Spring is coming!

Hi all,

The weather today was amazing. We had temperatures in the 50s! Crizzzazyness. I was amazed when I saw a guy driving around with the top down in his Porsche Boxster. I was able to go outside without a jacket on today too.

I can't wait.

-Kirk

P.S. Mom is back from the homeland...

There is a difference between relaxed and loose.

Hi all,

Hope you're having a good weekend.

I just finished a portion of one paper so I'm taking a small break.

In all my years of buying stuff from the uniform store of the Man, I've never really had a problem. It's gotten to the point where I just look for basic things that I like, and I will just buy them as long as they're the right size. So from now on, I'll pay attention to words like fitted, relaxed, classic and loose. I bought these jeans that were exactly my size - Took them home and immediately ripped of the tags. I put them on for the first time on Friday. The pant legs were huge! They were the right length, but a tad on the wide side. I was afraid that my foot would disappear under them. OK, ok, so maybe that's an exaggeration, but seriously the pant legs were wider than the ones that I've had before.

As I was changing into the sweatpants tonight, I checked the tag inside - "Loose fit." Huh. I randomly checked another pair of jeans that I know fit ok: "Relaxed." Who knew that there was such a big difference?

Imagine if these distinctions labeled more than just clothes. Like maybe, people. I wouldn't want to be called loose though.

-Kirk

Consumed.

Hi all,

Hope you're doing well this evening. I've pretty much been cleaning ever since coming home from work. That's it. I've done laundry, cleaned the kitchen, bathroom, and my room. I am a cleaning fiend.

Fear me.

And now, I have papers to start writing some papers. (yawn).

I'm going to take my first vacation day next month - The Friday after all my stuff is due. I'm going to enjoy my weekend early. I can't wait.

On a work front, I had some sort of review today at work (I'm not really sure what the official name is). Everything went pretty well, I think. No surprises or disappointments - we had some good discussion about work and whatnot.

As of late, I've been feeling disconnected from everyone. Family and friends, especially. It feels like school and work has truly consumed all of my free time. I haven't even had time to visit my favorite hot spots of commerce as of late. I'm bummed. It makes me think if I'm doing the right thing or not (again).

I'm also trying not to be that guy.

-Kirk

P.S. I feel a burrito comin' on for lunch tomorrow.

Please Please Please just let me get through these group projects.

I'm dying here. These next few weeks are going to be brutal. The house is an utter mess. Parental unit coming home on Sunday. I will be group projecting all weekend. I was group projecting this evening. Will be group projecting tomorrow.

I'm going to be a grouchy mofo...

-Kirk

A great place to visit, but not to stay.

Hi all,

Hope you're doing well. A very eventful day indeed.

I have been to the famed executive floor.

It is good. Life is good up there.

If that's your thing.

Where to start? I should have been tipped off that I wasn't in Kansas anymore when I stepped into the elevator and was enveloped in a very toity mixture of granite and marble in the elevator.

I should have known that I wasn't going to be in my element when we had to be "let in" by the door watcher dude. I call him door watcher dude because he seemed to be more than just the security guy - He seemed to be quite knowledgeable about the goings on of the office. Obviously he know when people come and go, but he knew all the administrative schtuff that was to occur that day. From how the teleconferencing system worked, to where the Man sat. Hmmm. Maybe he's the dude behind the curtain too.

Anyway, so yeah, I've just gotten to the door. :)

We were buzzed in and led into the most crizzazy looking conference room I'd ever seen. I'd seen some crazy dot com conference rooms, but none like this. I guess that's why it's called the board room. This was very corporate. Besides smelling funny (seriously), I'm talkin freakin big wooden horseshoe table (many mature trees died for this thing, let me assure you), microphones all along the tables, leather seats, and this podium that looked like it belonged in some Star Trek federation movie scene. I secretly think you could launch stuff from that console. This place would have made Don Trump proud. I thought the boardroom that he has on his TV show was corporate looking. I think we had that one beat.

The coolest thing in the room was the floor covering. It was this off white spiral pattern that started from the center and went out (I guess it could go from the outside in too) on a black background. Kind of non-traditional I'd say.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention - the tables all had those old skool pen holder pedestals. You know what I'm talking about - one of the corporate symbols of back in the day where you stick a pen into this base thing, on every executive's desk? Kind of like a single holster for a pen (or two). Crazy.

OK, so what else. There were no windows in the board room. It was pretty dark in there too. Mood lighting a plenty.

So outside of the super special board room, there was an "executive lounge" - With pretty much floor to ceiling windows.

The view kicked ass. I can't explain how neat it was. Everything looks so peaceful from the top floor. I wished I had brought my camera. Oh well.

We had some time before the presentation, so D Nice showed me around the joint. The boardroom was pretty cool (in a corporate sort of way), but I was more impressed by the the rest of the floor. All natural materialed table surfaces (leather, mineral, or wood) - none of the Formica table top and fabric cube crap. Real wood furniture. Clean carpet.

The odd thing was the inner doors. The executive offices were all along the windows. The core of the building was separated by these really odd doors. I was througly confused by them. You'd walk along the wall, and just see a handicap accessible door handle sticking out. No visible hinges, just an outline of a door that's flush against the wall. So you grab the handle and wonder: Push or pull?

So this door led to the restrooms and....

The executive kitchen. We were treated to leftovers after the presentation. At that time I was so hungry I would have gone around the room and asked, "are you going to finish that?"

So cool. This place was a mini professional gourmet kitchen. The people in there were so nice. There was a sub zero looking thing that was stocked full of food. I felt like a rap star. All that was missing was Cristal.

The food just tasted better there. The fruit was fresher. The beverages just tasted better out of a swanky glass. The bread tasted better. The chicken soup was incredible. The cookies were so tasty. The kitchen staff put up a fuss when we chose not to use the dishes and opted for the styrofoam plates instead. We did get the fine china experience when we had our soup though.

Oh yeah, real silverware and linen napkins too.

Sorry, I'm used to plasticware, styrofoam and disposable napkins in our cafeteria.

Oh yeah, I got to see the Man's office too. Not too bad. But I would have chosen different furniture personally ;)

At the end of the day, I could only sum up my visit in one word: Surreal.

I didn't realize whenwe went back to our own office complex, the minute I opened the door and was walking through the lobby, I immediately felt a relief of pressure. (I didn't even present!). Anyway, I didn't feel it, but the entire time I was up in the executive level, I had gotten progressively more tense. Going back to our offices was such a relief. After seeing what the execs have, I now call our offices the "ghetto." It just seemed fitting.

Even after I got back, it took me a little bit to decompress. Kinda crazy.

I thoroughly felt out of place on the executive level. It was nice and all, but while I was there, I didn't really feel like it was somewhere I aspired to be either. I think I like being in the trenches. It's hard to say.

It was a nice diversion from the day though...

-Kirk

Don't cry. It's only going to get worse tomorrow.

Hi all,

Hope you're doing well. I need to get to sleep soon, cause I have a big day tomorrow (sort of).

I had my first online course today. It was cool that I didn't have to drive to school (it was snowing and crappy out), but staring intensely at the computer screen for 2.5 hours was killer. I guess I must take more breaks at work because I sit in front of a computer for most of the day.

So tomorrow is going to be kind of interesting. Brizzai's boss is going to give a presentation to the big scary higher ups. We're talking the Man level here. I've been elected to go and more sure all the technology agrees and will work together. Kind of scary but I'm up to the challenge. The only bummer is that I have to wear the full corporate uniform tomorrow. Craziness. But it's a small price to pay to see the digs of the highest of high execs.

I'll let you know how it goes...

-Kirk

P.S. About the one liner up top - This was overheard from a few cubes over this morning (they were just joking around). I thought it was very funny.

Hi all,

Hope you had a nice weekend.

Tomorrow's going to be the first online course that I've ever had at school. Kind of exciting :) We'll see how it goes.

Did some group work today, we were pretty productive. Got a good start to the project. Now I just have to get working on the other one.

I also exercised for the first time in quite a while. Just leisurely walking on the treadmill for 30 mins, that's all. I wanted to start off kinda slow :)

It's Monday tomorrow. I can't believe it.

-Kirk

Toblerone rocks.

-Kirk

Momentum is hard to overcome.

Hi all,

Hope you're having a nice weekend.

There's nothing better than hot soup on a cold day :) This whole morning (and early part of the afternoon) has been dedicated to reading the paper and doing my taxes. I've been listening to all of the CDs that I've bought recently too - I've been serenaded by Norah (who has a new site), Sarah, and Frank.

It's pretty windy out there. I was out shoveling the light dusting of snow we had - it was nutty because the wind was blowing so hard.

So what's on the mind today...

Yesterday, the supaflyride turned 90k. Unforutunately, I missed it by 5 miles. Bummer. When it turns 100k, I'll have to get a picture or something.

Why don't they make single size serving soup cans? Why's it always have to be at least 2 servings? Because then, you're faced with a situation when you're eating alone - do you consume the whole can and get 2x the sodium? Or save it for a later meal?

I usually choose the former instead of the latter - Unless it's clam chowder, I probably won't have the same soup for a while. By that time, it'll probably go bad. I guess I could freeze it? But then it may suffer the same fate of the alfredo sauce that I froze last year :) It's still in the fridge. Frozen.

Anyway, I think I'm set for my sodium count for today. Maybe tomorrow too.

Speaking of pasta-like products, I would like to request to all food people to be more specific when describing ravioli dishes. Kind of like the hard boiled egg, one ravioli is a perfectly contained food. It has it's own container, and there's usully good stuff inside.

Anyway, back to my discussion - Whenever I order a ravioli dish, it's never what I expect. For instance, I was at a restaurant and ordered shrimp ravioli. What did I expect? Ravioli filled with some sort of shrimp goo, right?

Ho - It was meat product goo ravioli with shrimp on the outside. (shrug). So the same thing happens at a bistro where we had lunch last week. I wanted portobello ravioli - same thing. Meat goo filled ravioli with slivers of portobello mushrooms on top. Honestly, I didn't think there was one full mushroom in my dish. It had to be less than a half. It was tood, but needless to say, I was a tad disappointed. Is it just me? Am I just that green about ordering ravioli? Hmmm. I'll have to be more specific next time (or read the descriptions better)...

Oh yeah, so this morning, while I was shoveling, I noticed that there was a car that was parked (at an angle) half on the grass and half on the street. The car looked like it was pretty well stuck in the snowbank. I'm guessing someone lost control of their car or something, but it looked like someone thought the driveway was about 5 feet closer to them than it actually was :)

So 2 dudes and a driver of a Buick Rendezvous show up to try and dig it out. They end up tying a rope to the car and used the Buick to pull the stuck car out. It was hard to concentrate on shoveling the snow when all this was going on.

Today's food craving is to have a really good salad. Like a make my own salad bar type of salad. :) I'm not sure where to go though...

-Kirk

I think I remember that brownish green stuff - I think it's called grass.

Hi everyone,

Hope you're doing well this evening. I'm so glad it's Friday tomorrow. It's been an abridged week, and I'm glad it's almost over. We have a pretty big presentation coming up on Tuesday, so Brizzai and I have been busting arse trying to get it done.

For dinner I had to satisfy my burrito craving - I went to Baja Fresh and had a very leisurely dinner. I enjoyed my Ultimo Burrito (with tons of pico de gallo) and read the entire paper. The restaruant switched ther salsa verde - this time it was very green. In the past, it's always been kind of a lighter shade. Who knows. It was a little hotter than normal too. (shrug).

I used to have a complex about eating by myself at a restaurant. I would feel kind of self conscious, I guess. After travelling for weeks at a time on business, you kind of get over that feeling pretty quickly. I usually take something to read and just chill out. I don't like to feel rushed when eating - I always feel like I eat too quickly already and don't take time to enjoy my food. I used to travel with this lady who ate slower than I did - So I tried to do the same thing and match her speed - otherwise I'd always have to wait for her to finish. We were on assignment for over a month, and you know what? At the end, I ate slower than she did sometimes. Kinda odd - but now I'm back to my old tricks of eating fast again.

I once read somewhere that you're comfortable with yourself when you are cool with doing things by yourself - like going out to eat, or seeing a movie, for example. Although, I've never gone to see a movie by myself yet.

So it was nice out today. It was above freezing :) I drove home with the window rolled down a few inches. It was nice. As an added bonus, the days are getting longer again :)

For the first time in what seems like months, I saw something that I hadn't seen in a long long while. Brownish / greenish patches of grass. It's true, there is stuff under all those huge piles of dirty, grey, black, and brown snow. There is still some acual white snow, but if you look on the side of the roads, it is getting pretty gross. The snow has turned from pure white to nastiness. It's time for a change of seasons :)

Almost every morning I have a hard boiled egg - I usually just boil them in batches so I can have one in the morning. I'm always amazed at what a neat food the egg actually is. There aren't too many self-contained foods like that. Plus, the egg whte and yolk (why isn't it called egg yellow?) go well together. The white by itself is tasy, but there's not much substance. The yolk by itself is a little dry. Together, it's quite tasty. Plus, the extra pieces of egg shell add a unique crunchiness not found in too many other foods :)

-Kirk

A great way to travel.

Hi all,

Hope all's well this evening.

Came back from class a little bit ago. Our instructor was telling us about how his parents travel when they make their yearly migration down to Florida in the wintertime. I thought it was absolutely amazing. It's something I want to try some day:

They travel without a map. Just a compass that's in the car.

How cool is that? Imagine just being on the road and navigating the old world way. For me, it's cool for 2 reasons:

First, I would love to vacation and travel when time is no issue. Second, my adventure starts when I leave my driveway, not when I get to my destination.

I think travelling without a map is a great idea - I wonder if I could be that unstructured and free spirited to actually do it in practice.

Maybe I am in the wrong profession...

-Kirk

A low productivity day.

Hi all,

It's me again.

Ever since my blog entry earlier, I've not been able to keep focus on anything. My mind is wandering all over the place (going hither and thither). I tried doing some schoolwork, only to be distracted. Kind of a bummer. I got out of school early - we finished the presentations early so the prof let us meet with our groups to take care of some group work. One of the guys in my group didn't show up to class so it was kind of useless for us to meet.

I guess I'm just feeling a little anxiety about the group project. Everyone seems to be making decent progress, and we haven't started ours at all. I hope it's not going to boil down to the last week rush job like all my other assignments. Ugh. I gotta get out of this cycle.

Today I learned that one of my classmates is doing 4 classes a semester. He'll theoretically be done in 8 months. How do you like that? I was jealous.

He asked me the all important question of why I was doing this master's degree if I already had one - I had to stop and remind myself of why I was pursuing this degree again.

Is that bad?

(sigh).

-Kirk

OK, so maybe I'm a little too easily impressed :)

Hi all,

Hope you're having a great day. I am enjoying my President's Day off - The bonus extendo weekend. Unfortunately, like the last holiday (MLK day) it ends promptly at 6:00 p.m. when class starts up again. Oh well. 5 hours till the end ;)

So I did some errands that I put off from the weekend. As many of you may know, I am a big fan of shopping on the weekdays - since school started I've not had that luxury at all. But today I got a taste of reduced crowds and helpful staff again.

I went to the grocery mecca of Meijer this morning to buy some food - I normally avoid weekend shopping there like the plague because it's usually madhouse. Today it was less of a madhouse, but there were quite a few uhh, "more experienced" shoppers, if you will.

Anyway, so getting to the point. I go to the deli counter and the deli dude takes my order - I tell him that I want a half pound of ham. He throws on the glove and grabs a handful of ham, tosses it on the scale and Voila! Exactly .5 pounds. No more, no less. I was thoroughly impressed. Maybe a little too impressed. For me, it was like winning the small lotto :) Hey, it's the little things, right? Heh.

-Kirk

Will the real Kirk Tsai please stand up?

Hi Everyone!

Hope you're doing well. Long time no write. It's been quite the week, let me tell you. Tuesday night was spent writing my paper and preparing for my presentation. I just had to stop working at 1:00 a.m. because otherwise I'd be useless at work the next day. I got a chance to practice once or twice, and that was it. Everything turned out ok though - I can't really complain.

Wednesday night came and went - I did my presentation 2nd because I wanted to get it out of the way. The odd thing was that when I gave my presentation, I wasn't really super nervous like I always am. I think I was just so brain dead that I just didn't really care.

I wanted to get home from work early on Thursday, but it didn't happen. I ended up staying there working on stuff with Brizzai until 7:30 ish. By the time I got home, I just ate pretty quickly and just watched TV the rest of the night.

Friday was an interesting day - We had a morning meeting with a vendor in Ann Arbor. I had been planning to go out after work on Thursday to buy some groceries and stuff, and fill up on gas. I was down to less than 1/4 tank. I didn't want to fill up before I drove out to Ann Arbor because I figured that would be the day that I'd spill gasoline on myself or something. AFter getting home late on Thursday, I just didn't feel like going out.

Friday morning, I drove out to Ann Arbor without filling up... Can you see where this is going?

I completely forgot I needed gas until I drove home and noticed that the gas gauge light went on and the needle was on E and it seemed to be dropping faster than I had liked. Everytime I'd look at it, it seemed to sink lower. From the vendor site to the highway, there were no gas stations so I didn't think about filling up.

So, I'm driving along the highway, looking for gas stations. Got off at 2 exits and found nothing. Now I'm getting really nervous. The gauge says that it's below empty. To add to my madness, I had to go to the bathroom really bad. Every minute that passed had me on pins and needles. If I had ran out of gas, I would be totally screwed.

I was very very lucky. I finally found a gas station at the exit right before the one that I usually take. The whole ordeal of driving around looking for a place to go and fill up had added an extra 20 minutes to my trip. Needless to say, I was late getting back. Oh well.

Never again. I'm filling up when it gets to half now - I should have learned from the blackout :)

Although I still have schoolwork to do, I've been enjoying my weekend. Friday night I did a little shopping at Costco. Love the Costco - Here's why: I bought these swanky looking LED night lights from them, right? this was in October. Well, out of the 6, one died and stopped working last week. Plus, some of them had been getting dimmer over time. I was semi-ok with them getting dimmer, but I was pissed when the one light stopped working. Costco took them back with no questions. I was totally blown away. That's what I call customer service.

Plus, the Costco bakery has the best chocolate chip and oatmeal raisin cookies in the world.

Love the Costco.

The bummer was that Costco had no night lights for me to buy to replace them so everything's dark now. I can see myself stubbing my toes and running into walls.

Oh well. What else is on the mind...

Our mostly white winter wonderland has turned in to nasty looking grey and black snow mounds on the sides of the road. It needs to melt soon.

I'm excited because daylight is getting longer again. Spring is coming!

Oh yeah, I forgot to say, Happy Valentine's Day everyone! Hope you had a good one.

So about the tag line at the top. Every so often I try to find myself. On the Internet. Heh. You know, by doing searches on the web with your name. I know, this sounds nerdy, but bear with me.

So I do a search with my name on Google, right? Apparently, there's this java dude that has the same name as I do. As an added bonus, he's got his "top movies" list online as well. Just for the record, I am not a java dude. I took one semester of java in grad school, and that's it. As far as movies, my top movie of all time is NOT Star Wars. Blah.

-Kirk

Women that smile are sexy.

Hi all,

Hope all's well this evening.

Well, I made it through half of my to do list. I was completely and utterly robbed of my entire weekend. I was up till 4 Sunday morning doing the draft of my paper. I was hoping to finish the rough draft of it, and then just do some editing during the day. I managed to finish all but the conclusion and the abstract. So I finally finished. I couldn't believe it. I tried working on my second paper but I just couldn't focus. I was so fried after the paper. I managed to finish up the presentation and practice it by 11 last night.

On the one hand, I just want to take one class a semester for the rest of the 4 years... On the other hand, I just want to drop the whole freakin idea and just become a bum after work. Oh yeah, there's always the extend pain version of taking one class a semester, dragging my 3rd post-secondary education out to the length of my undergrad. Blah.

I most likely will not be able to work on my paper tonight. I am just too fried. Need to go to sleep early tonight. My heard was starting to hurt this evening from the lack of sleep (I'm guessing). I may try to start thinking about the diagrams I'll have to create for my paper and presentation on Wednesday. I don't know if I can do it tonight.

Tomorrow I'm going to be in meeting hell. I'm scared. Can you see the crust on me yet? ;)

Don't be that guy. You know who I'm talkin' bout - the old and crusty guy.

Wow, can you feel the negativity? ;) I am not a big fan of myself when I get this way.

The only thing that I'm looking forward to tomorrow is going out to lunch with my coworkers. well, maybe Must See TV on Tuesday too. :)

Such is life.

-Kirk

Big paper done.

Still lots to do.

-Kirk

I am really not digging school right now.

-Kirk

This weekend's gonna suck.

Hi all,

Hope you're doing well.

So this weekend is going to be all work and no play. I'm going to be even grouchier next week.

I now have the following due on Monday:
- 10 to 15 page paper
- 5 minute presentation on the findings of the paper

Due on Wednesday:
- 2 to 5 page paper
-7 minute presenation on the stuff that I found

I'll probably have to finish everything this weekend. I still have to do research on all of this too. blah.

So, starting tomorrow, I am going to have to become a hermit and never come back out until Monday. I'm not looking forward to this.

I'm sure I'll mix in play there somewere ;)

So just in case you couldn't tell, school is starting (well maybe not starting) to take its toll on me. A colleague of mine in class and I were talking. He was thinking about dropping a class because he's decided that his "quality of life" ever since he's started school has really gone down. He's a full time worker like me, part time student - but he's got a 5 year old too.

He was telling me that he's felt like he's been a little "edgy" at work - and I was like. "Me Too!" So we were discussing taking 1 class per semester, instead of doing 2 (what we're doing now). It seemed like a great idea, but then I remembered that 1 class a semester would take me 4 long years. Long years. So it begs the question, which is better? Going full force (fairly grumpy) or spreading the pain over 4 years (less grumpy)?

Either way, I don't know if I'm going to make it. Must... hang... in...

-Kirk

The Spirit of Giving.

Hi all,

Just a few quick things before going to bed. Recently, I've been going to bed around 11 or 11:30 ish. I just haven't been able to stay up very late. Not sure why. It makes getting up in the morning easier though.

So today I was selling raffle tickets to benefit the United Way. Our group at work was raffling off a Valentine's day gift basket. Beside us, there were people selling stuff for the Ticket to Ride Raffle which also benefitted the United Way. They were really cool too - they were trying pretty hard to actively get people to sign up, and they'd help us hock our tickets as well. I was happy to see so many work people so willing to give in order to help the organization. I know, I'm sure there were some people who were just hoping to win one of the cars, but still - Either way, all the money goes to a good cause, right?

And if you were wondering, I did buy a Ticket to Ride :) I didn't buy a ticket for the Valentine's day gift basket though - I'll probaly continue to boycott the occasion until further notice.

Better get to bed :)

-Kirk

Hi everyone,

What's going on? Happy Monday morning to you.

So my weekend has been extended a few hours. I don't have to go into work this morning because I have a vendor meeting at 10:30 and I was just going to leave from home instead of working for an hour and then leaving. I've been taking it easy, getting stuff together, and whatnot. All at my leisure.

So I don't know what the story was last night, but I just couldn't stay awake much past 11:30 so I fell into bed and was out. I would have probably slept all the way through the night, but I had the Northwest flight status notification turned on for my mom's flight, so my text pager alarm went off a couple of times. No biggie. I just wanted to know that she arrived at the homeland safe.

I didn't get a chance to finish all that I wanted to finish for my research paper this weekend. Oh well. I'm down to one week now. I have to write a paper and do the presentation. I'm sure it can be done, but I have to get my shite together and finish up the literature review. Maybe I can work a little during lunch.

-Kirk

Goodbye Mr. Fish.

Hi all,

Hope you're having a great weekend so far.

Today ended an era of pet ownership. The last Mr. Fish (the biggest and oldest fantail one) bid us adieu as he made his way to the big fisthank in the sky.

It was not a surprise - he was having some issues swimming (and staying upright) so his time had come.

My mom and I cleaned out the tank. The kitchen counter space has been reclaimed for kitchen use, and now everything looks kind of different.

I'm not sure if we'll have fish again. My mom didn't think very much about my small hamster suggestion for a pet. I'm not sure if we're ready for a dog either. Oh well.

-Kirk