MN trip pictures

MN trip includes 80's prom night party, Dinner with friends and lots of naps.
Click to view the pictures.

Fax

The dog keeps growling at the fax machine.

Kill rover! Kill KILLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

The dog that just can't stop

Someone has been feeding the dog crack. Maybe it was the neighbors, getting back at me for leaving town. Here is how the night went:

Finally crawl into bed, exhausted. Lights off, under the covers.
The dog: whine....whine....
Sean: 'go lay down'
..sometime later...up out of bed, out of the covers, make sure he has food, take him out in the back yard.
Into bed...heaven.
Same shit.
Take him out AGAIN. Make sure I wasn't hallucinating the food still in his bowl.
Same shit.
Play 'pull the rope game' hoping he'll wear himself out.
Same shit getting old now.
Explain that sean is very tired and if he didn't want to end up in someone's WOK he'd better shut the fuck up.
Same same same.
Give him one of those target bone things.
Same. More same.
Walk down stairs with his dog bed. Open the Sliding glass door. Toss it next to the door on the inside of the house. Go upstairs. Shut the door, with him ON THE OUTSIDE.
sleep..heaven...nightmares...shit.
BARK BARK BARK.
Fucking christ! it's 4:30 AM. The neighbors will lynch me.
Toss him in the house. SHUT the sliding glass door. Leave him on the outside of the bedroom door. Back to bed.

Me tired? No way.

Welcome home

Grass that needs cutting, a pile of mail, a needy dog, a blown raid array, power failure, pissed off fish, dog piss on the carpet upstairs, no food in the fridge, 10 billion spam emails, blah blah blah.

Dialup hell

Sister has dialup. Yes, it's true. AOL dialup and everything. Not that she doesn't have broadband options...she just chooses not to go there.

I think I'd rather stick my head in a bucket of starving leaches.

Think about it...no picture uploads, microsoft always stealing your bandwidth to download monster patches, CNN page loads so slow the news is over by the time you read it.

Besides that, everything else is going ok out here in the sticks...MN that is. The weather is nice, but I'm chased by a cloud of hungry carnivorous bugs every time I leave the house. The kids are adorable, but interrupt my many naps during the day.

Last night was dinner out in Maple Grove (think little house on the prarie all grown up) with Larry, Roger, David, Steph and friends. Got to meet David's long time girl, who seems pretty cool. Larry was as entertaining as always.

I'd upload pictures, but my plane leaves in less than 40 hours. Other than that, everything else is good.

I'll spell check this when I get back home. It probably wouldn't be done before my next nap anyway.

Work? what work

I hear the satellite controller project swirling the drain as the client puts the hardware on hold. I had a dream last night that I was a checker at safeway. Maybe I should think about it...

Campagne, chocolate, cheese party at sue's

Champagne, chocolate, cheese party at sue's place. Click to view the pictures.

Pizza theme dinner

Pizza theme dinner party. Click to view.

pizza night, work

Work is getting much better. I've been designing a controller for a satellite. It's been interesting. Tonight I'm having another dinner party. It's not the best timing work wise, but everything will work out fine.

I think Thomas the dog is bored out of his mind. Hanging around the house just isn't as much fun as running through the woods.

Divorced

Being divorced means never having to say "Have you been fucking some other guy again?"

Camping

I went camping over the weekend with some friends. Click to view the pictures.

Sunday I came back and helped Jeff move into his new Boulder apartment. Blast from the past -- last week I got an email from Amy, an old high school friend. She's in India. I've been having weird email problems lately, so hopefully she got my response.

She found me on Google. I show up alot on the first page. Good thing I don't have a stalker...unless she's kinda cute.

Today I'm a bit slow in getting started. Too much drinking this weekend. The workout went fine, and now I'm doing some work....

Capuvino french wine tasting theme

Capuvino french wine tasting pictures. Click to view.

Flashback

Circa 1989

German theme dinner party

German theme dinner pictures. Click to view.

Thomas the needy dog

Food? Walk? Bone? Outside? Play?
I have no clue what the fuck you want 99% of the time.

Flashback

Circa 1993

I'm in a mood

Think of it as male pms. Robin seems to think it happens about once a month. She may be right. Today is one of those days where everything pisses me off. The dog barking, slow web page loads, non paying clients, bitchy MID people, slow drivers, my headache, design problems that defy an easy fix, being hungry all day, my pile of mail I don't feel like opening.

On the good side, I had a nice workout at the gym.

wine@home -- Chianti wine tasting event

Event Details
Chianti $35 or less
Saturday September 17, 2005 Broomfield 7PM

Chianti DOCG[kee-AHN-tee, KYAHN-tee]1. Large well-known wine-producing area located in TUSCANY in central Italy. Chianti is one of only a small number of DOCG areas in Italy and one of five (along with CARMIGNANO, BRUNELLO DI MONTALCINO, VERNACCIA DI SAN GIMIGNANO and VINO NOBILE DI MONTEPULCIANO) located in the Tuscany region. The Chianti DOCG is a single APPELLATION but is divided into seven subzones, the most famous being Chianti Classico, which runs from the Florence area south to the Siena region. The remaining six subzones are: Chianti Aretini, Chianti Colli Fiorentini, Chianti Colli Senesi, Chianti Colline Pisane, Chianti Montalbano, and Chianti Rufina. The wines from Chianti Classico, which are usually identifiable by a black rooster (gallo nero) on the label, are generally more well known and of better quality than those from the other six areas. A wine made in one of the subzones may be labeled either with the name of the subzone or simply with that of Chianti. If a wine is produced outside one of the seven subzones, but within the Chianti area, it may only be labeled "Chianti." A federation called Chianti Putto is made up of growers located in the subzones outside Chianti Classico-their labels often sport a pink cherub called a putto. Chianti's STURDY, DRY red wines were once instantly recognizable by their squat, straw-covered bottles called FIASCHI. However, Chianti wines-particularly those from better producers-are now more often found in the traditional Bordeaux-type bottle. Only a few VINTNERS use the straw-based bottle, which today usually designates a cheaper, and often inferior, product. Chianti wines are made from four grape varieties-SANGIOVESE, CANAIOLO, TREBBIANO, and MALVASIA. Today, however, CABERNET SAUVIGNON is being added to some Chianti blends. The word RISERVA on the label indicates that the wine is of superior quality and has been aged for at least 3 years before being released. 2. Chianti is also a generic name used for ordinary, inexpensive red wine made outside of Italy in countries like the Argentina and the United States.

Special instructions: Bring some food to share with the group, and one bottle of wine per person or couple. The food theme for this event is Italian, so if you can think Italian that would be great.

Flashback

Circa 1992

That 3am joy again

3:02 AM
Woke up, the room is hot. Not sure what time it was because the clock is flashing 12:00. Get up, hit the head, drink some water. The dog is watching me.

Open the window, stuff in the fan. It would be nice if it was colder outside. Go back to bed, lie there a while. How long do you wait?

Waiting.
Waiting.
Waiting.

Fuck it. Get up, check the time on the computer. Look at email -- Nada. Some bullshit from ebay about my account. It's all spam.

Check CNN. Maybe something is going on? Nope. Lookup MID. Any 3AM posts? No. Only idiots are up this late on a Monday.

I'm hungry. Bad idea at 3AM. Think about something else.

The dog gives up and goes back to bed. Maybe he's smarter than I think.

Getting sleepy again.

Going for another try in bed.

Wine event 2005-08-13 -- Malbec

Wine event pictures -- Malbec. Click to view.

Feels like fall

Grey, cold, rainy.

I have time to kill today. There are things that I could be doing...working, working on the yard, laundry. Today I don't feel like any of that at all. Today is one of those days that nothing seems like it's worth doing.

Even Thomas is antsy today. He's here, there, everywhere looking for that perfect spot to be.

Where do you go from here? Maybe some reading.

Tonight is a wine event here, so I'll need to un-funk by then.

Big cheese tasting

Last night I did a cheese tasting party. Click to view the pictures online.

Don't fuck with Mr. Zero

Rainy

I think summer is winding down. You can tell-- the rain, the clouds, it's in the air. Typically about this time good Midwestern boys start hoarding food -- but I've probably got that covered already.

The dog has been a bit antsy lately. Maybe he's missing the walks. I should probably find some way to get him out.

I love fall.

Meet me on the other side

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side
See you on the other side

Honey now if I’m honest
I still don’t know what love is
Another mirage folds into the haze of time recalled
And now the floodgates cannot hold
All my sorrow all my rage
A tear that falls on every page

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side

Maybe I oughta mention
Was never my intention
To harm you or your kin
Are you so scared to look within
The ghosts are crawling on our skin
We may race and we may run
We’ll not undo what has been done
Or change the moment when it’s gone

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side

I know it would be outrageous
To come on all courageous
And offer you my hand
To pull you up on to dry land
When all I got is sinking sand
The trick ain’t worth the time it buys
I’m sick of hearing my own lies
And love’s a raven when it flies

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side

Honey now if I’m honest
I still don’t know what love is

-- David Gray

Goals are good

His goal is to bury a bone a day in the back yard. Strangely enough my goals tend to be the same, minus the back yard part.

Hiking

Lunch

Tapas and Sangria

Saturday I was at a Tapas and Sangria party. Click to view.

Sunday was spent hiking in the lost creek wilderness area with Hilary and Adam. We went about 12 miles. It was a fun hike.

dinner@home -- French part 2

French theme dinner party part 2, pictures. Click to view.

DOA

Project #2 went DOA when the end client coughed up a hairball on the cost. Oh well.

French theme dinner part 1

French part 1 theme dinner pictures. Click to view.

Zero to two hundred percent in two days

Mmmmm... well, work might have picked up. I had meetings today with a client on a project that looks to go right away, and tomorrow I have another meeting, same company, different project, that looks about the same. So, zero to 200 percent busy in two days.

At least, if #2 is a go, which it looks to be.

I was tired of napping all the time anyway.

Work

Bite my finger -- please

Another day in paradise

Ah, another day in paradise. I spent the last 2 days sick on the couch, but I'm feeling much better today.

I hate being sick.

Anyway, where was I...oh...sick. Yeah, mucho couch time, which is never fun. Thomas is missing his walks and driving me nuts about it. No gym yesterday or today. Bored out of my mind.

This week I'm hosting 2 dinner parties here and then Saturday I'm going to a spanish tapas thing.

Walk me