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My brother just sent out a Picasa album to the family of his trip to Texas. It was a pretty large album detailing Kelsey's birthday parties and all the goings on of a couple different families around the holidays. Daniel was sitting with me as we scrolled through them and eventually got to some that we were both in. Then we stumbled upon the gem of all photos. It might just be my favorite picture of us together ever. We liked it so much, in fact, that we wished we had gotten it months ago so we could have turned it into a heartfelt xristmas card. Well, you know what they say, better late then ... ah fuck it. Merry xristmas!

I do hope that 2009 has found you well. I've certainly had a helluva start. My two week long vacation is ending tomorrow and I just don't know how I am going to cope with it. I've had a good couple of weeks though.

First, my entire family came into town. I currently have 5 nieces and 2 nephews, and was just informed that there's another on the way! It was really fun to play with all of them and give them crappy gifts that they loved. Although, I will admit that the Hannah Montana electric guitar I got for my niece Kelsey was pretty rocking, even though it's already broken. So we did the whole xristmas thing and I spent more than a few nights driving between Addison and Allen to my parents new ridiculously large house. I got wine from my brother in the gift exchange and now the wine fridge is respectably stocked. And I got the new Nikon Coolpix camera from my parents. I highly recommend this little gadget. It is so freaking advanced. I guess when you only buy one camera every decade, they're bound to improve slightly.

The other reason everyone came was for my parents surprise 35th wedding anniversary. We'd been planning it for like a year (I helped a little) and had some extended family and a lot of old family friends hiding in the banquet room at Sneaky Pete's in Lewisville. Then when my parents came in with my sister for what they thought was an oddly dressy, far drive to Lake Lewisville just for dinner, everyone yelled HAPPY ANNIVERSARY and the merriment proceeded. DJ iMernex even DJed the party which was pretty fun. There was "free" beer and wine so I think everyone managed to have a good time and I know my parents really appreciated it. And I got the buffet leftovers so Daniel and I ate chicken and roast beef for a week.

Then we did xristmas with Daniel's family over at our apartment. His mom made filet mignon wrapped in puff pastry with some sort of filling. It was really good. We were in charge of vegetables so we served leftover green beens and potato wedges from the anniversary party. Waste not. Then we did a little gift exchange. His dad gave me a really cool shirt and a fedora that I adore. I think his sister helped pick it out, but it's pretty bangin. And I gave his brother guitar picks, guitar strings, and a guitar strap. And he was perfectly gracious even though I thought he might be like, "I don't have a guitar, you dick." But then I surprised him with the guitar I had wrapped up in the other room. It wasn't easy getting all that on the budget that was set but I managed to do it. g*d, I love pawn shops now.

Then there was New Year's Eve. We had a bunch of people over. There was a lot of food, dancing, tons of booze. We really had a good time. Gotta tell you though, it's that time of the year when Febrehabruarv starts sounding really good to me. I was thinking that maybe I wanted to do that master cleanse again, but then I read my blog from last year and decided against it. All the descriptions of sleepless nights, heart palpitations, and incessant heartburn jogged some memories I'd obviously repressed. Maybe in another year. I think I'll hearken back to the febrehabs of yesteryear when it was easy and fun, good clean living.

I think that brings us up to speed. Happy 2009, bitches. See you around..

My brother Michael is in town for xristmas, so I went over to my parents' house to see him and his family. When I went into the kitchen there were three bananas hanging on a hook and one of them had a smiley face on it. And the banana that his daughter was eating had her name written on it. But they weren't written on, per se, they had just rotted in such a precise manner as to produce these images. I have never heard this before, but if you "erase" a banana, it will rot. So you just take a pencil eraser, run it over the skin, wait about 20 minutes, and wherever you erased will be black. It is beyond cool.

My mom thought it would be funny to go to the grocery store and then when nobody is looking, write "BANANAS KILL!" on all of the bananas. You'd have plenty of time to get away undetected if anybody caught you doing it. I'm not sure I have the balls required to do that, but it's pretty funny to think of all the different options. Me? I decided to draw a monkey holding bananas. You can't really see all of him because he wraps around the fruit, but we did our best to snap a decent picture.

So that's my xristmas gift to you all this year. This newfound knowledge. As you come together with your family to celebrate the everlasting life of capitalism, take a moment to put some profanity on the bananas. It's the gift that keeps on giving.

My brother sent out this picture to my whole family. He said that he and his wife weren't really dressing up as anybody in particular, they just both chose wigs they liked so they could wear them to a party. But when he sent out this picture, he said he was going as me for Halloween. Flattered and a little impressed. It's always nice to know what you're going to look like 5 years from now. I have to say tho, Krista doesn't look a thing like Daniel. I don't think I'm going to dress up this year, so I'll also be going as me. I'm not even sure that I'll be doing anything this year. I already missed the block party downtown.

But I celebrated in my own little way. I bought a pumpkin and roasted the seeds with a sprinkle of clove, ginger, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Delicious. Then I also bought two eating pumpkins (they're small and green) and I cut them up and roasted them. So delicious. While I was in Australia, we had pumpkin a few times and I grew to love it as more than a canned pie filling. So that was awesome even though I sliced a couple fingers open. Those fucking pumpkins were like rocks. I finally had to just cleaver them open.

But more important than Halloween, New Year's Eve is coming up and I want to do something fun outside of Dallas. I was really thinking like a cabin on the lake with a few friends and a keg. But I really couldn't find anywhere within driving distance that I would want to go. Does anybody have any ideas of something fun they've done in the area? Lemme know. Kthanks.

It's been a while since I've updated. My apologies. I just returned from Las Vegas celebrating my brother Stephen's 30th birthday. It was a pretty big deal. The entire trip was kept a secret from him up until I took him and his wife to the airport. And then on top of that, it was another secret that me and my other brother, Michael, were on our way to the airport separately to meet and surprise him with our presence. It was pretty fun sneaking up behind him in the casino while he played video poker. After so many months of preparation, it was such a relief for the big reveal.

So we spent two days gambling, drinking, laying out by the pool, having some very fine high dollar meals, and seeing the Beatles LOVE show. Highly recommend. Also highly recommend Planet Hollywood. It's recently been redone and it is so nice. Nicer than the Bellagio, in my humble opinion. Crazy times.

His birthday was a little bigger deal than mine. I tried to keep the invite casual (I wanted to type "cas" as in short for "casual" there but I'm not sure how to spell it). I didn't even have a place for people to RSVP because I didn't want to get excited that anyone was coming. Daniel was kind of annoyed with me as we got ready to go out to the bar because he was hurrying me along and I was saying what's the point, no one's coming. He was like you always get this way on your birthday. So we got there, and DJ iMernex had reserved us a table. And then we sat. And sat. And sat. And no one came. Daniel was frantically texting people trying to get them to come to no avail. Finally before I called it quits I texted Keiff cause he had said he would try to make it after moving all day and he was on his way over. So hurray! Saved the day. Then we blew that hot dog stand and invited Lindsey over like we should have all along. Lesson learned. Next year, no party ... he said again.

My Harley riding coworker got in a really bad motorcycle accident this weekend. He has two broken ankles, a broken femur, broken ribs, and road rash. I think I need to go get some safety gear before I ride anymore. I'm paranoid now. Not that I wasn't before, but you get the point.

So good times, not much to report from the real world. Gearing up for Australia, dreading the 14 hour flight. But definitely excited. I'll keep you posted.

My custom seats finally arrived. They are brown Louis Vuitton print. It just made my hog like 100X cooler and probably severely upped the resale (and the chances of getting it stolen). I've gotten great comments from people on the street as well as a couple of enthusiastic women holding up their matching purses to me at red lights. I just couldn't be happier, so I shined her up for you and took a picture. Suck on this.

Miles per gallon is out. Miles per dollar is in. It's really pretty irrelevant how far you can go on a tank of gas, because all anybody ever does is use that number to try and figure out how much it's going to cost them to get somewhere. Instead we should all be talking in MPD.

In my perfect world, when the metal from the nozzle at the gas pump contacts the metal surrounding your tank, it acts as a datalink to upload to your car the price of the gas. Then you hit a button on your dash and it can show you in real time what your current MPD is. Well in lieu of that, I've done the next best thing -- an Excel spreadsheet. Yay! And since I'm not super interested in my car, I'm just going to keep track of the Vespa. I'm dangerously near riding it to work every day.

My coworker rode his massive $20k Harley Davidson motorcycle over here on Tuesday and we went to a parking lot where he taught me how to ride a motorcycle. From the conversations at work we'd had, he could tell I was pretty clueless about motorcycles, manual transmissions, clutches, engines, throttles ... the list goes on. So we went to a parking lot near here. He stood in the middle and I rode circles around him. And each time he would give me a different assignment. Give it no gas, but let the clutch out slowly. Give it no gas and let the clutch out fast. Give it a little gas, a little clutch. You get the point. He was trying to help me figure out the role of each. And I think it really, really helped.

My problem was that I couldn't get going fast enough. People got impatient as I went from first gear, to neutral accidentally, back to first, hit the brakes, stalled out, went to second, and then 10 minutes later was going 30mph. But I think that's fixed. I just took the ol' girl out to get some gas and purposely picked a gas station that is a few 45mph road blocks away from here. And I did superb. A guy at the pump complimented my scooter and we talked about gas mileage. And that is what spawned this entire blog.

Now, I'll grant you that the Vespa came with a complimentary tank of gas upon purchase, so my numbers are going to be a little skewed as to the performance of the motor (although accurate in real life). But I have gone 67 miles so far. And I've spent $2.12. That gives us a grand total of 31.6 MPD and $0.03 DPM. Oh my g*d, I love being green. Calculate your own MPD and post it.

After a few trips to Lowe's and a late night of carpentry and electry, we finally finished the bar. All we really need to do is touch up the areas where the hinges of the closet doors were with a little white paint. I also need to buy a beer fridge, obviously. Then we are open for business. Praise me.

I have been working feverishly on my bar this week to make up for my weekend warrior frustrations. Tonight I took the drawers (that I fucking built) and attached them to the cabinetry with these badass $15 rails. That may not sound like a lot of money to you, but in the land of drawer slides, that is just about as good as it gets. The only thing nicer is those ones you slam but they automatically slow themselves down and shut quietly. Too bad they didn't sell them at Home Depot.

Speaking of Home Depot: Why is it that every time I'm in that fucking store I am like the only person in the store. I mean the ONLY person in the store. When I bought the plywood, I was looking for someone to tell me what kind of plywood to buy and to help me cut it in half. And I walked through every aisle of lumber. And then proceeded through every aisle in the store. When I'd made it all the way to flooring without seeing an orange apron, I went straight for the customer service desk. No one there! I'm like 97% sure they were open. That has been the consistent pattern with that store. Fuck them. I hate them. If you need something from Home Depot, just go to Lowe's, cause they'll say hi, ask you if you need help, help you find what you need, make suggestions, and load it in your car for you. Way better.

Where was I? Oh yeah... DRAWERS!

Can you believe it? These drawers are major. (If you haven't been watching Victoria Beckham's new reality show, you are truly missing out. I fucking love her. I am going to attempt to call everything in my life "major" from now on.) The drawers are 18"x21"x6". They are so deep and big that we've decided we're going to inlay some foam covered in velvet and shape it to hold the various items we had planned for the drawer space. A knife. A bottle opener. Um... maybe like a backup knife? Too much storage for sure. One could most definitely hold 3 emergency liquor bottles.

I never thought it would be shaping up this well this fast. If you look closely there are many, many construction mistakes to be seen. One reason I greyed out the background was to hide some rough edges. But that will all be invisible with the finishing tile work and trim. I am so excited. I will let you all know when the bar warming party is. Until then, keep cheering me on!

P.S. Today is my brother, Stephen's birthday. Happy Birthday, brother! This picture is your gift.

Whew. Thank g*d that is over! No, I'm not talking about the holidaze; I'm talking about the plague I came through this week. On Xmas night, I went with Ryan S■■■ to have a few beers, came home, went to bed nearly sober. I woke up about an hour later and the onslaught of vomit, et. al., began. It lasted well into the morning where I found myself so dehydrated and so weak I was unable to hold myself up to throw up anymore, so I just kind of rested my head on the toilet seat and then slumped to the ground.

Something similar happened to me once in college and I ended up getting carted out of the dorm on a stretcher and into an ambulance. So I figured that might be a good idea again. But my insurance company has a 24 hour nurse hotline that I'm in the habit of calling before going to the ER, because that shit's expensive. The nurse wasn't too concerned with my symptoms and taught me how to rehydrate myself without enducing more vomit. I wanted to share it with you all. If you throw up, you should wait an hour before you attempt to eat or drink anything. Then after one hour you can begin to drink one ounce of water every 20 minutes. I did that, threw up one more time, tried it again, and it finally worked.

So there I was at 8 in the morning, freezing cold, sweating, shaking, my lips are dry and my stomach is tumbling, holding onto a shot glass filled with tap water watching the clock waiting for the next time that I can start sipping my meager nourishment again. It sucked so bad.

But, 16 hours later, I had progressed to crackers, and 24 hours later, I was basically fine. Still, it was awful. But at least the next time it happens I'll know what to do.

Other than that Xmas was good. Lots of little kids. Five total nieces and nephews this year. It's a far cry from the adult-only Xmases of yesteryear where everything was accompanied by a glass of scotch. But it was fun to convince a toddler that a fat man with a sack of toys climbed down the chimney while she was taking a nap. I've never really gotten to do that.

I got a wine fridge for Xmas. My brother Michael from California got it for me. It holds 28 bottles! I'm trying to figure out the best way to stock it. I might just buy a case of my favorite wine and then fill in the rest a few bottles at a time. But shit, 28 bottles is a lot. So if you want to bring me some wine, feel free, I have plenty of real estate.

In other news, Daniel has been in California for a long time now. He met up with his old baby sitter while he was there (he grew up there). She is now married to the brother of the mom from Mr. Belvedere! I'm not sure how that fact came to light, but it's true. Beeeoooowwwwww Streaks on the china! He said they're going to try to get me an autographed picture from her. I would truly cherish it. He also said they're going to give her my webpage address so she can see my Mr. Belvedere montage. That would rule. So if you're her, then welcome! I'm a huge fan. And we just might live the good life yet!

I like to think of myself as an aspirer. There's nothing I really excel at, but there are many, many things I am aspiring to be. Just one of those, as you may know, is a MythBuster. Although I do feel the need to recall my Brita water filter vodka experiment and mention that I did that before the MythBusters did.

Anywho, let me tell you about my latest experiment. This one is based on the episode where they test the absolutely retarded idea that burying beer in the sand, dousing it with gasoline, and lighting it on fire will cool the beer down ... as fire tends to do to things. They obviously busted this myth, but then set about finding out the fastest way to cool down a six pack. Keith can tell you that the fastest way to do so is in a cooler full of ice and salt water. You can bring the temperature of the salt water down to around 25 degrees Fahrenheit, envelop the can in the sub-freezing liquid, and a few minutes later, you've got a frosty cold beer. I've used this a few times in a pinch when the only available case of Kers Lat (or Miller when I'm at Lesbie's) is off the shelf. But it requires a sink, all the ice in the ice maker, and the remainder of salt in the house. Could this be improved?

Hypothesis: If I could get a saline solution with enough salt that it wouldn't freeze solid in the freezer, I could have instant beer cooling liquid on hand at all times. Plop a beer in for 30 seconds, rinse and drink. It should be fast enough that I don't mind doing it one beer at a time.

Research: Now, I do all of my research on the internet from uncertified websites, so if you see any flaws here, please let me know. What I read tells me that the average freezer is set at 0 degrees Fahrenheit ... well below water's freezing point. At first I thought it might be too cold at any salinity. But, another website suggested that when water reaches saturation of salt, the freezing point can be lowered to around -6 degrees Fahrenheit. So, it's probable that if I pour a shit ton of salt into a bowl of water and place it in the freezer, it will still be a liquid in the morning. A super chilled beer frosting liquid.

I was surprised how much salt the water could handle. You wouldn't expect me to be surprised since in the sixth grade I took second place in the science fair with, "Which Liquid Can Hold the Most Salt?" I received glowing comments like, "Why?" No reason, bitch, I was just fucking curious. g*d! Oh well, it was much better than my brother's, "Does Fertilizer Help Plants Grow?" Turns out it does. Anyway, it took about half a can of salt, but I wanted to make absolutely sure that it was saturated and had a few crystals left over that it couldn't absorb. And now, we wait.

I'll keep you all posted on my progress.

I finally did it. I've waited for 2 full years and the other day, I just decided to do it. I'm speaking, of course, about curtains for my bedroom. I was really daunted by the task of keeping my vertical blinds up. I could take them down, but then I'd have to store them and I have nowhere to store them. And to cover them means curtain rod extenders and screwing into studs, and I know nothing about any of that. So I came up with an idea. Instead of big beautiful curtains, I got blackout fabric. It's thin, it's light, and it blocks 100% of the light. I measured each window, cut out a piece of fabric that fit it perfectly, folded the top over, put a few grommets in it and hung it on nails. I can take them down, put them up, fold them in half to get some heat in the winter -- you name it. From the outside it looks all white, just like the vertical blinds, and from the inside, all you see is the vertical blinds, just like the vertical blinds. I couldn't be happier with myself. I have had a string of successful projects. I hope it doesn't end. I can't wait to be hungover this weekend and spend allllll fucking day in bed.

Speaking of bed ... my sleeping is much better. I have been on time to work 3 of the 4 days this week. That's unheard of. I even started showering in the morning instead of at night because I have so much extra time. I was pretty ecstatic. That, sadly and predictably, has faded. I could feel myself building up a sleep debt as each day went by and this morning I finally had to pay it back. I was one hour late to work. Today, coincidentally, was also the day I got the results of my take-home sleep test. I no longer stop breathing 70-90 times an hour. Now it's 22. 22 is the magick number. The lady from the doctor's office asked me how I'd been feeling and I said, "Much better, but not great." And she said, "Oh, how funny. I was just about to say your test results look much better, but not great." At least I'm no longer severe and am now considered moderate. It's looking like the tonsil are going to come out. I'm shying away from it, but I know that I'll eventually do it. I'll keep you all posted.

I bought a pumpkin today. It was an impulse buy. All I wanted were the seeds. I tossed them with butter and salt and roasted them in the oven. They're delicious. My culinary skill grows little by little every day. I can add that to the list with roasted chicken and blueberry pancakes. Rawk.

Have you ever heard of the mosquito frequency? It's this thing that businesses are using to cut down on teenagers loitering outside. It emits a sound at around 17kHz. Apparently teenagers can hear it and it annoys the fuck out of them, but adults cannot hear it. Trey told me about it at work today so we googled it. I found an MP3 of the sound and hit play. It was maddening. Trey accused me of not really hitting play. He couldn't fuckin' hear it! It didn't take long for everyone 25 and under in my immediate area to come over and ask what the hell the sound was. Then Trey believed me it was real. Which is funny because I'm the one that didn't believe him it existed. We gathered up all the old people around us and not one of them could hear it. One guy put it as his ring tone on his cell phone. Apparently teenagers are also using it to their advantage to allow their cell phones to ring during class without the teacher hearing it. I thought it was fascinating enough to share it with you all. CLICK HERE to listen to the most annoying sound in the world. And tell me if you can hear it.

Methinks it's time for me to go to bed. Gotta stick with the sleep rules now that they're slightly effective. Night, sluts.

I'm really diggin' this ClustrMaps thing I have going on. I want to thank Joseph for emailing me about it. Looks like the Sidesho is a lot more popular on the east coast than the west. Should I mold my brand of humor to benefit my already strong demographic? You know, make jokes about the Atlantic ocean n stuff. Or maybe I should be focusing on trying to bring up the readership in states I don't already have an uncompromising strong-hold on. Perhaps I'll start with Utah. Haha, fucking Mormons. They're all insane, did you know that? It's like the perfect blend of xristianity and Scientology. They think jebus will fly them a spaceship and drop their asses off on their own planet where they'll be free to engage in secret handshakes and secret tacky underwear without being under the watchful eye of rational people. joey smith bless 'em, they're all fucking mad!

Well that was tangential. My hungover posts tend to be a bit more random than the sober ones. My brother's wife's brother was supposed to come get my old couch, oh, 6 weeks ago. I was going to donate it but as a personal favor to him, I held onto it. It's totally cluttering my apartment. He couldn't find a truck so I gave him 3 weeks to do so, after which my brother's wife had to go to the hospital for a bit and her brother went to Houston to help out. So then I felt bad and had to give him an extension on picking it up. But that was like 3 weeks ago, so I've had this shit for a WHILE. On Thursday, the Salvation Army is coming by to get it. I can't wait to get my entryway back.

Went out on the yacht again on Thursday. I left work early and met the troops. They pulled into port to pick me up and were just gonna swing by the dock, I'd make a running leap onto the boat and we'd speed out of there. No need to park or any of that nonsense. So they pulled up, I jumped on and we sped off ... right into a sandbar. Luckily the lake was deserted, because we were fucking stuck. It was pretty funny but we couldn't laugh because Alexander was getting pissed. After about 20 minutes of revving the engines in reverse and kicking up a ton of dirt in the water, we finally got out on the lake. They had blown up a little 3-seater raft and were dragging it behind the boat. I rode it for a while. It was hella fun but I'm not much of a thrill seeker so I got back on the boat and let Kelly take my place. Next time we do that, I'm gonna go ahead and suggest we all have life vests on. As much as I'd hate a life vest tan, Jordan almost died. We hit this huge wave, Daniel threw up, and Jordan went limp, airborn, and under. It was scary and funny. He said he didn't remember falling out and woke up in the lake. Luckily he was okay. Not too much else happened -- oh, except that I can officially say I've been skinny dipping in Lake Lewisville. No details!

So I haven't worked out in like a month. Don't know why, I'm just lazy and can't get back into it. I was really concerned when I went the other day (isolated incident) that I would have gained back all that weight I worked so hard to lose. But I weighed myself ... and I lost three more pounds!!!1! Do you believe that shit? This "eating right" malarky must really work. g*d, I eat so much more than I used to. I usually have at least 6 meals a day and they're all packed with nutritional goodness. That makes a grand total of 21 pounds lost from the time I started eating right. I don't think you could have looked at me a few months ago and said "hey fatty mcfatfatfat fuckfat, lose some weight." Like I don't think I looked that fat, but fuck me, I look good now. I don't even think I weighed this little when I graduated college. Rawk.

Let's see, let's see, what else can I brag about. Oh! I think I might be an amazing cook. The other day I was in the grocery store and randomly decided to cook dinner for Daniel. I think all he ever eats is fast food junk food, and he's been having problems with his stomach so I thought a home cooked meal would be good for him. I roasted a g*ddamned chicken! Do you believe that shit? I like stuffed it with onions and celery and put a dry rub on it of salt, pepper, all spice, and cinnamon. And I baked it for 2 hours, and basted it every 20 minutes. It was so insane. I'm a masterbaster. It came out like perfect. Its the best chicken I've ever had. And on top of that, the whole bird was 6 dollars, and I got two very large dinner portions and a whole heaping plate of leftovers. I'm going to roast a bird once a week from now on. If we'd stop going out for oysters and wood fired lobster maybe I'd actually get a chance to eat some of my chicken delight.

I think that should be enough for now. I'm heading to my parents' house to watch World Cup Soccer with my brother Michael. He is in from California. His daughter Kelsey is THE cutest thing on Earth (perfectly tied with Kaylyn and Ann Marie). Then I get to have dinner with Miss Allison "Google" H■■■■■■. What a great day. Oh and my sister called. She is having a boy! Two nephews coming soon! Later skillets.

This month is shaping up to be a bit sparse on the entries. My apologies. But I did want to take a moment to let you all know that I have a third niece! Kelsey Lee F■■■■ was born yesterday. Michael, let me know if I messed that up, I've had a few beers since we last spoke. This is my third sibling to have a daughter once again putting me back in the lead for the most nieces of anyone in my family. I'm really excited. I haven't seen pictures yet, but I'm sure she's just beautiful.

Tonight I went to Ryan S■■■'s holidaze party graciously hosted by Ben et. al. We drank a little, at some delicious food, and exchanged "secret" Santa gifts. I got Ryan a bottle of Grey Goose because honestly, I did some last minute shopping, and you can't go wrong there. Kayne got me a hair crimper harkening back to a conversation months ago where someone posed the question, "If I bought you a crimper, would you crimp your hair?" The answer? Yes.

My hair is now crimped and streaked with blue, orange, and red colored hair spray so I have to take another shower before I go to bed and it's ever so late and work has been ever so hellish even without staying up late, so tomorrow should be interesting. Wish me luck!

I stole this idea from Shan's webpage. The instructions clearly stated to take the first sentence from the first blog of each month. I actually took the first complete thought instead of the first sentence. I was pretty pleased with the results, it's actually a pretty telling little summary of my life over the past twelve months. Enjoy!

January: I am so sick of painting. I feel like I've been painting for weeks. That might be because I've been painting for weeks.
February: Day 1 of sobriety gone and done. How easy could this be?
March: I can count on one finger the number of times that I have updated my webpage drunk.
April: In 12 hours I will board a plane bound for Zurich, catch a connection to Copenhagen, and then catch a train to Malmo, Sweden.
May: When I first heard the big news, I was like, "Backstreet's back?... Alright." The last two nights I have gone out on the town with Mr. Sean W■■■■ and both nights have lead us on the meandering path of alcoholic revelry.
June: So I wake in the morning and I step outside and I take a deep breath and I get real high and I scream from the top of my lungs, "What's goin' on?" g*d, remember what a kickass song that was? Well, I'm not blonde anymore ... not entirely anyway.
July: I hope everyone has big plans today for getting sunburnt, eating watermelon, and watching fireworks. Me? I'm sitting in my very air conditioned apartment watching a show about redneks in Oklahoma noodling for fish.
August: My oldest brother, Michael, who lives in Sacramento is expecting a baby.
September: This has turned into the weekend from hell. They pulled what they glibly described as "the ol' bait and switch." My "3 day all expenses paid weekend in New York City" has turned into "working 18 hours a day in Queens while commuting from South Jersey all over Labor Day weekend."
October: Since the last time we met, my CPAP has turned from a g*dsent to the bane of my existence.
November: Well, hello there. Haven't seen you in a while. How are you? Keepin' busy? Good, good. Well, hey, I'm gonna go grab a beer but it was great to see you. Mmm hmm, talk to you later.
December: I think this year, I've decided that instead of (or probably in addition to) celebrating the Solstice that I am going to celebrate Festivus.

Okay, I've got a couple for all of you Google-Earthers out there ... or is it Googler-Earths? Check out [43.8789746068,-103.459672608] and [34.1341770342,-118.321979438]. They are both really cool if you turn on "terrain" and then tilt it to the max. If you don't have any idea what I'm talking about, you need to get your ass to earth.google.com, stat! (Did you know the term "stat" is an abbreviation for the Latin word statim, meaning "immediately?" I didn't. I just googled it.)

I encourage all of you to find something cool, obscure, recognizable and post it on a comment here.

Lately I have been really into trying these local dives around town. It started with the Rainbow Cafe -- I know, I know, big shocker that I went there. But it's actually just a great little soda fountain eatery in beautiful downtown Carrollton. I don't think they've remodeled (or cleaned) since 19dickity4. They have a big rainbow awning over their soda fountains and make shakes and stuff. They also have the most kickass hamburgers and they come with a figurative BUCKET of tater tots. There are so many of them that I have to put some in my zipper pocket to eat later.

Then after Brett S■■■ and I woke up on Sunday (at 9:00am, for some ung*dly reason) we tried to go to IHOP but the line was too long. So we drove a bit further and came upon Pete's Cafe -- "Come on in, for Pete's sake." Too clever and they served breakfast all day long. Our waitress's name was Doris, she was a delightful 60-something woman who called me "honey." Her birthday was last week. It just could not have been more quaint, and the food kicks ass too. Brett wasn't feeling 100% so when asked what he'd like to drink, he said, "A big ol' whoppin' glass of water." Why he said that, we both may never know. Drugs is cool. But Doris brought me my coffee and water, and the brought Brett the biggest glass they had. Too funny. Doris is a sweetheart and I can't wait to see her again.

Then today when I left work to go get something done at the public library (on account that the noise levels in my office are raising my blood pressure rapidly), I happened by this place only called "Donuts" that I've driven past 100 times. I decided to stop in. The requisite little Asian woman behind the counter greeted me. I had 3 different kinds of kolaches, all of which were fantastic. She even warmed them up for me in the microwave and snuck 4 different kinds of donut holes onto my plate when I wasn't looking. I sat at this oooold-skool bar while I ate. A donut shop with a bar? So rad.

Look, buddy, all I'm tryin' to say is that there's more to life than Smith and Wollensky's, Pappas Bros, and Three Forks. All of which sound just delicious right now. Maybe I'll go there tonight. I'm getting my hair did tonight, though, so it might have to wait until tomorrow. I expect that when I return from Cincinnati, myself and the Addison Circle will be hitting up these delightful restaurants?

Now get GOOGLING EARTH!

I think I might need to start a Sleep Files of sorts. This will be last installment in that epic saga for a while. I went to the clinic today. They asked a lot of intelligent questions. They said I definitely need to come back and spend a night in their sleep lab. If anybody wants to go with me, we can totally spoon ... though I'm not sure if that's allowed.

The doctor was also kind enough to point out the two physical features I am probably the most self conscious about (although that term is just relative since I'm not really self conscious). He asked me if I'd ever broken my nose and then seemed to think I was lying to him when I said no. He said I have a deviated septum that could be contributing to my problem. He also commented on my overbite and said that my lower mandible being farther back could be pressing my tongue against the back of my throat as I sleep. Both of these could be corrected with very painful surgery, but I know a thing our two about blindingly painful surgeries, so I'd be willing to go along with it if they thought I needed it. That's kind of a last resort and they're not even sure it would come to that until I complete the sleep test. Still, if I did do that, I'd totally have a cosmetic surgeon come along for the ride to make the pain and suffering and rehabilitation worth it.

That sleep test won't be happening until I return from Cincinnati, though, so we can close this chapter for a while. I was quite tired at my appointment today due to breaking the sleep rules last night to go downtown for a couple glasses of wine with JD. Definitely need to make a habit of that.

Today at work, my body builder coworker delivered my 10 POUND BAG of whey protein that I told him I wanted. I am now supplementing my diet. But seriously, 10 pounds is sooo much more than I thought it was. Picture like a bag of dog food, only completely filled with powder. I laughed so hard when I saw it. It's going to last me well past its 2007 expiration date. So I came home from the workout, drank my shake, and then cleaned Tuna's tank. It was way past due. He seems rather pleased that I finally got around to it. I set him next to the laptop while I was in the bathtub scrubbin his rocks. When I came back out he was surfing around Friendster. Did he add you?

Finally, at lunch today somebody made a mention of an alias. All three of us in rapid succession offered up our aliases, mine being Donovan Blankenship. Then that made me think of Joey and Phoebe being Ken Adams and Regina Philange. And naturally that led me to think about how Allison adopted Fionula Flannigan as hers. Having a cool alias is a MUST. So I ask you, dear viewers, to post your pseudonym here on a comment. And with that, I bid you adieu.

My oldest brother, Michael, who lives in Sacramento is expecting a baby. I think I might have told a lot of you that this one was going to be a boy. This information was based on a sonogram in early July that said there was a 95% chance that it would be a boy. Well, turns out that our little Seabiscuit underdog is actually my third niece. How fun is that? I didn't really have my heart set on it being a boy or a girl, so it just cracks me up that the initial guess was wrong.

Speaking of crack, former Dallas Cowboys goalie and outfielder, Michael Irvin, was working out at my gym today. We happen to be there simultaneously on occasion. He works out while two guys stand beside him screaming encouragement. It's pretty ridiculous. They yell things like, "THROW IT UP! THROW IT UP!" and it makes me want to throw it up.

He asked me for my autograph, but I didn't have a pen.

I got my much desired referral to the sleep clinic, but now I have to go to a consultation with the sleep clinic doctors. That is tomorrow morning. I had to fill out a 13 page questionnaire regarding my sleep habits and symptoms. 2 of those pages were supposed to be filled out by someone who has regularly observed you sleeping. It's been a long, long time since I've had someone who regularly observed me sleeping, so I had to call 27. I actually learned a lot about my little problem when I asked him to 'check all that apply' given a list of symptoms. He said that I have severe problems with:
light snoring, loud snoring, choking, pause in breathing, gasping for air, twitching or kicking of legs, sitting up in bed not awake, getting out of bed not awake, becoming very rigid and/or shaking

That's kind of scary. I really didn't realize it was all that bad. People die from this shit. Wouldn't it be totally funny if I suffocated from sleep apnea the day before I went to the sleep clinic. That would make a great blog. If that happens, somebody take up the reins.

How come we spell it c-o-n-v-e-r-s-a-t-i-o-n but abbreviate it 'convo'? Shouldn't it be 'conver'?

One last note. Owen mentioned this to me first a while ago but it was down, now it's back up. Everyone, and I mean everyone, go to http://earth.google.com and download Google Earth IMMEDIATELY. It is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me. Especially download it on your work computer because it is amusing for hours and hours and hours.

I was just talking to Allistralian and I remembered a story I totally forgot to tell you all. I was sitting in a hotel room in Oshkosh, WI watching TV with my mom, my brother-in-law Bryan, and sister-in-law Krouton. There was nothing particularly good on (except the old school Saturday Night Live hosted by Pee Wee Hermann with musical guest some-crappy-zydeco-band) so we were flipping. As my mom breezed by TLC, I saw the logo for Sheer Dallas and made her stop.

As I explained the premise of the show, they announced that the stylists were going to pair up for a big hair contest. It was a radio announcement I knew all too well, since I was in Pompeo, the salon, when it happened. I mentioned that this was where I got my hair done, although I refused to tell my mother just how much my haircut had actually cost. About halfway through the show, I said, "Hey, there's Xristopher, my stylist!" And a few seconds later ... you guessed it! ... BAM, a full head shot of yours truly. I was on TLC for 3 glorious seconds, sitting in a chair with a head full of foil. It was one of the proudest moments of my life. If anybody else happened to witness the blessed event, do be sure to let me know.

Next order of business, I went and saw Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith tonight. I was gonna put it on my movie reviews, but I thought it was deserving of blog status. This movie was so badass. If you're a Star Wars fan at all, you're going to love it. If not, you'll still probably love it. There were so many badass elements to it, but my favorite was at the end. Before you whine and bitch, we all know what happens at the end, so I'm not ruining the movie. That'd be like me telling you the Titanic sinks. But when Darth Vader walks into the ship with the Emperor, they made it look exactly like Episode IV. They didn't revamp it at all. All the computers had ridiculously large, square LEDs that serve no purpose and all the dudes in there were wearing the old skool military uniforms. Love it. Go see it and let me know what you think.

To tie it all together, I think on my next haircut, scheduled for sometime in late June, I might go towards the dark side.

BUM BUM BUM BUMBA DUM BUMBA DUM

This past weekend, I was in beautiful Oshkosh, Wisconsin for the F■■■■ Family Reunion. We had matching T-shirts and everything. I was there from Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon. Rather than say anything negative about my own flesh and blood, I'd like to recount some of the highlights of my weekend.

By far the best part of it was my immediate family all getting together. It was the first time that all 11 of us had been together (the 11 being comprised of the 6 in my original family, 3 spouses, and two nieces). The big news of the weekend? Pretty soon it'll be 12. My brother Michael told us all that his wife, Krouton, is pregnant. This'll be their first baby and my third niecephew. So exciting.

My two existing nieces could not be any cuter. Ann Marie finally let me hold her for any period of time without screaming bloody murder. We got to hang out quite a bit. Kaylyn is absolutely hilarious. She's to the age where she's almost walking and almost talking. She really likes kitties and puppies. I think for her birthday in July, I'll get her 3 of each. And a drumset.

The reunion was alright. I didn't remember everybody's names, which was a tad embarassing. But I got to see my grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins and the newest generation of great-grand children. There were some interesting characters that have managed to marry their way into my lineage. The best part was ... all blonde hair, all blue eyes. It's like the Children of the Corn.

And I'm still single, so if you wanna get in on this, I'm your last chance. HA!

Holy fuck am I ever hungover. Last night was so awesome. So I video taped this wedding, right. My former daycare boss, Mary Ann, had asked me if I would. Her nephew Randy was getting married and they didn't want to spend the money on a real videographer, so they got the next best thing -- me! It actually ended up being really fun. I know both of Mary Ann's daughters pretty well so I kind of hung around them. But I was surprised how many people I knew, seeing as how it wasn't my family or anything. But Randy was marrying Heather, who is Dawn's sister and Dawn used to teach at the daycare.

There were three kids there that went to the daycare I worked at. I used to teach them swimming lessons, show them how to color outside the lines and play John Denver songs for them on the guitar. I hadn't seen any of them since they were 5 years old and they're all 10 or 11 now kickin ass in the 5th grade. Although in reality, only the brother of the groom, Chance, is even remotely cool. It took him a while to remember who I was, but he figured it out. He was dreadfully bored at the reception since he had decided not to drink so I was trying to help him out with things to do. First, I made him drink 10 glasses of water as fast as he could and build a pyramid with the empty glasses. Once he had accomplished that, I told him to get the disposable camera off of every table and waste the remaining pictures on people he didn't know. And finally, when I had to leave, I put him in charge of the video camera. Gosh, Mr. David is the coolest.

I ended up leaving the reception and meeting PlanoJay, the bartender, at BJ's Brewhouse. Had a red beer. Yum. Went across the street to meet up with his co-worker, Chad. Yum. I ordered like 3 pitchers on my tab, but I never paid. Go figure. Keith met me out there and I drunkenly introduced him to some hoes I'd been entertaining for a while. The drive home was interesting. It was literally two blocks, so no harm was done, but had it been any farther, it could have been trouble. The really interesting part was when I got back to my apartment, the streets were all but blocked with fire trucks. Hmmm. So I maneuvered around them and parked in the garage across the street from my building. Now, bear with me because this memory is hazy, but walking into my building I remember walking through smoke. And combined with the multiple fire engines this would have alarmed some people, but not me. I blissfully waited for the elevator amongst the clouds of smoke, went upstairs and went to sleep. I really hope the building didn't burn down, but I'm still alive so things are boding well.

I woke up this morning to find my away message saying, "This night was awesome... g'night" which are my sentiments exactly. Well, wait, I wrote them, so yeah. Today I'm going to Kaylyn's baptism. Pray for me that I don't look completely hungover. Peace!

Do you ever just have too much to say? So much so that you don't feel like writing it down. That's what happened to me this past weekend. I decided to just sit on my stories for a while, so details that once seemed monumental are now rather trivial. It will make my blog shorter, and the stories more compact.

First things first. My brothers Stephen and Michael, from Houston and Sacramento, respectively, both visited. Their wives came as well. Stephen brought Kaylyn around so Michael could meet her, to avoid having to introduce himself to her on her 13th birthday. I just loved this picture. I assure you, she was well nutured and attended to all weekend, but this picture is so something my fam would do. 'Ahh, just prop her up, she'll be alright.' It was cute though. It was really good to see everyone that came to dinner on Friday night. I supplied the dessert -- peach cobbler from Marshall's BBQ. Oh man, is it ever good. I made everyone try it, even if they didn't want to. I also passed around my shock lighter. That was some good entertainment there. By the end of the night, we had 11 people around the table holding hands, while Stephen and I grabbed the lighter simultaneously. Everyone around the circle felt the shock. It was hilarious.

That night I went out to the bars, but wasn't really having much fun. Ryan S■■■ and I decided to just go back to his place and go to sleep. When we got there, however, I coerced him into having one drink before bed. Which turned into two ... then three ... then we lost count. Much squeezy vodka was ingested despite Ryan's attempt to fall asleep. We watched Romy and Michele's High School Reunion, our favorite movie. Since the last time I saw it, I learned all the state capitals. So when they're at the reunion and Toby Dumbfuck asks them to name all the capitals and the Frinkazoid starts off with 'Albuquerque' I KNEW that was NOT the capital of New Mexico, because everyone knows that's Santa Fe. So we called everyone we knew to tell them that and even convinced Jason and Levi to come have a drink with us. We were beyond wasted, but obviously so much fun.

Saturday night I went out with Lil Jarrod. We had a blast. He is one of my new favs ... too funny. It was so damn crowded because this weekend was Pride. You could barely move and getting a drink was an impossibility. Ryan S■■■ got fed up with the crowds and left unannounced, so our plan to stay at his place overnight was soon liquidated. Bob and his brother and friends were in the bars too. Too good to see him! We had fun all night long and then set about trying to decide where to go. Even though I had like three Long Islands and about six beers, I was feeling adventurous so we turned toward Plano. But I can't go home because my parents set a big wake-up-the-neighborhood alarm when they go to bed. So we eventually ended up in Lewisville at Lil Jarrod's apartment. I slept on his couch and hope I didn't scare his sister in the morning. I don't think I did though because she was quite lovely and it was nice to meet her.

From there we went back downtown to the Pride Parade. I'm sorry, but I love Pride. I don't care how many people are too cool for school. It is my favorite holy day, second only to Thanksgiving. I fought for beads as best I could, and even caught some, a feat not to be overlooked. I got some sun -- so hot, saw tons of people I knew, hung out with Lil Jarrod and Marc, got to go to Hamburger Mary's for the first time and meet some new people. All in all it was a wonderful day. I was sunburned and exhausted when I got home, and since then I have been in the most inane training class at work. It is downright painful. But, persevere I will.

This weekend I am going to College Station with Ryan H■■■■. We are going to watch some ring dunkings. I'm not positive who it was but I wanna say Daniel. So I won't have my car but I will have my phone so call me and meet up with. Alright, sluts, I'm out of here. I gotta go work out because I'm morbidly obese. Peace!

Hey, I just wanted to drop you all a quick line to let you know that I'm alive. I've only recently realized the magnitude of what's left to do before the end of this semester -- in reality, within the next 7 days. I am basically going to be out of commission for the entire time, and then as soon as that's done it'll be time for finals and then graduation.

Let me give you all a piece of etiquette when dealing with a graduating senior. Every last person you talk to and mention graduation asks you, "So WhAt'S tHe PLaN fOr AfTeR yOu GrAdUaTe? GoT a JoB?! DerRrRrRr!" If a graduating senior does not offer up that information to you, then don't try to extract it from them. There's a chance, a good chance, that they don't fucking know what they're going to do. And NO, they don't have a job, so fuck off. This is all just hypothetical, of course.

I have several plans. I could live with my brother temporarily in Houston and hope to find a job there before his daughter is born and I have to be out of the house. I could move back home and leisurely search for a job in Dallas, and if I get one either get my own apt, or I just IMed Ryan S■■■ last night about moving in with him. I could move to OKC with my sister just to kinda get away from it all and see if I can't nab a job around there. I could stay in College Station for the summer looking for work to just party one last time before really applying myself to the search. I might give my other brother who lives in California and works for Intel my resume, and see if that won't work, but that would mean moving to Cali, Colorado or AZ. My only other idea is to cut myself to see how much it bleeds.

Today I am actually going to class. The fuckheads in my class decided on a take-home final while I wasn't around. Take-home finals are so much harder than real ones and are certainly more difficult than oral exams. I have to go get that final. Then I have to go to my last day of yoga ... tear. Then its directly to the greenhouse to meet with my team. I might change my oil first since that's highway driving, and I might stop by Best Buy to see if I can get a new battery since it is REALLY annoying that my laptop shuts off if you even jiggle the power cord. Like I said, so much to do.

500 more miles on the car, 500 more P-town memories. Lets recap, shall we? The whole reason that I even decided to go home was because my brother from California was in town and I haven't seen him in a long time. But as it turned out, I didn't get to see him even once the whole time I was home because he was busy with one of his best friends marrying his wife's little sister. It all sounded a little incestual if you ask me.

So Friday night I dropped in on Simply Fondue to see my friend Blake that I haven't seen in a while. We chit chatted for a while and then I went home. Saturday I was woken up by JennyC■■■ who wanted me to go to Stonebriar mall with her. And I did just that. We shopped for new clothes for her for a while with her mom and then I decided that I needed to find a new outfit to go out in since I had made some plans so I went to Willowbend. I walked around for a long time and didn't find jack shit to wear. It was pathetic. I was getting frustrated and had an entire day to kill since my family was all at the wedding, so I stopped into Toni & Guy and asked if they had any appointments available. They had one open but it was with the top designer guy so it was more expensive. Sounded good to me. An hour and a half later, I walked out of there looking and feeling like a million bucks.

I went to Coach then because my friend Clay that I was going out with works there and I needed to discuss our plans. He got off at 9:30 and then came to pick me up. We ended up at a bar called Minc around 11:00. We had one drink there but it was really dead because there was some huge $40 cover charge party going on elsewhere that everyone was supposedly at. So we decided to go downtown to the Village. I'd never been there before, and after skipping out on the line and the cover charge by darting in the ajar "Re-entry Only" door, we made our rounds. Not 10 minutes after being there, who do I run into but my old pal Ryan S■■■. I didn't even know he was going to be there. That was too much fun. We caught up on all the pertinent gossip. The cool thing about every other fucking city on the face of the planet besides College Station, Texas is that when the bars stop serving alcohol they don't turn on all the lights and kick you out.

I started noticing though that Clay, who had driven to the club, was almost doubling my alcohol intake, so I decided to switch to water in anticipation of having to drive home. Its a good thing I did too. We ended up staying until about 3:30 in the morning dancing to the best remixes of today's hottest hits. I was completely drenched when we left. It was so much fun. Clay had to crash at my house for the night, but since we had 4 empty bedrooms that wasn't a problem.

Today I woke up and went swimming for a while, got my first taste of the sun this summer. I got packed and ready to go and then met Chevy at Starbucks to share some smokes and stories, just like in the days of yore. Now I'm back home in College Station and I'm really rarin' to go for this next week of work. Hope you all had as much fun as I did this weekend and I will see you on the ol' flip side.

I'm headed back to Plano right now. My brother, Michael, is in town from California, and since I never get to see him I thought I would mosey on over. His wife's little sister is marrying one of his best friends. I don't care for weddings, especially of people who aren't immediate family, so I've forgone the invitation, but I am sure I'll see everyone involved over at mi casa.

A couple of shoutouts before I go. This blogging thing must be contagious. I see friends' blog popping up everywhere ... and not like Keiff's adventures in blogging that lasted two days, I mean real ones. So, if you ever get bored of mine, you should check out [Owen] and [Ryan S■■■].

That's all for now, folks. Have a wonderful weekend and I shall return on Sunday.

So much to say, so much to say. Let me start with our first football game. As many of you know, there are very few things that I love so much as Aggie football, so naturally I was pretty excited about the game. My sports pass wasn't renewed like I thought, so I had to wait in this long line in order to get it renewed. The point of telling you that, is that I couldn't pull with my friends so I just had a single ticket. So did Lindsay, so we decided to sneak in somewhere and sit together. I called Todd's cell phone and made him come down from his seats with two tickets so that we could sneak into his section, and then we ended up standing on his row since there was room. We had to move a couple times and Lindsay stood in the aisle for a while (I'm such a gentleman) but in the end we had plenty of room.

The girls behind me were pissing me off though. They were 3 ugly wenches and they kept talkin shit about every single play. They'd be like "Oh boy here comes our offense, this outta be good ... of course our defense is nothing great either" or "Oh great catch, I can't believe how bad we're going to be this year" and it was just constant. I mean they didn't shut up for the whole first quarter. So finally I turned around and I said, "Hi there. Excuse me. I was just wondering if you came to watch my Aggies play or if you just came to criticize every damn play. Can we please get a little team spirit back there?" And they kind of ignored me, but they shut up for a while. It was really sappin my fun though, so I had to say something. The game was great, I rank it #3 all time behind t.u. my freshman year and Notre Dame last year. We may not have played all that great, but thats not really how I rank football games. I really like turnovers, and there were more than enough to keep me jumping up and down the whole game. I'm not sure what the final count was, but there were seriously like 8 interceptions. And we won 31-7, which always makes for a good game. Anyway, I thought it was great. And thats the name of that tune.

When we got home, my neighbors Vinny and Cheyney (sp?) had gotten a couple of kegs, so the whole neighborhood came out again. Ryan and Todd showed up too and ended up spending the night here because we all got a little bit toasty. There were some people in the next building that were having a party too and theirs was much bigger than ours. They had to have had a good 60 people just in back by the keg. And every guy there was massive. I went inside their party for a while and I was absolutely dwarfed by everyone there. It was kinda weird. I don't know if they were football players or what. I met my other next door neighbor last night too and she was pretty cool. Her name is Brianne. She made us some fucking good mashed potatoes from scratch at like 4 in the morning. We know so many people in our neighborhood now, I'm gonna need to start jotting down names on a map to remember everyone. Its so great ... so incredibly different from the Enclave last year where we didn't see, let alone meet, a single neighbor in an entire year. Except for Candy, who we met once and then totally fabricated a personality for her until she was this fictional Kramer-esque 2-dimensional comedy schtick character. Whoo-ahhh!

So anyway, the parties were a little off the heezy so like 6 cops showed up and started IDing everybody. They never IDed me though, oh well. Apparently its illegal to drink in public after 1am, and the area between our duplexes is considered public. I was not aware of that. I didn't get any tickets but both of the people hosting the parties got slammed. Like $500 or something big like that. I'm not sure of the exact figure, I haven't ventured out of the house yet today to see the damage. Anyway, I'm gonna get back to the Food Network now. I just finished up a Good Eats with Alton Brown marathon (thanks for letting me know it was on Allison). I'll catch you skids on the flip slide.

Well, I was planning on waiting to make another post until I got my internet up and running, but it turned out that I just couldn't wait that long. I am using Keith's computer right now. His works just fine, yet mine two rooms over will not even find a connection. Its very frustrating. I've been on hold with Cox Cable for about 30 minutes now. I just moved in yesterday with my roommates for the next year Keith (who we all remember from last year) and Matt. We got ourselves a nice little duplex. If you wanna know where it is, send me and IM and I'll probably tell you. I just don't want to broadcast that information. Anyway, moving in has gone semi-well. I made myself a curtain today out of heavy canvas material because the sunlight was coming directly into my window this morning and I couldn't sleep past 8am, which is insanely early for me, as you know.

But enough about me. Lets talk about my weekend. I left around 9:30am on Friday with Allison to head back to Plano because my brother, Michael, got married. Friday night was the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. The rehearsal was nothing. It took like 10 minutes to tell us all where to stand (I was a groomsman) and then it was off to the Radison hotel in Richardson for the dinner. It was a pretty good dinner, some chicken with this sauce on it and rice and a torte for dessert. There was also an open bar. That was pretty cool. I didn't much care for the country and western DJ until he put on some Eminem. It really flooded the dance floor, and I think it was the only rap song he had, so he just played it over again to keep everyone out there. As a gift for all of his groomsmen and ushers, my brother got us headlights. They're these 3 really bright LEDs that are attached to a headband and they can either produce a steady stream of intense light or you can make them blink or dim it or anything. They're really cool. So everyone out on the dance floor had these blinking lights attached to their foreheads. It was pretty cool. I was driving so I had to stay semi-in-control. I did a good job though. Even though after the dinner party me and Allison joined some of Michael's friends across the street at the Fox and the Hound for another drink.

The next day I just chilled around with the fam. Almost everyone went off the take a nap, but I wasn't tired cause I stayed in bed until well into the afternoon. So as everyone retired, I called my friend Jay in Plano and went over to his house. I haven't seen him in like a year. We ended up going to Bennigan's for a beer and he bought me a shot. Let me tell you, it was exactly what I wanted right before the wedding, but it didn't end up being an issue. The ceremony was at 7:30 at night. It was a nice wedding. Krista, my new sister in law, looked great. And, more importantly, so did I. Everything there went off without a hitch. They flew back to Sacremento, CA yesterday and left for Maui today. They're going to be there for 8 days. Fun stuff. The party after the wedding was another fun one with another bad DJ. It was the same DJ that did my brother, Stephen's wedding. He said his name was DJ Brian. I told him he was really clever. He played all the greatest hits of 20-30 years ago. Kind of sucked, but there was free beer, so we managed to have a good time. It was good to see all the family and old family friends and stuff. Even though I really only got to talk to each person for about 5 minutes. The next day I was moving into my new place so I got up, had brunch with Allison's family and then we hit the road for College Station. I ended up giving Kari (Krista's little sister) a ride back too, so it was the fullest car I've ever driven to school.

Now here I am in my new duplex, just chillin waiting for somebody, anybody, from Cox to pick up and tell me how to get my computer connected to the internet so I can get my AIM running 24/7 and my webcam too. Hopefully that'll happen in the next couple of days. If not, I'll be contacting you all from Keith's computer at a later date. Excelsior!

The time is upon us, dear Sidesho-Viewers. In about 12 hours I will be on a plane to Las Vegas, Nevada for 3 days of glorious sinful fun. I'm starting to get really excited as I pack my bags and make last minute errands and purchases for things I might want. Hey, I know. I'll tell you what. If I win more than, say, $5,000 at the craps table (which is fairly likely) I will give anyone that leaves a comment a crisp, new $100 dollar bill. Yes my friends, the Sidesho-Bribery is back!

I will return to College Station on Tuesday. I'm going to chill and relax until Friday to go home for my brother's wedding. I would leave sooner but Allison is my date to the wedding and she only got off work for the weekend. Then (as I think I've stated several times) I will rush back to College Station to move into my new duplex. Then, of course, its time for the house-warming par-tay ... ooowwww! I'll let you all know when that's gonna be, cause I KNOW you all wanna be there. Anywho, I'm gonna go eat, take a nap (our sleep schedule's gonna be all screwy with the 6am flight and losing 2 hours) and then pack my bags and be on my way. Wish me luck...

Viva Las Vegas!

Sorry for the hiatus, kiddies. I just wanted to leave a quick note to let you all know that I am in San Antonio right now. I up and decided pretty spur of the moment to come see Kevin. So that's where I am and that's what I'm doing. I'll be back tomorrow and then I have a final on Tuesday and then I'm done with summer school. Score. After that, all that's on the calendar is the Vegas trip, Michael's wedding (my bro) and moving into my new place. Czech you skillets later.

I am finally back in College Station. I woke up this morning around 4:30am (California time) to leave for the airport in San Francisco. I think we got into Dallas around 4:00 CST. Then I hopped in the car and set out for Aggieland. Being stuck in traffic for over an hour extended my car trip to 4 and a half hours. I am so sick of travelling. And I have a migraine now, but anyway...

My week was fun. I went to San Francisco with my parents. We spent 2 days there doing the whole tourist thing. We went to Fisherman's Wharf, Alcatraz, Coit Tower, rode the trolley car, drove over the Golden Gate, etc, etc. Then we went to Sacramento to visit my brother. There we went to one of his softball and one of his soccer games. We also went wine tasting, but I was the DD.

All in all the week was a little more hectic than I prefer. But it was really fun. If you need more detail than this, you can always IM me. Now let's play a little game. Everyone who cares to share, Post a Comment on this blog and give us a little soundbite about how your Spring Break went.

Sooo close to Spring Break. I can't wait. I don't know if I ever blogged about my plans, so I will now. I'm going home on Saturday to good ol' Plano. Then I'm gonna hang out there for a few days and see some people. Then on Tuesday it's off to California to see my brother, Michael. He just recently got engaged, as you well know, and I've never been to Cali, much less seen his place so it should be fun. Plus its completely free. Thats the best part of it.

I finally posted some new pictures in on the Pics section. Its been a while since I promised I would. All of them are from over Christmas when my brother, Stephen got married. I think they're all pretty good. I'll probably add captions some day, but not today. Other than that, not much has happened. Keep up the good work, kiddos.

Have you guys seen this shit? Its called a BonziBuddy, and its the most obnoxious thing on the internet. But for some reason, that I honestly can't discern, I love it. You download this little purple monkey, and he sits on top of everything you do, and randomly starts talking in this computer generated voice telling you jokes and interesting facts. I think the only reason that I can put up with him is that I programmed in my name was "Master" so every time he talks to me, I have to smile. Cause I do love having my computer call me Master. And my computer already says, outloud, the name of whoever signs onto my buddy list, so it might as well be forming sentences. Anyway, I just had to share my BonziBuddy with everyone, cause he's too cool.

On a different subject, my brother Michael got engaged last weekend to his girlfriend, Krista. I just wanted to congratulate them on that. They think the wedding will be in about 6 months. That's all. Power to the people.