Musings

I was talking with my mom today, and we got onto the subject of American food. She told me of a ton of things that America does totally different than other countries - corn on the cob, baked beans, barbeque, stuff like that. Things that I took totally for granted, and didn't realize that other countries made differently, or not at all. This made me realize how little I know about the culture of other countries. I mean, the only "international" travel I've done is to Canada a few times. I've heard stories, seen videos, talked with people from other countries, but it's really not the same. That was just a thought that really struck me.


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Bleh

Well, I haven't updated in a while. Not too much has been going on. I still have no real job. I haven't officially quit my other job yet. I found out that I am getting paid for the work I do at the museum. I haven't done anything on my buggy yet. Hopefully, my best friend from high school will be coming home from Colorado for a few days (he's there with the Army).

The other day, my mom gave me a huge talk about relationships. That was really kind of wierd. She and my dad aren't getting along very well, but they are managing. My dad is a super space cadet, and kind of mean spirited, in general. My sister is royally pissed off whenever they fight, and says that my mom should just divorce my dad. Unfortunately my mom doesn't make enough money at her job to really support herself, as well as me and my sister. So, I don't think a divorce is in the works, at least not anytime soon. However it makes a stressful house. But back to the original topic, my mom went into a almost a half hour long spiel on relationships. It was a little awkward. I got the impression that she thought I was gay. That was a little disconcerting. I mean, I don't usually talk to girls that much around my mom, because I feel that would be rather strange. And the fact that she would say something totally out there at the completely wrong time. It would be super awkward, and overall embarassing. Unfortunately, me not talking to girls, even when they start flirting with me, leads my mom to start some awkward and embarassing converstations. It's annoying.

My sister has been planning a road trip to go see the guy that she is kind of lusting after, and wants me to help. I told her that I would love to drive, but that I really didn't have any money. She wasn't happy with that. The plan so far is to go to one of my friend's who is throwing a party, and then go to see the guy that she wants to visit. However, she is truly mad at me for not working and getting money to put towards this trip. So now I'm being yelled at by my sister, my mother is trying to get me to talk to girls, and I have no job. My summer sucks.


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Angry house

Well, the other day my mom and sister got into a huge fight. Not a screaming fight, but a definite emotional fight. My sister has been feeling the need to be in a different place other than this house for a while. However, she doesn't really want to make the step to leaving. The problem I had with hearing them fight is two fold. One, I hate hearing anyone have a major argument. Two, I feel like it's somewhat my fault. I'm not working this summer, and thus, I've been drawimg from my mom for cash at times. My sister has a job, and is paying for herself, mostly. However, she's not doing much around the house, so my mom uses me as an example. This, of course, makes my sister mad at me. I just want everyone to get along. Of course, that's never going to happen.

I edited my profile today, and the random question answer field is limited to 150 characters (like 20 words), and I can't manage to say what I want in that amount. So, here's my response to that - Who comes up with these questions? Do milkshakes have feelings? Why would I care? One of the other questions that I got was "Describe a wet waffle going onto a hot griddle" - don't waffles start out as batter? WTF? A wet waffle in my mind is soggy, gross, and is probably cold. Yuck. The person who came up with these needs some new drugs.

My car got fixed! It was a busted fuel pump, which was a quick, cheap fix, and now my car is functional again! Yay! However, it's going to need a new clutch sometime soon. Oh, well. I hope to get that before the road trip that my sister is planning out for me and her starts. We're supposed to take my car, and I don't want the clutch crapping out in the middle of nowhere. More on the road trip in later entries.

Now, for bed.


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A bit of rambling and some random thoughts

Well, only really one random thought, and not too much rambling, but the title sounded better than "Bored, yet again."

I was reading PC Gamer and took especial interest in their coverage of E3, which is one of the biggest conventions in the electronic entertainment world. It is where a substantial chunk of the new games coming out are unveiled and drooled over by the public. PCG had some 70 odd games that they looked at, and most of them looked very impressive. However, I noticed one thing - almost all are based around high end graphics engines and powerful physics models. Well, sweet! My game will look and perform like real life! Cool! Well, maybe not. I recently downloaded an independent game called UFO:Alien Invasion. This game is a remake of X-Com or something like that, which was a super famous game in the mid 90's. The graphics on it are 3D but not super advanced. It is turn based. It doesn't have a super advanced physics engine. It is also boat loads of fun! You run a Special Ops kind of team, and are supposed to deal with alien invasions. You maintain your base, reaserching things, and outfitting your team, and when aliens invade, you go and kill them. It is extremely tough, and takes lots of thinking. I'm surprised by the overall quality of it. There are still a few bugs in it (mostly sound, but a few other things like the campaign introducton, which isn't finished), but I can't wait 'till it is totally done! This made me really think about the games from E3. Why are developers pushing the visuals so much? Gameplay is much more of a draw for people over the long run. Friends will tell each other "Yeah the graphics are a little dated, but the game is still uber fun!" as opposed to "Yeah it looks good, but . . . " I don't know. I just hope that all of these games have the backgroup to go with the surface.


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Wishing for sleep

Well, Friday was a pretty fun day. Roasting hot, but the work installing speakers was rather simple and pretty enjoyable. I haven't gotten paid yet, but "the check is in the mail." I'm waiting in breathless anticipation for that.

Over this weekend, I'm working at the museum. For those who are interested in what the musuem is, it's a maritime musuem, and has a few replica boats, and a fairly large boatbuilding aspect. However, they are strapped for funding (being non-profit has its drawbacks I guess), and so I'm not sure if I going to be paid for my work here or if I am a volunteer employee. I'd like to be paid, of course, but I have a feeling that even if I do get paid, it will be closer to an allowance than a salary.

So I am on a lunch break right now, sitting in a nice air conditioned building, procrastinating going back out into the sweltering heat, and talking to the public. I'm wishing I got more than the 5 or so hours of sleep I got on a friend's couch last night, and eyeing what's left of the two litre bottle of Vault (tastes like a soda, kicks lick an energy drink - theoretically) next to me. I think if I finish that off, I should be able to last the three and a half more hours to closing. I like this job, but it can certainly be draining.

With my car dead, I had to drive my dad's last night when I went to my friends house. Doing this made me realize how much I love my car. My dad's car, while perfectly serviceable, just is lacking something. It is a Volvo 240 station wagon (my entire family drives Volvo 240's). The clutch is mushy, and engages really high. The gears feel out of place, not well sorted. The steering feels numb. My 240 just feels so much sportier. The transmission, although totally FUBAR, is still functional, and the gear ratios in it are perfect. The car seems to tell you so much more about where the wheels are and how the road is going. There just seems to be a bit more jump overall. I want it fixed.

My dad drove me to work today. I never want to ride with him again. I hate the way he drives. He shifts like shit (more on this later), he doesn't pay attention, and is super inconsistant in his driving style (zoomy one moment, old man-ish the next). On how he shifts - it's not smooth (I can kind of understand that with how the clutch is), and he shifts way too early. Way too early. He's in third gear at 20 mph. He doesn't downshift at all, either. He'll shift into 5th gear (a cruising gear) on a slightly flat spot (at 38 mph), and then when he's going up a hill, at 35 in fifth, he won't downshift!! It annoys the hell out of me. When you slow down for a corner, and downshift twice, and the car doesn't noticeably slow, then you are shifting wrong. I hate riding with him. I asked him if I could drive twice (not in a "I don't want you driving" manner), but to no avail. I'm going to see what I can do about not riding with him again.

When I was looking at my blogger dashboard today, I noticed something interesting - the AdSense thing. Apparently, you can create an account, let Google advertise stuff on your blog, and you get money each time someone clicks on an advertisement. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I think it would be sweet to get money just for writing my thoughts every few days, but is it selling out? Do I really want shitloads of crappy advertisements all over my blog? More importantly, for me anyways, is does it matter? I have all of 4 people (judging by the comments) who have ever actually read my blog. Would those 4 people make me any money? I feel kind of like a scumbag for even thinking about it. However, that sparked another thought - the only people who really would benefit from this are the people whose blogs are famous, which brought up another thought. How does a blog get to be famous? I know there are blogs out there with enough readers, that can influence tons of people and even companies, based on their reader demographic (not sure if I used that word right). How does that happen?

Continuing with the random subject changes, I've been reading a lot of Christopher Moore's books. That man is a wonderfully twisted writer. He has a crazy imagination, and enough writing talent to convey it to other people. For those of you who haven't read Lamb: The Gospel according to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, go out and find a copy now. It is amazing. So, I jsut finished Practical Demonkeeping and there was a quote in there that made me really think. "Stories are the only truth." That phrase really stuck out to me, and I realized that it was very true. All the history we know is stories passed down from generation to generation. Some of it has been recorded into text books, but lots is still passed on from parents to children. You tell your friends stories about what you did over the summer or at that crazy party. If the person you tell it to wasn't involved, they don't know if you are telling the "truth" or an elaborate fairy tale. To them, your words are the truth, or at least, they are for that moment.

So, my lunch break is over, and I think I should probably return to "working." I also ran out of things to write.


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What a day

It was actually a fine day until the end. However, here is my summation of today -

Woke up around noon. Mother was not amused. Mowed lawn. Came inside to take a shower, and was reminded that I needed to weedwack. Went back, got out the electric weedwacker, started going, and after doing about 6 feet, ran out of cord. Went inside, told my mom that we needed a new weedwacker, preferably gas powered, and took a shower. Lounged around for a few hours, then went and worked out for an hour at the high school. Come out, and the car won't start. Get ride home with workout budy (former track coach). Come back down with mother, and manage to start the car after much annoyance, and a quart of dry gas, and a quart of fuel system lubricant. Car is running extremely rough. Try to drive it around the parking lot, and it stalls multiple times. Leave it parked in the parking lot and walk to the summer track practice. A few little kids are particularly rowdy, and a few others are really frustrated by the activities we're doing. The coach stays an extra hour talking to a former student, and then we finish putting things away. Go back to the car, get it running, and decide to drive home. My mom will be following me. The car is still running extremely rough 9lots of backfires). Takes about 30 min to go the 6 miles home. I manage not to fry either the clutch or the tires (completely).

So that's been my day, for the most part. My mom is going to call the mechanic tomorrow, and I'm sure they're going to give me hell about it (I've wrecked this car twice already, and my name at the garage is 'Tanglefoot').

Tomorrow, I'm working with a local electronics business, and we're installing speakers in a store or something. It should be interesting. They pay good, and I think they provide lunch :) However, I have to get up at 6am to get to work on time. So, I'm off to bed now, and I hope I manage to wake up in the morning (as opposed to the afternoon)!


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I forgot

Right after I posted my last entry, I realized that I had forgot something. I had been reading over my blog, and was dissappointed by how few people seem to read it. I don't know why I'm dissappointed. I mean, I don't want to tell any of my friends about it because it's kind of personal and I don't want some of them reading the things I write here. I would rather have people I don't know and will probably never meet read it, because they don't have any background knowledge clouding their impression of what I write. However, if I don't tell anyone about it, then no one will read it. And I will be dissappointed, because it looks like no one really reads this. So, to all those who comment, thank you!! It really makes my day when I get comments :)

Work and such

My job still sucks, and I have been avoiding it something fierce (I haven't been up there in close to a week). However, I've been getting work on the side that has been paying much better. I did some haying with a local family farm and got $20 for a little over two hours of work. I told them I was available whenever they needed me :) Also, today I got a call from a local electronics company asking for some help with a job - they are going to be paying me $10/hr. My response was "Yes!!" Not surprising really. I like making money. However, I prefer to make it by doing the least amount of work possible, which means I don't usually end up making that much.

And in my usual method of totally switching the subject, I saw the World Cup final of France v Italy. What a game! I missed the first minute or so, but not much. For those who don't know, Itlay won, in a shootout. However, I think that they did deserve the win. They scored two goals, one of which was called back for offsides (the guy was like a foot off, maybe). The goal that France scored was a PK on a slightly iffy call. Also, the captain of France, and possibly one of the best soccer players in the world got red carded out of the game for headbutting one of the Italian players when the play was no where near them. It looked, to me, like the Itlalian was trash talking and the French guy took it way to seriously. However, he is a world class athlete, and should know better.

Well, that's about all that I have in my head. Again, if you read my blog, please let me know by leaving a comment!


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Contemplations

I realized the other day that I wasn't satisfied with my life as it is. The problem with that is that I don't know how to make myself satisfied. I have a car that I can use, I have a job (kind of), I'm playing music, I should be happy. However, I'm not.

As I was thinking about this, I realized that I don't have too many friends here at home. After having been in a dorm setting for a good portion of the year, I come home to sitting in my room, typing on this blog, looking at MySpace.com, listening to music, and trying not to annoy my sister. Most of my friends here are of the casual type (ie, we don't really hang out together much). We did hang out when we were at school (high school, last year), but that was because we were all there, and there really wasn't anyone else interesting. Don;t get me wrong, I really like my friends here, but I only really miss one of my high school friends while I'm at college. He's in the Midwest now with the military anyways, so I don't get to see him much.

So that might be one reason that I'm not satisfied with my life right now. Another is that I have quite a few projects that are going on, that are in pieces, and are just kind of sitting. I'm horrible at finishing projects. A previous post explains that in more detail. Also, I hate my job. I know, I've only had it for two and a half weeks, but I truly dislike it. I probably should be up there right now, but I woke up late, and I'm doing a workout with a friend at 3. So, I'm going to give it a miss for today. I'm not sure what I hate about it most. When I think about it, I can't find anything that's really bad about it - I'm working outside, the drive up there is really fun, the lady I'm working for is ok, the work isn't that hard, but still, I really hate it. Grr. It's not like I have much choice, with the summer half over, but goddammit! I wish I could be working at my old job.

So that's my misery rant for the morning. On a completely different note, I was looking at the area around my computer, and realized that I have a ton of trash in my room, but also the fact that trash is composed of totally empty boxes of crackers, bags of chips, and Goldfish containers. I remember opening most of them, and finishing all of them off. By myself. No wonder my friends at school call me a stoner without the drugs. I'm easily amused, and I eat like I have the munchies 24/7. This is bad.

Well, that's about all that's in my head right now. I'm going to go eat a box of crackers now :)


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4th of July

So today is the 4th. A time to celebrate the Independance of our country, proclaimed 230 years ago. People do this with copious amounts of explosives and alcohol, and by marching around in the sun for a while. Cool.

I was talking with my mom about how young our country is. It's quite frightening. Her grandfather's grandfather was around when our country was being created. That means that our country is only like 6 generations old! That's very frightening when you think about it. It also really puts into perspective how fast the world changes. Overall an interesting subject to ponder.

Now, in a complete change of subject, I was thinking earlier this week about how I have absolutely no work ethic. It's really bad. I hate working - even on things I like to do! Take my musket that I'm putting together for my reenacting kit. I've had it for two or three years. Three, I think. The year after I got it, it just sat in it's box. The next year, one of the guys in my unit, and who I worked with at the time, offered to put it together for me. He said the only requirement was that I had to do all the polishing. He would take care of most everything else. That worked. It is now in almost completed form. All that needs to be done on it is final sanding and polishing, and the stock needs to be oiled. That's it!! It's been that way all of this year, and most of last. I doubt it's going to be finished by the end of this year. Hopefully, but not likely. Damn it.

I was at work the other day, and realized that I truly miss my job at the museum that ran out of money, and couldn't hire me again this summer. That job was paying me to sit on a boat, and talk to people about what the boat was and how it was built. It was so nice! Of course, at the time, I didn't like it. It does get monotonous. People ask retarded questions, the days seem to go on forever, yadda yadda. It's a pretty sweet job though. Now, I'm being paid jack shit to weed a crazy lady's garden. I hate plants. I hate weeding. I hate not making any money. I have no work ethic. Since I have no work ethic, I only work anywhere from 1 to 3 hours at a time. I don't know if I covered this already, but with the amount she's paying me, it takes me half an hour of work ot pay for the gas I use to drive to and from her house. This means that I end up being paid for 1/2 to 2 and a 1/2 hours of work. For work I hate!! It gets to the point when I'm weeding, that I start to view everything as a weed. I just want to dig up the few real plants, and roto-till the entire plot.

So as I was finishing the last paragraph, my mom and sister got into a very strange fight, and I had to moderate. This seems to be my usual role in the family, and it scares me to think of how the arguments happen when I'm at school and not around. I usually end up basically saying "Mom, this is what Sis said" and "Sis, this is what Mom said." It gets boring, but at least it prevents an all out brawl.

And once again, I lost track of what I was going to say. So, happy Independence Day to all. Blow something up, and feel happy.


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Thoughts and ideas . . . or something like them

I've been thinking lately about a "beater" car. I would really love to have something to drive, or my own, that I wouldn't mind trashing to hell. Or having drunk people puke in the back. Or exploding the engine. However, this means that I have to get a car that I hate. I'm not really willing to do that. This presents a problem. However, I think it would be fun to have a designated driver vehicle. Four doors, rear wheel drive, semi powerful. It would also be cool if I could work on it myself. This limits my options in a big way. First of all the four door, rear wheel drive part. There aren't that many of those out there. Those that are - Volvos (2- and 7- series), Mercedes, Jaguar, some American models. The semi powerful part isn't hard. Any car can be made semi powerful, you just need money. The working on it myself - that's difficult. I think I would have to buy something not too complicated, and learn on it, because I don't have the skills needed. I think the buggy project will help, if I ever finish it. This brings me to another point. I really shouldn't be thinking about this. I have a project in the garage already!! Why am I looking for another one? Grr. More on this in a moment.

One of this things, with a four door, rear wheel drive, semi powerful, can work on it myself (or isn't fiendishly expensive to have repaired) is a Jaguar with a Chevy V-8 swapped into it. This can be done, there are conversion kits out there (jagsthatrun.com), and is a pretty elegant solution overall. The only major problem I see is that I would hate to see a drunk friend puke all over the leather interior.

However, I don't have the money to even think about buying another project, let alone a Jag. I have a project already that is waiting for money, and I don't have time for another. This brings me back to the question - why am I looking for another project? I think the idea behind this is that I like the idea of a project more than the execution. I love the image of me working on my own car, getting a beautiful end result, and having a grand time doing it. The greasy reality of it is slightly shocking to me. However, I enjoy doing it once I start, for the most part. Truthfully though, I'm often very nervous about doing a project. I feel that I rarely have the skills needed, and I truly hate screwing up. This is a bad combination. Sometimes, I just hate the way my mind works.

On a totally unrelated note, my cell phone works, and it's all that I can do not to make random calls to people, and be like "I have a cell phone!!" The phone I have is a track phone, with Virgin Mobile, and I don't want to waste my minutes. So, I shall restrain myself. Or at least try to.



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And . . . go!

Well, I have finally gotten with the times and purchased myself (or rather had my mom front me the money) a cell phone. All of my friends at school were slightly annoyed that I didn't have one, and thus pestered me to get one. Recently my mom got it into her head that I probably needed one, and kept asking me about it. So, we went to Best Buy, looked at cell phones, house stereos, and watched Fance beat Brazil in the World Cup (pretty big upset there, but it was an interesting game to watch). I ended up getting a Virgin Mobile camera phone (prepaid track phone kind of deal), that is identical to my sister's. Right now, I am trying to figure out how I want to activate it - there are so many choices, and all of them are stupid! I'm on the site right now, and all they want you to do is pay them as much money as possible. Gah, I hate consumerism.

On a different note, I hate my job. It has been raining on and off again (with the rain being accompanied by huge thunderstorms), and all the work I am supposed to be doing is outside. The ground at the house where I'm working is soaking (ie, everytime I take a step, it squishes). I'm supposed to be weeding, and digging a ditch. The ditch is mostly dug, and the weeding just plain sucks. I also figured out that at the rate she is paying me, it takes half an hours work to pay for my gas to get to and from work. That is totally not worth it to me. I'm going to talk to her the next time I go and see if she can either give me a big time raise, or have me do other work. Ugh.

I think I was going to write more, but I got distracted by having dinner.


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