Happy 50!

I can't let the day go by without mentioning it's the 50th anniversary of your favorite toy and mine, Lego! Even Google did a tribute with a Lego-themed logo.

Gotta love the brick! Although it's tough moving when you have about two cubic meters of the stuff....

(Un)Predictable

Lessee, what to kvetch about today? Well how about these guys?

If you look at this the day of the posting you can see that a very cold front is moving in today (Sunday). Yesterday, they said it was coming in Monday, on Thursday they said it was coming in Tuesday. And each day they "expanded" how long it's going to stick around by a day.

Now I know weather is a real chaotic system. It's hard to predict exactly what's going to happen with a real degree of accuracy. But the pattern described above is pretty consistent with these guys. Cold fronts move in faster and stay longer than these guys say almost every time. There's a part of me that wonders if it's actually an attempt to grab ratings. People don't like bad news and of course shy away when they don't like what they hear. For me, I'd rather get the "unspun" forecast if this is the case. I'm already in the habit of plugging the car in two days before the predict deep-freeze because of this.

Anyway, everyone complains about the weather around here, so in this case I'm just a single voice in the crowd, muffled by a scarf. I just hope the chill lets up a bit by next weekend: skiing in -30 in not my idea of fun. However there are hottubs and apparently a 2:1 female to male ratio going on this trip.

Every cloud has a silver lining?

Withdrawl

It's odd, but lately I've had the urge to renew my World of Warcraft subscription.

It's odd because at first, it was a huge hit with me. Sometime around level thirty I realized a couple of things:

• I had being doing basically the same thing over and over again
• The only way to customize my character was to get "uber-lewtz"
• 90% of the people I was playing with online were ass-hats

I'm still of course playing games, but since my nVidia card went to Silicon Heaven, it's been on my DS (Puzzle Quest) and my laptop (Sword of the Stars). But something is missing. I'm not 100% sure what: it may be the adrenaline rush of FPS combat, the rich and fantastic worlds offered online or the god-like power of an RTS.

That or I'm bored. Or I'm getting old.

With the writer's strike there's never anything all that good on TV (or at least the channels I can afford). So the cable is getting disconnected. With the fried board, I haven't been gaming nearly as much. I have been going to the gym on a pretty regular schedule, and am a quarter of a mile away from running five-k a session, despite the pack-a-day habit.

Dear gods, I can't actually be growing up can I?

Nah. Why else would I have all that Lego?

Embarrassment in my Pants

While I was doing laundry tonight I noticed something about my comfortable jeans.

Almost everyone has at least a pair of these. You know, the jeans that have frayed cuffs, worn knees, paint stains, bleach marks and in my case a huge hole in the back pocket where my cheap wallet has worn through. They're comfortable, lived in, good and trusted friends.

So while sorting through the washing I noticed something pretty dreadful. At some point I had worn a hole in the inseam just below the crotch. Naturally my first reaction was something on the lines of yeah baby! But it quickly dawned on me that the said worn-patch in the fabric was not from anything I could be proud of.

In fact...it was caused by my thighs rubbing together when I walked. This is embarrassing enough. But when the cute girl folding her laundry beside me saw this and realized the cause at the same moment as I did and she giggled I was mortified.

I gotta go check all my pants and learn how to sew re-enforcements in my remaining pants. And go run about 25k at the gym. And get diet pills. And then move to a remote cabin in the wilderness.

Gah...

The Theory

L'l Bro B may have hit upon why my next door neighbor has rage management issues: 'Roid Rage.

It makes perfect sense. Explosive outbursts manifested in violent action, seething rage and (possibly) domestic violence. When B mentioned the possibility, it "clicked".

I never understood the whole 'roid thing. That is I understand why guys want to get big 'n' strong but the stupid lengths they go to. Mind you that goes for plastic surgery, bulimia, excessive wardrobe dysfunction etc. Vanity, pure and simple.

Besides the mantra of "leaving a pretty corpse" doesn't make much sense if along the way you ensure nobody attends the funeral.

Post-It

Well it's already the ninth and I've only posted one entry this year so here's one just for filler. I did manage to get the new place. I shouldn't worry about these things - I have good credit, good references and a steady job - but I always get a tinge of anxiety when I apply for stuff like this. Maybe it's a fear of rejection but I like to think it's my past experiences with paper work.

For example a while back our HR department informed me that I had been paying Alberta Health Care at the family rate instead of the single rate so there we going to give me back the difference. Last week I was informed from the same HR department that they received notice that from AHC that I had not paid for AHC since my departure from my previous job, so I owed them money. I'm now arguing with HR that while I did owe two months' worth the payments for the past six have have been deducted from my pay and obviously not forwarded to said government agency.

This is not the first time this has happened.

Back in university, part of tuition was supposedly going to the government to cover these health premiums. So I was surprised when I received a notice that I owed five years in back premiums. Over the course of six months I attempted to get the University to show it's payment records (which they said they had) to the AHC. They both said it's not their respective problem, it's yours so pay up now. Due to the fact I was a student all those years and had little to no income I did manage to reduce the amount owed to about $2500 which I had to eventually pay. Needless to say anyone from my alma matter who asks me to donate as an alumnus get the cold shoulder.

I'm moving in the middle of next month and due to having five weeks notice actually managed to get movers on a Saturday. This will cost me somewhere around $400 but I'll consider it money well spent. Although I do appreciate their help, my friends tend to get severely injured when helping me move. I consider it taking one for the team.

And I was sick today. I woke up with a slightly sore throat but by the time I did the ritual 3S (shower, shit, shave) routine it felt like someone was ramming low-grade sandpaper down my esophagus with splinter-handled plunger. I was going to email a notice to my boss that I was sick, but when I opened my web mail, I notice several panicked messages regarding that project I keep whinging about. So I went to work, determined that the problems were: 1) I had made an assumption that someone had done some due diligence and 2) apparently I didn't yell loudly enough that having someone fiddle with databases who thinks it works just like "Microsoft Money" is a bad idea. So after breathing heavily on several people I went home and slept. It was surprisingly quiet after all my whining about the noise and it may me reconsider the possibility that I'm just being too sensitive.

The idiot next door who is repeatedly slamming his closet door open and shut puts that to rest at least.

On the Road Again

As promised (threatened, whatever) I'm moving again. I put an application on a new apartment at noon today: seventh floor, concrete building.

So in addition some peace ad/or quiet, I'm actually going to be saving a good chunk of change:

• Rent, including parking, is going from $1250 to $1175. Plus I'll get secured underground parking instead of the open lot with no lights I have now.
• Power and cable is included, so that's another $90 a month in bills gone.
• The new place has a pretty decent gym, so I can drop my $50 a month membership at the one I go to now.

So lessee, that's $215 a month less than the place I'm in now, or $2580 a year. Plus it's quiet (or it least it can't be worse than where I am now. Plus the new place a has a huge balcony.

Unlike last time, I really only looked at the one place. Now normally that sounds stupid, but it was a place that was in competition with the current dive. it lost only because the layout was a bit odd and a tad smaller than where I am now. However right now I have quite a bit of space that's going to waste (my TV stand is about 6 feet from the wall). The storage is better at the new place as well: there is some.

It sounds like I'm trying to convince myself that this is a good idea doesn't it? Trust me, it is. Did I tell you about my neighbor across the hall's new baby? The one with colic?

This time around I'm hiring movers. granted I'm paying two rents for February but I'll get that back with the projected savings. However I'm sure the folks who helped me move last time would be more than willing to do the beer and food thing afterwards even if they don't do any back-straining, leg-breaking work.

I haven't had a decent night's sleep in five months. It's kind of scary really. I go to bed at night actually tensing in anticipation of the nocturnal cacophony that has categorized my tenancy here. That is not conducive to a restful slumber. See? I'm so excited I'm bringing out the $2 words! All I need to do now is just survive the next six weeks or so. A ski trip and a blind date over the next while may or may not help that. At least there's the potential that I'll actually be sleeping somewhere else with those.

And yes the gym has been busy since New year's but not as bad as I thought. Maybe people just gave up on trying? However there is new eye candy, which I would miss except that the new place houses swimsuit models who work out there. Okay, why did I not move there in the first place again? Sheesh...