wouldn't smell like poo! Or something like that. It's bloggin time!

I don't really have all that much to talk about, as you were all present at the major event of recent times. Prior to that, we were preparing for said event, so not much was going on then either :-p

I would like to thank everyone for all their help in the setup, execution, and sanity preservation exercises undergone over the course of last weekend. It was a great help to pulling of what seems to be universally considered a successful event!

Other than that, I'm just going to work and thinking about the honeymoon, and how nice it will be after the craziness that was these past few weeks. Oh yea, and playing punch out on the virtual console. Nothing like getting your ass kicked by someone named Soda Popinski... who is purple... from drinking soda pop... and can knock you out with two hits... aside from being an obvious Russian stereotype :-p Sometimes 80's games really rule!

On a geeky note, when we got back I discovered that my chipset fan (not the one on the processor, but the one that controls the motherboard... mainly video bus) had died on my computer. That means no computer until I get it fixed. Very sad. I have a fix request in to the company, as it has a 3 year warranty, but haven't heard back yet. Either way, I won't have my computer working before we leave.

So I guess that's about all I have to say at the moment. I'm still keeping up with the one blog per month, which seems to be about my limit. Maybe I'll increase if I start doing some more exciting things or something. So for now we'll just sit here and wait for all of you all to get married, to do a group dance to "Drink and Fight" again, and have a ginormous party :-)

Are you pondering what I'm pondering Pinky? I think so Brain, but won't the dolphins rupture your internal organs?

Although I think I already was :-p I don't wanna be last anymore!!!

Don't have all that much to write about. There was some crazy work shit that went down, not sure what the final outcome will be, that could still take 6-12 months. Nothing overall bad for anything but my, by most accounts, already fragile mental state :-p

Not too much else going on. I'm trying to pick back up with FreeBSD, and am getting a book to sell my soul, I mean get a Cisco certification.

Beth and I have been taking dancing classes recently, which has been mega fun. Samba is a hell of a workout, and I like being able to turn her without stepping on her or me or falling over into the punch bowl and flailing around like even more of an idiot... or was that just a dream/disney movie or something...

Yay for inconherency! This is what happens when I blog with no direction!

Ooh yea, I almost lost my big toenail after getting stepped/slid on by a cleat during soccer, but I think it may actually pull through! Speaking of which I probably plan to par down the soccer playing in the near future (especially after the wedding), to switch to dancing, Aikido (if I can find it) and yoga (if I can fit it in). I miss controlling my body on that higher level, and manipulating the physical motion of yourself and others is just a sweet sweet high.

So... um... yea, I think that's all I got!

Are you pondering what I'm pondering Pinky? I think so Brain, but where would all the coat hangers go... the fish isn't that big!

So I guess I should join the host of... well everyone else in the new year. I just haven't really had all that much to say, and certainly nothing to expound upon recently. I guess blogs can be more than just philosophical soapboxes (well for me anyway, everyone else doesn't seem to be locked into that ethos, but anyone that has talked to me over the phone just shooting the proverbial shit would know that I don't do it very well). I also love run on sentences. :-p

I've been playing more guitar than normal recently, partially due to finding some music I actually deem quality, then due to realizing that I have been seriously neglecting some serious parts of my psyche recently. Yes yes, it's true... I have an artistic expressive side, that actually rears its ugly little head every so often. Previously this had been playing guitar in high school, then martial arts in college. I really liked the martial arts, as it was both artistic and physical, exercise and philosophy. Beautiful for 2 birds 1 stone lovers such as myself.

I haven't really felt the continual drive to return to it post college however, partially due to the politics of it, and partially because the urges to go have been satiated somewhat by playing soccer twice a week (although I'm nowhere good enough there to call it anything remotely close to art :-p). So I find myself getting a Mark Knopfler album (of Princess Bride and Dire Straits fame) and sitting down with my guitar to enter a mellow creative state (which of course does not boil over to writing).

My thoughts have turned once again to what I or the collective we should be doing in life. I could go on at length about this, but you probably have already seen fight club, and I don't need to reiterate the seemingly lost children that we occasionally resemble. Actually my biggest problem is that nothing I do at the moment can be shared or used to help others (not even in the classical service sense, but even in martial arts, you could help someone learn). Not sure where to go with that one, but it's under review.

As far as current events go, I go to work, come home, we make some killer food, and find a way to take the edge off until we do it again. Pretty routine, some adjustments to be made, and some things to be done, but I have no huge complaints about it.

I started reading a bit recently as well, currently some George RR Martin, and picked up a new Neil Gaiman and a Cyberpunk series Kris recommended. I'm a big fan of Gaiman (especially Neverwhere and American Gods), and like Cyberpunk in general. The Martin book is like the TV series of fantasy. Trying to be so much like Weis and Hickman, or Feist, but replacing originality with sex and violence. Has it's interesting moments, but doesn't seem to have that trandscendant quality I typically look for. Especially at 800 pages for the first in a trilogy :-p

I've also been reading quite a bit of Wil Wheaton's blog at wilwheaton.net. For those of you that don't know, he played Wesley Crusher on Star Trek TNG. Apparently he became a fairly decent author of short life stories. Kind of the catalyst for my creative malaise (the realizing that something more could be happening, not a mess of my creative outlets themselves).

So at the end of this meandering through my random thoughts, I have completed the first blog of my new year, and am no longer behind! :-p

Are you pondering what I'm pondering Pinky? I think so Brain, but where are you going to find 3 tons of Alka-Seltzer?

Pluto's demotion... Good! Now some may call me crazy, but I always hated the idea that one of those damn planets you have to learn the order of, actually changes distances in its eliptical orbit and becomes 8th rather than 9th... but only for awhile!

My personal bias aside, it sounds reasonable to me. More because Charron (its supposed moon) orbits it in a manner not unlike (yay for double negatives :-p) a binary star. They are swinging arround each other, not one staying relatively stationary as say the earth and the moon. Therefore they both have the same type of effect on each other, and at the very least should both have the same status. That they were given lesser than planet status makes sense, as they don't behave like the other planets we know more about. Have to be able to adjust peoples!

Unfortunately no major life stories or philosophical treaties for today... At some point I will write the overall religion debate that has been going through my head for some time now, but that takes some seriously careful wording, and is difficult to get out correctly.

As of right now I just feel pretty good, am excited to play soccer later today, and happy that I now have an Imperial Star Destroyer, and Slave One (I have a Lego Bobba Fett bitches!!!... and Han Solo in carbonite!) in suriptious and uber cool Lego form. If anyone sees those little kits for X-Wing and TIE fighters (they are like 1 1/2 inches long) grab some for me (I'll pay you back). I'm thinking of finding a way to suspend them from the ceiling and those would be to scale.

Yes, I'm a geek in some ways I know, but its one of my favorite fantasy universes (for reasons that suprisingly relate to martial arts and percieved realisim, which mabye I'll discuss if peoples are interested) and Legos are just cool. I've had more fun building them and then seeing them more as models then doing any playing with them (hence the desire for a mockup).

I also go this weekend for the Church CD recording with Beth. This is pretty cool. It will be my second recording ever, and I'm hoping not to screw it up too bad. Alot of times nobody can tell if we screw it up, but this would give them a basis for the next time they hear it live, and they would expect to hear the same thing from the CD. I tell you now people, everyone should do something in front of an audience like play an insturment or give a demonstration that can get them going, at some point in their lives. It's a really nice feeling that does well for the soul.

Hrmm... I guess I did find some things to say. Oh well, I guess that's a good thing right? Some more insight into my slightly addled brain? :-p

Kris, call me damnit! I think I have the online Winning Eleven thing sorted out, and I have a file for all the new updated teams/players!

Ahh yes, noticing the date, regardless of how much anxiety or problems the military may have caused me, a moment of silence for the fallen, those who will fall, and those poor misguided souls that mistake the words of the heartless for the faith of the ages (from every code, creed, gender and walk).

... ... ...

Thank you.

Are you thinking the same thing I am Pinky? I think so Brain, but why would you need all that kleenex if you were hanging upside down?

Cheese... hrmm... I know the answer of some people out there would be an entheuastic "I LIKE CHEESE!!!" I'm no cheese connesuer, however I do like it as a nice side item. Its sclupting potential however, I believe has much to be explored. I shall produce cheese art under the psudonymn Leonardo di Gouda.

As a side note, I'm considering technical certifications for my workplace activities. I approach these with a certain ammount of trepidation. While one, I haven't been informed of what said certification(s) would give me career wise, they are also a big pain in the rear in most environments. They are always full of questions that require intimate familarity with the product in question. You can miss stupid easy questions on the exam, just because it isn't your everyday job and you can't remember the command right off the top of your head.

There is also the saying simialar to "those that can't do, teach" in the tech world that goes "those that can't do, get certified". This is a test where you only take an exam. You don't even have to actually demonstrate the ability to actually do anything. Except of course for memorizing practically verbatim a 2 inch thick book that is about as interesting as analyzing the merits of the paper it's printed on...

Theoritically there is some value added to something like this, and I may even get paid more (although that's not yet determined, and may just make that solution for me), and most companies will pay for the classes kinda makes it something else to do. Its just that the idea is kind of distasteful to me (anybody remember my school experiences?), and not at all a motivating kind of thing. Such is life I guess, although I'm not sure that anybody who ever uses the word career to describe what they do has much more than cheese in between their ears... It just seems to be doing what someone else wants you do to at the time. Even CEO's are beholden to shareholders. Mabye its just me.

As always (as of yesterday) post a comment and i'll try to reply to keep me on this thing once a week!

Are you thinking the same thing I'm thinking Pinky? I think so Brain, but you'll never get the tiger to sit still that long.

Because I don't update very often, I began thinking about it for a bit. I have finally come to the conclusion that I very rarely talk about things when they are not pertinant. Not that this is a good or bad thing, just something I tend to do. Unless there is a reason, I no talkie.

However a solution presents itself very often and very quickly once the problem has been properly identified! My solution is to ask you all for help. If you would like me to post something, or discuss something, please let me know. My next post will be off of a comment for this post.

In other news (now that I got started), we went to peoples in MN for the weekend. Much fun had by all. Was interesting to watch us all come in with our built up presences and lifestyles that we have garnered in our time spent apart (myself included) and watch them slowly melt away into that nice and comfortable feeling that we all had together before we left. Twas a beautiful and very satisfying thing.

I am now 25 officially, and have the LEGO Imerial Star Destroyer to proove it! I'm not sure what to make of age, mainly in general. I had never really thought about it for the longest time, but the more I seem to have in life that is worth having, the more concious (still can't spell...) of it I seem to become. It keeps moving whether I want it to or not, so I guess I had just better figure out how to enjoy the current in the ever flowing river of life huh?

There was probably more stuff that happened between now and the last post, but I most likely forgot it. I have a tendancy to forget some things, yet remember others. Its not selective, but can be useful :-p

Leave your comments, give me fodder.

Are you thinking the same thing I am Pinky? I think so Brain, but where are you going to get that many lemons at this time of night?

I was wanting, and actually had started writing a blog regarding Japan and a recent documentry we just watched on yoga (and its health benifits/that of meditation in general). It was to include how I wanted to return to a regular meditative state and how being arround all of the history experienced in Japan (some stuff was 1500 years old!) revived that desire. However on the same note, I can't seem to write more than a few words without getting distracted, and can barely type properly. Thus I shall retire to recovering from my jetlag, and watching the Simpsons :-)