traveling done

We are back home. Another New Year's Eve with nothing special happening. Wife and I have been having a silent fight since somewhere between Pontiac and Bloomington. I had been driving all day and was drowsy and veered onto the rumble strips while she was napping. She woke with a start and asked if she should drive in what I perceived as a snotty way, so I responded in a equally snotty way. We haven't spoken since and there is an extremely palpable sense of anger between us.

I don't think we have ever had a good New Year's Eve together. It always seems to bring out my anger, resentment, bitterness and depression. Maybe shoveling snow tomorrow will help make a fresh start.

mostly there

Friday night/Saturday morning and again I am alone in a wakened state in my wife's parents' house. We had dinner with my brother-n-law, his wife, sister-in-law and her husband. The main focus of the dinner was for the kids to plan their parents' 40th anniversary party for next year. After dinner we came back to her parents' house and played her brother's Wii. I have to admit that it was a lot of fun. It highlighted how crappy is my physical state, but still fun. We are supposed to be having a faux Xmas morning several hours from now. At least this year we had a gift exchange among the six of us in my wife's generation. It is definitely preferable to get gifts for two people from lists than for four people you don't really know without lists for guidance.

I have played Geek Squad for my in-laws this week, assembling a drafting table, setting up a surround sound system and installing iTunes on their computer. My wife's sister's husband (the one who lived here for over a year room and board free) is supposedly a computer person by trade, but he didn't even have their subwoofer plugged in! After they get HD boxes from their cable company I will have to rewire everything again during my next visit. Sometimes I wish that was my job: installing electronics for other people, it sounds simple and stress-free because it comes so naturally to me, but at the end of the day I know that it would just frustrate me because most people do not see the world through the same lens that I do.

For Xmas, my wife and I bought new perfume/cologne samplers. Both our current fragrances remind her too much of strip clubs for her liking so it is time for a change. Too bad, because I really like my current cologne and have no problem being reminded of strip clubs. She got her sampler at Victoria's Secret and mine is from GAP. We are referring to them as the "whore of the day" and "mimbo" samplers respectively.

one almost down, one to go

Survived the second night of visiting by my brother's family. As discussed previously, his wife can be difficult to be around, she is just so loud. A bottle of wine for my wife and I both nights helped reduce the tension. It probably makes us look like alcoholics to them since every time they see us we are drinking. I suppose that's better than thinking we cannot stand their (mostly her) parenting style and find them tough to be around.

Next up is the wife's family. We are supposed to go out with her sister and brother and their spouses Friday night. Definitely need to avoid the massive hangover I got last time since we are supposed to be doing the family Xmas thing Saturday morning.

lazy Xmas eve

Mostly today I slept. Perhaps I will have more energy tomorrow.

let there be light

Thankfully we have reached the turn around point in the yearly cycle of daylight. Starting tomorrow we will get a little more light everyday for the next 6 months.

Tomorrow morning I will step on the scale before departing for a week of holiday events with family. I really want to repeat my Thanksgiving feat of not gaining any weight during the holiday week.

Survivor ends

Todd won Survivor China. The two other finalists were Amanda and Courtney. From very early on in the series Amanda was my favorite, it took Courtney a while to grow on me. Both women got sexier and hotter as the series went on. I really like natural beauty and these ladies showed it. Not that Courtney can't also look hot when made up (as evidenced by her modeling portfolio here), but she doesn't have to wear make up to look good. I really thought both women looked much hotter after 39 days of being at their primitive camp in China than they did on the reunion show where they both had haircuts with bangs and were wearing make-up. I will miss seeing Amanda's blurred out ass every week.

elevator vs. stairs

At my office recently they have posted signs encouraging people to take the stairs instead of the elevator pointing out the calorie burn benefits. I don't really have a problem with this being done, but shouldn't they at least place these signs at the elevators instead of the stairwell doors? I suppose placing them on the stairwell doors might make the people already taking the stairs feel better about themselves, but it won't do much to encourage the elevator takers to change their ways.

what does Saturday with snow mean?

It means nature provides the refrigeration!!

slow days in blog world

I suppose everyone (including me) is either busy with holiday stuff or winding down the year in a low effort mode. Yesterday I saw the most excellent sight at work: belly tattoo girl's G-string. I love low rise pants on girls who wear thongs and G-strings. That made my whole day.

it's a small world

While out with some people from work tonight I heard that a person at work was quitting and moving to Australia. I got a tremendous sense of deja vu and knew that I had heard/seen/read that before, but not about this specific person, more generically. After returning from the evening's events a quick search of my Google Reader feeds turned up the origin of my deja vu: a post on keep passing the open windows!!

inebriated blogging

Thank goodness for spell check. So after work I came home and had dinner. Then I went out to participate in the Hotties on the Street gig of the local AM radio station to which I listen. I got to the establishment where they were, made a very quick circuit of the joint, saw them and got cold feet and left. The vibe of the place just wasn't right for me. I left there and proceeded to a bar I had never been to before and didn't know was there (in a strip mall) where some people from work were supposed be gathering. I had never gone out with this group before, but got invited late in the day by the belly tattoo girl. I am very glad I went, not only did I see her, but also got to talk with several other fun people. If there is some more advanced notice next time I would bring J with me. I would definitely like her to meet a couple of the ladies who were there tonight.

I left there and went to one of my two old stand byes: Old Chicago. I put a couple more notches on the current holiday mini-tour and played trivia. The tragic bartender was working. She always seems sad. I suggested to her that her clothes were too big for her. She is always pulling up her pants and her shirt drapes over her.

Anyway, I had a good evening and I owe it all to J. Without her continued indulgence of my desire to desire to be a party guy it wouldn't be possible.

eBay definitions

Words don't mean the same things on eBay that they do in the rest of the world. Specifically "neutral". I thought "neutral" meant "middle of the road", "neither good nor bad", "neither great nor crappy", "meeting expectations". With this thought process in mind, I gave a seller a neutral rating. He went totally mental on me. After some back and forth with lots of sarcasm on my part and hyperbolic ranting on his part I have learned the following eBay seller rating definitions:

• Neutral = tracked you down and set fire to your house
• Negative = tracked you down, molested your children then set fire to your house
• Positive = anything else

Some of the blame is mine for not better understanding the eBay "community" definitions before giving neutral feedback, but holy crap. Are the standards so low that bare minimum is considered positive?

I didn't realize that eBay rating was like gymnastics judging where you can still get 9.137 out of 10 even if you literally fall on your ass right in front of the judges table. And you get the individual all-around Olympic gold medal too.

another lazy weekend

Accomplished absolutely nothing this weekend. Just lots of extra sleep. Had a great conversation with an old friend (or should I say long time friend, since she is slightly younger than me) Friday night after returning from the bar. That was the highlight of the weekend.

beer and chycks

Spent an unhealthy amount of time at Old Chicago tonight getting a late start on their holiday beer mini-tour. Just played trivia and drank beer and leered at women. I told one girl that I liked her eyebrows. Pretty sad overall I guess. But mostly at this point I don't care.