Tomorrow we are heading to Spain. This is our big family vacation we do each year, so all 19 of us will converge in Barcelona for 5 nights. Daniel and I are going one night early so we can beat jetlag and be prepared to help everyone else on arrival day. Stephen went early with his family to London and Paris and will end in Barcelona. My parents will be in and out, and everyone else disperses at the end of the trip. Daniel and I head south to Seville, Grenada, Andalusia area, then up to Madrid then home.

I'm pretty excited. I've been trying to kick this stupid cough for like 4 weeks now. Originally I had a sore throat, cough, stuffy nose after traveling to California for Megan's graduation. And that went on so long that I finally went to a doctor who said I probably had the flu, but now it was like a pneumonia bacterial infection, so I did a round of antibiotics. I'm still not 100% better so I went back to the doctor and she said it was just post-infectious lingering cough. She gave me steroids to help kick it faster, so now I'm roid raging. Better than coughing on an airplane for 10 hours. I have cough drops, a cough suppressant pill, and a mask if that should become a problem, but I'm feeling better today finally.

I try not to make my blogs just a recounting of every medical malady I encounter. But that's pretty much the narrative now. While we are away I will be turning 45 years old. I am not bringing my book of secrets with me because it would be a little heavy, so I'll have to read my 1, 5, and 10 year predictions when we get home. The 10 year predictions have been pretty wildly inaccurate. I couldn't begin to predict what will be going on 10 years from now so I stopped trying. I filled the book and that will be the only volume in existence. It was a fun activity for a decade or so.

Okay, who knows, I might even take a picture when I'm in Spain and post it here. I try to take at least one picture per day when I'm traveling, that's my goal. I also said I was going to try to take a picture of as many obscure locations as possible for maximum views on Google Maps so maybe I'll remember to do that. Wish me luck and I'll czech you all on the flip side!

I wasn't going to blog today since I already posted a picture of our new faucet locks. But then I realized what today is. Today is the 22nd anniversary of when I started working at my job. It's an odd anniversary to take special note of but this one seems poignant because I was 22 years old when I started working there. Okay, technically I was like 22 years and 11 months old, but still, this marks the year when I have worked there just as long as I haven't. That's wild.

What could I go back and tell that kid after his first day? I'll never forget getting there in my recently purchased Sears suit, and sitting in a conference room all day learning the most pointless orientation facts. They let us go early, but suggested we all go sit at our desks, set up our new laptops, and fill out some HR paperwork. I had neither a laptop nor a desk to sit at, so I said, "Should I just sit in the bathroom until 5?" Then I laughed and walked out the door and went home.

When my mom got home I was doing the backstroke in the pool and she screamed, "Did you get fired on your first day?!" And I said no, I just ... left. Ha. Although, I just went back to 2004 to read my first blog after starting my job and I said that my parents were out of town and would be until Friday, which kept me from having to answer a million questions when I get home. So either my parents left on a Tuesday or my memory of that day is entirely fabricated. Oh well, I'm certain that exchange took place at some point. But alas, I never did get fired and 22 years later I'm still going strong.

I guess I wouldn't really have any solid advice for me at age 22. I pretty much did it my way and it worked out. That's half charm, half privilege. And it got me where I wanted to be, so I guess I would just give the same advice I always say I'd give if I could time travel, "It all turns out okay."

I keep telling myself I need to be more narrative on my refreshed blog. I used to document the most meaningless things but they are more fun to read years later than anything monumental that I might otherwise remember. So here we go.

Two weekends ago, we drove my parents up to Oklahoma City for our niece Ann Marie's college graduation. She got her undergrad in 3 years with a 4.0 average. That apple fell nowhere near my tree! She is immediately going back to get her masters. So impressed. We stopped at Winstar on the way home and all pooled our money into a high stakes slot machine. I think it was like $30 per pull. After a few pulls, we hit a mildly good reward, doubled our money, and cashed out. I was happy to stop there but after lunch my mom wanted to gamble just a little bit more, so Daniel and I each put a hundy into a nearby machine and promptly frittered away not only our winnings but as much in losses. C'est la view.

Then last weekend, we hung out with the Allistralian. We had a great time getting to know her daughter who is gregarious to say the least. Her husband is addicted to AI, on a level far beyond what I've described. And he only uses it with the microphone like a conversation. And he always adds a ton of extra info. "I am sitting here with my wife and she is giving me a dirty look because she thinks I use AI too much, anyway, how do I heat up a chicken breast?" So funny.

Now we're sitting here wasting time until we can head to DFW for a flight to Sacramento. Now Michael's daughter Megan is graduating high school. We did have a super early flight but then AA moved it several hours later, so we won't have a huge buffer to get there and get situated, but should still have plenty of time without rushing -- IFFF our flight takes off on time. The last time we did this a couple years ago we just sat and sat and sat in the airport until we missed Kelsey's graduation and arrived at like 10pm. So we'll see.

Oh, in other news, we THINK we saw Muffin with a baby. At least we for sure saw her touching noses and letting a baby squirrel climb all over her. If it wasn't her baby then I don't think she would be doing that. We whistled at her to come get a treat, and the baby noped the fuck out of here, and Muffin sauntered over and enjoyed lunch. I wish she was training her babies to come to us so we could get some generational squirrel insurance.

I've always tried to be a bit of an ideas man (see: Mega-Blinds) but ever since Pitchmen came on TV, I've been dying to come up with an invention that I can market on TV. Sadly, Billy Mays passed away recently, so I don't think they're going to continue the show. But I can't let that stop me. I must press forward with new ideas.

Which brings me to my latest invention. It occurred to me while laying on top of Daniel, blocking his view of the television just how comfortable it is to lay on someone's chest. Why not make a pillow that follows those contours for use all the time? I can't really speak towards a woman's chest, but I assume that most straight men would be deterred from buying a pillow in the shape of another man, even though it is undeniably comfy, so I made some women pillows too.

You can't tell me you wouldn't buy one of these. You could, but you'd be lying. What do you think? I think it's a little better idea than my clip-on pants cuffs. For those days when you realize your jeans are just a little too short to be wearing. You reach into your glove box and pull out your clip-on cuffs and extend your pants an extra inch or two. I'm working on a prototype as we speak. I'll be sure to let you see it. As long as you don't steal it and market it! I'm serious.

I can't believe I stayed up an extra hour to photoshop boobs onto pillow. Wait, maybe I can. Late.

Thank you to everyone who had something nice to say about the new layout, screw the rest of you. Also, thanks to everyone who pointed out that the abdominal muscles on that one drawing are a tad ... howyousay? ... emphasized. But it's soon to be true because I have worked out for the past four days in a row and I don't plan on stopping anytime soon. I ran into my friend Scott at the rec when I randomly went on Tuesday and decided that he was going to be my workout partner. If I have someone call me and say, "Okay I'm heading up there," then I'm way more prone to stick to it. So we'll see how that goes.

This past week I attended a 3 day tutorial on how to mill circuit boards from scratch. You may not think thats cool, but I'm frickin' excited about it. This machine we have is so badass. You draw a circuit board in software and then hit go and it goes and shaves off copper from a board until you're left with the circuit you designed. Its really cool and if you're lucky, maybe one day you'll have one of my circuit boards in your brain.

Last night I went to Shadow Canyon with Ryan. It was fun, but the story I want to tell is from when we first got there. We didn't end up going out until 11:30 because I was workin out, eating, and showering. So we decide to start with a shot to get us caught up, so naturally I order a couple of 4-Horsemen. But Ryan didn't hear me. So when I handed it to him he said, "Whats this?" to which I replied, "An oatmeal cookie." Nonplussed as ever, he threw it back to an unpleasant realization that it was indeed a 4-Horsemen. I had to laugh. Although, I'll probably get in trouble if I don't credit the true creator of this gag, Allison. She did it to me one time at Fitzwillies with a Liquid Cocaine. Same effect. Anywho, that's all I can think to report, if breaking news comes up, you'll be the first to know. Ciao.

Another well deserved, and much anticipated, weekend. This weekend we have a few guests at the ol' Green Monster. First off is Ryan's (ex?) girlfriend Jennifer who pops in from time to time. I think she's here to have a baby or something. Either that or her sister or someone is having a baby. I dunno, I try not to pay attention. Also, David is gonna drop in to see us. He supersedes invitations and just drops in from time to time. I actually think he may be hitching a ride with Todd's parents this weekend to come see us. They're driving down from Arlington.

Tonight I think we're going out with Todd's rentals to have a drink or two and then we're going to drop them off here and hopefully go to Ryan T■■■■'s party. That's the plan anyway. He hasn't called or IMed me with details for the party, so I hope its still going on. Otherwise I don't know what the hell we're gonna do. That's whats on the slate for tonight. Tomorrow Ryan mentioned something about maybe having people over. I don't know, I never know whats going on until it happens. You might have to hear about it after the fact. Until then, you have nots, be safe and don't do drugs.