Got Busy Doing A Whole Lotta Nuthin'

Last week in Memphis was very nice. Except for the sunburns - that can be downright unpleasant. I did do a little water skiing, which was interesting. I also got some free Central BBQ, which tastes even better than the stuff you pay for. And I gave Garrett his Christmas present, finally.

Another plus about my vacation back in Memphis was getting to spend Jennifer's birthday with her. She got some very nice & thoughtful presents from me, and we shared a s'mores sundae at the American Cafe - run, do not walk, to try it.

I also got to be the best man at Russell & Laura's wedding. That was a really awesome experience, and I was honored to be asked by Russell (even if he asked me through Facebook - really, Russ? Really?). I think I did everything right, except holding the rings in my hand through the entire ceremony. Oh well - its not like I had to wear them. My impromptu toast wasn't terrible either.

Today, I had my performance evaluation with my acting Team Lead & the Director of M&P. It was a no-pressure meeting, for obvious reasons, and I wound up getting an "exceeds expectations" rating, which is better than I ever did at Smith+Nephew. Go me.

Finally, I'm about halfway through The Scourge of God, and I'm really liking it. Stirling has a wicked sense of humor.

I Grew Up Eating Food

If you're a fan of Top Chef, you'll get that. Its in honor of my new-found desire to experiment more in the kitchen. The other day I made a homemade Godfather Melt, a popular item at the Fox & Hound Pub. Its just chicken tenders smothered in pomodoro & basil pesto sauce, mozzeralla and cheddar cheese. With "seasonings," on top. I subsituted pomodoro sauce with Ragu original, and substituted "seasonings," with nothing. Still delicious.

That led into last night's test run of Basil Pesto Pasta with Chicken & Mushrooms, inspired by Nothin' But Noodles. Jeff came over to help, and supplied salad & bread. The results were nothing less than triumphant. I'm open to suggestions for future consideration.

Well, I'm leaving work tomorrow before noon so I can be back in Memphis as early as possible. Why? Because I need to pick up my tuxedo for Russell's wedding (its on Saturday). Hopefully, we won't have many sizing errors. Even so, its someone else's wedding that get screwed up.

Banks Make Me Angry

Fax machines make me angry too. Why people insist on using them, I don't know. They're like pagers these days. Except you don't see doctors, drug-dealers, and pimps dragging a multi-function fax around do you? To make a long story short, my bank jerked me around yesterday and today about what all they'd need to send me a copy of my car title. And I had to fax them a signed request. Because having that kind of function on their secure internet banking software would just be ridiculous. Grrr.

In other news, taking next week off from work will be on the one hand relaxing, but on the other hand may indirectly bring about the Apocalypse. Or at least the utter collapse of the Launch Abort System program. Yeah, I'm that important. Seemingly.

Some Catholic Bishops are taking Biden and Pelosi to task on their pro-choice stances. I need a good chess-bishop pun here.

Showdown at Cremation Creek

Wow, second day in a row. In some schools of thought, that's a repeatable trend and can be reported as such. To hell with statistically significant sample sizes. But I digress. Wait...no I didn't. Oh, dear.

All sorts of things got accomplished at work today. The big thing on my plate right now is a materials testing proposal that I'm working on with a senior engineer. Mostly, the senior engineer (we'll call him Steve) is actually working on the test matrix and I'm putting it in a much more readable PowerPoint format. Steve does ask for my input, but he uses the same tone that one uses when posing the question, "does anyone else want the last roll?" Steve gets points for being polite at least. Also, this presentation may float all the way up to the Orion Program Chief Engineer's office. That's both exciting and a little scary. We'll see how that turns out.

I also took care of some business relating to the upcoming move (more details as we approach - I might even devote an entire post to the narrative).

Now that I'm done with my thesis (that's another narrative that I'll get around to (let's say next week) ), I'm finally getting a chance to read again. Right now I'm about halfway through The Galileo Affair by Eric Flint & Some Other Guy. I really need to hurry up, because I've got a highly anticipated book coming out in September, The Scourge of God. I'm torn about what to do there - its a continuation in an already substantial series and my longstanding tradition is to re-read the previous novel right before the new one comes out. Not only does it reorient me to a universe I haven't fooled with in almost a year, it also temporarily satisfies my hunger for the new book. Right now the release date is 9/2/08 and getting through a book and a half by then is quite the feat even by my standards.

The Democratic National Convention in Denver, CO got kicked off today - well la-di-frickin'-da.

Finally, hurricane/tropical depression Fay struck Huntsville today. So far, I'm not very impressed. I'm guessing the media plays them up for ratings.

Fun With Formatting

Well, I've got the formatting tweaked to my liking. If you don't like it, feel free to leave a comment. It won't do a darn bit of good, but I understand that its very cathartic. (Please keep the swearing to a minimum - Jeff, I'm looking at you).

I have to say, since I've been gone, Blogger has added a lot of useability to the formatting interface. I like that because I can do a lot more tweaking to the built-in templates (especially the sweet photo I cropped for the header). Good job, Blogger.

If you want your blog added to the blog roll, let me know. The same goes for websites.

New Title, New URL, Same Lousy Writing

They don't pay me to be a good writer. They don't even pay me to write. And who are they anyway?

Well, its been almost a year since the urge to blog last coursed through my veins. I guess I'm a little rusty. But blogging is like riding a bike - you never forget how and you stand a decent chance of skinning your knees. Fortunately, I wear all the recommended safety equipment.

Anyway, this is mainly a place-holder entry so I can eyeball the formatting better. As for content: this blog will most likely center around my (mis)-adventures outside of work. That's largely due to the soul-crushing banality of my work, but its also to avoid nasty legal issues like unintentionally divulging sensitive information and violating several federal statutes. So instead of talking about things that may or may not blow up at work, you'll mostly get reports about cooking disasters and venting about lousy traffic. So, par for the course.