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.

Today I awoke at exactly 4am at which time I arose fully refreshed and took a shower. I spent time making my hair look nice, pressed my shirt for work, and looked put together. I had a nice breakfast of Kellogg's cornflakes with strawberries before brushing my teeth and leaving for work. There was no traffic since I arrived at work at 6:30. I brewed a pot of coffee for the office and got my Monday paperwork out of the way before arriving 10 minutes early to the 7:30 meeting. After the meeting I got out to a job site around 9 and finished out my 10 hour day, making extra time by skipping lunch. After bringing an entire school online, I went and worked out for an hour and a half. I've lost 4 pounds since the last time I weighed myself on Thursday. I tanned. I came home and cooked some chicken red beans and rice that was so good it'd make you slap your mama. I ate a reasonable portion despite being starved. I have leftovers for tomorrow. I did all of my laundry and folded it. I cleaned the entire kitchen and disinfected. I cleaned the toilet and scrubbed the bathroom floor. I smoked no cigarettes and drank zero beers. And I did all this with time left to make it to bed early tonight.

Who am I and what have you done with the real Sidesho?

I can't believe how much there is to say, seeing as how I haven't blogged all week. You would have thought that with my birthday and everything I would have been chomping at the bit to tell you all about it, but in classic Sidesho-style I blindsided you all once again with my cunning and prowess. And by "cunning" I mean laziness, and by "prowess" I mean "general malaise."

My birthday was fucking awesome. I mean, I had to work and all, but that wasn't too bad. My coworkers all wished me a happy birthday. After work I went to dinner with my parents at a place called Smith and Wollensky. It was fucking awesome. To sum it all up, they used a crumb duster at the table. I ate and drank until I could barely move. I would venture to say it was the best meal I've ever had. I went to bed just a little early that night.

The next day my coworkers, remiss for having been denied the pleasure of a birthday happy hour, dragged me out to Duke's in Addison. Even though I had vowed publicly long ago to never go there again. I figured happy hour didn't count. Plus they were having their weekly dodgeball tournament and I wanted to see it. The co-s kept me with a beer in my hand the whole time. At one point, someone went to get me a drink while someone went to close out a tab while someone was leaving, and they all decided to get me a beer at once. So I had three full beers in front of me. It was AWESOME. I didn't end up staying to watch dodgeball so I can't tell you if it was cool or not, but I may check it out at some other point. I came home that night to my grandmother, 10 year old girl-cousin, and her 10 year old friend. I barely had time to say hi before I went to bed even earlier than the night before.

Speaking of, the girl-cousin is in my shower right now singing her fucking head off and it's about to use up my last nerve. It was nice to get to see her and get to know her a little bit, but there is a reason I don't hang out with 10 year old girls on a regular basis. Many, many reasons. And my mom has been fighting with my grandma pretty much since she got here ... which I find to be hilarious, because it reminds me a lot of when she and I fight. But it's not very fun for either of them, so that sucks. My dad remains stoic with the glass of Jack on the rocks.

Last night was Katie and Jeff's wedding. Congratufuckinglations you two. They are too cute together, so I braved the cathlick church to watch the blessed event. I went with Ryan S■■■ and we were the ONLY two wearing any color. My outfit was kickass. I got some new chinos from Banana and paired it with this kickass purple shirt and blue/red paisley looking tie. It was a killer combo I'll just say that much. As soon as I get some pictures back from Allison I'll add them to the imaginary picture page I keep promising. Ryan was wearing a pink shirt and a pink tie and we looked stellar. Of course, we were the only ones there who didn't look like we were going to a hoe down. It was so typical. My hair was in a wedding-hawk, a hairstyle I invented just for the wedding.

The reception was ridiculously fun. Much Coronas con lime ingested. Many high school friends and many, many Aggies. A little dancing, a little mingling. Ryan caught the garder ... too funny. After the reception ended almost everyone went to TABC, a bar in Uptown. Chilled, drank a little more. Ryan and I headed to Round-Up to meet up with everyone around closing time. A couple more drinks, to TMC to dance, and then Whataburger! Taquitos at 4am, nothing beats it.

Now here I am upstairs in my room with the door closed trying to avoid everyone for the remainder of the night. I cooked a turkey for dinner ... not exactly of Thanksgiving proportions, but another winner. So I feel I've deserved some quiet time. Sorry for the hiatus, you know I was thinking of you all every moment I was AFK. I'll try to keep you more informed in the future. Crack is whack.

God, another lazy day. I feel so worthless. I'm almost craving some homework or another class to attend. That's how bored I am. Today I went to class and then immediately into the ENTC lab to work on my summer long project. I even wore a sweater and jeans today because its always freeeezing in there. It was a good thing I did, too, even though I was miserable thru PoliSci.

I stayed there for like an hour. I tweaked a couple of things that had always bothered me in our project. I just really don't know how to start and its frustrating because I can't see how the thing works currently because everytime I try to compile it as a whole, the computer crashes. I've now successfully crashed like 5 computers in that lab. Even the lucky computer from last semester. If they won't start working, or I can't find a working one, then I'm shit out of luck. And if I'm shit out of luck its really going to suck.

On an up note though, I ran into my SCOM prof on the way to class. I told him I still wanted my peer evals back and he said something to the effect of, "Why won't you people leave me the hell alone, I already gave you an A, what more do you want?" So I did make an A in speech despite the little fiasco of turning in the final project. Whoo hoo.

What's on the slate for tonight. Well, it is a Thursday. I was thinking of grabbing some dinner and maybe going out for a change. Since all I did today was sleep on the futon. If you or yours feel like attending, let me know before too long. Later kids.