Cynically Optimistic

Nearly everything that has to be stored at my folks house is now packed into Rubbermaid containers. I've thrown out four times that much stuff, so that makes me feel good. I do wish I could put my photographs into storage as well, since I really don't need to have full time access to them but something inside me is saying "keep those with you". So, I'm keeping them. It'd be nice to have all the negatives scanned and saved onto the hard drive and backed up in 3 places... oh who am I kidding. Never. Gonna. Happen.

Next, packing clothes and stuff for 2 weeks of traveling. Tomorrow I should get my laptop returned from hinge replacement surgery. If all my data hasn't been erased I'll be posting pictures from last weekend - eventually. Just no time right now.

Upcoming... possible blogging from the road! Long stretches of highway, I can hardly contain my excitement. Anyone want to lend me an mp3 audiobook for the road?

Posted by Jeff at 10:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Notice to all my midwest peeps: I'm going to be in the general vicinity of Iowa City the weekend of July 7-9, plus part of the next week. My schedule is pretty flexible with travel dates, as I'm driving back. Please check your schedules and let me know if you'll be around and want to:

a. grab a beer
b. eat some ice cream
c. have dinner
d. play tennis
e. play frisbee golf
f. geek out
g. show me your newly hatch offspring
h. catch up over coffee
i. (insert idea here)

My cell phone number is the same. Call me or email me. Or call Wendy.

Posted by Jeff at 03:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Busy busy busy is what I am. Tired too, after a wondeful weekend in NYC for Pride. A couple of people have already bugged me about photos. Last year at Pride my camera was brand spankin' new, and I've taken 4392 pictures with it since then. That works out to be approximately 18.5 GB of full-resolution jpeg images in a single calendar year. Just think if I had a camera that could shoot in RAW mode. Time to buy another external hard drive.

Anyway, photos might be up this week using my backup computer while the laptop is off getting hinge replacement surgery. Tekserve was a bust. In the mean time, please enjoy this cupcake. I know I did.

Posted by Jeff at 10:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Until last night when I tried to close the screen and put my baby to bed. Something went *crack* and the screen became extra floppy. I figured I could pop whatever it was back into place and things would be fine today once I borrowed some tools from work. Alas, the "titanium" inside the bezel of the screen has cracked and now won't move due to lack of leverage.

I plan to run by TekServe on Friday and see if they can repair it for me, since the LCD still works great, as does the rest of the machine. Here's hoping.

Posted by Jeff at 10:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

It's this time of year that makes me wish I lived further north. Scotland kind of north. The kind of evening where at 10 PM the sun is still brightly shining, and dusk stretches until the sun resurfaces at 3 AM. Heavy curtains or blinds are a real necessity. Days seem to stretch on forever, and the increased sunlight somehow increases my mood greatly.

Less than two weeks of work remain for me here on Long Island, and I'm really looking forward to leaving. There are a few things that I'll miss, one being the spectacular rose garden in a neighbors backyard. His whole 0.25 acres are roses roses roses. I stopped street jogging when I joined a gym in January, but I might make a lap around the neighborhood this week just to take it all in. Guess I just want to jog around and watch all the people not wave at me as I smile and stride right by. I plan to stop and smell the roses this time.

Posted by Jeff at 01:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I should be in pain, but my opiate receptors are saturated. Drugs are good. Real good. Thanks to some shoddy dental work done while in Coralville (never trust a dentist who calls you "big guy"), I had a crown replaced today. I hate the evil looking dental needle - my jaw is sore and my molar would be throbbin were it not for meds.

In other news, I put on my web geek hat a couple nights ago and upgraded my photo gallery installation. From time to time I like to pretend I know what I'm doing in a unix shell, but it usually involves either an IM or a call to Wendy to get me out of a bind. This time it was relatively painless, except I'm pissed that it wont keep the same default template and now I have to edit CSS. My rudimentary understanding allows me to tweak things, but I have no hope of designing a stylesheet from scratch.

One of the things I learned in my upgrade is that apparently I have some very popular photos on my site, most of them relating to Green Day. Here's the photo with the most hits, and most comments. I don't get it either.

Two weeks left to work here at the Brook, and then a month of freedom. The plan for July is to hit the road and visit a lot of people. Proposed stops are DC, NC, and IA. Then move into my new digs in NYC. Leave any other requests with my secretary. I'm going to pass out now due to beer + drugs.

Posted by Jeff at 09:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Flying in the spring means you sometimes have to deal with thunderstorms. SWA Flight 713 last Friday was more exciting than most rides at the Magic Kingdom. Cups and nuts were literally flying into the aisle due to incredible turbulence. Even the flight attendant had to suspend service and grabbed a seat in my row. Still, the pilot managed to land safely and only slightly behind schedule, beginning my weekend in DC.

“Let’s ease into the weekend, try not to overdo it.”
Being in a celebratory mood, Tom and I sipped martinis while dodging raindrops, switching to beer only after a large sip of tequila. So much for easing into it. Following Helix and Titan, we scarfed down a hot dog and caught a taxi to a party. The home was beautiful – great paint colors, tasteful artwork, and dramatic centerpiece in the dining room. Turns out someone there liked it so much, they ganked the host’s candles on the way out! Not Cool!

“Search for Colecovision"
Saturday morning was spent watching clips on YouTube and playing with new tech toys. Brand new Apple products are like crack. Soon, hunger pains won out over technolust and we walked to Lauriol Plaza. The chickadees there are aggressive! If you drop a chip on the ground the tiny little birds peck it to bits and fly away with chunks. Better than pigeons or rats I suppose. After filling up, we bought party snacks and hurried home to clean up for the pre-parade party.

“See him kill his own mother with a broken lawn chair.”
Party on! George, Carl, Rich, Bob, Lou, Peter, James and company had a fun time hanging out and chatting over m&m’s and hummus. Just before throwing everyone out, Tom pops Dr. Tran into the DVD player. I love watching other people watch Dr. Tran for the first time. Plus, it never gets old to me when I re-watch it.

“Please don’t stand on the furniture”
After we heard the parade start, the pack of us stumbled downstairs to find a spot to enjoy the parade. It only took about 5 minutes before a few of us split off to watch the parade from inside Halo. Unsurprisingly, DC’s parade was noticeably more political than even New York’s. Both the crowd and parade participants were very well behaved – I didn’t see anyone get arrested.

“No Amber, not more Jameson… okay fine… Twist my arm.”
After Chinese food (in retrospect – ugh!), Tom and I met Carl and headed to Blowoff. What a night! Great crowd, great energy, great music and great video. Everything was definitely in full effect. Most of the usual suspects where there. We danced and jumped around and shouted until the wee hours of the morning, and then collapsed.

“Cornfed? Look more like Beeffed to me”
Sunday Sunday Sunday – Festival time! If you’re not there you better be dead or in jail. After another ill-advised meal (learn from my mistakes, no more bad idea burgers), Tom and I walked down to the festival. Pretty standard really – meat on a stick, commercial vendors, arts and crafts, of course politicians. Right away we bumped into a lot of friendly faces and stopped to chat and recollect on Saturday’s festivities. Later, we used our crazy ninja skills to avoid being plastered with stickers en route to the beer tent. The tent was fairly crowded, and we only stayed for a little while. Standing around in the sun drinking a Bud is so draining!

“I’m totally veto-ing waiting in that line.”
Sunday night I got pulled along on the tradition of meeting up at JR’s – with the rest of the known universe. At first insisting it was insanity to wait in line for the privilege of having vodka spilled on my shoes and smoke blown in my face, we made a lap around 17th street, running in to Jim and Don who, while waiting on their entrée, agreed with me that it’s lunacy. But the line got shorter and I caved, but we didn’t even stay there for longer than 30 minutes. Pizza rescued our stomachs, as we spent the rest of the evening watching Seinfeld and the Simpsons (which really has jumped the shark anymore – the jokes are so recycled).

Now, I need a weekend to recover from my weekend!!! Go check out the photos!

Posted by Jeff at 11:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Friday night I braved the pouring rain to venture into Hell's Kitchen for a blogger gathering (a.k.a. nerd convenion) called GB:NYC3. Mark from Zeitzeuge plans an annual trip to NYC and organizes a night out for fellow bloggers. Despite the weather, it was a fun night hanging with friends like Sean, Ed, and Joe - and meeting some fun new people, like Mark, Tim, Mark, Eric, Michael, Glenn, David, Vasco, and Vinny. I'm sure I missed a few folks, so feel free to leave corrections and additions in the comments. I can hardly remember names, and luckily I keep my camera around so I can remember faces. The venue was nice for the gathering, except for those damn ottomans that several people kept tripping over. The kids mingled. They sipped cocktails. They guzzled beer. They did tequilla shots. They rubbed a belly or two. They exchanged hugs.

Those more observant than me overheard a couple having a spat. "You always do that! You always embarass me in front of my friends!" "Who? These people you just met?" Does everyone work for Overheard in New York? Also, a public service announcement: If you're coupled, and you don't want your significant other to know you're out in a bar making out with another man, it's probably best not to do such things in a bar full of bloggers armed with digital cameras. And even if I was ready to respect your wishes to not post said photos, if for no other reason than good karma, all that goes out the window when you resume said behavior not 30 seconds later. All warranties expressed or implied are null and void.

Enough blathering. Gimmie the good stuff - photographic evidence.

Update: Glenn's photos are online, too.
Update 2: Mark has a whole bunch of photos up now.

Posted by Jeff at 01:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Thankfully, the network orgy of sweeps is over, allowing me more time to watch mindless drivel on the really high channels. I now not only get VH1 Classic, MTV Hits, and Country Music TV, but also VH1 Soul. Yes! My favorite stuff is still from VH1 Classic. I've seen crazy videos from Carly Simon, Cyndi Lauper, and so many hair bands I can't even remember (because really, who remembers Ratt anyway?).

Last night, while enjoying a rare thunder and lightning storm, I caught the tail end of a Fleetwood Mac video followed up by Dead or Alive's video "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record)". Sweet zombie Jebus! 1985 was such a good year. I can remember roller-skating to this song back in the day. Truly, the video has everything you could want from an 80's spectacle: big crimped hair sprayed into a wave, a sequined eye-patch, nose ring, creepy fingernails, purple velvet and gold lamé. Throwing Glitter!!! It's the gayest thing I've seen on tv, and I love it. Pete Burns, you're awesome!

Posted by Jeff at 10:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)