Journal

A Few things

Work has been challenging and interesting lately. Because I've been prodded a bit by Brandon, we've gone in to use Medseek's Sitemaker's language to produce the new modules we're working on. After some annoying inconsistencies between what they say to do and what they do in their actual modules based on this system, I've gotten down to where I've basically figured out what they do. The way they do things has barely changed (as far as presenting data, they just keep it standardized so it all looks at feels the same because it ends up using the same code. I've had a few late nights, but I think I'm moving forward pretty well.

Chris and Holly get married today. I hope the day goes well and everything goes off without a hitch.

Shannon's birthday is on Monday. She turns 29...again...at least that's what she is claiming. I'll be making lobster Alfredo and a nice chocolate torte...at least I assume it's nice, since I've not made it before. It has lots of chocolate in it, so I'm sure Shannon will be happy with it.

We went and saw 300 last night. I thought it was really good (even though our seats kind of sucked), but Shannon wasn't as thrilled about it. It really felt to me like reading a graphic novel, and a good one at that. She did say that the gore seemed more cgi/cartoony so it didn't offender as much as other gore in movies.

We've decided to go on a diet (excluding Shannon's birthday)...well more like change our lifestyle, The pasta that we had earlier in the week is just a start. More fresh fruits and vegetables is the long term goal here. Shannon wanted us to join up something like weight watchers, but to me it seems a bit silly. If we really take it seriously, then we will support each other (which is pretty much the goal of WW). We just both pick bad things sometimes, and it kind of rolls from there. But I think if we both push forward, then we'll end up better...although this does mean more work for me, since a lot of the "I don't feel like cooking" foods that we have are high fat and calories (hello pizza). I've also started using much less cheese too (sigh).

On Monday, the PC Support people came and told me I was getting a new laptop, since mine is going off lease at the end of the month. They wanted to take pictures and what not, but I said, no, I'll clean it off and have it ready by the end of the day, and they said they'd come back today or tomorrow (Monday or Tuesday). So I still don't have my new laptop. The laptop has been cleaned off, so it's basically worthless to me and I'm dreadfully annoyed now. Hopefully early next week, cause I may just have to start installing stuff back on it.

Out and about...and a bunch of random crap

Other then the wind, it's quite pleasant out today...We ran a few errands and headed back home. I did have a 69 cent gallon of distilled water (for my machine) drop out of my hand, bounce and then explode in the driveway...so that was kinda funny I guess.

Some snow is still blowing around in the city and they keep pushing back the blowing snow advisory (6 last night, 6 this morning and now 4 this afternoon), so we'll see what happens. A lot of snow has melted off our driveway...except where the sun doesn't really reach. The way that the land is around our house, there's anywhere from 6 to 18 inches of snow.

Tonight we're going to Red Robin to celebrate Tiff's 21st birthday. Afterwards, the Tiff celebration continues with the girls (at Jerry and Renee's) and the guys (most of them) will be heading off to send Chris off into married life (about a week away).

After being in the house and shoveling (3 times in 2 days for a total of about 5 hours), it was nice to get out and it'll be nice to be out and about.

We had our first totally unplayable Netflix movie (Lilo and Stitch 2)....they quickly sent us a duplicate, which worked great. We watched The Prestige, which Shannon liked, and I enjoyed the hell out of...although near the end I guessed both twists before they happened, but it was more like "Ohhhhhhh that's cool" rather then "lame". It actually makes me curious about Tesla, and I think maybe I'll read something about him (so if you've read something and have a suggestion, let me know).

Snow Day!

No work today, my boss text messaged me this morning, right after I finished most of the snow removal, "IHS closed". So that's was nice.

I have already taken Shannon to work (which is fairly close to my work), so it wasn't fun to drive, but not totally terrible. Apparently the doctor she is working with today isn't coming today, but she has other things she's gonna do.

The snows still blowing around, I don't know how much of the snow is new snow, or how much is just coming off the ground...

Snow Blows...

Snow Blows around and around. I don't know if much is accumulating, but we can watch it through the window swirl around. No loss of services yet...it sounds much worse to the West and North of the metro. I35 to the north of Ames is closed, I80 west of the metro to Nebraska is Closed.

One of the funnier stories of the night was a sheriff was out rescuing others in his SUV, but ended up in a ditch...but that's not the funny part. A guy passing along tried to help him out of the ditch with no luck...continues on down the road...and a few minutes later ends up in the ditch himself.

Anyways, we're camped out, watching movies (pretty stupid ones) watching the trees and wires sway in the wind.

Risk....er...Settlers of Catan Night

So on Saturday, since most of the girls headed off to Holly's Bachelorette Party, a few guys (Chris, Dave, Ryan and myself) ended up playing some Settlers of Catan. First we got some food at Chef's Kitchen (I almost suggested the El Aguila Real on Beaver, cause I thought it would be funny), and then headed back to my place.

Risk was passed on, since Dave didn't so much want to play. We then setup and played a long game of Settlers. While doing this we sampled and drank several of the collection of whiskeys (Scotches, ryes, etc), rums and Cognac at my house (Sorry Dusty, Chris finished off the XO) and after a sufficient level of tipsiness (ie "I can't really taste this anymore"), we switched over to beer.

Chris and Dave had a little spat over placing the thief on or on the side of the number on the land, which eventually ended up in the board getting messed up (luckily Chris remembered how things were). I ended up winning.

We were going to watch the Prestige, but Ryan suggested that it probably wasn't the wisest thing to watch while we couldn't pay close attention. We ended up just chatting until Holly brought Shannon home...shortly afterwards people made their trips through the snow and slick roads home.

Fun times.

Couple of Movies

So we headed over to Chris and Holly's to see Apocalypse Now and we watched the extended version...which I must say is worse then the original cut. There's this whole French Ex-Patriot scene which is totally pointless. From the time building up to the scene at the end, we know that the main character is messed up, the whole scene is pointless (other then pointing out that the French messed up there first... I sort of like the original, the redux is way to long and has to many pointless things in it.

Last night we headed out with Chris, Holly and Dave to see Reno 911!: Miami. I laughed, it was fun...apparently I hadn't watched the show in a while, because there's an entirely new character that I didn't know about...*shrug* oh well. It was still pretty funny.

Welcome to the World Allia!

So this past Sunday, February 18th at 7:45 AM (Pacific) my youngest sister (Lovina) gave birth to my new niece Allia Eve Roundy. She weighed 7 lb 14 ounces and is 21" long.

Welcome to the world!