Hi all,

How's it going? Hope you're having a good week. It's been a bit since I've written.

It's kind of wacky. I've kind of been in a reduced communication mode with all of my friends. I think with the new job and stuff, I've been kind of preoccupied or something and haven't been as social. Not sure. I used to be on the phone pretty regularly in the evenings and on the weekends, but I haven't been lately I'm sure this stage will pass though, it always does.

OK, so what's been happening...

Ever since I've started my new job 7 weeks ago, I've always bitched about having to get dressed up in business casual clothes. OK, not always, but I always reminisce to the good old days when I could wear pretty much whatever I wanted to work. Jeans, t-shirts, whatever. Well I was pretty much willing to do anything to be able to pull on a pair of jeans and go to work in the morning.

The time has come. For the low low donation of $50.00 (I would have paid more, believe me) to a charity, I now CAN WEAR JEANS ON FRIDAYS for the rest of the year. Hellz YES! You don't know how happy it makes me feel. My 8 billion pairs of jeans will not be wasted. For this year, at least. Plus, it's less wear and tear on the khakis :) Ok, so that last thing was a lame excuse. But I'm just so happy that I can wear jeans on Fridays. Starting in May! So yes, this Friday, I will be sportin the jeans to work. I cannot wait. I am always going to be super happy on Fridays now. Especially on pay days too. I couldn't ask for anything more. Well, except maybe wearing jeans to work every day. :) But I will be happy with one day a week. Woo hoo! Now I wonder if I can wear gym shoes...

And now, I have a gripe.

I was driving home from work today, and I was waiting at a light to make a left turn. Some driver in a black Audi TT roadster was going in the opposite direction, waiting to make a right onto the same street. Pretty sharp car. Except, his front wheel was a dirty black, completely caked with brake dust, while the back wheel were a shiny silver. What is up with that? That's such a crime. If you're pushing a 40k plus ride as cool as that, there is no excuse to have your car be that dirty. Seriously. Now don't get me wrong. I'm not blasting people that are driving a car that's just filthy from regular driving. My car gets pretty dusty and whatnot at the end of the week. But this dude had to have neglected his car for a while, for that much buildup on the rims. Come on man. I should report the car abuse on your arse.

So my brother goes in to donate bone marrow tomorrow. It's kind of scary for me (and I'm sure him as well). Hopefully things will go ok - It'll be for a really good cause. Thursday morning at 8 is when they start the festivities. He's always been quite the giving guy with a big heart - I tip my hat to him. I was really surprised to hear that there was someone who thought that what he was doing wasn't such a great idea. Unfortunately, it won't be a good idea to that person until they're on the receiving end.

-Kirk

Hi everyone,

The weekend is finally here. I'm very glad. Not because necessarily because of work. I'm just glad to be able to sleep in a little tomorrow, and lounge around. I thought I'd try to get a jump on laundry for this weekend, so I'm washing everything tonight. I'm not sure how much actual time it'll save, as I have to iron about 2 weeks worth of shirts... Not looking forward to the half day it will probably take me :)

I have been very bad this week about not eating out. I've gone out so many times for lunch or dinner that I think I've reached a record. Today for lunch, we went to this sports bar place. I was much more comfortable there. Not because it was a sports bar though ;) I was kind of stinky afterwards because of the smoke, so I had to take a shower as soon as I got home. It was nice to do that. Afterwards, I just wanted to put on some sweat pants and lounge around the house. I still have to watch my recorded Must see TV from yesterday too.

It's supposed to be pretty warm this weekend, so I'm hoping to get a car wash or two in. I slacked last weekend because of the wacky weather.

-Kirk

Hi all,

It's kind of funny the things that you reminisce about at random times...

Today I had a moment with the copy machine. Nothing perverted, thank you very much. But I coveted a copy machine from a prior working relationship. It's kind of funny. The one that we have at the office now is the same brand of copier that my old office used to have. But this one isn't as fully featured.

Back in the golden days of the internet age, I used to be able to feed a truckload of paper into our copy machine's sheet feeder - it could staple, collate, punch holes, and give me a back massage all at the same time. there was something satisfying and seductive about producing flawless stacks of copies stapled and 3 hole punched with such precision it would bring a tear to one's eye. Letter, Legal, and my favorite, Tablod (11 x 17). I sing the praises of tabloid sheets of paper like I do for my mint Oreos, pudding, and weekday shopping. Strongly recommended. I lived on Tabloid paper for a long time. I may be suffering from Tabloid paper withdrawal.

6 weeks at the job today... Woo hoo! And as an added bonus, tomorrow is Friday, and it's PAY DAY! woo hoo!

-Kirk

Hi all,

Hope you're doing well...

So I had a thoughtful moment in the checkout lane at Target today. I was in line behind a lady that was buying various "personal" products (I wasn't really paying attention to what they were until the end) and she had purchased a 3 pack of condoms.

Not a big deal right? Well, other than being jealous (heh). I was thinking to myself what an important decision it is when buying condoms. I mean, other than the safety aspect. Come on, I was waiting in line and I was bored. So I just kind of mulled it over a bit while I was waiting.

I would think that one would buy a 3 pack while casually dating. You know, just to have them "on hand," "just in case." Otherwise, wouldn't it make more sense to buy the larger quantity packages? (e.g., 12 packs)? I mean, come on. If you were going to use them often, would you really buy them just in 3 packs? It's just a tad more cost effective, I'd think. Maybe if one was extremely worried about condom freshness and effectiveness or something. Well, I guess 3 is easier to hide as well.

I dunno, just a thought.

So today, I was again reminded that toidy restaurants are really not my bag. Again, I felt like Jed Clampett at this restaurant we went to for lunch. In celebrantion of Office Admin day. The service was good, the food was pretty tasty, but I dunno, I just didn't really feel at ease, like I would be at a more casual restaurant. I'm sure my coworkers think I'm nuts.

-Kirk

Hi Everyone,

Again, just a short blog entry today.

Work was work. I like this week, because things have been a little slower. A few people from the team are on vacation, along with a bunch of people from the whole office as well, I'm sure. The bigger boss is on vacation as well. So you know what happens when the cat's away...

I did some light shopping today after work. I went to the mall to walk around. Didn't buy much, just got a chance to get out outside of work. the mall was pretty quiet, so I can't complain.

I got my blood test results from the health screening last week (maybe 2 weeks ago). They think I may have sleep apnea. (shrug). When my real insurance starts up, I may go in to see a sleep specialist and maybe even go for a sleep test. We'll see. I think it's kind of wacky that I'm going to pay someone to drug me out and watch me while I sleep. I know with my luck, I'll probably have my mouth wide open and be drooling all over. Nice. Hope they don't video tape it.

Which reminds me of something. 2 nights ago, I was dreaming I was doing some kung-fu fighting stuff trying to kick some ass. I'm not sure whose arse I was trying to kick, I just remember it was very intense, and I was swinging some wood fighting sticks (I don't know what they're called in the martial arts world)... Crazy. Brizai thinks I have some pent up angst. Perhaps...

-Kirk

Hi all,

I thought I'd sneak a blog entry in while I could... It's already past my bedtime, and I have less than 20 minutes left on the laptop battery. Man, I love wireless ;)

So I was talking to Brizzai (a.k.a. Brian) during work today - I was showing him some pics that I had on my filespace from school. I must have totally nerded out, because he said to me, "Dude, you really need a girlfriend." I was laughing pretty hard. Trust me, he didn't have to tell me that... I've kinda figured it out on my own.

I talked to Geneman this evening, and he has started his own blog as well. Now I've got some competition ;) I need to start coming up with some good material. I'll post the link once he gets a few more blog entries in.

I talked to my mom and dad on the phone today. Apparently, it's getting quite hot in Taiwan. While it's still nice and cool out here :) I wore my first short sleeve shirt of the season to work today. It felt weird. I think it's still to early. I will go back to my long sleeves tomorrow. I think I caught the sniffles towards the end of the day. I was coughing a little too. That's all I need.

So just for fun, I called a few places today to see how much it would be to get the windows of the supafly ride tinted :) Don't ask me why. I just feel like it's a natural thing for me to do ;) Although, I think I have to get new tires first. I'm getting mighty close to those wear bars.

I was out shopping today, so I missed my normal Monday show (although I'm not really sure if it was on today). But I did catch a few minutes of Mr. Personality. I know, I can't believe I'm admitting that I'm watching those shite Fox shows... With all the hype of the host and whatnot, I was a little curious, I must say. I didn't watch all of it though, just like 10 minutes or so. I think the same person did the dramatic music for this show that did all of the other recent monday night Fox reality shows....

=Kirk

Hey all,

Hope you're doing well this weekend. This past Thursday marks the 5 week point at the new job. Time is definitely flying. Now I just have to start getting on with the rest of my life...I signed up for my benefits and whatnot on friday, so I should be good to go there. It's nice to have all of that junk out of the way.

Not much to report, sadly. Just kind of laying low. I pretty much did administrative stuff. Just bills and junk that I've been putting off. Not much planned for Easter, other than maybe getting some Japanese food. No dyed eggs, no marshmallow chicks and bunnies.

I saw a fun license plate today: pd4it. Seen on a blue Porsche Boxter S driving towards the mall.

-Kirk

Hi all,

Hope everything's well.

I went to my photography class this evening. Pretty good stuff. It hink I'll learn a ton, and hopefully learn how to use my camera for more than point and shoot stuff.

So today, I went to my old high school for the class. Man, have things changed. It's vastly different from what it used to be. There's actually carpeting in the halls now! Plus, the lockers are different. It's just weird to be there after so many years. I think I visited once or twice after high school graduation, but I've not been back ever since. Kind of wacky. I'm glad to know that they're trying to improve the facilities though. Ever since the new high school went up, I'm sure the kids probably feel like they got the shaft in regards to high schools :)

-Kirk

Hi everyone,

ok ok, so I'm a sucker for a happy ending. I watched parts of the season finale of the Fox show, Married by America. I had caught the first episode, and then I figured I'd see the last one. I thought it would be like Joe Millionaire (uhhhhh...) where the producers recap everything that happened during the previous episodes to fill up the 2 hour finale.

Anyway, I thought I'd see a happy ending (at least one). Nope. None of the couples got married. I didn't realize that they got money if they did. Isn't a successful marriage enough? I guess not. Hey, a half million wouldn't be bad either.

So I think Fox just recycled the same "anticipation / dramatic" music that was featured in Joe Millionaire. I thought I was watching that show again.

Tomorrow I start my photography class. I hope it's good. Stevarino will be one of my classmates. It should be fun. If not, we'll make it fun :)

-Kirk

Hey all,

Hope you had a nice weekend. I'm closing this one up as we speak. Need to go to bed soon. My original plan of going to sleep (as usual) has been foiled. Alas.

Today, I spent a good part of the day in the 3 step car wash, polish, and wax process. Many hours were used today to restore the supaflyride back to it's original supaflyness. Looks pretty good, but I'm not that convinced that the 3 step polish and wax process is actually effective. I'll see tomorrow when I drive to work.

My mom is now in the homeland. She called me this morning to let me know that everything was groovy. I'm very glad she made it there ok.

Day one of living alone. It's not exactly my favorite but that's ok.

This evening, I was talking to a neighbour on IM (instant messenger). We got to talking about relationships and whatnot (I forget why). I was complaining that it's difficult to meet other single people in the working world. She was saying that other people my age in her office felt and complained about the same thing. I guess it gives me hope. It was starting to seem as if everyone else was in some sort of a relationship except me. There just needs to be a good way for single people to meet outside of work. Not in a smoky loud bar, just in a pretty casual setting. Where there's no pressure, and you can meet people that are in similar situations (single, hopelessly single, happily single, etc.) and just chill. It would be great. You could find a homie to hang with, or maybe something more if the stars are aligned correctly.

I guess the main thing is to not lose hope, right? Just when I start to, there's always something that kind of draws me back. Kinda wacky, I think.

Until then, I will let the sounds of Norah Jones lull me to sleep.

I'll catcha around.

-Kirk

Hi everyone,

The weekend is finally here. So happy. And it looks like I may actually have a chance to wash the supaflyride this weekend. I'm so excited. Let the waxing begin!

Once again, I've realized the importance of having good coworkers at your job. They make the day go by much faster, and make work more enjoyable. And you don't realize this until they go on holiday.

Past few days have been pretty uneventful for me. Nothing too exciting to report.

My mom is leaving for the homeland again this Saturday. Some unfinished family business, I guess. This will be the 3rd time she's been there this year. I'm still planning on November, I think. Still tentative, but that's what I'm aiming for.

So today I was at this meeting for work. There was this lady who was the queen of electronic gadgetry (but not of integration). In the meeting, she had her NX series Clie (the one that flips open and the screen flips 180 degrees), a Blackberrydevice, and a cell phone. I was thoroughly impressed at the hardware that she was packin. I didn't go up to talk to her about it (because she darted out after the meeting) and I was also intimidated by her ;)

-Kirk

Hey all,

At work today, we had a "health screening" fair type of thingy. For like 10 bucks, the sponsors would draw your blood and screen it for stuff. I had forgotten to make an appointment, so I was lucky enough to get a walk-in spot and get hooked up. Everything went pretty fast, blood drawing went well - I forgot to fast, so I guess the results won't be as good. Oh well. I'll find out my results probably this weekend or something.

So the sponsors had some informational tables set up on the way out. Pretty interesting stuff, let me tell you. I found out that there's a difference between the clinical terms of overweight and obese. I had no idea. There was this card thing with a dial on it. You matched up your height and weight, and it showed you where you were (normal, overweight, obese, etc.). I found out that I'm overweight. :) Woo hoo! So I'm going to rename the health screening fair to the "give you low self-esteem fair." Heh. I guess last year, they would measure your body fat as well. I'm sure many people were happy about that :)

The most amusing thing out of the fair was what I call the "tubes of fat" display. Whenever I read nutrition information, I just look at how many grams of this and that are in it. I see the percentages, and that's about it. But I guess I never really thought about how much say, X grams of fat or Y grams of sugar actually was. Well, this company put the exact amount of fat and sugar of different foots into individual test tubes. I was severly traumatized when I saw the test tube for my former favorite McDonalds sandwich, the Big Mac. I'm telling you, the test tube was just FULL to the top with fat. Ugh. I don't exactly know how many grams of fat it was, but it sure looked like a whole hell of a lot. They had other things like brownies, doughnuts, etc. Severly troubled, I'm telling you. I'll probably chill on the big macs and brownies for a little bit. And the amount of sugar in a can of coke? Fugghettaboutit!

So while treadmilling today, I saw a movie trailer for another movie featuring an Asian dude kicking some major ass. Is that what all Asians are good for in movies? Doing kung-fu fighting shit? Don't get me wrong, we look pretty good doing it, as stereotypey as it is. But I'd like to see Asians playing in a wider variety of movies. We have some areas lightly covered, but I'd like to see more Asians in the "entertainment industry." I tip may hat to all of the Asian actors that are trying to make it, but we definitely need more.

-Kirk

One quick thing...

I don't think I could ever name my kid B.J. That's just wrong.

-Kirk

Hey all,

Hope you're doing well and had a good weekend.

I'm fragile. I just finished a 3 day tryst with a new cell phone. It was love at first sight, but then it evolved into a love-hate relationship. I was about to be engaged to a new icy blue Sony Ericsson T306 phone through AT&T Wireless' mlife for a year. The phone was beautiful. It was very small, compact, great battery life, color screen, I could beam phone numbers and whatnot into it from my pda, and compose my own ringtones. But with the popular "can you hear me now" tests, I was very unhappy. In fact, my old legacy celly system (bow down to the trusty time-tested Motorola Startac) was pretty much on par with the new fangled 3G phone. After numerous dropped calls and times where I was assured a 2 bar signal but couldn't make a phone call at all, I decided I had to get out. Luckily, I had 2 weeks to decide before I was locked in. So today, after just 3 days, I had a tearful breakup, and returned the phone to the store... I bought my mom the same phone as well, and she was not happy with it either. Apparently, the ATT network is still pretty new, and it's still not there yet. I figure I'd give it 6 months to a year, and then things would be groovy. In the meantime, the search for a new celly continues on. I will miss that phone though, that's for sure. (snif)

So what was up with the huge amounts of snow today? I thought last snowfall was the last of the season. I guess not. And oh yes, the freezing rain was just peachy. Lovely.

I love the time change we just had. The day seemed to fly by today. I was impressed. I have to start dragging myself to work earlier now, so I can get out and maximize my daylight time :)

-Kirk

Hey everyone,

how's it going? Hope everything's groovy. So I survived another week at the new job. It doesn't totally feel like "work" yet. Don't get me wrong. I like it, but I still kind of feel like I'm on the consulting scene, and this is just a temporary gig. Maybe I just need to move more of my stuff into my cube or something. Right now, I just have my lava lamp, and a mail sorter thing that I brought in from home. That's all. Only other things on my desk are paper and, well, paper :)

I guess I'm comparing it to back in the day where I used to work. I'm sure I'll accumulate the same amount of stuff as I did back then. I'm still in the old mindset, I think. It's weird for me to plan meetings one or two weeks in advance. I guess that's where "internet time" comes in. Meetings would be planned pretty much on a daily basis for the day before (if you were lucky) or a few minutes to hours before they actually started. I can't believe how long I worked that way. Not that it was a bad thing - I enjoyed the pace and fast turnaround of things. But the air of uncertainty really took a toll on me. But now, I'm getting used to how things work. But when I have tasks to get done I get nervous when they don't get done as quickly as I think they should. But like I said, it's just the culture. And when in Rome... ;)

For the past few days, I've been kind of flying solo. My friend who I knew before (and my boss) has been on vacation since Wednesday. I think I've been doing aiight without him. Since I wasn't as familiar with my surroundings and coworkers, I'd kind of filter things through him, or he would filter things out for me. He'll be back sometime late next week, so hopefully I'll be fine. Everyone in my group has been pretty cool and helpful while I find my way around.

Anyway, can I just say how much I love ice cold chocolate pudding? I don't know what it is - I've always enjoyed pudding here and there (in the residence halls), but until recenly, I've probably had a little pudding cup full every day. It's so good. Recently, I've been going to Costco to get the zillion packs of pudding in a box. So tasty. It's up there with mint Oreos, I'd have to say.

I forgot to mention about the other day - Last monday, when I went to the new employee hazing, I mean, orientation, I stopped by at the standalone Gap on my way home. While I was getting into my car, these totally punk kids (in dad's Porsche, no less) were driving around the parking lot, showing off their impressive ride. I thought it was funny, because I think the kid who was driving didn't know how to drive a manual transmission car very well, because he'd rev the engine to get started, pull into the parking spot, get out, etc. Maybe he was showing off the fine mechanics of the Porsche... Maybe not. Anyway, it was humorous to watch these kids drive around. You'd hear WeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeee and then the car would move a foot. The car was totally hot though. It was a dark metallic blue Porsche 911 ragtop. Not a bad way to spend a good chunk of cash, let me tell you.

So we got the nasty reminder today from mother nature that even though we had some spring weather, she will still keep us in check by slapping us with some frozen rain. She probably just doesn't want me to fully hand wash my car just yet.

-Kirk