one of my toes and i got blood on the floor. i couldnt get it to stop bleeding. i put some pressure on it for a while, then wrapped a bandaid over it tight. that seemed to help. its ok now, just needs some healing time. i should have put polysporin on it this morning. its weird that i’ve had to many cuts lately. i never wear socks around the house, though. i dont like the static..

so i’ve cooked two good dishes since last posting

* szechwan beef
* cajun baked chicken

both came out well. i served them to friends, so no pictures this time.

the main thing lately was this past weekend, our maintenance weekend at work. we had a ton of work planned. and, of course, things went awry and it turned in an 18 hour work day. i was exhausted. i came in for another four hours on sunday. sunday i called mom to wish her a happy mother’s day. i haven’t seen her in too long. well, wednesday will cure that. i need to get a haircut, speaking of which.

vacations are in the works.. this week i’m off to utah to attend my brother’s wedding. i’m not sure yet what i’ll be expected to do or –yikes– say. i do know i’ll be wearing a tuxedo at some point. i hate wearing suits.. lucky for me i’ve lost some weight so it won’t be tight on me :) im planning on bringing plenty of colour film and the canon with me. and later this summer, cancun with my other family. that will likely be black and white film. and the holga, definitely. i wish i had a real medium format camera. i want a 6×6. :-/

this morning i noticed what looked like a small piece of glass on my desk. i swept it towards a paper and ended up cutting my fingertip. it took a while to stop bleeding.. and i’m not actually sure where the glass bit is now. for a while it was in my finger.. i bit my finger a bit.. using my teeth to put the right pressure in the right direction.. and i felt the glass bit on my teeth. so i think it fell out.. it didnt hurt as much then, so i’m pretty sure. finally got it to stop bleeding.

i’ve been accident prone. i sliced two fingers on a damned stovetop reflector dish and, before that, sliced my little toe on my left foot on the bed frame. poly-sporin really does help out a lot in speeding up recovery from cuts.

anyways.. lots of work crap going on in these two days. my new manager at work seems cool. laid back, not too formal, ponytail. he’s been in the biz for a long time. so i like him.

now off to the salt mines for me..

dinner was a brazillian recipe, pollo borracho.

chicken with diced ham and onions, with cumin and sage. the sauce is white wine and chicken stock. garnished with capers.

quiet evening at home. dinner was good. a little hungry now, but no smart snacks around. i was thinking about writing about where i wanted to steer my life. the next song up on the soft rock channel is “you gotta be” by des’ree. amazing.

you gotta stay together
all i know, all I know, love will save the day
herald what your mother said
readin’ the books your father read
try to solve the puzzles in your own sweet time
some may have more cash than you
others take a different view
my oh my heh, hey

funny how things like that happen.

i just sorta stopped to listen to the song. next up was james taylor. last night at the restaurant they were playing his greatest hits album. of course, i knew the songs. i sang one of the songs for boman and tim. i’m not sure if either had heard me sing before. maybe tim. actually, i might have sung from that album for tim before.

more later, i guess.

brie and prosciutto stuffed chicken breast. served with spinach salad and sparking water. man, this turned out well.. :-)

the other entry title, “how does this make you feel” is from the song by this group named air. it’s an incredible song. it’s got a melancholic rythym and is “sung” by a computer voice. the voice is expressing its extraordinary love for another.

i am feeling very warm right now
please don’t disappear
i am spacing out with you
you are the most beautiful entity that i’ve ever dreamed of

at night I will protect you in your dreams
i will be your angel
you worry so much about not having enough time together
it makes no difference to me
i would be happy with just one minute in your arms
let’s have an extended play together
you’re telling me that we live to far to love each other
But our love can stretch farther than the eye can see
so how does this make you feel?