So Sarah's website linked to thinkgeek's microbes.. They're quite cool, so I decided I need one or two for work.. Its just appropriate.

What else, its cold, out, that's annoying. I don't have much time to talk, I'm too busy microbe shopping.

Ohh, my comment issue is fixed, so I'm opening then up again, sorry for the small interlude.

I know some of you forget (myself included) to read the comics. Last sunday's foxtrot was quite funny, and I keep forgetting to mention it.

Ok, enough excitement, off to work. its payday!

So I didn't check the weather and traffic until about 1 minute before I left yesterday. This aparently caused major headaches, since stuff was majorly backed up due to snow. While I may have a very light RWD car, aparently no one else knows how to deal with snow, since lots of people (after taking 1:20 to get there) at work said they were sliding all over the same roads I was on, and doing fine at 50 or so... oh well.

Yeah, I didn't look at the powerpoint thing, I think I tried, and then it hosed itself, so I just read the html stuff, sorry about that, I looked at it the day before yesterday, so I forgot, but then I couldn't update about it.

I'm having a few issues with comments, so I've upgraded to the latest version of MT, but I need to close comments for the next few updates, all should be better soon, (just depends how busy I am to go and fix them)

Its cold out, but nothing too exciting, and aparently its also time to leave. Except I need to go and find a shirt to wear, its too cold to wear a button down shirt, its definetly sweater day.

Ok, so after a random not working time (I think that's the first time I can recall hrmph being dead, but I don't even know if it was hrmph or the interweb somewhere between here and Oakland... anyway. I'm back.

There isn't too much exciting, except that I managed to get home quite quickly yesterday. Going through downtown I actually hit 60 for most of it. This is a big change from the usual stop and go 15mph stuff. Yay for good weather, but we'll see what today brings. Also, for those of you who have been to cleveland, I found this site: innerbelt which explains things like 'the stupid 90 degree turn on I-90' predates interstate standards, so that could explain why its stuck there.

Umm what else, I'm sorta hungry, as I get used to getting up earlier, I seem to be getting hungry earlier, but maybe that relates to eating earlier. Amazing how all of these things are linked I guess...

Uhrm, I should probably write more, but I need to get going, so I guess I can't. I'll think of more interesting things later.

Oh - pepband Adam IM'd me this link - Sad, how one Gay 'incident' can mess up your career... I wonder if he'll actually be good if he makes it to the majors.

So, its not that I dislike snow, its that it makes everything a pain. If I lived 3 minutes from work, and had a car (like ohh a MINI) that had heated seats and wasn't prone to spinning out all the time (not dangerously, but you just need to pay attention more in a RWD car) it'd be easier..

Hrm, what else, so the car started making odd noises while braking mid last week. I called and made an appointment with Bob... Besides he not being able to find cheap brakes, so I now have Bendix brakes on the rear, it worked out well. (I didn't know Bendix even made car brakes, I thought they just made trailer air brakes and such). $155 or so in parts (pads + rotors) plus $65 installation. Handy..

So I had a concert today, which was mostly an attempt at getting the local high school kiddies to come to Case, in the guise of letting them play at severance hall(aparently this is a very big thing, even if I've done it 4 times now..) anyway, it was ok for 30 minutes of playing, but a lot of effort. And Bill decided he didn't want to play at the beginning of the concert because it was too much work to get him a chair, so I sat next to Kurt, who is the best player, but he played a string bass part in the 1st piece (of 2) so it was unecessarily confusing.

what else, I know there's other things to mention, but I can't seem to remember much of them... Uhh I get paid on friday, I need to figure out if I should do anything to celebrate... besides get annoyed at the possibility of going out to a restaurant on friday, because they're too damn crowded.

I think this is very long, and I'm doing it tonight, because then I can leave earlier if necessary tomorrow. and try to avoid getting stuck in traffic, or having to get gas in 4 degree weather like last friday, and attempting to eat the world's worst egg + cheese sandwich, which I picked up at the gas station (its a nice station, no Sheetz, but good for Cleveland) serves me right for gas station food, but still, i think it was a freeze dried roll, at least tasted like it was.

I don't know how late I woke up, I guess a few minutes, In any case there isn't much time for this.

Quick updates, I do now have two monitors at work, both 20.1" flat panels, though they're not the same. I need to see and decide if I want to switch around so they are.

Otherwise, besides heart lattes aparently I didn't miss much, I did have to sit in the room in the lab at work next to a large (2L or so) flask holding some random yellow liquid while I was writing on a clipboard what I needed order from the science catalog. As the flask wasn't labelled, I hope it wasn't anything too scary, but you know, it was the room that says something like 'biohazard don't enter'.... But anyway, I'm sure the lab coats I ordered will be worth it. and now I'm off to work. lets hope the snow isn't too much of a pain.

Why is it that I only notice how many comments or entries there are after a major number... (like 602 comments)

Anyway, so aparently a watermain broke last night, but Cleveland seems to like us better then say Poughkeepsie likes Helen, since it was a few miles away. But now I am watching the news to see if they cleaned off the road I need to drive on. Not good to drive on roads flooded and then frozen..

Besides that, umm, I finally got my computer at work. It has a spiffy 20.1" LCD Monitor, besides that nothing else especially exciting about.

I ran out tea cakes, (I only bought 2 at the market and ate them Monday and Tuesday) so I need to find something else interesting for breakfast.

Mitch called, aparently he's deciding on moving again, so he's moving to a house, which should save him a bunch of money, though its with 3 other girls. I dono if I'd want to do that...

Oh well, nothing else interesting to say, and I can get off and get to work in the excitement of snow...

well I managed to 'oversnooze' so I'm about 8 minutes late, and as I'm usually in the house for about 35 minutes after I woke up, this is a big deal.

Oh well, so this is clearly funny for someone who lives in Cleveland (remember Akron is Cleveland's bitch) but I saw what I think was my first live Blimp. A goodyear blimp was flying over downtown on my way home. I wanted a camera, since it was dusk, so it was black, and framed against the skyline with lots of red, and then the pile of smoke coming out of the power plant... Rather cool looking, but also eerie, like WWII photographs, or the hindenberg crashing in NJ photograph... Anyway, damn those blimps. Aparently you can win rides in the them....

Uhh, not much else to report, I'm starting on more real work stuff and less training stuff, I had to eat lunch at subway yesterday, and I'm not sure why, except Namita wanted to go there, so I went along... blech, I need to try the cafeteria out more, it seems like a better deal for $4, except subway of course is at least getting out of the building.

Ohh well, need to get going so I avoid the traffic, there was more of it with it not being a holiday. And need to listen to all the state of the moron news.

Look, its so boring I have nothing to discuss except the weather. But it does seem like it didn't actually snow much around here, so I should be able to get to work uneventfully. I wish I always worked on holidays, with MLK day yesterday, there was like no traffic in either direction. Very spiffy. And now its Tuesday, so there's traffic again.

Umm, jen made coffee again, this is very exciting, but I think its going to be an orange coffee day, technically mandarin orange, as when I was busy exporting syrup from CA, they didn't have any of the spiffy valencia stuff. Rather sad, but I think mandarin should be fun.

Ok, so I got a computer at work, but not mine yet. I just got a login, so I could login to the one on my desk. Which helps, except I got assigned a bunch of (like 500 pages) of stuff to read on operating procedures....

Dean seems to have gotten 3rd in the caucus... sad since he even managed to figure out to use the interweb. Of course I should really just support whoever can beat bush, and Kerry with his veteran stuff could do it.. Could. Anyway, must go get my coffee and head off into the coldness. Blah, I'm really looking forward to it being light when I go to work, I wonder how long that will take.

Hey, finally a title that I haven't used part of before. I guess this job thing has its perks. SO anyway, I couldn't fall asleep last night, so I stayed up until 1 or so, but then of course had to get up at 6... Blah, though really I'm not too tired, and for whatever crazy but useful reason, Jen got up while I was showering and made coffee in the spiffy new coffee maker (Which I can't find a link too, I just get a bunch of google bombed pages for coffee crap). Anyway, it makes into 2 travel mugs, so I can just grab one and head out the door.

What else, I didn't get as much done on the walls as I would have liked, maybe I can do another coat tonight, it'd make me feel better, this job thing definetly gets in the way of being productive sometime Maybe that's why people usually pay people to replace their walls, blah. I don't make that much money.

I need to think of other things to discuss, but can't... sad

This week is actually doing stuff, which should be more exciting. And rumor had it that my computer was sitting on the loading dock, so maybe I'll get that today. Its all very new and such, except that the most productive thing (besides finishing training) I did on friday was adjusting my chair to make it compfy. Though its not really, I prefer ones where the seat bottom tilts with the back, and this one has the back tilting on it its, the seat remaining parallel to the floor. Oh well, we should be getting new cubes (I work in a cube... I guess I could have mentioned that) in a month or two, I hope that includes chairs... There's aeron chairs in the conference rooms, I'd be quite happy if we got those, or some other herman miller chair, like the ergon III to go with my $3 ergon I. Ok, time to get to work, need to grab my coffee and head off into the slightly trafficy, damn cold that is cleveland before dawn. (not the dish soap, that's made by Proctor and Gamble, which is in Cincy...)

So aparently from the last bottle to the current bottle, my shampoo changed. This logical as the bottle changed a bit, but you know, it smells all different. I swear my shampoo changes every time i buy a new bottle. Why does life need to be so complicated? Its not like I even notice it doing anything better or worse, it just smells different and the bottle looks different. Oh well.

Speaking of products, this shaving every day certainly increases the rate at which I use shaving gel.

Hrm, I have 7 minutes until I leave, (I hate when the computer clock gets off, it confuses me...and it does it all the time if my timesync software dies) I'm not sure what else exciting I can do. I guess I can listen to the radio, as Jen's alarm has gone off, and she's not awake but is not snoozing it.. fun stuff.

Anyway, I don't have a contract with verizion, my last contract expired in May (I'm pretty sure that's when).... Of course they seem to not like motorola's camera phones, and I don't really want to change brands, so blah. stupid phone issues.

So aparently, I can update in the morning for several days in a row.

Anyway - so what I'm doing at Steris, since people don't seem to know, I'm working on liquid steralization machines, for things like endoscopes, that can't be steralized with high heat (autoclaving), and need to have stuff pumped through them.

And I don't make $40 an hour, so I guess my estimate was a bit off, but you get the point.

Umm, nothing too exciting really, it snowed yesterday in the afternoon, which would be fine, if it didn't cause annoying traffic, which extended the trip home by 150% (35 min without traffic in morning to 1:30 or so...) and yes, I know its not exactly 150%, but whatever, too early to go googling and such.

nothing else too interesting, this job thing is getting in the way of me continuing on the walls, and they're almost done, it'd be nice to finish that up sometime, but I guess the most likely time is this weekend. upside of course that now there's income so after the walls can afford flooring. Oh well. Its a bit snowy out, so I think I'll go brush off my car and head on out. yay thursdays. I wonder if anything's good on TV... new ER that I would have liked to sleep through. Damn adelphia and its slow ass getting DVR.

Its been a long time since I've gotten up this early on a regular basis. I think I remember why I don't like it. Its dark, cold and too damn early. But it seems as if if I don't get up around 6 and leave before 7, I'll run into traffic, which would make it impossible to get to work on time. So blah, getting to work 1/2 hour early seems to be the order of the day.

Oh I was tired after going to dinner at Lola (cleveland's local celebrity chef restaurant, Jen can say more about it) so I didn't update last night. Stupid job cutting into other things.

Nothing else really exciting to say, aparently Mitch, who had decided to go to Vegas because he could get into CES never ended up going to CES, probably related to CES being from 9-5 or so last weekend. He did however point out that the porn convention was open to the public for the first time, so he made it to that. I guess it had better hours, anyway, I thought that was mildly amusing.

Ok, almost time to leave, so I need to get off into the wild black coldness that america's north coast is. (Aparently Steris' recycling + paper shredding is done by some company like north coast shredding, just to keep with the coastal thing.

Well I'd like to get to sleep soon, since you know I've been up for way too long.

Several observations: Having your social security card in your wallet is pretty useless, and prone to identify theft issues, so don't do it. But if you do take it out, remember, so you don't look dumb when the HR person asks for it to verify your I-9 and you end up forgetting it.

Why would someone add lemons (Chipotle has them available for drinks, like most quick serve restaurants) to Hi-C lemonade? does it somehow improve the taste? I was going to ask them, I was too puzzled at the concept. I'm sure it exponentially increases the juice content.

Uhh, what else.. Work was generall boring. Because I did learn some new things in Pro/E (there's a / I dono why, there is, ask PTC who makes it) but its just damn boring to sit in a classroom for 8 hours, I don't learn that way anyway. Upside, I get free lunch and breakfast for the whole week.

Oh, so if anyone wants to make a photo album, they should probably just use iPhoto on someone else's mac and FTP the stuff up that way. While my method (Arles) makes nicer pictures, the software isn't free (so it expires its trial all the time) and it doesn't work as well, (though does work on Windows)

Anyway, I need sleep, so I think that's about the extent of the excitement for today. Everyone else should follow my lead.

So I almost had all my clothes laid out, like I did before school, but that got nixed a bit, as there aren't any good flat surfaces to lay out around here, and then the shirt I was planning on wearing is a bit wrinkled, so its in the bathroom to get shower-ironed. But still its a good plan.

So besides needing to leave at 7 tomorrow (which is about when I'll always need to leave) I think I'm all set, hopefully the insanely early time will cut down on traffic, but you never know until you try I guess.

Uhrm, what else, the weekend was uneventful, except that I went to get more shirts. You can never have too many, especially when they're at Old Navy. I think its good I don't get graded on what I wear to work, so I can easily fit in.

Well, I doubt I'll be on aim, and also this week should be reasonably boring, since I'm spending it on a 'Basic' Pro/Engineer course, which I basically already did 3 years ago. But hey, I'll learn new things and its a new version, and there's always lunch to look forward to. And on the upside, I think I get paid more an hour then I paid for college courses. (we'll ignore that CAD was an overload course and thus free)

Ok, time to get to sleep, perhaps I'll have more important things to discus tomorrow. Or you can all ask exciting steris questions.

So, tomorrow I need to go in to get my ID card, I guess its handy I got a haircut today.. I swear I said that already though, and then I get lunch. It should work out nicely.

Umm, what else, I need to find all the forms and stuff that i need to fill out, I'm not sure if I need to do that by tomorrow or monday. In any case, I should get to moving on it.

Uhh, I got more drywall stuff, but I'm highly pissed both home depot and lowes stopped carrying (since like 2 months ago when we did the drywall in the bathroom) the tape I was using... Had to make do with substitute stuff, but its just a total pain. grr. Aparently I can still buy it online, but its not exactly simple to order something and wait a week, there's a schedule to keep! so just damn you home depot and lowes. especially since they replaced it with an inferior kind.

Umm, so what else is interesting today. Not much really, though I think grilling needs to either move outside, or wait until the kitchen is done, so a vent hood is happily working. At the moment its a bit too smokey with no ventillation. OOps... Maybe once it stops being like 15 degrees out, it'll be easier to just go outside and use the grill, or maybe I can find a book on how to grill things without generating gobs of smoke. I think neither is likely for the next few months.

about it for excitement around here, so I think its time for sleep. there's a spiffy weekend ahead, even though I think most of the plans are finishing the drywall upstairs.

I am so uncreative, everytime I think of a title, it's already taken. I should just use the same one from the previous year on the same day. If it was a weekend, I guess I could be creative...

Anyway - Its cold out, it doesn't make doing the garbage any easier. The stuff left outside froze, so its much more difficult to move garbage bags when they're covered in ice, and its just generally a pain. Oh well, its January, contrary to logic, there's not that many days left until its warm again, assuming around my birthday or so. Speaking of which, I guess I should start a list or discussion of what I want. But I just noticed my arms hurt, so clearly the garbage weighs more then it should (damn snow weight) so that will have to wait.

On other news, I noticed that hrmph doesn't have the search feature that newer versions of MT have. Is this a problem for anyone? Its easy enough to search via google...

On other random news: (mostly to get back at Helen for the Toooooooom comment) I was browsing along blogs (random sidenote: read TOWM's blog more - make link tomorrow) and ended up in the middle of a life discussion on sex. I'm not sure how that became generic blogging material, but its just not as interesting as say, avoiding work or worrying about catch nail covers. Clearly I'm at the blogging stage where stuff isn't as deep I guess...

So back to the not-deepness, crap I can't remember what else I was going to mention. Oh tomorrow is my last day of not really needing to work, since I need to go in for lunch on friday. I also need a haircut, and some more home improvement stuff... (Its amazing how many useful 5 gallon buckets one can aquire as joint compound comes in it, and just doing a small area takes several buckets...) Or maybe I'm not good at it, so I use too much. Whatever, I think engineering pays better, so that's all that matters. That and I'd like to think I'm better at engineering.

Uhh, Its past 11. Which means nothing, except that I keep thinking I should get better at going to sleep. So I'll start with that now.. well after I brush my teeth. Clean teeth are happy teeth! (Though since I've gotten a job, I don't seem to have anixety dreams about losing my teeth anymore, go figure..)

So I thought of calling this entry tacos, but you know. it was already used...

Today wasn't very exciting. I woke up a bit late, and then futzed with things like cleaning and working on the walls. Though those are progressing nicely. Maybe in a few days or so it'll be done... Its certainly not easier with things in the way, I guess its the peril of living in the middle of renovations.

Ok what else. So aparently trader joe's cheap sauce is better then their expensive sauce, at least in the Pasta dept. Fortunately emergency pantry items (tomato paste, pesto, parsley and oregano) can fix this.

uhh, so yeah running out of time for freedom before the job, but i haven't gotten any calls or anything, so i guess i passed the background and drug checks, always a good thing. on the bad thing dept, i really need to find more socks, I only got a few pairs of non-white socks in rochester, and i really can't wear white socks to work. blech.

well unless i wear linen pants. but i don't own any of them. and no, i'm not buying any.

umm, i really need to ponder more interesting things. like buying thermocouples for the furnace and water heater... don't want to end up without hot water, even if that's the cool thing to do, I don't really feel obligated to join that club.

ok, i really need to get to sleep, i would have written more, but aparently i needed to transfer entries for helen, so that took up some time... but hey, they're all happy now.

so you know, sometimes when you want to blog, but then you just don't have the effort? see, someone needs to create and autoblog feature. you just think about what you want blogged, and then it appears, (well after you preview and click publish of course, but you get the idea)

in other news, uneventful trip back from NY, nice to have one of those for a change...

Oh yeah, happy 2004. forgot that I haven't updated in that long, damn year...

my credit card expires (i won't say when, since I know you all stalk me) this year. its sorta odd. you know, you don't think of these things until they happen. I guess the upside is since I got a platinum plus last time, I wonder what I'll get this time, I feel like they need to outdo themselves every 3 years.

I don't know why I'm talking about my credit card, but oh well.

Hrm, what else. We stopped at wegs in Wilkes-Barre, and they had a good deal on a roasting pan and a pizza stone, which is rectangular, so it'll work well for bread as well. Very good stuff at large discount prices. wahoo.

ok, I'm not sure what else to mention, there's another ad for grapermelon gum on tv. Yech shellac.

Ok time for sleep :)