OmegaSpade79's musings...

Since I last posted a lot has obviously happened.

I went to California as planned for Labor day weekend and had a great time seeing Family. I've already booked a flight and car to return for Thanksgiving week. I went and saw 'Gamer' while I was there, it was much better than I expected.

I've been keeping busy with my house. Final inspection is scheduled for 10/12/09. I'm ordering Ceiling fans and Blinds this weekend. Then my last major expense should be appliances. I am still waiting to hear on bids for landscaping.

I have been sticking with my diet and exercise retinue. I've lost 50lbs now. I'm going to need to buy a new jacket this year and I'm on my last belt notch in a good way :P I'm holding off on buying clothes as long as I can.

I met someone last week and have had a couple of really good dates with them. We are planning on heading down to Crater lake this weekend.

STRANG6R should be paid off by the end of the year too.

Oh and I passed a couple more Microsoft Certifications. Which feels nice to have in this economy. I'll probably work on my CCNA next in a few months and VCP 4.0 next year.

In a lot of ways moving to Oregon has been very positive.

I have to admit I post less here because of my facebook. However so much has happened recently that I needed to do an update here.

My biggest news is I have put a deposit down and am building my very own custom house in Springfield a suburb of Eugene. Which is only a couple of miles from my office still. The house should be built by labor day. I designed the interior layout and design on my own so it will be interesting to see how it works in reality. It is a 1650' house, 2 car garage with no hallways 3br, 2ba.

I also drove down to California a couple of weeks ago to pick up the last of my stuff from my parents garage. It was a great trip, I got to see Eric, Bree, Ed, Parents, Kate, Josh, Megan, Mike, and Bill.

Things are also starting to warm up here and there has been less rain. If buying a house didn't clue you in I am very comfortable here in Oregon and my job is going as well as I thought it would. For work I also passed my Microsoft upgrade exams to make a Server 2008 server administrator. When the windows 7 testing is out I will upgrade again to Enterprise admin.

Next month I am probably going back to Alabama to see Mike & Sarah and Kalamath falls to see cousins.

I'll try to start posting pictures of my hosue as it is built.

I've been fighting a cold for a couple of weeks now so things have been slow.

I did see the Watchmen last weekend. I enjoyed it, definitely my type of humor. Not certain it's for everyone.

I finally swapped my turn signals completing my upgrades to Stran6r. I have updated my pictures to show the new turn signals, scoop, and LED lights. I am very happy with how it turned out.

I read "The Return of Depression Economics" while I was flying to California by Paul Krugman. So far he is dead on about how this recession is progressing. In so many words he admits inflation is how we are going to get out of this recession so more motivation for me to get into a house soon. I've been watching housing on CL here in Eugene and I think I'll be able to afford a decent single family home.

I had a nice visit to California seeing my family. However, I won't be trying that on a short weekend again too much time at the airport especially with the weather.

I got a new tv stand and some better lighting for my living room and it has really improved things. My sister also showed me how to posterize my digital photos so I got a few of those hung up now too.

I got a new wii game for $10 this week too, "Rubix". I am really enjoying it a great puzzler.

I am also starting to work hard at finding a place for us to stay in Munich for Octoberfest and am finding most places already rented out. I am not looking forward to having to look hard to find a decent place.

I've also been getting into facebook as a great way to keep int touch with old friends.

People have been telling me to do it for years...

I finally decided to buy a house this year. The Obama Tax Credit for first time buyers is just too attractive. I was planning on paying off Stran6r this year but instead I am going to use that money for a down payment and closing costs. Then in February 2010 I will use the Tax Credit to payoff Stran6r getting me back to less then my current rent car payment monthly payments. Except in 2010 I will then own my car outright and have a Mortgage instead of rent. So I've got a lot of studying to do in the next few months to prepare. For the Tax Credit the sale has to close before 12/1/09 so I figure I'll have to enter escrow by the end of September. Which is perfect because my lease is up at my current apartment on 10/31/09. This is pretty exciting to me.

Tonight I went and saw, "The International" there is an EXCELLENT gun fight scene. But the rest of the movie was just okay, I already knew about debt being a yoke on society.

I'm also swapping my 32" TV for a 37" with integrated DVD this month too since they now cost the same.

I went and saw "Frost/Nixon" the movie about the Interview where Nixon admitted his guilt and apologized in so many words. I didn't know the story before I saw the movie so it was all new to me and it was very interesting.

The movie did an excellent job of subtly visually communicating the traits of Frost and Nixon. I love it when movies don't try to beat you over the head with the obvious and leave you to figure it out. "Children of Men" is another example of a movie that pulls this off well.

They contrasted Frost and Nixon very well, they both what to be famous and liked but for completely different reasons. Nixon wants fame to justify has place and as acknowledgment for his brilliance. Frost is an entrepreneurial playboy type who thrives on attention and the big Hollywood larger then life image.

By the end of the movie I felt a greater understanding for the narcissism that drove Nixon to believe he was above the law and the loathing of people in general that fed his narcissism.

The SuperBowl was a very good game this year. I think the Steelers earned their win but the Cardinals did not embarrass themselves. If Matt Lienart can't step up next year they'll be back to the playoffs.

I did my Taxes this weekend. I'm getting a big enough refund to pay for my ticket to Munich and do some more upgrades to my car and a detail job. Despite taking two months off last year I actually made more then the year before :) I've applied for a new airline visa I will use to buy my Munich ticket which will earn me another plane ticket to California.

I'm flying back to California in 3 weeks for my Mom's bday. One nice thing about this down economy is things are getting cheaper. I rented a nice car for the whole weekend in Stockton for $25 out the door! I'm looking forward to visiting.

I am still enjoying Volunteering at Next Step. Next week I am starting new position their as a finalizer.

I also got my GPS it's great, and even shows my progress as I move.

Work has been insanely busy, I was assigned a project to create a virtual private network replicating an 8 server application. It took 3 weeks but I got it done last night!

Well I was able to make the drive to Stockton for the holidays. I had a good time seeing everyone. I worked through new years basically forgot about it until it had passed.

Work is still going fine and I am still enjoying the impact I make here.

I have also gotten into a couple of websites recently, Facebook and Meetup. Facebook is a lot like Linkedin but for more social networking. So I'm working on connecting with old friends. Meetup is a great way to find groups with similar interests. So far I have joined a bookclub and gaming club.

The first book club assignment is "Three Cups of Tea" which is about what I have been saying since 2002 the way to win the "War on Terror" is to win hearts and minds to give the most destitute in the world hope for children by getting them healthcare.

I've still got my 8700 blackberry I've now added facebook to it. The latest version of googlemaps supports a bluetooth USB receiever so I have oredered one I am looking forward to having true GPS as opposed to triangulation.

I also have completed one shift of my new volunteer job at NextStep recycling refurbishing donated computers for schools and shelters. It was a lot more manual labor then I imagined and I have not done that kind of work in a long time. It was interesting to get back into PC building.

So I counted and I only posted seven times so far this year. I am going to work on improving that.

I went and saw "Milk" Sunday night. It was pretty good, I thought they did good job of not making light of his homosexuality and at the same time not beating you over the head with it. I really wish this movie had come out before the Prop 8 vote. They also did an excellent job of underscoring how Milk was a Martyr for the cause of Gay Civil Rights so his death was not the end of the movement. Odd connection, my Kindergarten teacher was Mrs. Dan White...

I also woke up to something for the first time this morning, three inches of snow on the ground. I'll upload pictures when I get my apartment finished (I still need a couch). Fortunately I live about a mile from the office otherwise I probably would not have gone in. Driving a rear wheel drive car through that much snow with no chains is not easy. I am thankful though I got to try it before trying to cross the pass in the snow. I am planning on heading down to Stockton for Xmas but if it's snowing I may not, an 8 hour drive is bad enough without adding snow.

Work so far is going well I am making contributions already. I had a great time Friday night after work. I went to a vendor xmas party and was out pretty late with the vendor my boss and his wife.

I also finally got all of the pieces to my bed together on Friday night. So now I'm enjoying sleeping on a memory foam bed, and so far it's been great. Tonight the low is 18 degrees!

10 days till 29... wow

Picking up where I left off... Finished rereading the "Song of Fire and Ice" series. Martin has recently announced the TV Pilot is going into production I'm really looking forward to it.

Lately I have been reading more Heinlein I haven't read anything of his I haven't liked yet.

Also been playing Wii. I still highly recommend it. In fact I returned my PS3.

Bree & Eric's wedding was great three days in good company at Lake Tahoe. A few weeks ago we went to Jim Gaffighan together. Jim put on a good show a lot of new material.

One of the things holding me back from posting is I bought LED taillights for Stranger and I have them installed. I also bought a hood scoop though and I didn't want to post till I had pictures. Already, the taillights are a big plus. I also bought new tires for a really good price with the live.com/ebay cash back offer.

Dating... Well I was dating someone really cool for a while. She really liked me for me, and I learned a lot from her. Ultimately, we were just too different but still a good experience.

Argent Software... I no longer work there. I was laid off on the 28th. They had already laid off a lot of people and I saw this coming. The Bonuses promised never materialized so I wasn't too upset when it happened. I got a lot of travel out of it too, Hong Kong, Seattle, and Austin Texas.

This all lead to Eugene Oregon. I live there now as of Friday night. A day after being laid off I found out one of my favorite former bosses was now working in Eugene. We got in touch and I found out his company was looking for a systems engineer so I applied. It took about a month to go through all the interviewing but I now have a good job that will keep me going through the recession. The cost of living is a lot cheaper than California so far I found a good 2br 1bath. Bought a 32" LCD TV and getting acquainted with HD.

In the political realm I was releaved to see Obama win. He has big expectations to meet...

While I was off in November I also hit the gym pretty hard. I discovered Elipticals are very easy on my knees and let me do some serious cardio. They have the same machines at my Apartment's Gym. I'm also about a mile from my new office. I start work there tomorrow.

Oh and I've renewed this domain through 2019...

So Hong Kong was Hot & Humid. It was also very productive, spending a week with my new boss was great I feel a lot more comfortable with him which is critical since I'll be primarily dealing with him over the company instant messenger. The training went well too by the second day he just had me help show examples of what he was talking about rather than answer questions since he told the group I knew the answers.

I did my first solo on-site visit this week and it went just fine. I have another this week I will be studying for tomorrow.

I am going to Seattle the last week of this month on business too. I'll take some pictures from the space needle.

Speaking of Pictures, I uploaded a new picture of me in Hong Kong. I also added a pictures page for Hong Kong.

I also added a new rant tonight I really think is pretty good. It's an exploration of Protests as individual therapy.

I've been re-reading the Song of Fire and Ice series this summer. I have also been seeing a lot of movies. Get Smart and Kungfu Panda were the funniest I have seen so far and would recommend them. Wanted was much better than I expected excellent action series. HellBoy 2 was also very good, if you liked Pan's Labrithyn you'd probably enjoy it.

I have been doing a lot of dating too. Nothing spectacular so far... I think I need change where I am looking there have been way to many giant * lately as in, she would be great except, she's unemployed, a full time gamer, dead end job, etc. Friendship is based on shared experience, so I need to figure out how to find people to share experience with or share.

Eric and Bree are getting married in a couple of weeks in Tahoe I am looking forward to that, I have never been to Tahoe. August 23rd the Hops in Humboldt brewfest is back and I'll be going with Eric and Adam again.

I also bought a Wii before leaving for Hong Kong and that has been a LOT of fun.

Yep, I know I picked the right company to work for now... They are sending me to Hong Kong at the end of the month for a week of trainging! I ended up taking a great sales engineer position with a leading enterprise multi-platform network monitoring software company. I've been working here a week now, the perks are even better than Capital! It seems like this job is well within my abilities I just need to do quite a bit of memorization of the products. Not sure if I'll finish my CCNA now since it's not really relevant to this position. Though I would still eventually like to get a PMP.

The last few weeks at Endsight were not pleasant, the last week my boss threated to fire me twice! Despite having already resigned the only thing that kept me there was not screwing my clients and co-workers. On top of that it was my best sales month ever at 100k!

Vacation was great I totally relaxed spent a few days up in Northern California seeing Eric and Adam. Eric is getting married next month, I found them an awesome wedding gift.

I went to Birmingham/Atlanta for a week with Mike and Sarah. It was a good week of enjoying southern cooking, Monkey ball, and the Georgia Aquarium.

This weekend I am going to see "Stranger". On a related note I finally got the DMV to approve personalized plates, Stranger is now "STRAN6R".

I am really looking forward to Hong Kong....

Well this will come as a surprise based on my last post, but I resigned from my job on Tuesday.

Stress was mounting to a ridiculous degree and they were still not allowing me to delegate to the help desk. Today they counter offered me and it finally got figured out.... Silly me I thought my job as a consultant was to maximize revenue. Actually according to them it is to document the crap out of the network and then sales will follow... My Method was stabilization, reasonable and critical documentation, make the sale then fill in less critical time consuming documentation as needed. In a more perfect world people who make less then me would fill in the gaps and handle user level issues. I have now been corrected I am supposed to be a one man show and damn the revenue once I hit a minimum. Fortunately, I already had two job offers and I will be accepting one tomorrow morning. At least I can leave with a clear conscious now that I know we fundamentally disagree on what my job was. I'm looking forward to a huge reduction in stress and increase in pay :) Plus an oppertunity to get back into enterprise technology.

So my last day will be May 15th. My new job starts June 2nd. In between I will be going to Alabama and Atlanta to see Mike. I'm also going to drive up to Eureka to see Adam for a few days.

Speaking of driving, Ford came back to me and offered me a $50 a month 7 year 100,000 mile warranty for Stranger so I've got that setup. I also paid off the last of my student loans. I'm hoping to have stranger paid off by the end of the year.

At the beginning of this month my old boss Lou was in Pleasanton and I had dinner with him. It was good to catch up with him and he helped give me some confidence in my job hunt.

I've seen a lot of movies since my last update. Persepolis the animated movie about an Iranian girl growing up in the midst of the revolution. The animation was excellent and I'll never look at a head scarf the same. Fight Club was playing at the SpeakEasy last night which I had never seen on the big screen so that was cool. I've also started rereading The Song of Fire & Ice.

I am making big progress on my CCNA should have that done by June 2nd.

My life has been consumed by work and looking for another job in the last few months. Looking forward to that changing :)

I had asian food for lunch today, my fortune was you will have a thrilling day...

Then I had my review right afterward and it was quite thrilling. It's a relief I will not have to worry seriously about them for a long time. Endsight did the right thing for me without having to fight which was a relief. I now have the highest recurring revenue among my group of engineers.

I've been on a couple more dates this month. Nothing special came out of either one. I consider myself a moral relativist because morality is determined by societal custom. Likewise it has occurred to me that standards of beauty are the same so all that should matter is what makes me happy.

I saw my niece last weekend she is smiling and interacting a bit now and is a lot more fun. I am going to Stockton for the Superbowl this weekend.

Obama is not my ideal candidate but he is the best of what is left.

I saw walk hard recently it was okay. Cloverfield was really unimpressive.
I went and saw "Blade Runner" Final cut, I liked this cut best of all of them.

Adam was down in San Jose for training and I met up with him for dinner it was good catching up with him.

I bought CCNA books so I plan to get that done within the next couple of months, since besides MCSE that is the other key cert to have and I have been doing more NOC work lately.

I've been 28 for 2 whole days. Speaking of days it's been a very good one for me. I have wrapped up fixing another client and performed some dicey installations successfully on several servers. I am now up to 11 clients total. I have another review and bonus next month I am really looking forward too.

I spent xmas with my immediate family. My sisters baby is doing fine, she is smiling and sitting up now. I think I'm going to spend new years with Eric & Bree in Santa Rosa.

The older I get the bigger my ego seems to get :P It's so irritating that most people have to do something stupid before they get smart about what is important in life. On the other hand, thinking things through and avoiding what I consider obvious mistakes makes me an odd ball. More and more it is also being clear that the simple ability to prioritize efficiently to make the most of time makes me some kind of amazing dynamo relative to other people... And really it comes easily to me and I am a person who really enjoys my leisure time AND being the best at things.

Recently I have seen Juno & Sweeny Todd. Juno was very funny the dialog is a little to witty for kids that age but I thought it was funny with a good twist. Sweeny Todd is just what you expect from Tim Burton & Johnny Depp and I was really impressed and enjoyed it. I really want to see I am Legend still.

Without any updates.

Well the biggest news I have been up to is I have now paid off all my credit card debt and in early February I will have all my debts paid except for stranger and my student loans at 1.6%.

My sister also had her Baby Girl. I'd never really been around infants, they don't really do anything. But my sister is doing well.

Work is still going well I am up to 9 clients now. Our Christmas Party was in a Luxury box during a warriors game. It was the best company xmas party I had been to great food, and a lot of fun without political BS.

I interviewed for an internet research volunteer organization, waiting to hear back on that.

Overall I have been spending a lot of time working and saving.

It has been a very busy last couple of months. I am up to 6 clients as of Thursday this week. Would be 7 but one of them can no longer afford us so I am losing them. Work is going well still though. I paid off one credit card last month and this month I will pay off my last one with my first bonus. For this reason I have decided to cancel my Cancun trip. If I save, I should be able to pay off my only private student loan with my next bonus and tax return in January leaving me with only my Car and 1.6% student loans as my only debts :) I still plan to go on a 2 week trip in June to Europe if I can swing it with work. After that I will start saving to pay off my car.

I joined Toastmasters a couple of weeks ago finally. They meet 11am Sundays a few miles away and it is a decent size group. I have my first speech next week, I wrote this afternoon and will practice this week.

My sister's "IT" should be born this week because they are going to induce.

Things are still going well with my roommates, one of my roommates now has a kitten.

I also finally visited the SpeakEasy theater in Oakland. You can order beer and food and watch a movie! I saw King of Kong and Shoot'em up there. Both very funny.

I also saw the new Resident Evil in my opinion the best of the series so far except for the garder belt :P

So I went to "Hops in Humboldt" this weekend a local brewery festival. Spent the day getting very nicely toasted with Adam and Eric. We had an awesome time.

Work is going very well still. I am up to 4 clients now and everyone is still giving me high praise.

I have been doing some blind dating in the last month. I have learned a ton from that. I think I have really found my center and learned a lot about what I am looking for. This was the first time for me that I have gone out with someone before I knew definitively if I liked them. Probably needles to say none of them have been amazing, but I have been having a good time meeting new interesting people.

Been seeing a lot of movies as usual the most notable was "SuperBad". Most vulgar I may have ever seen but super funny, maybe the funniest this summer.

I'm also trying to decide where to take my Annual Thanksgiving weekend trip. Right now Cancun is my top pick.

I just saw Sicko, it is a movie I recommend for every American. It is a gut punch to the American Ideal of selfishness, he brings all the pieces together wonderfully and there was not a dry eye in the theater.

So far so good in Berkeley. I really like my new job, it has given me a huge confidence boost in my Server engineering skills since I am working on my own. My boss and coworkers have also been really cool. The perks have been decent so far too. I maybe taking on my second client this week. My house mates have been cool so far too.

I also met up with my friend Josh who lives in Berkeley I had not seen in 5 years. We seem to still have a lot in common so I look forward to hanging out with him. He also let me know the White Stripes are playing at the Greek bowl at the end of September so I am trying to get a bunch of people together to see it.

I'm updating from the Sea Bean coffee shop in Seward Alaska, the most inland Ice free port in Alaska. I started this trip in Anchorage Saturday. It costs as much to fly to Alaska as Europe, but it is only a 4 hour flight. I had a lay over in Seattle weird airport since you can't see the city from the airport the way you usually can. Arrived at my hotel about 10 pm. The Airport is only open at night, about 8pm-2am so all flights are red-eyes. Sunday I did about 5 miles of hiking and went to the zoo I got a lot of good pictures I will post when I get back to California. I went to a Turkish restaurant that was pretty good for dinner. Alaska is beautiful country but as expensive as California.

Yesterday, I took a train into Seward and went on a day cruise, I saw seals, dolphins and Glaciers. Glaciers are amazing looking and according to the park service are not shrinking here in Alaska in the last 100 years. It takes 100' of snow to make a foot Glacier ice. The food on the ship was some of the best prime rib and salmon I have ever had. Today I walked all over the tiny town of Seward and picked up some gifts and my communist party membership card from Russia. Before I get back on the train tonight I am going to a Bistro for dinner. I still have not seen any whales or salmon so I am hoping to see them on my Cruise in Whitter tomorrow.

Friday last week was my last day at Capital. It marked 26 months with them. Jody took us out to dinner and we hung out at Kevin's afterward. Everyone has found a better job and I think everyone is going to be fine. So it was more of a celebration of leaving the company. I start my new job at Endsight next monday and I am looking forward to it.

I am also looking forward to seeing "Sicko" & "Live free or Die Hard" when I get back to California.

I got my hands on Iggy Thump last week the new White Stripes album, musically best I have heard this year. Year Zero by NIN still is my favorite though due to the message and lyrics. I like the new Manson album but I am disappointed. Manson to me was the embodiment of the religious rights inner-child. His latest album is a personal piece about his love experience, and while it is catchy and a nice listen so is a lot of pop music. Manson has always tried to be an objectivist rather then political, while challenging society as an Icon Iconoclast. His latest album does not carry this tradition. Trent Reznor on the other hand has suddenly surged into Activism with his latest album predicting the beginning of the end of human society in the next 25 years, at the hands of the American Theocratic Empire that is destroying the world and the environment. If you haven't heard it yet, you need to.

I left for Raleigh on Tuesday night as planned. I met up with Mike, Sarah and Todd for Dinner at the Angus Barn/Wild Turkey Saloon. We had a great time over great food and drink. The amount of drink disabled me till noon the next day. At that point we left for the wedding rehearsal. I always thought weddings just happened there was a lot more to it then just showing up. The rehearsal dinner was held at "Tylers Tap Room" with a hosted bar. So I had a great time with Ryan trying to drink each other under the table while enjoying NC style pork. After that us kids headed over to another Brewery and had several beers and rounds. Once again we didn't really get moving till noon again. Sarah and Mike did a great job planning evSoerything so it was a mellow day, no drama. It did rain out their outdoor ceremony so the ceremony ended up being held at our hotel. The reception, food, and drinking was great. A lo of people flew out from California that I had not seen in years and we all had a great time. I am just now starting to get over my hangover. I hadn't drunk this much since living in England. I have a lot of good pictures. I'll upload when I get from my next vacation.

So this is my last week with Capital. It should be fairly light, and then after the going away party Friday, I will be leaving for Norcal. Because my flight to Alaska leaves at 3pm from SFO on Saturday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070529/ap_on_re_us/cindy_sheehan

Dear Cindy,

Thank you for fighting the good fight for as long as you did. I am writing to say I completely understand why you are retiring from the movement. I went through the same thing a few years ago in Grad school. A life of public service is a very hard thing when you are not being wined and dined by lobbyists. A life of public service is one of self-sacrifice for what you believe to be the greater good of society.

The problem I realized and you seem to have come to the same conclusion is that no matter how much you give there will always be those waiting in the wings to undo everything you worked so hard to change.

The Democratic party is nothing about apologists, apologizing for being liberals because at the end of the day they are owned by the same corporate interests that run the republican agenda.

At least the Republicans own up to their agenda and give their base what they thrive off of, Hate & Fear.

What does the Democratic base get? Nothing but false hope and promises that one day when the time is right we will honor what you put us in office to do. Until then, you need to be patient and wave your flags for us and not say anything mean about our dirty business as usual.

Ultimately it is just disgusting and like you I don't see a way out. The 2 party system here in America is too cemented in place for now.

I extend my deepest sympathy for your son and thank you for sharing your loss with the rest of us. My heart hurts every time I hear a personal story behind the death of an American service men. I just wish the rest of the public would wake up and see the lives of all these young people with bright potentials is in no way worth whatever rationalization of the week there is for the War in Iraq. I hope they figure it out before we invade Iran and more brave young people have to die for what?

I hope you can still find some peace,

Art Jannicelli

So my new company end-sight.com has set my start date for July 9th. I finally had an opportunity to talk with my new boss and I am very excited about my first client and have been studying for it.

Landam is laying us all off on June 30th. So rather than sit around bored in Berkeley for a week I decided to take another trip. So I thought to myself where can I go by myself without terrible crowds and being too hot on the week of 4th of July. I decided on Alaska on June 30th I am flying into Anchorage and spending a day there. The Next day I am going to Seward to go on a Whale/Glacier cruise for a couple of days. Then I'll be going to Whitter for the 4th of July for a Prince William Sound wildlife cruise and they have an annual BBQ celebration in this tiny town with fireworks. I am then taking a Red eye back to California on Friday July 6th. I'm going to take loads of pictures as usual to post here. I am really looking forward to this trip. I also will have lots of pictures from Mike's Wedding in N. Carolina I'll be heading out for that on June 19th.

I get to work remotely till probably Tuesday June 5th. I had start playing WOW again a week ago, but as usual it dawned on me that devoting so much time to a game is silly. Without any new certs to study I have decided I am going to try getting back into writing. I have a couple of ideas for truth stranger then fiction funny short stories I am going to try to write up to start off with. I really love the way Sci-fi shares philosophy with people who don't take philosophy classes. I am just not confident in my ability to create natural conversation. We'll see how this goes...

http://news.com.com/2100-1028_3-6186193.html

This is purely extortion...

I call bullshite:

"If that doesn't happen, other taxes may zoom upward instead, warned Sen. Michael Enzi, a Wyoming Republican, at a Senate hearing on Wednesday. "Are we implicitly blessing a situation where states are forced to raise other taxes, such as income or property taxes, to offset the growing loss of sales tax revenue?" Enzi said. "I want to avoid that."

Excuse me, did anyone else notice the skyrocketing of home value in the last few years? Oh you did, well that translated into billions more in property tax revenue since homes are taxed on their value.

IF any taxes are imposed on the internet they should be for one purpose alone, to create nationwide free broadband access and to protect the Internet from malicious attack. I'd pay for that, but the internet tax should not be used for general fund.

It's also unworkable to force every etailer to give sales tax to every state as the article says it's just not feasible. Plus we already have to pay shipping, not paying tax evens that cost out.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/2007/05/gop_candidates_.html#comments

This story is shocking in itself, the Bush Administration is going headlong into war with Iran. Not only have they been having the CIA attempt to destabilize the Iranian government they have moved 3 aircraft carrier fleets into the gulf and as of today are playing war games landing marines miles from the Iranian border in Kuwait... Anyone else notice the Iranian's are just playing tit-for-tat in meddling in Iraq?

What is even more amazing is the comments on this story. Many FOX news disciples are calling for charges of Treason be brought against ABC for reporting a story that was checked by the White House and CIA. Worse, there is no legal authorization from congress allowing acts of war to be committed against Iran. ABC was 100% justified in running this story even without asking the White House and CIA!

Then you see all these Republicans parroting Right wing talk radio that Valerie Plame was not "covert" so she was not outed. Way to split hairs, CIA people are not always out in the field and a lot of them like her work incognito as agents by running important American interests as basically sleepers for the CIA.

Lastly, I am sick of hearing that this country is split between the far left and right in congress! WRONG! There is no far left in congress except maybe Dennis. The far left are people like me who stand for Peace and Social Justice. The current Democratic party is right of center and are so because they are hooked on corporate money the same as Republicans. There is only one party in America Republican and Republican-lite (democrats). The DNC does not represent the left, they represent the do nothing center-right. If anything what this country needs is a charismatic radical leader to remind them the left is in their best interests and the right is just exploiting them.

The more successful I get the easier it gets to see how the rich are so disconnected from the rest of society. It's easier to blame the victim and the different then confront your own mistakes and learn from them. I'd like to think I am different because I work towards solutions rather then blaming.

7 weeks left in Socal. The roommate situation is still good. In fact I am fairly certain I am going to look for another roommate situation in Berkeley. Yep I have a great job offer in Berkeley. I officially start on 7/1/07. The pay is very fair, and the culture is very similar to Capital and they offer a lot of training including an MBA program. So I am releaved to be done with my job hunt. Not only does this company look great but Berkeley looks like an ideal place for me, young town with lots of liberal activism. The company has invited me to company Go-Kart races on 6/15/07.

Work has been extremely busy with long hours. But we are trying to turn things over by June 1. So we won't have to work out of the office at all hopefully in June we'll just telecommute.

I saw 28 days later this week, and after seeing that excellent movie I am really looking forward to seeing 28 weeks later this weekend. There are a lot of good movies due out this month.

So now my emphasis will be changing to finding a room to rent in the next 7 weeks. I have gone to one open house. The people were cool the room wasn't that great though.

Yep took and passed my last test today. I am officially an MCSE with Exchange and SMS 2003 specialization. A huge relief to finish those 9 exams. Although I am starting to consider taking the Citrix CCA exam.

My company laptop motherboard just died. So I will be without a laptop for at least 1 week. Figures since it only had to last another 10 weeks before the company would take it from and most likely never use it again. Could have been worse though, the warranty was going to expire in 3 weeks.

I saw "Hot Fuzz" Tonight. Great movie very very funny.

I have moved in as a roommate to a new place in Irvine. I have turned over my keys to my old place so I am hoping it gets rented soon. I ended up having to move out inside a week, because I got into a dispute with my old landlord over when I gave notice.

So now I have just 10 weeks left in Socal. I have started looking for work and I have a couple of interviews next Friday. My MCSE is making me a hot item. So it looks like I have turned a corner as an IT professional and may not have to difficult a time finding work in the future.

I just went and watched Grindhouse tonight. WOW! What a movie, Tarantino & Rodriguez at their best. Planet Terror was a classic gore Zombie movie, great dialogue, and fairly original and Rose McGowan is HOT. PEOPLE THIS IS A DOUBLE FEATURE a good part of the audience left after the first movie and did not come back for the second feature "Death Proof". The intermission had a hilarious slasher movie called "Machete" and another called "Thanksgiving" so stick around to watch them. Death Proof was also really good, I thought it was pretty unexpected, I really liked the ending too. Both movies were pretty different from what their trailers had suggested. You will want to see these movies sooner rather then later because there were not that many people there so they may not be in Theaters long. I hope this isn't the end of double features $8.50 for 200 minutes of great cinema is a bargain.

I passed my 293 exam. I have finished reading the book for 294, and I plan to study and review this weekend and hopefully take the exam Tuesday morning at the latest and then I will be all done wooh.

I had a great time in Stockton. My Sister is pregnant! My Brother in law got a new great job. So I took them out to Ruth Chris Steak House to celebrate. the food was great about $50 a head, but everyone agreed it was money well spent. Then we went to Tory's wedding she looked beautiful and I was glad to see her wedding and meet her husband finnally.

I also put a deposit down on a room to rent for a couple of months since my lease runs out on 4/28. The complex has tons of great features, and it is fully furnished so I am going to sell off everything that won't fit into stranger. It was hard to find a place for a good price for just 2 months and was okay with me working from home at least 3 days a week. Another thing I like about this place is there is a huge pool right outside.

In the last month I have been trying to get more healthy. I have started jogging. I am also eating fruit, yougurt, and cottage cheese as snacks. I eat one meal a day either at work or I just have rice with chicken/Fish at home.

I just got my taxes done too today. Ended up owing $600 thanks to my options cash out last year when capital was purchased. If not for my student loan interest and moving deductions it would have been a lot worse.

Now I need to get motivated to clean up my place so I can put my stuff on craigslist for sale. On top of my studying and jogging. At least I have a few weeks to get it done. I also need to get the place cleaned out of my stuff so I can hire cleaners to come into to clean the place and shampoo the rugs. I only have a $300 deposit so I need to be sure everything is as perfect as possible.

I also started reading another great book, "Android's Dream" very funny sci-fi. The same author has another book coming out on the 15th :) NIN has a new album coming out on the same day that I love the singles for. Manson's album is slated for Late May at this point.

It's going to be a busy month, but lots of good things happening. Oh, and we have been notified we will be terminated on 7/1/07 so I won't have to quit and now I can get unemployment if I haven't found a job by then. However, I have already started looking, so hopefully I will find something good in nocal before then.

For the last 7 years I have avoided the topics of religion and faith except in a very superficial sense on this site. Although, for those who know me in reality they know that this is a very important topic to me. I was raised roman catholic so religion is a very controversial issue in my family.

I've known I was an Atheist for almost half of my life now. At first I was probably attracted to it because of my tendency to distrust authority and tradition. It became hardened as I lost faith in mankind and the leaders of men who claimed to do God's work when all they really did was preach hate, racism, militarism, nationalism, and supremacy of their own religion. Manson, sums it up with, "I never really hated one true God, but the God of the people I hated".

Since moving back from England though, my sister married into a Baptist Family of really good people. I have also become very good friends with a Mormon. These are good people to their core's and I never expected to respect and trust people so full of Faith. In fact, when it comes down to it, we have a lot of the same goals and hopes for humanity, we just have different motivation for wanting them.

This inspired me to think about what actually makes us so different and I determined it comes down to Faith. Simply, I have none, people of Faith speak of feeling the supernatural and of their love and trust in humanity. I simply do not have either. I have learned to depend on myself. When I need something I set a goal and I take care of it myself. I do not need to involve a higher power.

With this established, I started thinking about what caused this divide where 90% of the population has some kind of Faith, and where so few have none. I started by thinking about the phrase, "Our Father's our are models for God". However the more I considered it the more I realized it wasn't just one person, I admittedly have a very low opinion of people in general. One of the tenants I live by is, "Expect nothing and you will never be disappointed" Teddy Roosevelt. Ultimately what I came up with is Faith is an expression of trust in mankind and lacking that, I have no Faith which is what the new rant I posted, "On Faith" is all about.

Back to the usual, I have finished reading and practicing for the 293 exam and have started working on study guides my goal is to take the test Thursday morning, after that I will have just one more to go.

This weekend I am going to Stockton, I am looking forward to it, Tory is getting married.

I saw Pan's Labyrinth. Yes it is as wonderful as everyone says it is, go see it. The story and the effects were great, and I liked the theme of confronting Fascism.

I just added a new rant for the first time in a long time, "Jesus Camp Review". That movie was very hard for me to watch.

I also so "Nomad" earlier this week about Khazackstan's Nomadic history. Weak Cliched movie, and they take credit for Genghis Khan... I was not impressed.

My Phoenix trip for next week has been postponed a month so I have started working on exam 293.

The motherboard I bought for my new server arrived DOA. So no new server till I get the RMA taken care of.

Yep, I passed 291. I way over studied for it. I also passed the SMS test today. So I am officially down to 293 & 294 to become a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer with exchange and SMS specialization. I am very excited and it kind of feels unreal to be at this point. I still plan to finish these last two tests by 4/28.

I have been meaning to update for a couple of weeks, but every time I was ready something would come up that made me want to wait so I could add it to the update.

My other big news is there is a very good chance that the company that bought Capital is close to making me an offer to come work for them in Norcal, specifically Martinez. I have been told me three different sources this is in the works. I am not enthusiastic about moving to Martinez, but if they make me a fair offer I will probably go. I just hope they can give me an offer before I have to sign a lease in Irvine. I am going to start looking for a room in Irvine again if I have not heard anything by the first week of April.

I have also decided to liquidate my stuff again. It occurred to me that replacing everything I own minus clothes, books, and computer gear would cost far less then renting a moving truck again. So in April I am going start selling off my stuff. I'm going to do it in two lots, saving essentials like my Bed and TV for last. I'll then hopefully be moved into the next place I can live so I can hire professional cleaners off of Craigslist to clean my place for me and shampoo my carpets. My current complex has a nasty reputation for screwing people on move out and since I only put $300 for a deposit I am going to be careful not to owe them anything over that. It has sunk in as well, I bought boxes last night.

I also broke down and spent the $89 to build myself a new server out of spare parts that should be Longhorn 64 compatible. So far it's a AMD3200, Gig of Ram, 250GB HD. Fry's had a free with mail in rebate sale on computer cases. I am hoping to get rid of the computer I built in 2000 for about $150 on CL. I am going to finish putting the computer together after I finish this update.

I saw "The Host" today a Korean Monster movie that got rave reviews. I was not impressed, it was okay, but not nearly as funny or scary as it was reviewed. I don't think it was a bad idea for them to release it the same weekend as 300.

300 on the other hand was awesome, the effects were outstanding. I liked the story, but I am sucker for anything that underscores humanities innate violent and sexual core. The only failing I thought it had were, the sex scene at the beginning between the King & Queen was unnecessary, and overall they did a poor job of defining how free blood thirsty killers are better then tyrant blood thirsty killers since that is all a matter of perspective.

With all the furor over Iran taking offense some people might think it odd I liked the movie. Bottom line, most American's are incapable of distinguishing Persia and Iran. The people who do know, recognize 300 as a work of fiction. Most American's probably thought Persia was a legend or make believe empire. In fact if it weren't in the news they definitely would never know better.

Stranger spent almost a week at Ford this time, however after bringing in actual Ford engineers I have not heard the sound since. I will know for certain after I return from my Norcal trip a the end of the month.

A friend of mine gave me 4 pre-release tracks off of the new NIN album they are GREAT, I am looking forward to a political album from Reznor. Manson has tentatively set his release date for June.

Oh and I gotta just say this season of Rome was spectacular! I really liked the finally, I like where the series is heading and I can't wait till next season.

That's it for now, I am going to start working on building my new server.

Last week I passed 70-297 after taking the week long Microsoft training course at Quick start. I was very impressed with Quick Start I learned a lot from the class the computer equipment was satisfactory and the complimentary breakfasts and one lunch were nice.

I have started studying for 70-291 when I have passed that I will be MCSA w/messaging. If I pass 2 more after that I will be MCSE. I am also going to take the SMS test. I plan to have all of this done by 4/28.

Why 4/28? Well that is when I will have to take down my home lab. I got my lease renewal today and these bastards want over $350 more a month to go month to month. Since my work contract is unpredictable and will not last long enough for a lease, I will be moving out on 4/28. At this point I plan to rent a room, because it will be a lot cheaper and it will make it easier to move back to Norcal ASAP once I am down with work here in Socal. So now I have to start thinking about what to sell, Trash, keep, or store. At the moment it looks like I will be working for capital until the bonus pay out of 6/30/07 and there are strong indicators they want me to stay past that. However, one of my rules is I don't work for free, with all of my certs done I should be able to land a 20% raise by changing jobs in Nocal on top of the cost of living decrease. So to keep me down here I'd need another large bonus and salary bump. It will take a whole lot more once my VP leaves.

So between Cert's and moving I am going to be very busy the next few months.

Eric is coming down for the weekend, I am looking forward to seeing him. Last time I saw him was at the Tenacious D show in November.

Stranger is also starting to make a growling noise from the rear axle again... Not sure what can do on the 3rd attempt...

I have now passed MS 07-284 & 70-285 the exams were on Exchange Administration and Implementation. I passed both with a 910. I have been talking with other people taking these exams and I'm told I am doing it faster then most people.

Capital has paid for me to go to classroom training for my next exam 70-297 Active Directory and Network Infrastructure Implementation. Hopefully I will take that exam the week after. Assuming I pass that will leave just 3 exams till I will be a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer with Messaging specialization. This should open a lot of doors for me, I will no longer have to skip jobs that require an MCSE as a Prereq.

It also occured to me last night I have only 90 days on my lease left. I can't believe it has been 9 months since I moved here. I will be moving to another place when my lease runs out on May 1st, it is just not worth the $1333 a month.

With work winding down my focus is on finishing my MCSE testing. I am starting to itch to move back to Norcal.

Finally some new movies are coming out this month I am looking forward to seeing.

...

Just got back from seeing Chlidren of Men For once the critics were right. That movie was outstanding. The filming and symbolism were excellent, the story was told subtly and kept moving. The action was suspenseful and moving, and served the plot. The people who hate this movie, are missing the point that it is a story that is trying to make a point about the human condition while on a quest. The reason why women are infertile is just a motivating factor.

I passed the Windows XP test for MCSA. I have started studying for the Exchange portion, I plan to take that late next week.

I just got back from another vacation. This time I drove to Norcal for the Holidays. It is about a 5.5 hour drive from Lake Forest to Stockton, CA. I didn't hit traffic coming or going. I left on the 21st and returned on the 1st. Stranger's rear axle is getting ever louder. However I probably will not be able to put it into the dealership until the last week of the month.

I spent Xmas weekend with my immediate family and had a good time catching up. I also had flown in on the weekend of the 18th to Surprise my Mom for her Xmas party.

Tuesday Night I went to Dinner with Bill and Mike, they got me the best gifts this year. It was good to see both of them; I had last seen them when we went to Europe together in June. It was good to hear from Bill that his next movie "Blood Gulch" is on schedule and they should be filming in June, so far I am on board for the website and being one of Bill's Gophers. Bill will be producing and directing this one. I am officially a "Technical Consultant"

On Wednesday I went to a Stockton Thunder Hockey Game with Mike and Chris.
Hockey is much better close up in person.

Thursday night I went met up with Natalie in Sacramento who I had not seen in about 18months. It was great catching up with her, she is flying out on the 23rd so I'll see her again which will be fun.

Friday I got to see Tory at the poorly planned surprise party for me. My Family does not know any of my post-high school friends other then Tory. But we had a great time with the people who were there and it is always good to see Tory.

Saturday I got wrapped up in a great book, "Old Man's War". Basically, in this Universe when Earthlings hit 75 they become legally dead and join the military to defends the Human inter-galactic empire in return for a cloned body to become young again. It was a very entertaining book with a fresh perspective on Sc-fi warfare since the soldiers had the minds of 75 year olds and the bodies of 19 year olds. At only 300 pages it is a good light read. I am also working on "Slaughter House 5".

Sunday night was New Years, Cece and I went to the Rio City Cafe in Old sac to celebrate. We were able to enjoy a nice meal and see some fireworks warm and indoors without crowds. My xmas gifts were also a hit.

So it has been a very busy last few weeks but a lot of fun.

Oh and a big WOOH! On December 22nd I became a Microsoft Certified Professional when I passed my first Cert test on Server 2k3 (Covering 700 pages of reference material and requiring demonstration of knowledge via simulation). I am now 66% done preparing for the XP test, which I hope to take by early next week. Then I will start on the Exchange test which should not be too tough. Then I will start cracking on the really challenging 291 exam. These tests take up so much of my time, but I have decided they will be my emphasis for the New Year. I really over studied for the first test I took, but passing easily has given me the confidence and motivation to work towards finishing the other 6 tests.

I've also seen a couple of bad movies, 'Babel' and 'Good Sheppard' both are critically acclaimed both are dull and slow. I got the point but you could get to it faster and with more effect on the audience.

So hopefully next time I update I will have two more cert tests done.

I have also started looking into where I will work in Norcal once I am bought out of my contract here, any time between tomorrow and October. I am really going to try to not settle on the first offer I get and prepare myself as much as possible by getting certified.

You never realize how much you need a vacation till you get one.

Seeing Adam and Eric last weekend really loosened me up. We had a great time at the Tenacious D show. 16oz beers were $7 which I pointed out was cheap for SF. The show itself was good, they stayed true to the album. I will see the movie this weekend. The album out is just the movie soundtrack and I was not all that impressed. Other then that I spent a lot of time with my Sister and Brother in law that weekend and was pleased they also like Sushi and there is a good Sushi place in Stockton.

Then I had a short week at work and set out for my Arizona trip. If you ever decide to go to Hoover dam, be advised there is a lot of slow traffic which would be maddening on a motorcycle. The Dam itself was interesting and I got some good pictures I will post when I have the time.

After the Dam I took the 40 to Williams. What a disappointment a very small town. In the future I will stay at the railroad museum hotel or the Grand Canyon itself. I did get to use an old fashioned gas pump for the first time when I was there. The Grand Canyon Resort Hotel lacked a working TV or Internet and no alarm clock in the room on top of thin walls allowing neighbors to wake me up constantly.

When I woke up my car was covered in ice and it took several minutes to defrost. Then I headed to the train museum to take the train to the Grand Canyon. I decided against that when I was informed it was a $75 trip by train. So I drove "Stranger" my Mustang to the Grand Canyon. Along the way I stopped at an indian trading post and bought some great gifts.

The Grand Canyon itself was amazing, pictures and movies do not capture the size. I drove all around the rim and got lots of pictures. It was $25 per car to get into the park, I would recommend getting a pass in one of the shops on the way to save yourself the time of buying one at the park gate.

After the Canyon I drove to Phoenix and stayed at the 3 Palms resort which was really nice, I recommend it for the price. Sunday I met up with Jarret, Oaks, and Anthony to watch Football at 'tilted kilts' basically a Hooters sports bar. It was great seeing them and catching up with them.

After that I made the 7 hour drive back to Lake Forest, I only hit 45 minutes traffic which was shocking for a holiday weekend.

The only other downer is Stranger is making grinding noises from the rear axle again, so back to the dealership...

Now I am going to get busy with studying for my MCSA and I want to take the first test in the first or second week of December.

Wooh! Lots of Vacation. This weekend the company is flying me up to Nocal for a Project. So I am looking forward to seeing my friends up there again. Monday night I am going to see Tenacious D in San Francisco with Adam and Eric. I am going to pick up the new album when I get off work this afternoon.

I am planning on going to my Aunt's for Thanksgiving in Temecula which will be good.

The day after Thanksgiving, I am going to go on a road trip to Hoover dam, and then drive out to Flagstaff, AZ, Saturday I will be going to the Grand Canyon. Sunday I am going to drive into Phoenix to see my former coworkers which will be fun. Then back to Lake Forest. I'm kinda dreading the traffic, it was bad last year on the way back from Death Valley.

I saw stranger then fiction last weekend. The movie hit close to home and was Ferrell's transition to Drama. I enjoyed the movie, but I felt like I was leading the laughter in the theater.

I saw Borat the week before. It was very funny, there are a few extremely graphic minutes that were almost to much for me, but overall it was very good.

OT is picking up at work which is nice, my WOW toon is up to 46.

disappointed Vista will not be out till 11/30.

So we have a tenative retention agreement through June 07 at my company so that is a great relief. In June I will start looking for work in Norcal (East Bay, Silicon Valley, Sacramento, and Stockton).

The guys at work introduced me to Youtube.com so I am now keeping up with the Daily show and South Park for free. However, the latest South Park episode on Warcraft, got me to reinstall it and give it another shot... And I am hooked, at this moment I have a lvl 35 Warlock. Last time I played the server I was on was over crowded. Seems the crowds have calmed down and I am on a brand new server. So I am lvling with everyone else. Warcraft is EQ perfected.

I went and saw the 3d Nightmare before xmas this last weekend, the 3D glasses they used worked with my glasses. I had never seen the movie on the big screen and I really enjoyed the new details. Marilyn Manson is covering 'This is Halloween" on Leno on Halloween night I am looking forward to it.

I am still working on my MCSA. A lot of good movies are coming out in the next few weeks I am looking forward too.

I bought a Processor (FX 3GHZ OC)/Hard Drive (SATA2) Combo upgrade this week in preperation for installing Windows Vista next week. I am using IE7 and I really like the tabbed browsing, although it takes some getting used too.

Well in the last month I have gone on a lot of interviews. I had no trouble getting parralell offers. However, I was unable to land anything that would have been better then what I do now at capital.

Yesterday, Capital formerly was acquired by Landam. My Director has really pushed us hard to stay and said he will do everything he can to make it worth our while. So I have decided to stay with Landam and work on my MCSA. Unless, I find an outstanding oppertunity I will be most likely be moving back to Norcal next summer. In June of 07, I am going to spend a week in Washington DC after going to Mike's wedding. So after that I will be looking hard for work in Norcal probably. My Director thinks we should all still be employed by then. I hope to have my MSA done long before then. I built myself a Lab DC yesterday and so far so good.

Labor Day Weekend I flew out to Stockton. I had a great time, got a hair cut, saw my family, Tory and Bill.

I saw a great movie this weekend Idiocracy. It is a Mike Judge movie and he did a great job predicting the planets future and the moral delima of social responsibility. I highly recommend it for a laugh and a thought.

I also saw, This Film is not yet rated. It is a really good expose on the film ratings board. However as a movie, I did not like how it flowed or ended.

I bought the latest Disturbed album, 10,000 fists, this album did not dissapoint if you like Guitar driven metal you will enjoy it.

That is all I can think of for now.

~ Art

So the huge news is my job stability has gone from a 12-24 month window till lay offs to a 1-9 month window! Yikes! So I am working extremely hard to find a job in Orange county within in my pay range before the start of Quarter 4 on October 1 and hiring freezes.

I had my first interview Friday that I thought went pretty well, but I am competing with 10+ canidates so I can't be sure of what I am up against. It is a mid level engineer position at a nationwide consulting firm. The office itself was impressive similar culture to CTG just more casual. I think I could learn a lot there and so far they have been the most receptive to my salary expectations.

I have 2 other strong job leads. One is a position of last resort. While it pays okay it will not be much of a challenge and skill development will be up to me. However the other opportunity is outstanding, International consulting, and training. However the pay will probably just hit my minimums. The perks though are so tremendous I'd be an idiot to turn it down. Another IT manager used to work there, and gave my resume with a sterling recommendation to one of their EVP's and introduced me to the guy. Hopefully I will hear from them soon.

Fortunately CTG, has been very up front about the looming layoffs and have been understanding with accommodating our needs to look for work.

What motivated me to write an entry tonight were two articles that have been circulating in the Tech news that have been irritating me. First, there is a huge thing being made right now about PS3 issues. Specifically, it costs to much, it is too complex and therefore it will have a small customer base and as a result of that developers are pulling out of making games for it. I'll start by saying I am not a console gamer. I am so out of it with console gaming I thought no one in their right mind would pay $400+ for an xbox 360. Yet they were sold out on launch date. So now we have the Game media telling us, gamers won't pay $600 for the new PS3. I think they are dead wrong. The kind of people that bought the first 1 million 360's (some paying a $1,000 for package deals), were not buying the latest XBOX, they were buying the bragging rights and prestige to owning something in high demand that cost a lot. Console have reached a point where they are luxury commodities. As long as a shortage can be guaranteed and the same million people will get in line again and drop $600 or more to say they had it first. There are around 275 million Americans, even if just the top 1% of house holds needs to purchase the console it is a smash hit.

The second thing that I found irritating was Symantec's white paper today on Vista vunerabilities. In short the paper says, if malware is disguised as needing to run with legacy permissions or is mis-identified as an admin level process it will be able to compromise vista at a root level, UH! DUH! This article, followed PR this week from the Black Hat conference giving credit to Microsoft for doing a good job with Vista Security. To me this is Symantec flat out trying to justify it's own survival. Granted Microsoft has taken a shot at Symantec with it's own Anti-malware solution, however if Symantec made the best product like NOD32 they would have no need to fear. Microsoft is just beginning to delve into Malware prevention and removal, with the time and resources at Symantec's disposal it is laughable how much better NOD32 is compared to Symantec, Mcafee, and Trend Micro whose revenues and experience should allow them to create a superior product to Microsoft or NOD32.

In the last month, I have been reading a lot more then gaming. I've read Fallen Dragon by Peter F. Hamilton. It is a love story hidden below a great Sc-fi mercenary story. I really liked the ending and enjoyed classic Hamilton mercenary action :)

I also finished reading Fall of Hyperion. Interesting story, the writing in Hyperion was better. This one had more of a plot, I just couldn't get into it much.

I am now reading a collection of true stories written by Chuck Palahniuk. If you are a writer you should pick this up it is very insightful. So far he is arguing that the contemporary drive to succeed is a sort of drive to be able to choose who you socialize with. Self-Destruction on the other hand is a reaction to the loneliness the success builds and the self-destruction devolves you back into the mob.

I added another set of pictures, this time of my Death Valley trip from last thanksgiving. One of these days I will get around to uploading my new Europe trip. I was starting to get short on web space, but I just saw doteasy.com who hosts my domain is now giving me 100MB of space wooh. Also on the travel front, I will be going to Washington DC for the first time at the end of next June after Mike leaves for his honey moon.

I also went to Comicon again this year. For me, it is now officially too big. The highlight of the show was seeing the Boondocks Panel. 2 years ago when I went to that panel maybe 70 people there. This time at least a thousand! The good news is production has already started on Season 2 and I now own season 1:) On a side note I also got the new Chappelle season, I can see what Dave was upset about, it was not as good as season 2 and it really was doing more to enforce stereotypes then make fun of them.

Friday I saw the boondocks panel and did some shopping. Saturday was a zoo, in short due to the crowds and stupidity of security in and out of the convention I did not get to meet Kevin Smith or see the Simpsons movie preview. However, I did get to see Rose Mcgowan, Rosario Dawson, and Quinton Terrintino for the first time.

As usual I have also been seeing at least one movie a weekend.

Saw a pre-release of "A scanner Darkly", a little predictable, but I enjoyed it overall. If you are into stoner humor you will really like it.

Also saw Clerks 2. I have seen all of the View Askew movies. This one really picks up after Clerks 1. I enjoyed it a lot, it was very funny and I could empathize with what Smith was saying to our generation. What I got out of it was, don't do what you are "supposed" to do, do what will make you happy. The other theme was don't underestimate the less then beautiful people.

I saw 'The Ballad of Ricky Bobby tonight' holy crap, that movie was FUNNY! I did not stop launching the whole time. Damn the critics see this movie. Although, I will admit to watching Nascar occasionally so that could have been part of it... In other sports news I have completed my draft picks for Fantasy Football.

I think that is quite enough for tonight. I am going to work on tweaking my resume so more and writing a template interview thank you. If any of you know of decently paying System Administrator positions in Orange County drop me an email.

~Art

Just about the week, I last posted, one of the other guys in my group got laid off. Not to worry my job is pretty secure for now :) I was seriosuly considering a job in Stockton but I was talked out of it by a peer. So I am going to stick it out with these great guys until its impossible to continue to do so.

Last weekend I bought a used bed a golden wood color. I also bought a new desk. Consequently I can now rock Duel displays (posted a picture in the Mustang gallery).

I have been doing a whole lot of reading in the last mont. I have read:

Judas Unchained by Peter F. Hamilton, this is the final book in his latest series. Once again Hamilton succesfully creates a whole new world that is amazing. In this series he tackles the epic question of how does Genocide/Xenocide fit within the idenity of Humanity.

Native Son by Richard Wright: For a Classic this book is a real page turner. The story revolves around a mistake early in the book so vivid it feels like a dream. If you've ever wondered what it feels like to be poor, Black and Angry this may be as close as you can get.

Armed Madhouse by Greg Palast: If you liked "Best Democracy money can buy" You are gonna love this book. Palast's chapters on Big and the robbery of the 08' elections are very enlightening. His chapter on Oil changed my perspective on how Saudi manipulates the oil market through Opec. As a result I am pulling my money out of Big Oil.

Haunted by Chuck Palahniuck (Author of Fight Club): AMAZING book, it is a collection of short stories woven together into a single plot. He tackles Humanities self-destructive nature and asks is out of Fear of Pain or the Stupidity of never moving past our own pain? Not for the weak of Stomach. Just make it through "GUTS" and it is easy from there.

Hyperion: A Scifi classic very intetrguing anotehr set of short stories woven together, I will read the sequel.

Next I am going to read Fallen Dragon and then return to Hyperion. Hopefully I can keep all this reading up.

I have also seen:

Superman ~ Lois sure can take a beating... To much Drama not enough action. Good but dissapointing.

Nacho Libre ~ Funny! If you like Jack Black you will like this movie.

Who killed the Electric Car? Really great movie. I had no idea a viable Electric Car has been available since 1996 and how far off Hydrogen technology. Check this one out!

Inconvient Truth: Al Gore does a great job of bringing all the facts of global warming together. If you have doubts see this, and if you don't bone up your arguments.

Final Fantasy 7: Best CG I have seen to date. Clearly pointed at Children But very true to the game.

Xmen3: Good Effects, interesting story.

I am going to stop my Net flix this month in light of all the reading I am doing and discovering a really good independent movie house less then 20 minutes from my place.

I also beat Knights of the Old Republic. I have never been that huge a Star Wars fan. My Epic is the Matrix. However, after playing Knights of the Old Republic I must admit the Jedi story is much closer to my heart. I have already ordered Knights of the old Republic 2.

In the near future I am still looking for more to do outside of work. I am flying to Nocal this weekend for a work project. Maybe exercise more and volunteer when I get back for what though? I'll be keeping an eye on the Meixcan Presidential elections and Isreali attack on Palestine could be a highly explosive week.

WOOH!

I got back from Europe last night. I had a great time. I will upload pictures when I get back to Orange county this week. We made it to Budapest, Prague, and Krakow under budget. There was quite a Snafu at the beginning with one of our people missing the flight cause they arrived less then an hour before the flight so the rest of us barely made it. He ended up taking a BA flight though and caught up with us a couple of hours after the rest of landed in London.

From London we took a connecting flight to Budapest on BA. I don't think I have been on a plane with less leg room... Fortunately it was a short flight around an hour. At the Budapest Airport we met the Cab I pre-arranged and went straight to our room at the Kleopatra Apartments.

http://visitprague.cz/main.php3s1=accommodation&s2=apartments&s3=detail&lng=en&sekce=3&id=172

I highly recommend this place. Tamas' will take good care of you. He got us the cab. The room it self was clean and well stocked at a great price. If you are going to Budapest consider staying with him.

The first day in Budapest we walked south from our Apartment, and saw the parliament and walked through the biggest Mall I have been in anywhere. It was as long as a city block in a V-Shape 4 levels both side were the same length. The Metro system there is really good and cheap. Fair warning they do check tickets. The 2nd Day Mike & I went to the Castle District and saw the huge Church there and the Fisherman's Grotto. That night we went to a great buffet. Our last day we went to the city park and saw the Circus and Beer Tent.

Overall we had a great time, their dollar is worth .005 of a US dollar so things were cheap. The food was not that great, very little English was spoken, and there was virtually Tourist stuff to buy. However they are doing a great job renovating some great sites and in a couple of years this place might surpass Prague due to its prices.

We took the train from Budapest to Prague. The ride was smooth, other then being woken up 3x for our passports. We saved about 50% over flying. However, you really do not get to sleep well taking the train. Next time I might bight the bullet and pay for the flight and hotel room.

In Prague we had a great if expensive breakfast buffet at the Intercontinental. We were not able to check in until 10am. Then we slept until late in the Afternoon. At that point we walked out to the Charles Bridge, and looked at the shops. Mike and I had dinner at the "Crazy Cow Steak House" restaurant. It was reasonably priced and VERY good. The next day we went on the communist and city tours and did a lot of shopping. Our guide really drove home, how badly communism damaged Prague, and the effect of the holocaust had on the local Jewish population.

The Apartment it self was okay. There was no shower curtain, the locks were very difficult to work with. The TV had no English channels. They did arrange a cab when we left. I would stay here again, but I definitely we look at all my options.

Overall, Prague is everything that is said about it. It was the most expensive place we stayed. This does dictate how much fun you will have.

We took the train again from Prague to Krakow. The train ride was bumpier this time and we got less sleep. We stayed at Hotel Cracovia http://www.polhotels.com/Cracow/Cracovia/

I really recommend this place. They serve a good Polish style breakfast buffet. The place is dirt cheap. Rooms are clean and well stocked. They arranged a cab for us to the airport. The location is prime, tours pickup here last and drop off first.

I went to the Salt Mine and took a tour of the city. The city tour was amazing, I knew Poland was Catholic, but omfg the churches in the city are second only to the Vatican. I also picked up a lot of gifts here.

The flight back was extremely, close I had only 20 minutes when we landed at Heathrow, to get my bags, and go from Terminal 1 to Terminal 3 to pickup my boarding pass and I made it! Never in my life has my bag come out first!

Overall Krakow is still my favorite city to visit. It is very cheap, friendly and safe. There is a lot to do whether you are drinking, eating, shopping, or sight seeing.

The trip as a whole was a great experience. I had a lot of fun with everyone. We did a lot of drinking ate some great food, and saw a lot of Eastern Europe.

I did learn to when Virgin Atlantic says they close their ticket desk 60 minutes before the flight they mean it.

Now after 2 weeks off I am ready to get back to work at full speed.

Next weekend my Parents are visiting me at my new place in Socal.

The work situation is getting interesting. We have been advised that within a year or two it will be in our best interest to work someplace else due to the pending acquisition. For me this does not change much, I will continue to work hard to get better and improve my title. It just means, I will need to follow company strategy closely to jump ship at the right moment with the right people hopefully.

So I moved down here on April 30th. It was good to spend time with Bill for a couple of days we don't get to do that very often anymore. I rented a Uhaul and spent the night in Bakersfield. I ended up getting a 16' truck which ended up being the right size, my stuff would not have fit in a 10'. I ended up only having 11 boxes, plus my furniture. I seemed to have only lost one box in the move.

The weeks leading up to the move were nice as I throttled down my work load and handed it over. This is the first time I have left a professional job on really good terms. I made sure to leave a lasting good impression on the leaders I would work for again.

Once, I got to my apartment, it has been problem after problem. My Oven and Dryer still suck. My fridge was missing when I moved in. The carpets need to be repalced. The shower was very slopply grouted. The washing machine leaks. Not to mention the amazing incompotence of the managerial staff, the mainteannce staff has been fast and great so far.

With that said, the job has been great. Plenty of time to work on one thing at a time. I am really enjoying it.

This last weekend, Cece flew out, and I took her to Dave and Busters and Redondo Beach to a Samba Brazillian BBQ place. We had a good time.

This weekend I have to start packing for Europe.

So this week I put a down payment on an apartment in Lake Forest. It is less then 2 miles from my new office, and it has in unit washer/dryer and garage. I'm getting for $100 less then I thought I would be paying.

Lake Forest itself is really a nice area. In fact I have never lived in a better area. I spent the weekend driving all over and there appears to be plenty of everything.

I saw "Thank you for smoking" Friday night, it was pretty entertaining I'd give it a B". Sunday I saw "Inside man", I enjoyed, I didn't look at the time once, which is unusal for me.

Besides that I spent the last 5 days working with my new work team. After working with them and seeing where I will be living and working this is getting much more exciting, there are a lot of perks I did not factor in. I am eager to get down here and start working.

They also gave me a Treo 650. These things really are like crack, so much to setup and customize. I already ordered some accessories from Ebay.

So the rest of this month is going to be dedicated to moving, finalizing plans for the europe trip and seeing my Norcal friends and family before I go.

This time I have an excuse... I couldn't reveal what was going on till I was sure it was going to happen.

For those of you I haven't nauseated with constant updates, it is official. I am being promoted to Computer Systems Engineer (Mega ultra supa l337 computer N3rd). The promotion was conditional on moving to Orange county. So as of May 1st this year I will be living in Lake Forest, California.

In a perfect world I could have taken this promotion and continued to live in Northern California, but that just is not possible. This is the kind of opportunity you have to take when it comes, you can't go to college to get into this, and experience is definitely king in this new position.

I'm hoping to move into a place with an attached garage and in unit washer and dryer.

I have been living in limbo since Thanksgiving when I hit my IT director up for this promotion. It is nice to finally know a date and it is a sure thing.

I went to Eureka with Eric this weekend and saw Adam. I went on a ride along with him, he seems to really be good at being a cop. It's too bad we just keep moving further and further away from each other.

I sold the Cougar less then 24hours after posting on craigslist, I put allt hat money into savings so I will have plenty for Europe in June.

So now I need to get busy getting all packed up again to move.

Been way to long since I updated. However a lot has been happening and I have been very busy.

I did fly to Socal for Thanksgiving. It was a great Holiday. I wanted to rent a Mustang but ended up with a Monta Carlo. I was not impressed. I had a great time with my family down there.

On December 22nd I bought a new car... A 2006 Mustange GT! I got the premium model with the Red Leather interior. The gas mileage is only slightly worse then the Cougar, and it is a whole lot faster then the Cougar. No buyers remorse yet. I got it for just $500 over invoice.

Xmas was great spent it with my immeadiate family. Had fun buying gifts this year since I had both the time and money to do it. I also gt really great thoughtful gifts from my family.

December 27th I flew out to Alabama and spent a week out there with Mike. We went to Nashville for New Years and stopped in Lynchburg Tennesse on the way. I had a great time. Ate great food, and experienced the best restaraunts there are "Brazilian Steak Houses".

Work is going extremely well. I'm still enjoying it. It's going to be a very busy year to say the least.

My new years resolution is to lose weight and get into shape for my trip to europe at the end of May.

My lease also ends in May, and I'll be moving out of this place, the flooding has been really bad. No water inside my unit, but I don't like slopping through it every time it rains. Maybe I can get Satelite at the new place too.

So Happy New Year, I'll be Dieting, working out, and making sure I have plenty of Money for Europe.

I know it has been a while. Lucky you, I am still at work right now and I'm on hour 14. At the moment I am configuring 20 new workstations for a project tomorrow.

Recent news, I got a nice raise last Friday. So I am as happy as I have ever been working here. It's actually been just over a year since I got back from England and I am now making just about double what I did working at HPM that I left on April Fool's day. It's nice to be working in such a positive enviornment where I see almost limitless possibilties for the future. So I don't mind being at work right now :)

A couple of weeks ago I bought my ticket to Alabama for a weeks vacation I am taking at the end of December to go out to see Mike. I've also planned a trip to eastern Europe for next June. Mike is on board, and I have the time off. I'll probably commit to it this month. We are going to Budapest, Prague, and Krakow, over 10 days. I want to get back to Europe before the air fares get insane due to oil prices. That are only going up from here on out.

So the IT Golf weekend was a lot of fun. I even enjoyed Golfing. Something I would like to improve on. Doesn't seem that difficult a thing to get decent at.

I got the cougar repainted this month too. I'm glad to be out of 2 tone. I have also had my alignment done, and installed 4 high performance tires.

I did buy a new case for my computer. I got an Antec Lanboy. I am sold on paying good money for cases now. It cost me $100 but it came together like a dream. Its light, and I added a couple more LED's and it looks great.

Other then that, I have just been keeping busy with work and seeing movies. This weekend I am having Cable installed. Going to start shopping for a digital camera for my upcoming trips too.

Well a 15 hour work day is enough. I'll finish up tomorrow.