Sweet Victory

Anyone who missed the KU/Florida game tonight should be sad. That was one of the best games I have seen. And now it might be bedtime.

Me Encuentro Mal

Well it is Thanksgiving. This year I can be thankful for all my friends for listening to me bitch about my job. I can also be thankful that I quit said job, even if only partially. I am thankful for the glorious year of Magic that was 2006. Spain will probably get in the way of that a bit in 2007, but I hope to keep building decks, even if only on paper for a bit. Also, obviously I can be thankful for getting to go to Spain again. Yay for that!

Today I am decently sick though, with a nasty sore throat and unending tiredness. Since my Grandma is in such bad shape, I didn't get to go to the family dinner because I didn't want to make her sick (and possibly kill her), so I stayed home and slept. Hoping that it will clear up in a few days and I can go visit. Right now I'm waiting for my parents and brother to get home so we can eat some dinner. Mom has a turkey that is bigger than most dogs I know... just for the four of us!

Made a fun Magic deck the other day, much to Bob's dismay. Might be the best that one of my kooky ideas has worked since the Deck Deck and my Black Deck. I still need to work with my Dark Depths Deck and my Green Black Deck to get them going better, although I haven't tried them 1v1 yet. Also have random ideas for more strange decks that I need to put together. All hail the glory of Magic!

Also been working out a lot lately. Feeling much better for it. And, get this, I've been eating at home! Crazy I know.

Since Bob, John, and I are all stuck in Lawrence without anyone else, this weekend should be a fun mix of War3, Magic, and Movies. Silly people and their going out of town for the holidays. Hopefully even going to get a free day to do some programming. We shall see.

Now I will leave you with the greatest trailer of all time. Can't wait for this movie, although I hear there will be no NIN on the soundtrack. At least they had the good sense to use Just Like You Imagined in the trailer.

Productivity

So I finally started working on my work requests at work last night, in order to get them done fairly close to the deadline. I say fairly close because the deadline was yesterday, but they moved it up a full month on me, so they will just have to wait. Granted, had I been at all motivated or excited about my job for the last six months, I would've had everything done way before the deadline, no matter when it was, but oh well. In about 6 hours of work I got 7 of my 14 requests done. Also have a pretty good lead on two others, leaving 5 to start. There should be no reason not to have them all done by Monday for the testers to get on. Guess it all just depends on how much Magic and Hero Wars I get in this weekend, since that is now my social life!

Speaking of Magic... got a whole new deck built today. I am proud to only own 13 of the 60 cards I need for it. It's a true printed spectacle! Bob would be proud. Hoping to get some time tonight to throw together my white weeny deck from Time Spiral too, giving me two new decks to try tonight.

This Sunday is my Dad's 51st Birthday. w00t!

Not much else to report. Want to work out, but promised Bob I would help him unload his Pods tonight, so that will have to substitute. On the upside, no work on Friday, so I can work out then.

Also randomly got excited about the Magic Site today and came up with some more ideas. When I was building that one deck I was lamenting over the terrible search capabilities available to deckbuilders today, and that was probably the spark that got me thinking on it. Just hope I can get all of this work stuff out of the way soon so I can work on Magic Site without feeling guilty.

Que Lo Cumplas Feliz

Two birthdays to celebrate today. First is Kathy's, who is 20. Unfortunately, she is in Texas so hard to do much celebrating on that one. But, happy birthday! Second is the World Wide Web. Yep, today the web portion of the internet (they are different, if you didn't know) has it's sweet sixteen. Your webpages want cars. If you are interested, here is a link to the history of the world wide web.

Harry pasted me this link to a sweet new sport that I think everyone should take up. What I think would be really funny is to extend this by getting about 8-10 people in a store to simultaneously run out when the alarm goes off. Everyone would just split, running in a pack to the nearest burger place. It would be hilarious.

Been mostly doing chores around the apartment and such. While doing laundry yesterday I started reading the Economist again. I had forgotten how much I loved it. I still have a lot to go (been distracted), but I just find it so interesting and in depth about things. It is quite the brilliant weekly magazine (over 100 pages about the entire world every week). If you want to be up to date on politics, economics, business, technology, and new books about said topics, then it's definitely worth a look.

Also read a really insightful article entitled Mind the Gap by Paul Graham. He discusses the idea of the 'income gap' in capitalist societies and has some very good points. I especially like his description of the "Daddy Model of Wealth" and agree completely. As a recent college student myself, I know how it is to view the world through those eyes. The basic idea is that most kids and students see wealth as something that comes from a central source and gets distributed, hence feeling that it should always be fairly distributed, whatever fair means. They consider it injustice if the distribution is not fair. Graham argues that wealth is not distributed from a central source, but created by everyone everywhere. A job is by definition an exchange of money for your wealth creation. You create wealth by doing whatever it is you do, and in exchange for that wealth the company gives you money, since that is an easy way to trade wealth you don't want (the newly painted house or peice of software), for wealth you do want (food, tvs, fancy cell phones).

I've had sort of a crisis of belief lately, and not in the religious sense. The more I read and understand about economics, management, and business, the more my views shift on such things. The crisis is that now I can't really agree with either political party on things. I find the Democrats too protectionist, and pandering (the minimum wage hike and capital gains tax hikes make me ill). I find the Republicans too paternalistic (gay marriage, stem cells... legislating their religious beliefs), and pandering (flag burning amendments, etc). Also, both parties just seem so corrupt and apt to just pass tons and tons of pork. We need a new party. In fact, time to follow through on an idea I had. Stay tuned for that one I guess.

In more personal news, finally bought groceries after working out today. Going to try and stop eating out every meal and eat more fruits and veggies. I already can lift more in just about every exercise than ever before, and it's only been a month now. I am definitely more focused and motivated to go work out than ever before as well. Hopefully I will keep that up.

Mmmmm, orange juice! And with that, I'm done.

Straight No Chaser

So this week was quite the terrible one, but I choose not to pour out my sorrows to teh interwebs, because then I'd just be another whiney blogger. Things are hard, but they will get better, one way or the other. Think right now I am living on a strange sense of denial and fools hope for the future, but I imagine that will kick me in the nuts eventually.

Last couple days, my life has been Magic, basketball, and flash games. Stumbleupon.com leads me to such glory as Storm the House 2, which everyone should beat at least once in order to see the glorious hidden weapon.

Magic has been fun, and is getting me ramped up for deckbuilding again, which should lead to more magic playing, which should lead to more motivation to work on the site.

Oh, and working out is a good waste of a couple hours a day.

Not incredibly much else happening lately, other than aforementioned sorrow. I try to stay either busy or asleep, as time to think usually goes poorly. Also kind of avoiding talking to my parents, as I just don't want to explain anything. Guess I'll have to give in to their calls eventually. Normally I enjoy talking to them.

Spain is 11 weeks and one day away. Looking forward to having something to work towards (schoolwise) again. Not really sure what I'll do after that, it's a tossup between grad school or staying in spain at the moment. We shall see. Most likely depends on my motivational state at the time. Another option is coming home to make millions with Bob. I particularly like that option. Obviously I'll do that.

The cats are absurdly hyper right now. I'm sure it will end in tragedy. Anal Kitty looks like a coked-out-timebomb right now. I opened a drawer and she jumped about three feet in the air, which for her is a lot of exerted effort.

Anyway, my general rule when blogging is that if you degenerate into talking about the cats flying (yes flying) around your room, then you are done. So I will be done, after pasting in the following lyrics that struck me as appropriate during my drive home the other day.

"drink life as it comes
straight no chaser
straight no chaser
drink life as it comes
straight no chaser
...
keep on driving
hair left morning wet
there's nothing like losing you
there's nothing like losing you"
Bush, Straight No Chaser

(Don't worry, this blog won't get too sappy, just indulge me for a bit, as things are tough right now.)

"You do something to me that I can't explain.
So would I be out of line if I said 'I miss you'?

I see your picture.
I smell your skin on
The empty pillow next to mine.
You have only been gone ten days,
But already I'm wasting away.
I know I'll see you again
Whether far or soon.
But I need you to know that I care,
And I miss you."
Incubus, I Miss You

Con Mis Manos

So this week was entirely devoted to errands and paperwork.

Got hotel reservations for Texas trip on Sunday. Finally got my ex-landlord to mail me the check he owes me (so he claims). Cleaned a bit, and got mounting brackets for my parent's plasma bought. Also bought a slew of birthday gifts, as I have a bunch of birthdays coming up.

Got Student Visa Application for Spain finished and turned in. That involved a physical and doctor's letter, a letter from my insurance company, money order, two page application, passport photos, a plane ticket, copies of everything, ad infinitum. Just glad to have it out of the way. On the plus side, for a mere $60, KU will run my application to Chicago and pick up my Passport for me when the Visa is done. This saves me two trips to Chicago and much sanity. Thank you KU study abroad people!

Now I need to actually pay the school in Ronda. But, of course, I am stupid and sent my passport off with my Visa app without writing down the number. The credit card payment form for Ronda requires a passport number. Oh well, I'll find a way out of this.

Did I mention the plane ticket? I officially leave on January 30th at 2pm... in case any of you are counting down or anything.

Tomorrow is my brother's birthday. He will be 20. A strange thought. Going to spend it eating lunch with our grandparents then dinner and movie with our parents. Will be fun. Then off to Texas!

A generally successful week, even if I spent over 10% of my annual salary on plane tickets, hotels, and tuition. Anyway, off I go to pass the time. Just want to fast forward a few days!