Pictures from the Outer Banks are up.
I’ve been sleeping on the couch. Bronwen’s gone, and there’s no rule that I need to sleep in our bed. And for some reason, I haven’t been sleeping well in our bed. The couch is softer than our bed. And the downstairs is a little cooler than the upstairs. My back may be a little tweaked, but it’s worth the hard sleep of my soft-n-delicious couch.
I forgot how much fun it is to go body boarding. Slone and I went out yesterday afternoon for a little over an hour. It’s so much fun. He has an extra board and set of fins. During summer weekends, the lifegards blackball the beach by flying yellow flags with black circles. That is, no surfing is allowed. They don’t want tourists getting hit in the face by loose surf boards. Body boards are the exception. So we went out and caught some nice sized waves, trying to avoid running over innocent 909′ers.
Furg’s wedding was great. Bronwen and I got to sit at a really cool table of friends — Ooze and Carin, Nick and Kim, Bowis and Oldham, Felix and Susie. Furg and Meg looked so great and happy to be with each other. His brother made a great toast and mentioned their high school football team several times. Classic Furg. The reception was at a beautiful place called Strathmore Mansion.
When I got into DC on Saturday morning, I had breakfast at Ooze’s place with Sluggyjunx. He brought donuts and beers. We watched a weird David Lynch flick and talked about the old days. It was awesome.
Look for more pics this week. I need to get the North Carolina pics up — promise I will.
I hate the red eye. It’s a necessary evil if you live on the West coast and have family and friends on the East coast. The flight makes it possible to work all week and spend the weekend 3,000 miles away. My classic itinerary is a Jet Blue flight out of Long Beach (LGB) direct to Dulles (IAD). It leaves at 9:30 pm, and gets into Dulles at 5:15 am. Variations include Delta’s 1:00 am flight from LA (LAX) to Atlanta (ATL) and then a 7:00 am hopper up to DCA. Going to North Carolina last week, I took a 9:00 pm flight from Orange County to Salt Lake City (SLC), then got on the 11:30 pm to ATL, then took a 7:00 am to Norfolk (ORF), then rented a car and drove the last hour. You follow? Red eyes are usually crowded, but they are rarely delayed. The goal is to get where you’re going, do what you’re there to do, and get back home to catch up on lost sleep, without taking any time off from work. Just plan on spending the weekend in a sleepy daze. That is why I hate the red eye.
Furg’s getting married in DC this weekend. That means I’m on the redeye Friday night, putting me in DC around 5:30 am on Saturday morning. I’ll get a couple hours of sleep and then it’s time to let the festivities begin. Hopefully I’ll be rested enough to enjoy the party. Furg’s one of my buddies going back to junior high. I leave the next morning at 6:00 am, having been in DC for less than 25 hours. Three days later, I turn it around and head back for Nick Newcott’s wedding (my brother). Insane. But that’s the life of someone who moves to California after having built a foundation on the East coast. In the three years I’ve lived in Cali, my trips east have just about averaged one trip each month and a half. Would I rather live in DC? Naw. Having too much fun on da Wes-side.
UPDATE: The Chief is okay. Just needed her battery cables jiggled. Tim said there was a little corrosion on there blocking the current. That was a close one.
So I should have bought Google stock at IPO. I love the company, it’s products, their vision, and their foresight. I just downloaded their IM client. It’s a small 900K download, includes integrated voice over IP, and it’s totally integrated with Gmail. Google Earth — awesome. Gmail — awesome. Google search — awesome. So easy for companies to buy search result ads and key words. So easy for Google to make money by… connecting people with information. I guess that’s what they do best. Connect people with information.
Uncle Tim (our old landlord) has The Chief and hopefully he can fix her. I’m worried about the old girl.
First off, I promise myself I will write in this blog more often. Now on to more business… I’ve been driving Bronwen’s car (2002 silver Hyundai Elantra GT Hatchback) to work. She’s been driving The Chief (1980 Mercedes Benz 300TD wagon). Yesterday morning, The Chief decided not to start. May be alternator or the battery. Either way, we’re strugglin. Bronny’s at home getting that sorted out now with AAA and Uncle Tim. Uncle Tim is Tim Jones, our old landlord who became a part of our little family. He’s our link to The Chief and a sweet Mercedes mechanic, if you can catch him when he’s not off traveling or boating or doing the things that guys who don’t need to work do in their normal daily lives. After we get The Chief all sorted out, we’ll need to figure out this car situation. Need to get something more reliable as a second car, especially with Bronwen expecting.
Zack, my youngest brother, 10 years younger to be exact, moved out to college at Biola this weekend. It will be sweet having him nearby. Bronwen and I will make sure he has a good meal every now and then. I’ll also make sure he has a way to the airport for trips home, etc. Glad he’s here.
Almost done trimming trees around the complex. We’re about 70% complete. Just need to clean up the rest of the trimmings and we’ll be in good shape for the termite/dry rot repairs. The world is coming together.
Just got back from a weekend with Bronwen’s family in the Outer Banks, North Carolina. We stayed in a beautiful beach house on the ocean. It is a huge house, as most of them are, with lots of levels, windows, decks, and high vaulted ceilings. Hurricane Irene veered off, out into the deep Atlantic, missing us entirely. Only trace of her was a decent size swell, which I was able to surf three times a day. Water is much colder there than I expected. It hit a high of about 75, but today and yesterday, it was no more than 70 degrees.
I wish I could be there with them for the rest of the week, but with the new job and all, and tons of weddings coming up, I have no vacation time. So I red-eyed it there on Friday night, left this afternoon (Monday), and made the long weekend feel as long as possible. I’m tired and need to get some rest for the busy work week ahead. No Bronwen until Saturday.
Bronwen’s preggers. Pregnant, that is. In about 8 months, I’m going to be a father. We had our first doctor’s visit today and the little, .7 centimeter dot in Bronwen’s uterus has a heartbeat. Saw it myself on the ultrasound. We’re just starting to tell people. I’m starting to get used to the idea of being a father. But I’m still freaked out by the responsibility.
Spent the weekend relaxing and working. About half and half of each. On Saturday I spent a leisurly morning with some buddies. Had breakfast at Alta Coffee Shop down on the peninsula, in Newport Beach. It’s an awesome little place with good food and great coffee. You can sit inside or out. Most nights during the week there’s open mic music. Then went to see Wedding Crashers.
Sunday I vented my skylights. Now they pop up and the hot air in our loft can escape. As soon as I popped them open, the hot air blew out of our house and the whole place felt cooler within 10 minutes. I put two simple hinges on the rear lip of the skylights. The skylights are 33 inch, square, plastic, dome style, and they sit on a curb. Apparently, they were just being held in place by two rusty nails each. Gravity is what keeps rain water from entering the gap between the curb and skylights. Now they each have two screwed-in hinges on the high side. On the inside, I devised a system of 12 inch bolts to prop them open.
I have a “new” washing machine. By new, I mean slightly used. By slightly used, I mean tagged. By tagged, I mean I found it in the complex’s garage, sitting in a public space, spray-painted with black graffiti. It definitely had the word “bitch” painted on its lid. But realizing it was much newer than our current machine, and knowing that ours sounded like Mt. Saint Helens every time it hit the spin cycle, and seeing that this newer machine had been abandoned for weeks, I decided the graffiti could be a nice trade off. After enlisting the help of a couple new friends from our community, Eric and John, we loaded it up into a grocery cart and lugged it up to my second floor laundry closet. Through many jokes and laughs about who tagged the washer and what he or she meant in doing so, I hooked up the hoses, drain, and power cable. The test run was a success and the tagged washer indeed runs much better than my old machine. Some heavy scrubbing with soap, water, and pot scrubber, removed the graffiti. I left the graffiti on the side and back of the machine for posterity.
Pole Saw died last night. I was trying to cut up the piles of trees I’ve been cutting down. The chain blasted right off. Manufacturer’s defect. . . ha. Or, just me pushing the limits of an electric chain saw with the motor of a blender. The groundskeeper for the temple next door asked that I cut the trimmings into small, managable piles so he can haul them to the dumpster. The trees I cut are all growing on his side of the wall around our complex, but they were hanging over the wall and scraping against our buildings. Must not have been trimmed in years. I have no idea whose legal responsibility it is to take care of the trees, but our home owners association (HOA) was ready to pay $5K to trim the trees. I saw the estimate and almost choked. For a $119 electric pole saw and 3-4 days of my “workout” time, I could do the same thing for free. Luckilly, John and Eric are helping. Permission to do the work? Better to ask forgiveness on that one. I’m saving the residents thousands of dollars. Our complex is like the Wild West. Pretty much anything goes at this point, until the HOA really solidifies.
Last week I spent several hours listing 14 items on eBay. The auctions all closed this morning and now Bronwen and I need to spend several hours packing and shipping the stuff. Was it worth the 400 bucks? Possibly. I’ve had garage sales before, and been amazed at what you can sell for cash. But I HATE putting on garage sales. eBay is great for selling and getting rid of stuff, but it more work than 5 or 6 hours with your stuff on a blanked by the roadside. Plus, eBay charges for everything. What a business model!