Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Briefings
My dad always said "If you can't be smart, at least try to look smart." Ok, maybe he didn't say that... but it sounds like something he would say.
I had my first TDY with the new job. We were doing a bunch of briefings to the type of people who don't go anywhere without their team of lackys. I've been told that when a person makes the rank of Major in the Air Force, they take away his tongue. When he makes LtCol they take away his brain... and when he makes Col they give him back his tongue. In all honesty, although I've had my fair share of upper management buffoonery, I've found that once you get high enough you tend to run into some really talented people. The guys I talked to were on the ball and pretty tough. I couldn't rely on my usual method of abrasive sarcasm but in the end I think I held my own. The big news is that my bosses were happy and have decided to continue to pay me... which is always good.
I'm not much of a beer guy but we did throw a couple back (I had two). One of them was a Brazilian beer called Xingu which I ordered on accident. It's actually pretty good and sweet for a dark beer. I decided it was like a Guinness... but not shitty.
This picture is not of that beer. It's the picture I sent my boss when he asked where I was after the first round of briefings. I then promptly sent him directions to the pub.
So that's about it. I didn't really take any pictures because I didn't have time for any. It was a really fast paced, really stressful event and I'm so glad to be back home. It was a horrible flight back with two mechanical failures causing me to stay in Atlanta longer than I wanted to... which happens to be not at all. Atlanta sucks.
On a side note, I think I got a good in for Rome NY. There's this little place there called the Air Force Research Laboratory, and I think I made a good impression on one of the big wigs from there. Hopefully in a year or two Joy and I can escape from Suck-antonio and get to somewhere more normal. Also, I can live out where I can build out my wind turbines in peace!
I had my first TDY with the new job. We were doing a bunch of briefings to the type of people who don't go anywhere without their team of lackys. I've been told that when a person makes the rank of Major in the Air Force, they take away his tongue. When he makes LtCol they take away his brain... and when he makes Col they give him back his tongue. In all honesty, although I've had my fair share of upper management buffoonery, I've found that once you get high enough you tend to run into some really talented people. The guys I talked to were on the ball and pretty tough. I couldn't rely on my usual method of abrasive sarcasm but in the end I think I held my own. The big news is that my bosses were happy and have decided to continue to pay me... which is always good.
I'm not much of a beer guy but we did throw a couple back (I had two). One of them was a Brazilian beer called Xingu which I ordered on accident. It's actually pretty good and sweet for a dark beer. I decided it was like a Guinness... but not shitty.
This picture is not of that beer. It's the picture I sent my boss when he asked where I was after the first round of briefings. I then promptly sent him directions to the pub.
So that's about it. I didn't really take any pictures because I didn't have time for any. It was a really fast paced, really stressful event and I'm so glad to be back home. It was a horrible flight back with two mechanical failures causing me to stay in Atlanta longer than I wanted to... which happens to be not at all. Atlanta sucks.
On a side note, I think I got a good in for Rome NY. There's this little place there called the Air Force Research Laboratory, and I think I made a good impression on one of the big wigs from there. Hopefully in a year or two Joy and I can escape from Suck-antonio and get to somewhere more normal. Also, I can live out where I can build out my wind turbines in peace!
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Twilight
I'm taking Joy to the next one when it comes out. I've read all the books and I cannot put into words how much I hate this series. Wow... I guess I have the same literary prowess as Stephine Meyer. If only I used my powers to create vacuous charactors in a book about glittery vampires. DAMN YOU BARELY LITERATE TEENAGE POPULATION!
Marathon and soccer
I took the kids to see the SA marathon today. I had a couple of friends running it and thought it'd be fun. Now, personally... I don't run unless somethings chasing me. In fact, if something was chasing me, I'd probably just give up then to. The kids really had a good time. We ate banana's that were for the runners, drank Gatorade that was for the runners and got some nice swag... that was for the runners. Apparently all you have to do is say you are grabbing one "for your wife".
After that, we went to Britney's soccer game. They were playing the North San Antonio white kids and it was a heated battle. The game took place right around the corner from the middle of nowhere so we had lots of room to play. Seri and I spent this time running around like maniacs till she found a net to hang in and rest for a while.
It was a really good time all together. When we got home Joy's mom decided to watch the wiener kids for us and Joy and I went out to PF Changs for some lettuce tacos. We stopped by Barnes and Nobles to check out the nook. They didn't have a display and the Barnes and Nobles guy was an idiot... so we left. I would think that if you take a job at a book store... and are over the age of 20, that maybe you'd read stuff from time to time. Well, there's B&N guy and he's at the nook kiosk, he's got the nook pamphlets that talk about the nook... and he can't answer shit about it. "How does the 3G interface work for buying books?" "I don't think it has that." "Really, because it's in the pamphlet that you just handed me... and you work in a book store... where people read shit all day. Why don't you grab a Starbucks, go over to that comfy chair next to the loser with the Macbook and learn a little about your job!"
See, there a go again. Expecting an average level of intelligence while living in San Antonio. My mistake. Oh well, we're totally getting a nook. I feel like such a pleb getting excited over a e-reader. It's like an artist getting excited over the latest doodle pad pro... it's just not right.
After that, we went to Britney's soccer game. They were playing the North San Antonio white kids and it was a heated battle. The game took place right around the corner from the middle of nowhere so we had lots of room to play. Seri and I spent this time running around like maniacs till she found a net to hang in and rest for a while.
It was a really good time all together. When we got home Joy's mom decided to watch the wiener kids for us and Joy and I went out to PF Changs for some lettuce tacos. We stopped by Barnes and Nobles to check out the nook. They didn't have a display and the Barnes and Nobles guy was an idiot... so we left. I would think that if you take a job at a book store... and are over the age of 20, that maybe you'd read stuff from time to time. Well, there's B&N guy and he's at the nook kiosk, he's got the nook pamphlets that talk about the nook... and he can't answer shit about it. "How does the 3G interface work for buying books?" "I don't think it has that." "Really, because it's in the pamphlet that you just handed me... and you work in a book store... where people read shit all day. Why don't you grab a Starbucks, go over to that comfy chair next to the loser with the Macbook and learn a little about your job!"
See, there a go again. Expecting an average level of intelligence while living in San Antonio. My mistake. Oh well, we're totally getting a nook. I feel like such a pleb getting excited over a e-reader. It's like an artist getting excited over the latest doodle pad pro... it's just not right.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Fixing the truck
Joy's dad had a problem with his truck. He had a large pipe in the back and backed into a telephone pole. The pipe then wedged against the wall of the bed and bent it into the cab. We were really surprised that the cab window didn't break. He took it to a repair shop and they wanted $500 to take of the bed and knock it back into place. Instead I came up with this idea.
I Used a pole to go in between the bed and the cab and then used my tie downs to pull on the pole, which straightened the bed. It worked awesome!
I got the bed back straight for free. So I'm feeling pretty good about myself. Also, I realized that now, when I do stuff like this, I can say that I engineered a solution. I guess before when I had crazy ideas, all I could say is that I did some stupid shit!
Then moving on to my car. Using my history of used cars that I drove into the ground as a base line. I figured that when it comes to breaks, you just wait till they start making noise and then change the pads. After 90,000 miles, my brakes started to make noises. So, I picked up some pads and got to work after the kids went to bed. The first thing that went wrong was my jack broke. I bought this really cheap hydraulic years ago and that decided it didn't want to lift anymore. So off to Walmart I go. I get the better of the two jacks available and get back home just to find out that there is a TORX bolt holding in the brake pad. So it's back to Walmart. It's about 3 am now... and there is only two people in the store. Me and this lady.
Oh fun! Of course she got ahead of me in line and of course she took a full 20 minutes to check out! I was pretty much at the end of my little happy rope when I got out of there. O get back to find out that I need a new roter, so I just quit there and go to the shop. In the end it took about $400 to get everything fixed. That was the pads, a roter and another roter turned. It was just too much fun.
As a consolation prize for reading about my Walmart misadventures... here's a picture of Hayden right before school.
I Used a pole to go in between the bed and the cab and then used my tie downs to pull on the pole, which straightened the bed. It worked awesome!
I got the bed back straight for free. So I'm feeling pretty good about myself. Also, I realized that now, when I do stuff like this, I can say that I engineered a solution. I guess before when I had crazy ideas, all I could say is that I did some stupid shit!
Then moving on to my car. Using my history of used cars that I drove into the ground as a base line. I figured that when it comes to breaks, you just wait till they start making noise and then change the pads. After 90,000 miles, my brakes started to make noises. So, I picked up some pads and got to work after the kids went to bed. The first thing that went wrong was my jack broke. I bought this really cheap hydraulic years ago and that decided it didn't want to lift anymore. So off to Walmart I go. I get the better of the two jacks available and get back home just to find out that there is a TORX bolt holding in the brake pad. So it's back to Walmart. It's about 3 am now... and there is only two people in the store. Me and this lady.
Oh fun! Of course she got ahead of me in line and of course she took a full 20 minutes to check out! I was pretty much at the end of my little happy rope when I got out of there. O get back to find out that I need a new roter, so I just quit there and go to the shop. In the end it took about $400 to get everything fixed. That was the pads, a roter and another roter turned. It was just too much fun.
As a consolation prize for reading about my Walmart misadventures... here's a picture of Hayden right before school.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Friday, November 6, 2009
Halloween 2009
We had a really fun, but laid back Halloween this year. We didn't have any friends over so I didn't have to cook a whole bunch of food. I ended up grilling shish kabob's and making some corn on the cob. We started out the day by carving pumpkins.
Hayden was actually down with cleaning out all the gook, which was nice since that has historically been a dad duty.
Seri drew her own face on her pumpkin... which looked nothing like the finished product but, she was happy none the less.
After that I took Hayden to his Halloween party at school. Right away I find this kid dressed as the black knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Sure enough there is his sister in a killer rabbit costume complete with really sharp teeth!
It was hilarious and their parents were cool enough to let me get a picture. Hayden was in his costume as well. When I got it, I found these really cool red goggles, which ended up being lost by the time they were needed. Luckily, I had some red hair dye so I spiked his hair up and he was good. He was a mercenary... but he insisted on calling himself a mercy.
When it was time to trick-or-treat, I ended up using the hair dye as well as some black make-up to make red and black tiger stripes across Hayden's face. It ended up looking really cool. He was a bloody mercenary now... or a bloody mercy if you asked him.
Seri was Snow White. She would not sit still long enough for a good picture! She was really pumped!
She would truck up to any house, very much wanting to go all by herself and yell out 'Trick or Treat!!' and then plop her bag down in front of the candy giver. If the amount she recieved didn't meet her internal quota... she'd repeatedly say 'Trick or Treat!!' till she got another candy. It took me a while to realize that she was extorting all our neighbors this way.
Pretty soon her bag was pretty stuffed, but she wanted to just keep on trucking. I ended up giving her a piggyback ride back to the house where she promptly fell asleep on top of her candy bag!
It was a good night, we did have the usual idiots playing Tejano music till I called the cops on them... again. I also got to use a liberal amount of dry ice around the yard so we had spooky smoke all night. It was fun.
Hayden was actually down with cleaning out all the gook, which was nice since that has historically been a dad duty.
Seri drew her own face on her pumpkin... which looked nothing like the finished product but, she was happy none the less.
After that I took Hayden to his Halloween party at school. Right away I find this kid dressed as the black knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Sure enough there is his sister in a killer rabbit costume complete with really sharp teeth!
It was hilarious and their parents were cool enough to let me get a picture. Hayden was in his costume as well. When I got it, I found these really cool red goggles, which ended up being lost by the time they were needed. Luckily, I had some red hair dye so I spiked his hair up and he was good. He was a mercenary... but he insisted on calling himself a mercy.
When it was time to trick-or-treat, I ended up using the hair dye as well as some black make-up to make red and black tiger stripes across Hayden's face. It ended up looking really cool. He was a bloody mercenary now... or a bloody mercy if you asked him.
Seri was Snow White. She would not sit still long enough for a good picture! She was really pumped!
She would truck up to any house, very much wanting to go all by herself and yell out 'Trick or Treat!!' and then plop her bag down in front of the candy giver. If the amount she recieved didn't meet her internal quota... she'd repeatedly say 'Trick or Treat!!' till she got another candy. It took me a while to realize that she was extorting all our neighbors this way.
Pretty soon her bag was pretty stuffed, but she wanted to just keep on trucking. I ended up giving her a piggyback ride back to the house where she promptly fell asleep on top of her candy bag!
It was a good night, we did have the usual idiots playing Tejano music till I called the cops on them... again. I also got to use a liberal amount of dry ice around the yard so we had spooky smoke all night. It was fun.
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