Since Jen mentioned the earthquake, and few of you read slashdot, here's a before and after picture (if you go up a directory there's more)

Dave was off in northern Thailland, which is reasonably far from Phuket (where they were diving a before the quake) which was also rather badly hit (but not as bad as Indonesia and Sri Lanka) but is a much more affluent area, so seems to be coping better.

About it for today. End of the year, all that stuff, not much else to report. I saved my end of year paystub, so now I can throw all the other ones out. It will cut down on clutter. I really wish we didn't get stubs, but I suppose that so much of the company are sales people, service people and blue collar workers, who would actually have different pay rates each time, and thus care, so I should just collect my stubs and do something with them.

So the trip to Ny was fun, but it got delayed by about 6 hours, and then moved to going into Newark, because all the little jets out of here got cancelled. I ended up getting to fishkill at about 3am. Not so fun.

Coming back, we were only delayed about an hour. Also not so fun.

Work is reasonably quiet this week. Which is good, so I can catch up on important stuff like cleaning my desk.

Besides that, its just well, the end of the year as well know it, and I feel fine.

so as I've mentioned, I'm flying out tomorrow until Sunday to hang out in NY for Christmas. That means that I may have time to do things with various people who probably will never read this, or read it once a month.

In the event you'll be in the area, and read this, leave a message, or call the fishkill house, or my cell (if you have the #) or anything else.

I know there's lots of other things to mention, but I forgot them all, as usual.

So I've woken up late every single day this week. To continue that tradition, today was the latest yet. Ooops.

Nothing else to report I suppose, I just wanted to explain the lack of anything happening.

I feel I should do something. I'm running late, as usual. Fortunately though, in my working 40 hours a week is good math, this isn't much of a problem, because I worked through lunch yesterday for stats class, then stayed an hour late chatting with people (about work stuff) so if I'm 15 minutes late today, so beit.

In other news, I really can't remember what else I was supposed to talk about... Since we're on the MT-B discussion, it actually does a really good job of blocking spam, because so much of it is similar, you can add very vague terms, and it will block it all. Its not like anyone posts comments on texas hold em, but for whatever reason, that's the popular thing to spam about lately.

Umm. Need to get to work. It is getting late.

Well, in another exciting day reminiscent of life in rochester, its cold and snowy out. Though suposedly its stopped snowing now, which should improve life a bit. I know its been discussed before, but it snowed like 9 months ago, why does everyone forget how to drive in the interim?

In other news, there isn't much. I need to leave early to have time for actually clearning off snow and other fun stuff. I tried to do that yesterday, but due a severe lack of planning (aka looking at the weather or out the window) I didn't notice it was snowing, so I lost time to clearing and slow traffic. Oh well.

Time to get going.

Well, so when It seems that I'd like to sleep until 9:30 on weekends, it makes it very difficult to wakeup for work during the week. Yech.

In other news, the latest presents include a circular saw, a towel warming/drying rack, some pancake mix to go with the syrup, and some donuts.

all in all not too bad.

And I meant to mention this a while ago - don't order vietnamese bubble tea that's coffee flavored. It seems this means they use real coffee to flavor it, which as is usual for warmer places insanely strong. It tastes good, but you can't drink enough of it to even pull the bubbles off the bottom of the glass, so you keep sipping, and then get stuck with tons of bubbles.

Oh well. Damn mondays.

Well, so the question was asked, what I got. I've gotten so far (at least unless I forget something)

Hanukkah cookies
Bouchon Cookbook
Maple syrup (though that may actually be jen's gift...)
Heated towel rack
Chocolate

There's many days left, so I'll have to continue to stay updated.

Besides that, its supposed to be colder this weekend. Not really exciting, except that I was going to try and mow the lawn, mostly to use up the last gas that's in the mower. It would also of course get rid of some errant leaves.

Yay for fridays!

Not much else to report, I'm excited about going to the market tomorrow, we haven't gone in a while.

And I got a haircut, but that's almost a non-event.

This week's activity, and its only wednesday has been waking up late. I'm not sure why, but ohh well.

I've managed to branch out to french spam comments, this is very exciting. At least it gets more interesting by the day.

ignoring that, not a whole lot else is going on. I will manage to take a picture of the glasses, but I keep forgetting, and then there's other stuff to deal with.

Speaking of other stuff, not much else is happening. But I need to clean my keyboard. I should put that on my list. Its one of those things you always think about, but then never remember to do, very annoying really.

Besides that, Happy hannukah to everyone, and to all a good night.

Ok, not really.

Aparently, the plans have evolved quickly that Christmas will now be spent in new york. but due to the short planning, it seems not everyone will be around. I guess this is a fair tradeoff.

In other news, its cold out.

I went clothes shopping, and now keep having these decisions on whether its better to buy a shirt for say $35 on sale vs a $20 shirt, if the shirt is a better shirt. Such a dilemma, I suppose. Do I go based on how long it will last, or is it irrelevant because I'll probably think its ugly in a year, so it won't last that long anyway. The eternal clothing dilemma I suppose.

Oh, I got new glasses like 2 weeks ago, and never mentioned it. Unfortunately, they were expensive, since I actually had to pay for the lenses, and I've managed to need really expensive lenses. The insurance gave me a $15 copay for the eye exam, and like 50% off frames, but didn't really do much to keep the glasses from creeping into expensive territory. THey're nice though, so I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, and I haven't had any other large purchases lately. Maybe I'll take a picture of them if there's desire.

Besides that, Its time for another monday. So I need to get going.. wahoo. No band though. Last concert of the fall was this weekend, so I have mondays free for a few weeks.

So I meant to discuss the fun and exciting world of the south yesterday. But I forgot. So oops.

So it seems the largest thing that differentiates Atlanta from other places is the availability of tea everywhere (including fast food places) and grits. I'm not sure why this is worth mentioning, but as the last time I had grits it was at some nasty breakfast buffet in orlando a decade ago, I have to be honest and say they're actually good when served at a normal place. So I suppose they have been vindicated. Cheese grits aren't bad either.

I need to get gas, because I half forgot/didn't feel like it yesterday, so I need to leave a bit early to go and do that. So I'm doing that now.

Its been a while. I guess I'll blame the holiday for that, but I hope it went well for everyone.

Not much is happening. Jen is down in Columbus again, so I'm cat sitting and all the associated stuff. I also should probably be doing other things like shopping and errands and such, but I was pretty tired last night, and today I have a training thing, that runs until 6. Of course its my fault it runs so late, because I organized it. Stupid scheduling would only allow it then.

In other news, aparently progressive has decided to rename their independent agent sold insurance. Its now called drive. I suppose I need to decide if I want to stay independant or just buy directly from them. Not a big deal, but something to figure out in the future. Probably in april when my policy renews.

Oh well, I don't want to be late, so I need to head off to work now. Blech. Its cold and windy out, the perfect weather to encourage you to go outside and freeze.