Holiday!

Yay! Not three, not four, but having myself a five day weekend!

Man I have a lot of crap to do.

• Clean car inside and out
• Get new tires
• Help L'il Bro B move to Vancouver
• Clean the house
• Book a hotel for Maui
• Take L'il Bro G to Lethbridge
• Avoid checking my work email

So really if I only do one of those a day, I'll be okay. Whew!

The non-smoking thing is sucking at the moment. The last three days were just a great ball of fun trying to conduct not one but two month-ends. Rerunning last month end and starting this month end is confusing as hell. And to top it off, we have new people involved in the process. They're good people Stewart, fine Americans but they don't know what the heck they are getting into. I really wish "the wagon" had seat belts. And child-proof locks. And while I'm wishing, erotic massage and instructional seminars by Amazonian astro-physics PhDs. Good for your mind and body!

Okay this week has obviously taken its toll.

Non-Smoking

So no smokes for the last 48 hours, almost exactly. Okay 46 hours.

I won't go into the knuckle biting, sweat-inducing, temper-flaring moments of the past couple of days. Yes, I technically quit last week but I managed to fall off the wagon several times and a boat once. Do not attempt to go boating with a little brother who takes the position of "captain" way too literally. Cap'n Bligh ain't in it.

Besides the long term health benefits of not smoking $12.49 a day, I found (again to my surprise) there are short term benefits. As I've mentioned, I've taken up running on the treadmill and try to get in three 5-K runs a week. I mostly managed, but with a couple of two-minute "breaks" of just walking.

Today, I went the whole 3.1 miles at six miles per hour straight, no breaks. Plus I managed to up my weight on all my sets and almost get to max reps. Which is unprecedented.

There have also been some mental benefits. Capa may have noticed that I was boppin' in my cubicle all day. On the way home from work I couldn't wipe the cheesy grin off of my face. And generally I went the whole day without homicidal mania kicking in even during the drive to work. So that's good right? And maybe just maybe there has been a subtle confidence boost: I noticed I was being checked out by women at the gym and they weren't repulsive (urinating dog! urinating dog! Pratchett reference).

Now I'm still going through withdrawals. I'm chewing through a pack-and-half of gum a day and gnawing tooth picks like I have a recessive beaver gene of something. But this time it feels good and right.

Mind you all the good things above may just be my version of dead-baby-crawling-on-the ceiling (Trainspotting reference) but even if it is I'll take it.

I'll be able to afford the week in Maui I just booked for my birthday/mid-life crisis. And I won't be as embarrassed to take my shirt off at the beach. There's still the dead-white skin that is my heritage but at least there won't be as much of it.

"Doctor Horrible!"

Okay, seriously folks, go here. It'll only be around for a few days.

If you are or were ever a fan of Buffy, Angel or (and I know almost all of you are) Firefly then go get some more Joss Whedon goodness.

Sorry about the links to Fox but technically they own the rights to all the shows they canceled.

Why haven't gone yet?!? Go!

I am such a fanbois.

A Good Day to Quit Smoking

As usual, my timing is impeccable:

1. I was awoken at 4:35 AM this morning by the dumpster-divers rifling through the last night of Stampede trash. An altercation about who got the half-full bottle of something or other ensued and was ended when said bottle was smashed over one of the opponents' heads.
2. Was the first at work this morning and discovered that most of the weekend processes didn't.
3. Somehow I got roped into being the contact for my team on a new project which at first seemed like a simple matter but by the end of the day looks to be a political nightmare.
4. I had to (and still am) running month end for the third time this month because of, well, I don't know really.
5. Minor plumbing problems (kitchen sink not draining) on Saturday resulted with me coming home today to a giant hole where the wall used to be. Sawdust, muck, water and dirt everywhere.

Needless to say, tomorrow is Day 1 Version 2

Burning Sensation

Wow. In my efforts not to spend money, one of the biggest hurdles is to keep myself entertained. Or at least busy. When I'm bored, I spend money on tings that relive the boredom for about an hour. This is costing about $20/hour on average.

So toady after the gym (I'm paying for it until the office moves to the new building) and grocery shopping (stuff that's absolutely required and on sale) I started burning the CDs I've purchased over the past few years and never got around to burning. These have been languishing in various nooks and crannies in my car for a while.

38 CDs. And about half of them "Best Of.." albums. I must be getting old when I buy those. That or the music is.

And of course as I burn them, they get filed into the big box (why keep CDs around?). And I gotta wonder why I have some of the stuff. "Shonen Knife"? "Enigma"? Okay, I an understand the kitsch factor. How the hell did I wind up with a "Spice Girls" album? Either an ex- or a drunken purchase (probably a combination of both).

What I was happy to see are the "harder" bands like "Primus", "Cake", "Tupelo Chain Sex", "Ministry", "Day-Glo Abortions" etc. Apparently I was into the whole Ambient Electronica thing when I got my iPod and didn't load up with something a tad harder. I haven't burst an eardrum in a while so it'll be a nice change. Also found my old "Supertramp" and "Yes" albums if I wanna get groovy.

Man I love hearing this stuff again.

Impulse

Okay the whole not doing the impulse buy is harder than I thought. I picked up "Midway Arcade Classics" and "Guitar Hero 2" for the PS2.

And two weeks worth of nicotine patches. Quit day is Monday. We all know how this is gonna go....

I'm Moby the Sailor-man!

Yesterday was my first full-day sailing lesson with Li'l Bro G. Although the weather was less than cooperative, and there were times that G and I almost came to blows (the little boats we were on are a bit "tippy") it was a blast and a half. Looking forward to the next couple of weeks of this: I could see myself sailing the ocean-blue as a retirement plan. Especially if my home-port was somewhere in Italy.

So as befits sailors returning to shore, the Bros and I went drinking, fighting and lookin' fer wimmen. Actually went to a strip club to watch Ultimate Fighting Championship but that's as close as you'll get in the middle of Bald-Ass Prairie.

On the work front, my stock-purchase program kicked in for my last check and, well, let us just say I see a lot of Kraft Dinner in my future. Ouch. My take home dropped over 40%! I'll have to fill out one of those "Mr. Tax Man, please stop raping my bung hole until tax-time" forms. I'm even considering stopping smoking. Really. Not going to happen, but it may be a last resort.

My Mass Effect review has gone critical. It's long, meandering and really doesn't say anything you can't read anywhere else. So I'm going to start again. And probably start the game up again. But in the mean time, here's what I learned from playing Mass Effect:

1. You can be an asshole or you can be a saint. But if you try to be a bit of both, you won't get very far.
2. The women who are strong, funny and fun think I'm a dork.
3. The women who are socially inept shut-ins with strange skin conditions throw themselves at me.
4. No matter how extensive the character creation engine is, I'm still ugly.
5. When I'm in charge, expect any order issued to be ignored in favor of standing and staring at a crate.
6. Pointing a vehicle in the direction yo wish to go and hitting the gas will get you there eventually.
7. No matter where you go, someone else got there first and will charge you a fee to enter. Or just shoot at you.
8. Blasting zombies with a "boom-stick" is great fun no matter what the age, epoch, universe and cause of zombie-ism.
9. The exact item you need will be in the store the moment you can't afford it.
10. The universe is out to get you. This can be handled with bigger guns, better armor and the ability to throw shit into outer space with the power of your mind alone.