Category: Uncategorized

I think learning to surf would be awesome.  Have you ever been to the beach and seen people out there surfing?  Doesn’t it look fun?  Come on, you know it does.  And I’d like to try it.  It’s like skateboarding on the water.

I remember when I was kid we all had skateboards.  I was never very good at skating, though.  I got my first board when I was  8 or so and I learned to ride it well enough but I could never do any real tricks.  I couldn’t even ollie which is like the most basic of all skateboard tricks.  I remember practicing it in my parents’ garage but never being able to figure out how those guys did it.  How could they do it without their feet being strapped to the board?

I liked skateboarding well enough, but the reason I stopped is because I couldn’t really do it in the street.  You see, our driveway was fine.  It was nice and smooth, but when I would try to ride my skateboard in the street, if I ever hit one of those little pebbles my board would stop but I would keep going.  After that happened a few times I realized I probably shouldn’t leave my driveway, and that just wasn’t much fun.

Maybe I just didn’t have the right kind of wheels or something.

Anyway, I would like to try surfing.  I don’t think you can just buy a surfboard and go teach yourself, though, so I’d probably want to go to a surf camp, maybe something like this, or take lessons or something.  I don’t even think it’s the kind of thing you can watch a video of to learn how to do.  You probably have to have someone there helping you along the way and correcting your mistakes in person.  At least I would guess cuz it seems pretty involved.

Then again, I’ve seen videos on TV of dogs surfing, so I’m not sure how hard it actually is.

The fact that I don’t live anywhere near the ocean probably isn’t helping anything.  I suppose I’ll either have to take a vacation to somewhere close to a beach, or maybe I should just move there.  That would certainly be a different climate than what I’m used to here where it snows in the winter.  I actually kind of like it when it’s cooler (around 10 degrees C is a comfortable temperature for me).  But we’ll see; I’m not sure how my boss would feel about me moving!

I record most of the TV shows that I want to watch and then watch them later so I can fast forward through the commercials.  I really dislike commercials, especially when I’m already paying for cable TV.  Have you ever noticed that in most things, when you pay, you don’t get ads?  That’s how computer software is, that’s how subscriptions to certain websites are, and that’s even how the apps I download on my smartphone are.  But with TV, paying doesn’t remove the ads (commercials).  That being said, there are some commercials that make me laugh.  In particular, I like the commercials where a company specifically talks smack about its competitors.

You see that kind of thing with laundry detergent commercials, for example.  They’ll take two stained shirts and wash one in the competitor’s detergent, and the other one in their super awesome ultra detergent, and then show you the results.  Surprise!  The one washed in their detergent is perfectly clean and the one washed in their competitor’s still has a visible stain remaining.

You see it with auto insurance commercials, too.  Now, most commercials are just like “hey, here’s are product, look how awesome it is,” but car insurance companies seem to like having mascots.  What does a Gecko have to do with car insurance?  Or a caveman?  Or a comedienne who works in a pristine white store?  Nothing.  But apparently they’re doing their job because I remember them.  The best car insurance commercials, though, are the ones where they show rates from each of the different companies to show you that theirs are the lowest.  Now, I still get my car insurance rates online, but I do enjoy the TV commercials.  I do most of my shopping online, as a matter of fact, but that’s another topic.

Now, things like laundry detergent and insurance rates can be objectively compared, but sometimes you see commercials try to do the same thing with something subjective, the the taste of pizza.  They’ll show two people on the street trying two different types of food and they’ll have everyone saying one brand is better.  This isn’t as effective.  How do I know those people have good taste?  Did you know some people have a specific gene that makes them not like cilantro?  That’s why some people think cilantro smells like soap or bugs, and why other people think it smells great.  I love cilantro.  So if someone tells me something with cilantro in it is gross, why should I take their word for it?

Plus, how do you even know their “comparisons” are accurate?  Maybe they only showed footage of the people who said their product tasted better.

But like I said, I usually just skip the commercials cuz I record the stuff on my DVR.

Last night was kind of a mess.  I was at the bar with my friend and we were just having a normal night.  We met up with a few people and closed out the first bar and then decided to head a few streets over to another bar that is open until 3am.  I haven’t been out that late in a long time but you know how it goes when your friends are in town.  So anyway, that bar closed, and rather than go to a 4am bar (we’re not in our early 20’s anymore!) we decided to call it a night.  I offered my friend my couch if he didn’t want to drive back home.  You see, he lives out in the burbs, and while it’s only about a 35 mile drive, I didn’t want him to have to drive home so late.  We had stopped drinking a few hours before this point (again, we’re not in our early 20’s anymore!).  My friend assured me that he was fine, so after a late night snack (pizza places that are open 24 hours a day are your friend), we said our goodbyes and he headed home.

Well, apparently he got stopped on his way home and charged with a DUI.  But the crazy part is he said they asked him to take a breathalizer and he agreed because he thought he was fine, and he blew under the legal limit.  And he still got arrested.

He said he’s kind of blown away that it happened.  He’s planning on getting a DUI lawyer in Sarasota and fighting it because he doesn’t think he should get a DUI if he wasn’t over the legal limit.

I didn’t even know that was possible.  Part of the reason I like living in the city is because I can pretty much walk wherever I want and not have to worry about driving home.  I mean there’s always taxis and public transportation if it’s too cold to walk or whatever, but the point is you don’t have to drive.  Not to mention, finding parking is always task in the city, too.  You basically either have to find a spot that’s open, which can require driving around for a while until one opens up which you still might have to pay for if it’s a metered spot, or you have to pay for parking in a garage or lot somewhere which is going to be about as much as you would’ve spent on a taxi, anyway.  That’s like added incentive not to drive.

It’s important to travel to different places to experience different styles of life from different perspectives.  A lot of people spend all their time in one area or town or city and end up with a somewhat limited view of the world around them.  Sure, they can see things on TV, but it’s different to actually go experience them.  That’s not saying you have to go live in the desert or something, but just visiting other countries or cities can kind of shape your world views and understanding of people, and that’s always a good thing.

This is something that I want to start doing more of, too, by the way.  My traveling experience so far is pretty limited.  I’ve been to a few US and Canadian cities but have never left the continent.  I’m planning on changing that soon.  There are a lot of places I want to go, and I don’t want to keep putting it off because people tell me the things you put off you keep putting off and eventually never get around to them.  I want to go all over the world.  I want to visit Italy and ride on a gondola.  I want to visit France and go to Paris and visit the Louvre, and the Eiffel tower and have a picnic in the field and then go to a cafe just relax and revel in the fact that I’m in France.

I’d like to go to Asia and have sushi at a restaurant on a hidden away street in Japan and then see a Noh play or a sumo match.  I’d like to go to Indonesia and visit the beach and go shopping and learn Indonesian and book a hotel Bandung in the native language.  Btw, did you know Indonesia puts the adjective after the noun (like Spanish and Thai)?

And at every place I go, I just want to chill and talk to locals and share stories and experiences and learn more about the people and their perspectives on the world.  I’d like to move abroad if I find a place I like living enough.  I have a friend who did just that; he went traveling in Europe and ended up moving to Holland because he liked it so much.  That dude is so happy, he’s just like, yeah man, it’s great here.  Of course, he’s one of those people who are always happy anyway, but he’s probably happy because he follows what he wants to do and doesn’t really care what anyone else thinks.

I need to be more like that.

Seriously, I’ve been slacking off on my workouts for the last… I don’t even remember.  It’s absolutely amazing how when you stop doing something it soon becomes your habit to not do that thing anymore.  I’m not trying to sound like one of those people who always brags about how good of shape they used to be in or whatever, but I used to be in pretty good shape.  I used to exercise regularly.  I used to be decently strong.  I used to be able to run a few miles without stopping.  I could bench press my own body weight.  I mean, I wasn’t like a pro or anything, but I was in pretty good shape.

And then one day I just kinda stopped.  I probably had something to do, and I thought to myself “oh, it’s no big deal; I’ll just go to the gym tomorrow instead.”

And then tomorrow came and I didn’t go.

I’m not sure how it happened, either, because I was one of those people who got annoyed if they missed their workouts.  So I can’t believe I would’ve let myself start missing workouts like that.

But sure enough, I haven’t been to the gym in months, and while it annoys me on a large scale, I don’t have that “oh man I missed my workout!” feeling anymore.  It’s like I’m in the habit of not going anymore.  It’s kind of like how I’m in the habit of not cleaning my home office, and that’s why my desk is super messy.

So I’m basically not where I want to be, and not only do I have to get back in the game now, but I’m considering trying green coffee bean extract to try and give me a little boost to help me lose a little extra weight.  I’m not really one of those people who uses a lot of supplements, but a little help here and there might not be a bad idea.

I’m pretty sure once I get back into it, I’ll stay in the swing of things.  I don’t like the fact that I stopped working out and I don’t think I’ll let myself get back to this situation again.  I also want to see if I can find a workout partner.  I think I mentioned that before.  It might help on those days when I don’t have as much motivation as I would like.

Anyway, I need to go to bed now while it’s still a decent hour.  I don’t want to be dragging tomorrow.

Ever have your computer die on you?  I remember when it happened to me.  It was about two years ago, and I was surfing the net one evening when suddenly my computer shut off.  I thought we had lost power or something, but my TV was still on.  I tried pushing the power button to turn it back on, but nothing happened.  Suddenly, my heart kind of sank.  Did I just lose all my data?  I had been collecting songs and stuff on my computer for the last 8 years.  Did I seriously just lose all of them?

I had an external hard drive that I did backups on, but I didn’t do them very often.  In fact, I probably did one once every few months, and all of the songs and stuff that I had gotten in the last few months hadn’t been copied over yet.

And what about all the work I had saved on my computer?  I did have some work stuff on it, too, although my initial concern was my music.

Fortunately, it turned out that my hard drive was just fine and I didn’t lose any data.  My motherboard had died which is what caused the computer to shut off.  My computer was a good 5 or 6 years old at this point, so it’s not too out of the ordinary for something like this to happen.  Unfortunately, it was a proprietary motherboard for a computer that was no longer made, so my only option was to buy a new computer.

I was able to remove my old hard drive and connect it to my new computer with an adapter so I could copy over all my files and documents and everything, so I didn’t lose any data.  But I sure was freaked out.  It caused me to start having better backup habits.  I now have an external hard drive that I back up any time I get new files, and I also use cloud storage from Mozy to keep my important files online so I can access them from anywhere.  I seriously don’t want to take any chances with losing data again.  It’s fine if a computer dies.  I mean, you have to replace it which can be kind of expensive, but there’s a lot of data that can be priceless because it can’t be replaced.

It’s also possible for your hard drive to fail.  I got lucky in that it was my mobo that failed.  At least I didn’t lose any files.  I don’t know what I would’ve done if it was my hard drive that crashed.

This is one of the 2 months that I get paid 3 times and this past Friday was the first check. I usually wait until the last one to have fun with it but I actually needed some things this time so I ordered them today. Most of it was stuff for my new apartment. I bought some wire shelving that I plan on putting up in my 2nd bedroom. The room itself is pretty small so I am making it into an office. I am not going to put a bed or anything like that in there. I doubt I’ll have many people staying over anyways. I just moved to this city and don’t have a lot of friends. Right now it is basically just this girl I work with named Erin. She’s nice and all but right now we only have a coworker/friend relationship. I have thought about asking her to do something after work sometime but I’m going to wait until we are a little friendlier with each other before doing that. The last thing I want is for her to say no or even worse would be for her to say yes but awkwardly.

I also ordered a new entertainment center and am pretty excited about getting it. I’m not excited about putting it together but I’ll manage. I guess I could ask this guy that lives on my floor to help me if needed. We are both smokers and smoke outside and I’ve chatted with him a few times. He seems nice but is older and I can’t say I’m attracted to him at all so there will be no romance between us. He hasn’t flirted or anything with me so maybe he doesn’t think I’m too attractive either. I guess he could also have a girlfriend or wife that lives with him but I didn’t see a ring on his finger. My Dad doesn’t wear a wedding band though so that doesn’t mean much.

Anyways I am starting to ramble here so I’m going to wrap this up soon. I still have a couple hundred dollars to play around with so I’m going to do some more online shopping. I really wouldn’t mind a new phone but am still a month or so away from being eligible for an upgrade. I guess I can hold off until then although the phone I have now is really starting to tick me off. It keeps freezing and the only way to unfreeze it is to remove the battery.

How many people do you know that make new years resolutions but don’t end up keeping them?  I always see everyone talking about them at work during the first week of the year, and everyone is so motivated to keep them, and then like a month later everyone has forgotten or fallen back into their old habits.  If you belong to a gym, you’ll also notice that it gets super crowded during the first few weeks of a new year as all the people who said they were going to work out will be there, but it usually gets back to normal around the next few weeks cuz most of those people eventually stop going.

People always make these huge resolutions that are such a change from what they normally do that it’s hard for them to keep them.  I believe that if you are going to make a resolution, make it something less wild and more attainable.  For example, if you haven’t read a book in a while and you want to start reading more, don’t make your resolution “I’m going to read 10 books a month!” because going from zero to 10 is quite a change.  Instead, make it something like one book a month, or 15 minutes a day, or something like that.

My resolutions?  I’m going to be more organized.  I’m pretty messy.  My desk at home is covered with mail and papers and water bottles and CDs, and my desk at work is even worse.  And even though I pretty much know where everything is, it tends to give off the wrong impression.  Although I have heard them say geniuses have messy desks.  I like that saying.  But really, it does sometimes take me a while to find stuff.  But rather than making some crazy resolution like I’m going to get all super organized, I’m just trying to do it in small steps.  I also need to start keeping better track of my receipts.  Last year it was kind of a pain to find all the stuff I needed for taxes.  I have a Five Dock accountant and I try to keep everything organized to make their life easier, but I couldn’t find all the receipts I needed and it ended up taking a lot longer than it should have to get all my tax information prepared.  I really don’t want to have to go through that again.  I already get stressed out enough during tax time.

That’s really my only resolution, though.  I’m going to try and be more organized in all areas of my life, but especially at work.  I should start by getting a bunch of folders to group all my stuff in.

My brother just came back home for Christmas break from university.  He just finished the first semester of his freshman year and hearing him talk about it makes me remember when I was at university, too.  Thins sure have changed, though!  Ok, when I was a Freshman, about half the people on our floor had computers.  If you wanted internet access, you had to use  your room’s phone line, and of course that meant that you couldn’t make (or receive) any phone calls during that time.   It was dialup access, which meant it was slow.  We used to download a lot of music back then, and I remember it would take like an hour to get a single song.  Of course, we all thought it was the coolest thing in the world so we weren’t complaining.

When I was a sophomore they were supposed to wire our dorm for high speed internet access, except they messed it up or something, so we didn’t get high speed access until second semester.  But holy cow was it ever fast.  Downloading a song now only took a few minutes, if that.

My brother’s dorm has wireless internet if they want it, as well as an ethernet connection.  Pretty much everyone there has a laptop, or a computer, or both.

When I was at university, email was kind of a new thing, and we all got university email addresses, and all our professors were trying to explain to us what email was.  Now it’s such a normal thing.  Everyone has like a dozen addresses.

So anyway, my brother was talking about how there was a break in in his dorm a few weeks back, and everyone is kind of freaked out now.  They tell you to always lock your door if you go anywhere, but still.  So for Christmas I’m getting my brother a dorm safe.  It weighs 30 pounds, so that will at least discourage people from trying to take it, but you can also lock it to a floor panel.  I think it will give him some peace of mind.

I told my brother to enjoy university.  Looking back, I really miss it.  I remember being excited to get into the “real world” or whatever, but that really was the best time of my life.  Real life can be boring and stressful.  Of course, he won’t realize that until after he graduates, cuz that’s how it works.  Anyway, I’ll probably head over to my parents around the 23rd or so (I gotta work in the meantime, you know!) and see them and give them their presents.  Hopefully this safe works out.

Of course I get the urge to start working out pretty hardcore again as soon as the weather starts to get colder again. It seems like it always happens this way. It starts getting colder, the days start getting shorter, and all I want to do is to start training for next year’s races. This year I ran quite a few 5K races and I even managed to run a half marathon. I don’t think I’m ready for a full marathon yet but I’m getting closer and closer to my goal of running a marathon. I’m still not sure if I’m ready for a full marathon next year, but I know I want to at least improve my half marathon times.

I think another goal for me next year is to find a running partner. I did pretty much everything solo this year and it got a little boring in the middle of the season. I have a few friends that love to work out but I haven’t been able to get them to commit to any races. Weight lifting seems to be more their style, but I’m sure if I try hard enough, I can convince them to at least run a 5K or two with me.

One other thing I discovered this year is that as I run more and more, I start to burn through shoes. In fact, I managed to burn through two brand new pairs of trainers this year. Next year I think I’m going to see if I can find some cheap trainers at getthelabel.com. I love running, but it can be expensive. Out of both pairs of trainers I purchased last year, the cheaper pair of the two actually held up quite a bit better than the more expensive, premium pairs.

Over the years, running has turned into one of my biggest passions and all I can think about in the winter is how badly I want to get back out there and race. Sure, I can work inside on a treadmill or run on an elliptical, but it’s not the same at all. Nothing beats the brisk morning air rushing against your face as you are sprinting with everything you have, pushing your body as hard as you can, almost to the point of failure in a race to the finish with hundreds, if not thousands of other competitors. It’s a feeling like no other.