So yesterday I wanted to do a post and I wanted to rip something out nice and quick so I decided to answer the feature question.  It was the first one that I answered and the first two comments kind of irked me.  I had to resist the urge to flame/rebuttal back to them.  That's what I'm going to leave it at.

Yesterday was the second anniversary of marrying Amanda.  If you click the little calendar thing to the left and go to Jan/Feb/Mar 2006 you can read all about the fun time.  Then if you go to Apr/May/June/July/Aug 2006 you can read about how Amanda and I spent our first 5 months of being married with 900 miles between us. 

We did nothing for our anniversary.  We are thinking about getting a nice dinner to celebrate this weekend.  Amanda had to work late and for our anniversary meal we had chili dogs.  Nothing fancy whatsoever.  I suggested cracking open a bottle of champagne to make the occasion a little more romantic.  I was only partial serious but champagne really makes anything fancier, just like spoilers makes cars faster!

Of course when we sat down to eat our romantic anniversary dinner in front of the TV the cable wasn't working.  (^*%&*%*^( Comcast sucks ass.  They bought out or local cable company and it's been all downhill.  We called the number on the screen and proceeded to sit on hold for 42 minutes.  The guy said that our cable has been shut off because of an unpaid bill.  I asked the guy the amount and he said that it was $95 something.  That was one months bill which just so happens to be the first Comcast bill that we've received from them and that came in the mail LAST FRIDAY! 

I told the guy he was an idiot, that it's bullshit that I sat on hold for 40+ minutes, and probably some other stuff.  He said that there was nothing he could do.  I mumbled something that I can't repeat and hung up the phone.  Magically a few minutes later the cable starts working.  Idiots....I hate hate hate satellite but I'm so close to switching just to spite these ass hats.  The only thing keeping me from jumping ship is that there is no insanely fast DSL in our area and the thought of taking an internet speed hit makes me cringe.

We watch a TV show and then went to bed.

Last night I also lifted again.  I'm not as sore today as I was last week after chest/triceps so hopefully that means that my joints and tendons are fine.

That's it....time to work.

No, I don't think homeschooling should be illegal but I do question the general homeschoolee's level of learning. 

I know a couple of people that were homeschooled and only one of them actually received what I deem to be a quality education.  In this situation a guy's family formed a coallition of other families that wanted to homeschool their children.  They allowed the parents that were subject matter experts in a certain topic to teach the children.  They then devised a rotation schedule for the students.  It is actually a pretty neat system and it probably reflects the learning process enforced at the college level.

Granted I don't have kids, but I have no plans on homeschooling our future children.  I'm a smart guy and know quite a lot and my wife is smart as well.  We each hold college degrees from respectable institutions and my wife has a doctorate but I would not want to place myself as the sole person responsible for my kids education.

School also offers that invaluable social aspect as well as the ability to play sports or participate in other extra-curricular activities.

So illegal?  No
Preffered?  No
Capable of providing in a solid educational footing?  Certainly if done right

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Goodbye weekend, hello work week.  Where is a vacation?  Amanda and I need to firm up our vacation plans.  I have roughly two weeks to use before June so that doesn't leave much time.  I have no idea what we are going to do but we need to do something. 

This weekend was ok, but nothing spectacular.  Amanda worked all weekend and I was feeling pseudo-unsocial and just stayed at home.  The only thing that I really wanted to do was go gun shopping and there was a big gun show but no one wanted to go with me.  I didn't go which probably wasn't that bad of a thing.  I didn't really do anything all weekend.  I guess that it would be ok to call me lazy.

I just got a call from the warranty department from our home builder.  It turns out that they are going to be tearing out the old driveway and redoing it.  I'm actually surprised that it wasn't a fight/struggle.  Maybe word is out with the subcontractors that I'll take their ass to court (and win) like I did with the low voltage people.  The concrete company is questioning the material under the concrete but I have no doubts that it was the fact that they poured the concrete when it was below freezing.  I questioned them on it at the time and they assured me that it would be fine.  Shortly after we moved in the driveway began to crack and over the course of the last year the crack has begun to run up the entire length of the driveway.  It has widened slightly but no doubt over the next few years would continue to expand.  I have no idea what this would cost a few years ago to do on our own but my guess would probably be in the $10-15,000 range if you figure in removing the old one and pouring a new one.

Only thing that sucks about this whole thing is that we are going to be without the use of our garage/driveway for about a month while the concrete sets.  I could probably bitch and get some type of compensation, but truthfully I'm happy that they are doing the proper repair and not just patching the crack.  Heck, I wouldn't even know what type of compensation I'd seek since it's hard to put a value on a garage.  We used to pay $100 a month for a garage in an apartment and now we have a three car garage so $300 would probably be reasonable but I'm not going to chase $300.  Yes, you heard that coming from me....I'm leaving something alone!

Next weekend is Easter weekend and I don't have a clue what we are doing.  Last year we hosted easter but that isn't happening this year.  I wonder if any of our friends are staying in town and not going with family....if that is the case maybe we can have friend over for easter or go out to brunch somewhere.  We'll have to see.

That's it for now, back to work.

Saturdays, that glorious time when I don't have work hanging over my head, I can sleep in, get up early, go shopping, do whatever I please.

This morning I choose to sleep in until around 9:30 and lounged around on the internet for a bit.  Now I'm downstairs drinking some wonderful coffee, watching some TV, and typing a post.  The coffee is absolutely wonderful.  We have this single serving coffee maker that makes some of best coffee.  Right now I'm drinking Starbuck's "Morning Blend" with just a tad of sugar in it.  My first cup is just about gone and I think that I'm going to have another cup. 

This morning I woke up in bed and my legs were really sore.  I couldn't figure it out.  Why in the heck were my legs sore?  Then I remembered that I lifted last night and did shoulders/legs.  Legs are my least favorite thing to workout but it's so necessary.  To start with my legs are really long and skinny.  They probably aren't really as skinny as I think they are.  It's probably the body part that I have the most body issues with.  I think my calves are small but then again if I wear dress socks and I pull them up like you are supposed to I can barely get them up without feeling like they are going to rip.  It's kind of weird how the mind can interpret  it's own body.  The other reason why it's so necessary to workout legs is that they are the largest muscle groups in your body and by stimulating them you actually spur greater testosterone production and make working out the rest of your body that much more effective.

After working out last night I made dinner.  I wanted to make fresh fettuccine alfredo and I found this recipe from the Food Network.  It was from Emeril and let me say "BAM" the recipe was unbelievably good.  It was so damn good and it was good enough that I would have paid for it in a restaurant.  The  real test was that I added chicken to it and Amanda actually cleaned her plate.  The fact that she actually did that probably means that the recipe was pretty good.  It's amazing what some fresh ingredients can do for a meal.  I grated my own parmeasan, used some fresh green onions and garlic, real heavy cream, and some good quality pasta. 

That's the update for yesterday.  I didn't post what happened Thursday besides the quick pulses, but that's about it.

**Second cup of coffee gone**

Our little doggie is so funny.  He's almost the perfect little doggy.  He is playful but pretty much only when you initiate.  He loves to sit on your lap, or sit next to you.  He is generally pretty darn good.  He doesn't bark too much.  He stayed small which was nice.  He's also just a little prissy too, I guess that is the malteese in him coming out.  He hates to go outside when it's rainy or snowy.  He avoids puddles or dirt.  The other problem that I have with him is that he refuses to ask to go outside to go to the bathroom.  I think that it has something to do with him hating to get dirty or wet. 

Are any of you experiencing post-college withdrawl?  I miss learning new things.  Granted it's been about three years since I've sat in a class on a regular basis.  I plan on starting to work towars my masters sometime soon but I also want to take some enrichment classes.  The question is what do I want to improve myself in?  What do I love but I have a lots of room for improvement?  I am thinking cooking and photography.  I'm a pretty good cook but there is so much that I can learn.  Then photography....I love to take pictures but all too often that is really what I do just take pictures.  What I take is far too often just a picture rather than a photograph.  I wonder how much you can really learn from taking a couple of classes in these.  Not to mention that I wonder what they cost.

Speaking of cooking, I'm trying to narrow down the kitchen necessities that I really need to complete my kitchen.  The next thing that I have my eye on is a Kitchenaid stand mixer.  They aren't cheap but they are pretty much considered something you buy for a lifetime.  It's the traditional wedding present but we didn't get one.  I think that Amanda won't be happy but maybe if I promise to keep it in the pantry she'l relent.  She hates stuff on the counter but she gets her toaster on the counter...heaven knows that I don't ever use that thing.  I don't think I've made toast in two or three years.

Ok, that's it for now.  I am going to finish watching Alton Brown making cookies and then play Call of Duty 4.  Maybe after that I'll cook some lunch.

Oh, and I have an update about our first ever weekly menu and getting groceries all at once.  Let me say, it kicked ass!  I think that it's something that we should do every week.  It saved time, probably saved a little bit of money, and was just an overall success.  The only one that had to go to the grocery store was Amanda because on her cooking night she went with a non-traditional meatloaf recipe and had to pick up an ingredient or two. 

Hopefully Amanda will be up for the same thing this next week.  Maybe make the menu tonight and then grocery shopping Sunday.

I have a 10am meeting and I'm kind of in that lull before the meeting when I don't want to dig into anything and then have to stop, so I decided that I would give myself a few minutes to get a post up.

I'm so freakin' excited that we had a nice day yesterday.  It was in the mid to high 50's and today is in the 60's.  I went to lunch without a coat on and I felt so free.  Feeling the cool spring(ish) air hit my skin made me feel so rejuvenated.  Then on top of that with the daylight savings time switch it's now light out so much later it just feels good.  I want to mow the yard, wash the car, go for a run, sit outside, grill out, drink a cold beer in a lounge chair.  Warm weather is so damn close.

I've been pretty busy the past few days and that accounts for my lack of posting.  Tuesday I had a doctors appointment in the morning so I worked left for the appointment then came back to work.  I then stayed late and worked on some computer stuff that I could only do after the plan shut down.  I stayed until about 9pm but got damn near all my outstanding issues taken care of. 

Yesterday I left work about 45min or an hour early but didn't get to go home.  The CEO requested some assistance with his home computer so I went there to help. 

When I finally got home I wanted to do something but I was feeling a little tired.  I took a short hour or so nap on the couch.  I then got around and played Call of Duty 4 for about 45 minutes or so.  I was really surprised that I stopped playing since I was really kicking some serious ass. 

I cooked dinner and then we ate.

After dinner I watched a little more TV.

Then at nearly 10pm I decided that I wanted to workout.  Amanda agreed to join me and so we went to the basement and spent a little bit of time down there.  I did back/biceps and was a little nervous since that was my first time doing that since I hurt my back but everything was fine.  I kept the weight manageable and made sure that my form and posture was as perfect as possible. 

Speaking of lifting....I really have gotten weak.  I think that it will take me the better part of 2 or 3 months to get to some resemblance of my old self.  I don't think that I have lost a lot of size I'm just soft and have no definition. 

Ideally I would like to do cardio in the morning and lift in the evening but I don't think that I can ever adjust to going to bed around 10pm to get up at 5:30 to for a run.  I manage the getting up early when I'm on active duty but I can't pull out of bed when it's optional and there is always the evening.  Damn my stupid half asleep rationale.  The thing that irks me is that I know that the extra hour of broken sleep with me hitting the snooze bar every 10 minutes isn't going to add anything to my rejuvenation.  If anything it's going to make me more tired and annoy my wife.  Perhaps when the sun starts rising and it's not pitch black outside I'll get the motivation to get outside and run but for now the draw of the bed is too much.

Seriously, one extra hour in the day and I would be so happy.  One extra freakin' hour.  It doesn't necessarily even have to be a true hour to make the day 25 hours.  Just save an hour of something whether driving, cooking, cleaning or showering. 

Speaking of saving some time I think that I may have actually accomplished the saving of some time this week.  Remember how Amanda and I made the menu and went shopping for the whole week?  Well, we have stuck to the menu and I have managed to cook the dinners and not have to go to the grocery store once.  That in itself is probably saving me at a minimum of 25-45 minutes of time per meal.  I guess that is a start.

Ok, while I'm on the subject of sleeping and time, I have to ask, what is your natural rhythm?  Like if you had no obligations and didn't have to wake up for work or school what would your sleep cycle be like?  How much sleep do you need?

I think that my body would wake up about 8-9am and I would go to bed around 1-2am.  I think that if I could have that cycle then I really would never be tired throughout the day.  Instead society forces me to get up and make it to work before 7:30-7:45 while my body wants to stay up until 1am-2am every day.  UGGGG

Ok, time for the meeting.

So, another weekend has gone by.  This weekend was pretty uneventful and was one of those weekends were Amanda and I were pretty much shut-ins and unsocial.  All too often our weekends are crazy busy and we don't do anything but travel, socialize, and host/visit friends.  Sometimes it's nice just to have a weekend where we stay in and our lazy. 

Friday night we ordered pizza and watched TV.  The pizza guy forgot our bread sticks and then told us he was going to bring them back to us....he never did.  I think that Amanda wrote a letter to Pizza Hut, but I'm not sure. 

Saturday was our lazy day.  We just lounged around all day.  Amanda slept a ton, I played lots of video games and watched TV.  I think both of us spent the entire day in our PJ's.  We watched a couple movies.

Sunday we went out to breakfast and did something that we have never done before, we actually made a menu for the entire week.  We planned out the meals for the rest of the week and made a grocery list that corresponded to the menu.  After breakfast we were going to get groceries but the movie theater was calling my name and we took a little two and a half hour detour.

After the movie we went to the grocery store and bought everything that we need for the week (hopefully).  The grocery store was kind of bare because their warehouse was in Ohio and they got pounded by the recent storm. 

After groceries we came home and did some odd things and then watched a movie and ate dinner.

Overall it was a nice relaxing weekend although we didn't really accomplish any of the stuff that we probably should have done. 

Of the four movies that we watched this weekend I think that Amanda like one of them.  The others I think that she watched to pacify me or because there wasn't anything else for her to do.  I liked all the movies that we watched though.  Dream Girls -  I didn't know it was a musical but it was good anyways.  The singing was top notch and it was definitely better than Moulin Rouge which was probably the last musical that I tried to watch.  Martian Child -  Wasn't too bad....I probably wouldn't watch it again.  Vantage Point -  Was pretty good, moved fast, not all that deep but a good way to waste an hour and a half.  Deja Vu -  Different than I thought it would be, a little more Sci-Fi still pretty good though.

No big plans for the rest of the week.  We are stocked up on groceries for every meal though.

Ok, that's it, time to move on to something else

I just want to do a really quick little update this morning.  I don't have a lot of time but I think that I can squeeze something out.

After a week of anticipation, false starts, floods and miscues the exercise equipment has been relocated to the basement.  When I got home I went to work staging everything to be moved.  The Bowflex is huge and that biotch was not going to go through the door so I had to partially disassemble the thing.  The treadmill was too wide to roll through the door and had to be pulled sideways.  The elliptical was already moved out of the room so I was all ready when my buddy came over.

We tackled the Bowflex first.  Granted it was the lightest thing that we moved but it was also the most awkward since the base was so large.  I contemplated disassembling the base but I remembered spending hours beating the damn thing with a rubber mallet to have it seat properly and if at all possible I didn't want to repeat that situation.  We managed to finagle the thing down the stairs and then tackled the treadmill.

The treadmill is like this looming wart on my nose.  The thing has been the bane of my exercise routine since we got it.  When we purchased it I didn't want to wait for Sears to deliver so I took it home in the back of the Mitsubishi Eclipse I had at the time.  It stuck out the back of the car and we were in a snow storm.  Then when we got to our apartment I proceeded to move this heavy ass thing up the front steps, up a flight of steps to our door, into the apartment, and then up another flight of steps to the bedroom.  What in the hell was I thinking?  I don't know how I managed to get the thing up all by myself but I did.  I guess that I am truly a studly mofo.  Fortunately I no longer want to prove my perch in the jungle and I don't try to move heavy things by myself.  We got the treadmill down without too many problems. 

The final thing we had to move was the elliptical and I wasn't looking forward to moving it.  It was delivered by the company we bought it from and it hasn't moved since.  The thing is a really good quality one and has a huge ass flywheel and weighs a ton.  Thankfully the thing is pretty narrow and it moved the easiest of the three.

Now that everything has relocated to the basement I have to set everything up.  I think that this weekend I may put in some additional lights down there.  I'm also going to price punching bags. 

Amanda commented as she was squeegeeing the basement that she would love to have the basement finished and start having parties down there.  I agree that it would be nice.  I'm contemplating starting on it myself but I don't want to commit to work on it every single night for 5 hours.  I think that if I work on it part-time I could have it done by the end of next winter. 

Later on in the evening we ate dinner with another couple at BW3's.  It was pretty good but I caught my mouth on fire.  I ordered my normal Hot wing sauce but the wings were really unbelievably hot and by the 8th wing it was no longer fun.  The simple act of placing a piece of food in my mouth was painful.  It was kind of nuts.  Thankfully my mouth has since recovered.

We have no big plans this weekend, but that is about par for the course since we usually don't have anything crazy going on.

Indoor swimming pools are for rich people or in our case stupid people. 

Yesterday I had my buddy come by to finally move the exercise equipment down to the basement.  When we went downstairs to plan the way to move the heavy ass equipment we discovered that we were know playing host to a 1600+ square foot swimming pool.  Granted that would be a rednecks dream but it certainly wasn't mine.

Our basement was filled with about 3-4 inches of water thanks to the float on the sump pump getting stuck.  That meant that there would be no moving of exercise equipment and lots of work.

I was kicking myself for being a fool.  Like many things around the house, I had been planning on putting a backup sump pump in but never got around to it.  Hell, I spent the first year in our house going down to the basement during every heavy rain to make sure that the basement was dry and it always was.  I didn't even hear the damn pump run ever so I figured that the back-up pump wasn't a big deal.  I was dead wrong.

Thankfully we didn't have a lot of stuff in the basement and most of what was down there were empty boxes of TVs, vacuum cleaners, etc.  I don't think that anything of real value was damaged or ruined.

I then played electrical Russian Roulette and went to the pump and removed the float activation and plugged the pump in directly.  In hindsight it was probably pretty stupid to do since I was standing in a couple of inches of water and very well could have ended up getting my ass electrocuted. 

Since the pump was now working I went to the hardware store and proceeded to spend oh, about $370 on a backup sump pump, a battery for the backup pump, pvc, hack-saw, glue, couplers, elbows, acid for the battery, and finally a squeegee.  It's not that I don't need what I bought, in fact I was thinking about buying a squeegee this weekend to use to push the sludge from the melting snow out of the garage.  I also don't mind buying the backup pump because like I said earlier, it has been on my list to buy for over a year now. 

I got home from the hardware store and did something that was almost as stupid as standing in water while plugging something in, I woke Amanda up from a nap to help me in the basement.  Luckily, I survived both of the situations and Amanda came down to help me.

We then spent the next couple hours squeegeeing, going through boxes, and vacuuming water with the shop-vac.  Around 8 or so we finally had it pretty much cleaned up.  The standing water was gone and the pump was working.  In fact, the drain tile was still pouring into the sump so I sure as hell wasn't going to disconnect the pump to put in the backup.   We decided that we were going to go out to eat since after standing in water for a couple hours destroyed any desire that I had to cook.

I plugged the dehumidifier back in and cranked that baby up to full to help the basement dry out and hopefully prevent any formation of mold.  Thankfully the ambient humidity is pretty low right now so we should be fine.  If I notice any mold formations in the next week or two I'll have to bleach down the floors and walls.

Thankfully this morning when I went down there it was basically dry with the exception of a few isolated damp spots.  The humidifier was still cranking and the sump pump was kicking on as needed.  Today when I get home it should be basically back to normal.  I am going to try to move the exercise equipment down there and then this weekend I'll put in the backup sump pump, but I still don't know how I'm going to do it since the installation is going to be pretty tight.

We ate sushi for dinner last night, it kicked ass.  We then came home and I fell asleep with a full belly of raw fish, rice, and some superb Kirin Ichiban.  It's probably my favorite Japanese brew and it really goes great with sushi.  I don't think I could drink it with pizza, but with sushi or some hibachi it kicks ass.

No big plans tonight, maybe we'll move the exercise equipment and not find a red neck swimming pool.

**EDIT**
Just wanted to add some pictures.

See the round black thing?  That is the sump well.  That collects all the water from along the foundation that flows into the black tubing and into the well.  There is a pump that sits in the well that is activated when the water level gets to a certain point. 

Normall what happens is this:

The sump fills with water and the pump then pumps the water through that white pvc (which is in concrete) where the water is lifted up and is then pumped away from the house into the backyard with the majority of the water going into a shared water drain area and into a retention pond.

When the pump stopped working the water filled into the sump and since there was nothing to pump it out gravity worked to fill the basement with water.  The system has worked perfectly and our basement has been totally dry, until the pump stopped working.  Since the sump pump with draingage configuration is one of the best ways to keep the basement dry it is quite dependent on a functional pump.  With the pump not functioning the water will take the path of least resistance which is into the basement.  I also think that the reason that there was not more water in the basement is that the water table/level was actually fairly low which was why once the pump drained the basement floor it continued to pump water that was filling into the sump for a couple of hours.

Ok, that's it, hopefully you learned a little something and if you have a basement hopefully you go out and get a battery operated backup pump.

You know the smell?  The smell that instantly brings with it any and all bad connotations Granted the memory/smell relation can work positively as well but there is nothing like that W H A M  feeling when you smell something that you really don't like.

Yesterday I read an article about how my toothpaste and mouthwash is staining people's teeth brown.  It's pretty scary and I didn't waste any time dumping both of mine in the trash.  In case you are wondering the product is the Crest Pro Health line.  You can read about it here. 

So while I was at the drug store I decided that I would restock my hygiene supplies so it was new body wash, razors, shampoo, etc.  The body wash that I have been using for the last few years is AXE body wash.  I've been pretty happy with it.  There at the store they had a new scent/style.  It was hydrating which I thought was cool since my skin has been pretty dry. 

Anyways, back to the start of the post when I talked about the smell/memory relationship.

This morning in the shower I decided to give the new body wash a try.  I lather up my puff thing and it hits me.  My throat kind of gags and I begin to retch a little.  Instantly I knew what the smell was...it was the indistinguishable smell of  black licorice and Jaegermeister.  It's one of my least favorite smells in the entire world and here I am washing myself with this disgusting odor.  Somehow I managed to complete the washing process for the sake of having hydrated skin but damn, I don't know whether I'll use it again. 

Ok, I may give it one more try but after that I will probably return it or have Amanda return it since I bought it from her company.

Nothing exciting yesterday.  It was icy so I stayed in the house.  I didn't move the gym last night, maybe tonight.

No other news really...I'm looking forward to lunch today since I'm starved.  I may grab another mug of coffee but I'm afraid that I may start running around like Cornholio. 

I'm not going to go to open gym tonight.  We are supposed to get quite a bit of freezing rain.  Maybe I'll be able to get the gym relocated to the basement.  If not I'll maybe make some banana bread since I have a little bundle of bananas that are just about right. 

Amanda closes tonight so I will have a pretty empty evening to occupy myself.  Maybe I'll watch a movie or something.

My ankle no longer hurts.  My blister is still hurting a little bit but it's much better since I used some scissors to drain it instead of a needle.  I think that I may be able to get on the treadmill tonight.

I'm pretty hungry so I'm going to go to lunch.