DVD's and deals galore, its a small world...

Have you ever been to Costco, or any of the other Gumugous chains out
there and realized that eventhough you are going there for one or two
items you end up with ten or fifteen for no apparent reason... Just
because it was there, the coupon was there and you figured, ok I
haven't been here in a while and viola, it was fate, destiny, karma or
your wallet saying, I'm dusty empty me out...

Ok, talking wallets aside, I was in Costco a day or so ago, and I
decided, ok, get stuff because I was house sitting for the Grandparents
and I needed food.

Being the holidays, I parked, got out of my car (always a good thing to
do, or else you end up hitting your head against the glass) and looked
around. I spotted two people walking towards Costco... They were my
Uncle and Aunt... Go figure. Small world indeed. I wished them best
wishes, seasons greetings, gave them hugs, etc and asked about the
kids... They have four sons. They were all doing well. Everyone was
well. I may speak about them at another date.

Of course passing through Costco I always ran into them, etc.

Back to my purchasing of stuff...

There was a coupon for $25 off - Simpsons Season 1 through 3 OR Family
Guy Season 1 and 2.... It was a hard, hard choice.. but I finally
decided. I picked up the Simpsons DVD set. It was originally $94. But
with the Coupon it came to $69. Which came to $23 a Season...
All-in-all not too bad. I also grabbed Mr. and Mrs. Smith. What can I
say, I'm a DVD-Movie-enabler of sorts.

Picked up a dual package of Sun-dried Tomato Raviolli and Cheese (never
got to eatting it), Provallione Cheese, Eggs, 2 Loaves of Whole Wheat
Bread, and 18 pack of Burritos, a Barrel of Peanuts (maybe not a barrel
but a frickin' huge one)... which they are still in my trunk... opps.

I ended up watching Eddie Izzard's - Glorious
DVD, which is the prelude to Dressed to Kill. It was just as funny and
only made in 1997. I wish he made more recent stuff, I'll have to look
at his webiste for more current information.

I can't think of anything else... surprising eh

Vx Out

Funnies for a Server down Tuesday...
Warning, some language is inappropriate (but anyone under the age of 13
has already heard it... there is no swearing)

My guild has a warped sense of humour... No wonder I get along with them so well. Anyhow, for those who aren't aware, that song is from a
brilliant musical about muppets called Avenue Q. I highly recommend
checking it out. That's who made this song, and some WoWer's made the video

http://www.youtube.com/watch.php?v=lr_HR-iIlYg

Check it out...

Early Presents and new views

My dad was down for the weekend. I'm sure I've mentioned him from time
to time. Anyhow, he was down, and we went to the Golf Centre to get my
new present. A Ping Sandwedge. So now every club in my bag, except for
my 3 wood and 5 wood are all Ping I still have my old set of custom
pings from back as my high school or college present from him. So I'll
have to try it out this summer.

Now, my present to him was going to be an antique watch that I
purchased at an engraving shop (where I got my step dad's knife and had
the phrase: You are a cut above the rest. On it, see last year
christmas time.) It's a nice, silverish plated watch with an antique
picture on the front of it. On the back is engraved:

Fore a Dad,
That drives for the greens,
Shoots out of difficult lies with ease
And Putts like the Pro he is.

For those of you that don't know, I write all my own material.
Something that I've had a gift for since I was very young. Maybe it was
my reading Cyrano du Bergerac that inspired me... Shakespeare never did
it for me. Stupid ol' English. Modernize yourself man, it's the 21st
century.

Movies: Double Feature, who knew...were you really surprised?

Saw two movies back to back, I haven't done something like that since I
saw: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Askaban and Bourne Supermacy in
one day way back when.

So my Dad and I saw the intellectual movie, Syriana with George
Clooney, Matt Damon and Dr. Brasheer from Deep Space Nine (can't think
of his name)... It dealt with the politics of the Iran people as well
as the US, etc etc... All in all it was rather boring personally...
That's one thing I won't discuss politics and religion. This movie was
a combination of both. It wasn't bad at all, I assure you. If you are
into that sort of thing, be my guess go see it.

After that we saw, Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the
Wardrobe. I read this C.S. Lewis novel oh, so many years ago... and it
was incredible. I also saw the BBC version of this film oh so long ago
as well. This movie was extremely true to the novel it was like I was
reading it once again. The voice of the Lion: Liam Neilson and the
Voice of the Badger: Michael Caine were fitting that's for sure. The
graphics were incredible, and the battle scene as my dad decribed it
was very 'Lords of the Ring'-ish...

That one would be definitely worth seeing again.

Next Weekend... more films

This weekend we have the opening of King Kong... It's a Peter Jackson
film so make sure you go to the washroom before hand and don't bother
eatting or drinking anything for three hours, you'll be glued to your
seats.

Fun with Dick and Jane, Jim Carey and Tea Leoni (David Duchovney's
wife, that lucky bastard) looks like a good comedy for the holidays if
they have you depressed as well.

Belt testing in a week... Green, the colour of Christmas

JJ Class has been going extremely well. Belt testing next wednesday, I
shall take the time to practise at work, since you all know, between
WoW and 8 hours of boredom, I can actually use that to accomplish
something

Vx Out

Look who came to town and a new job? Who woulda thunk it...

Let's see, just a ton of things that have happened to me over the last week.

For starters, looking for jobs while on a job (albeit not at
the job that you are currently at, because that's just not kosher or
anyother kind of meat) is always tough.  Personally for me, it
gets depressing. My minset is that, if I'm at a job, why should I look
for a new one... I just got to where I am now and I'm happy. 
However, I see the other side of the coin as well. We never stop
changing and I know that it is always good to keep one's options open.

Like with Company #1: It was a great job. About 2 months later, I had
to get out of it because the company didn't want to get legal software
after my repeated asking and telling of the consequences. That and the
fact they wanted me to be a cold-caller with a script. It was at a Real
Estate company.

I was supposedly fired, but do to the fact that I had all documentation
stating my job description, the fact that it had the cold-caller script
that I was supposed to say on it and in my job description, I was more
than happy to turn that into the government agency that Company #1
hired me.

Company #2: It was a great job as well.Good people, work was fairly
steady. Boss was an old friend of mine from back in the grade school
days. Things were great for 6 months and then my boss realized that the
staff liked me more than him and started to make my life a living hell.
But I stuck with it. Call it stubborness or the fact that I wanted to
piss him off so much that I kept doing my job to the best of my
ability, without any confrontations violent or otherwise. But, I did
use the email and asked for clarification on issues that I wanted to
make sure that I did things the way he wanted them done. That way I
could say: "I did it the way you specified and reitterated to you
exactly what you said..."

I was let go because the last eight months or so, we had just been
butting heads, he would go to the owners at the time and I would keep
doing my job. Then one day I was told to come into his office, he said
that he was letting me go. When I asked for a reason, he said that he
didn't have to give me one. He also wanted me to sign a piece of paper,
I just got him to photocopy it and I handed in my phone and was
escorted out of the building to the dismay of the staff, they didn't
realize that I had been let go.

Apparently he had been on my computer, went into my email and gathered
over 6 months worth of email and used that against me, etc.... Needless
to say I was glad to go, but I wanted to go on my own terms.  That
company now has gone through four IT Technicians and now they have my
ex boss and two others working for him... go figure.  Still a
great company. That was in the greenhouse industry.

Company #3 and #4 have been documented already on this xlog so I won't
rehash the old siren bit and go into the details... you all know about
it...

Which brings us to Company #5... It is a great company. The people are
good. The work isn't challenging. My boss is amazing as a person. He's
funny. Loves to play video games. The other person I work with is a
cool guy. Love to play video games. They are all good people to work
with. No one is threatened by each other. Everyone works extremely well
together. It is the best work atmosphere that I have been in siince I
have started over seven or eight years ago...

So when I went for a written test, for a possible Company #6, 30
multiple choice questions. I was the first to complete them. I had to
deal with 5 other people there: two of them female, two of them male of
a visible minority and myself, male caucassion.

A few days ago I received a call on my answer machine they want a second interview...

I don't know why but I have mixed feelings about it. Sure it is more
money. It is steady full time hours. The pension is great. But like all
jobs, is there security? Who knows...

As for who came to town, my dad did from the big city of the T.Dot. We
had dinner last night at a Steak House, and not just any steak house,
Ye Ol' Steak House... been around for over 30 years. Excellent meal.

Then I drove him to his friends house who I've known for as long as
I've met them. Their daughter apparently played World of Warcraft...
and you know my ears immeidately perked up at that lol... So I went in,
showed her how to get a new interface through Curse-gaming.com and I
realized that it was MC night. She hadn't been to MC, so I hoped on,
asked to be put on the list and got to show her Ragnaros... by fiber be
purged! She was so amazing at it

So amazing that she called her boyfriend and said non-stop that I was
an amazing player that had all epic pieces, trinkets coming out my ass
and soo many rings that I didn't have enough fingers.  Then she
got to see the full fight of Ragnaros and I took many many screenshots.
We finished at 1am EST. Got to love the West coast servers.

I have to go back and hook up their wireless router to that computer so
she can take a full account of the game instead of the dialup she has
been used to.

I won't be able to play Onyxia tonight... or maybe I will try But no BWL for me Oh well, what can you do.

Let me know what you think about the job situation, I am curious to hear your thoughts, that I am.

Vx Out

A-Eon of a party and then some..

As posted oh so long ago, I decided to go to Jenn and Dave's party...
Before that I went with CoderMike to see Aeon Flux. Usually MTV shows
to Movies aren't that good... This one was a surprise. It was well
done, not over the top and director/creator Peter Chung should start to
direct movies, he has vision.

Had dinner at Kelsey's, of course, afterwards and chatted.

I arrived fashionably late, by about half hour and waited and
chit-chatted a bit, and waited and played poker... and waited...
finally around 11:30pm after waiting for three people I do believe...
We finally got to exchange presents...

If you recall, last year I gave my present of Happy Gilmour/Billy
Madison DVD combo and received.... an aluminum wine opener... that was
so filmsy and cheesy that I stuffed it away never to bring it out
again.  But then a though dawned on me... Regift...

Do you think I could find it? nope... So instead my gift was a $6.89 8
Horror movies on 2 DVD's.... What do you think I received this year?

4 Coffee mugs with Christmas theme's... rather nice actually and....

Wait for it...

Still waiting?... good...

Gingerbread Penis's.... with blue testiculars and did I mention the
pearls?... charming... there must have been one really lonely housewife
that has more than a cooking fetish thats for sure...

Read it over a second time if it didn't hit you the first time... yes,
that was my reaction too... what the f'ck.... Of course, I'm the only
single person there. Naturally. Jenn is sloashed off her butt. Dave is
playing host and I'm the laugh of the party... again...

Fun times... but I took it in stride. Laughed along with them.

This will be the last time I go...

... probably...

Vx Out

Still alive.. just been working ... err.. playing alot...

Work has been meh. To top it all off its been so meh-ish lately that
I've taken up reading a book... or finishing a book. Almost done it
too. Next I will be learning Japanese. I have the books, but no one to
speak it with... I shall muddle through it.

WoW is wearing on me... I think that I've actually increased my playing
time since I've been at work and at home... I didn't think that that
was humanly possible.  I guess you know that you are getting bored
with it when you take up fishing in between Arathi Basin Battleground
Queue's... and level it to 300 in about 4 days.  You also know
that you are getting bored with it when you decide to drop skinning and
start on Engineering. I got to 300 in about 3 days. I also purchased
all my mats off the Auction House (at horrible prices sometimes...
farmer's market indeed) and actually only spent 300g which isn't too
bad IMHO.

But I did get an actual warning from Blizzard. I was trying to purchase
Dense Stone off of a Farmer and that farmer accused me of trying to
make Dense Grinding Stone instead of Dense Powder... Words were
exchanged and I called him a 'fucking tool and a farmer'... I was
reported and given a warning... I rebutted my case and received a
'canned' response saying, this was just a warning but be mindful of
your language....

Go figure...

The gift that keeps on giving.

I've decided to goto Jenn and Dave's christmas party again this
year. But unlike last year, I'm not bringing over $200+ of wine and
dessert wine. I am however, bringing over a $13.26 of plum wine that I
will be drinking. I am also bringing back the crappy aluminum corkscrew
that I 'received' last year. If I get it again, I'm re-wrapping it and
giving it back, again.

I figure that if I keep giving it back, either 1) I won't be invited
again. 2) I'll be told to get a better gift. 3) Who knows...

I mean I really enjoy the times I have there, I truly do no matter how much she pisses me off...

Anime watching fun fest

I've been bored if you can't tell lately. Between boring work and WoW
and Class and the occasional gym outing... I've had time to DL anime
that I haven't heard of, or have heard of in minute passing. Recently I
watched (all 51 Episodes and 1 OAV) of Full Metal Alchemist.

I must say that was one of the deeper Anime's that i've seen in a long
time. It was in Japanese with FanSub's in English (which is the only
way I will watch my anime) the English translations usually don't do it
justice... See Dragonball Z series if you don't believe me.

Movies lately...

Harry Potter, SAW II, nothing else has really caught my eye... I might go see that Johnny Cash flick sometime...

Vx Out

Meh, meh ... meh meh ... Blarg, Blarg... Honk

Playing games by day and night...

Work has been slow. Ok, let me rephrase. Work has been slowing down to
the point of stopping. Not in the plant mind you, but in our
department, our company is still meh, going...

Talks about selling it, union employees gruntled, christmas season coming up, etc etc...

Nothing changes...

--------

You still do webpages? O RLY? YA RLY! NO WAY!

Had a meeting with a cilent on Wednesday and had a good lunch for about
an hour and a half (got it in before I had to work). The website is
brand new. New company hosting it. New company holding the website
storage space.

So the cilent wants a Top-down layout, with a sub-linkage section on the side.

Let me start from the beginning....

This is a main website. The long and short of it is that there will be
8 sub websites as well which will be accessible from the side menu
(will probably do it in tables). The main menu will be along the top
with the Logo that I'll have to put together.

That and a message board is needed.. Iwas thinking of PhpBB seemed reallly easy to use.

It's 2am and we just took down RAG!!!! Woo-frickin-hoo!!!! and CoderMike wasn't here.. what a shame

Vx Out.. I'll post more tomorrow

Lost Hours, Remembrance Day and too many hours gaming...

This past few weeks I've been going to work, playing games at work,
going to the gym, playing games at home, sleeping, going to work....
the cycle keeps on a going...

But today (er... yesterday) was Remembrance Day. This day has become a
media circus. If you asked ten people on the street, "What is the
meaning of Remembrance Day?" They would all say the same thing: "It's
the Day that we honour the fallen heroes of World War II and to thank
them for our Freedom..."

But, what does the average person know about the sacrificies that one truly made back then.

Probably nothing... and it is a true shame.

So I say this. Go to your Grandmother / Grandfather, Great Grandmother
or Great Grandfather (if they are still around, god bless them) and
give them a hug, kiss on the cheek and look into their eyes and say,

Thanks for everything that you've done for me.

Vx Out

PS.... I was working on Friday and they told me to leave with
the rest of the shift at 6pm... I came in early at Noon and was to work
until 8pm... I emailed our HR manager asking if I could make up 2 extra
hours along the way and he basically said no.  Fun...

It's been a week... time for an update...

CoderMike paid me back... he owed me $20 for 7 Dual-sided DVD Case
holders and for the gas money to drive up to play golf on one of the
frickin' coldest days that I've ever played golf... shot a 61 on 1 of 3
nine hole golf courses and a 48 on the back. Played really well on the
back nine I was proud of myself.

At the Movies... Seen Saw yet? Saw Saw II...

Saw Saw II... I hate horror films. I truly do. I wanted to see Legend
of Zorro... But CM didn't... I'll see it next weekend or something like
that.

Not quite the book club, but close enough...

I picked up a new book... Book you say... I know, I haven't read one in
a while and this one isn't my standard sci-fi fantasy type either... It
is a book by Will Ferguson called: 'Hitching Rides with Budda: A
Journey Across Japan. He is a Canadian Author and I personally havent
read anything of his at all. But this for some reason pulled me in. I'm
about a quarter of the way through it and if you haven't picked up on
it I'm enjoying it...

Parties, Parties, Parties and Wedding?

Jenn msgd me and asked if I was going to their christmas party on Dec
3rd.. and to save money, the wedding invitations were in the same
envelope as well.  But she wanted to meet to talk in general, if I
wanted to on my break goto Timmy's and get a coffee, etc. I honestly
don't have time for that at work. Plus, 15 minutes isn't enough for a
talk...

The jist of the conversation we had was like this:

J: Why don't you come over or call anymore.. was it something I said or did
Vx: No. I've been busy
J: Well we never get to talk, etc etc
Vx: Because I know the questions you'll ask me...: How's work. How's
the family doing. How are the repairs to the house. Are you seeing
anyone. It's the same questions you've been asking me for over five
years now.

To answer them: Work's work. Family is fine. repairs are going. nope.

I don't think that I'm being rude, but this week has been busy, last
week wasn't so busy. But, I'll probably go to this Christmas
party.  In our conversation, she said that my response to her
wedding invitation would be that I was working and wouldn't be able to
come. I said that I would love to go and was looking forward to it. I
know that she is trying to include me. But honestly, it is only because
she is alienating her friends (she's said that so and so wasn't being
nice to another person and she's cut them out of the wedding) and you
know what, that is her problem and it is a result of how she treats
people.

I can only say how sorry I fell for Dave so many times... but I'm done.

Warcraft News...

Finally got my Arcanist Robe, so I won't be getting any items for a while... But I look spiffy...

Class...

I miss it. I really really do...
When I do get there, I make the most out of it. I don't care how much
pain I put myself through I just know that testing will be coming very
soon... too soon. I personally just don't feel prepared.

So last Wed, did Yellow to Orange review which was helpful and it
showed that I didn't forget as much as I thought. Although getting
confused with that and Orange to Green didn't help much

But it's late and I'll sign off

Vx Out

Ok, new 'site' layout and yes, I actually might be colour blind....

I've always thought that I knew what colours went with another, be it
in perfect harmony or not... Maybe I'm just in a Halloween-ish mood
hence the greens, oranges and browns... But, other than that I've got
nothing.  Yesterday was a complete and utter waste of time,
although I did get in 2 runs of Scholo, 1 run of Baron in which at
Stitches part (all that play know the part) we actually took so long
because we didn't have enough DPS that that particular part reset
itself and the mobos appeared yet again.

Apparently I can be drafted into doing anything as I learned on Monday from CoderMike....

CM: Hey
Vx: Hey
CM: Jman, Erwin, Kristen and a few others are golfing on Sunday, want to come?
Vx: Sure, I'm always up for Golfing
CM: Good, because I told them you were already going...
Vx: Really.. you did huh?
CM: Yup. it's like 30mins away from your house in an obscure town west of London...
*Vx looks on the Net.... Ah that place*
Vx: There are only two golf courses there... I doubt if we are going to the Semi-Private one....
CM: Ya, here's the site... Also, you're driving me and Kristen up there because your car is more realable then mine...
Vx: Really? I am. am I?
CM: ya.
Vx: Pitch in for Gas money then and I still have to get my trunk fixed
CM: You still haven't done that yet?
Vx: I've been busy....I'll get it done on Saturday

Speaking of which, I should call the Mechanic... It's amazing that my
trunk latch to open it is a small piece of plastic that broke because I
had too many golf bags in it... What are the chances of that... So my
tool, is a 4' inanimate alumnum rod with a duck-taped #3 Flat head
screw driver to it...

The irony of that is I still have to crawl into the trunk to find the
release latch and yet the trunk is more comfortable than the
backseat... go figure. It must of been a memory of the time I was
helping install stereo speakers in Dave's trunk and he ended up closing
the trunk on me.... Luckily I'm not clostrephobic (sp)....

How stable is your job?

I've just learned that the QC department of Company #4 has been cut
down to 32 hours a week... I wonder if we will be next... Luckily I'm
kinda still putting out my resume...

A Parade on a beautiful weekend..  I just want to get my hair cut