TrickMo

I checked out my blog a minute ago just to try to remember when I last posted, and was shocked to see that it was last month. It’s just been busy. I started a new job on June 1st, and this month has flown by. Friends visiting, family visiting, a trip to Florida, tons of homework to get up to speed for the new gig,  more visits from my family, a trip out to the Arizona border, more friends visiting, home improvements, a wedding or two… Truth be told, I have hardly had a moment to sit back and reflect. This moment will have to suffice.

Good.

Uhh. Things are good.

Baby to arrive very soon! Lina getting bigger by the day. Getting ready for the wild ride of parenthood to begin. That’s all.

Sorry I haven’t written. I’ll try to be better about that.

Today I had one of those technology moments. You know, the kind where something out in the technosphere jumps out at you. And it was my favorite kind - the unexpected variety. I spend a good deal of time putting stuff out there - blog entries, various web sites, social networking stuff. But today…something came flying back.

A few days ago, I set up a Google Alert (http://www.google.com/alerts) on my name, so I could see when people post about me around the web, and also see how much is posted about the more famous guy with my name. Well, today I got an alert about a car wreck.

Just read it, and you’ll understand why this shoked me a bit.

Alfred girl, 17, killed in two-vehicle crash

The other day I launched a new web site for my everyone’s favorite Cairn terrier Playa. My plan is to update it daily and upload a ton of pictures and videos. I also have a web cam up, and hope to add lots more interactive stuff to attract people to follow my little beast (as if her good looks aren’t enough -pshah!).

Anyway, the site is PetStalker.com. Check it out and let me know what u think!

Stalking my dog Playa - but like, in a healthy way

No more sleeping on the floor! After a month sleeping on a mattress on the floor, we finally got a frame for our bed yesterday, and I had an enjoyable little mystery while assembling the frame. While preparing to attach the headboard, I found there were no instructions for attaching to our type of bedframe. Initially, I started to get worried that the salesperson had sold us incompatible pieces. I went to the web site to investigate, figuring if they didn’t have some support forum, there would at least be people around the web compaining of the same thing. I never had to go that far though, because once I pulled up the downloadable instructions, I found that they had 2 extra pages that were not included in my package. Naturally, those pages detailed how to attach our specific pieces. Everything went together fine in the end, once I swapped two legs, exposing the mounting holes (another thing that was omitted in the instructions).  I think I’d like to make a comedy sketch or something about bad instructions. I think technical writers who do consumer instructions are pretty sloppy - maybe because so few people are reading their work. Well listen here, sloppy instruction manual writers. I’m paying attention, and my hands are sore today because I had to take my bed half-way back apart due to your sloppiness. So….shape up! OK, that rant made me tired. Maybe I need to lie down on my new bed.

I normally try to steer clear of celebrity gossip, if only because it’s nonsense and completely uninteresting, but the news about Ashton Kutcher racing CNN to the million Twitter follower mark caught my eye. Not ignoring the irony of it being ABC reporting this ‘news,’ I am just wondering about the implicit comparison being made here. When did people start equating the ramblings of celebs to legitimate news sources? Those things often make the news (something I could really rant about too), but when did they start actually being the news? If Ashton wins, will he be declared the superior news source? Better yet, I’m wondering if CNN will have to change their tagline to ‘More People Get Their News From Ashton Kutcher.”

Fox News reported today that cyberspies have penetrated the US power grid. Am I the only one who thinks it’s interesting that this story came straight from this season’s plotline of 24? It used to be that it took a few years for the events on 24 to actually take place (like having a black president - season 1, and the explosion of Mexican drug cartels - season 3), but now real life has almost totally caught up with 24. Is Jack Bauer on the case?

I found this picture the other day while digging through some boxes. This must have been around 1978 (dating myself just to provide nostalgia, I know). I don’t recall being robots for halloween though, so my guess is we just decided one day to dress up for fun. Mom fashioned these outfits for my brother and me from grocery bags and tin foil. I especially like my ice cream freezer bag boots. It reminds me of that fantastic Flight of The Conchords song Robo Boogie:

The distant future,
The year 2000
The distant future,
The year 2000
The distant future,
The distant future.

It is the distant future,
The year 2000.
we are robots.
The world is quite different ever since the robotic uprising of the late 90’s.
There is no more unhappiness.
Affirmative
We no longer say “Yes,” instead, we say “Affirmative.”
Yes, er…affirmative.
Unless we know the other robot really well.

I’m really not one to fight with my toys, and I pride myself on being the master of my technology world. However, I’m quite annoyed with my phone today. It humiliated me. That’s right - my phone did. Intentionally. With malice. You see I’ve been neglecting my cell phone, because in my new home I get totally crap coverage. I can hardly get a call, and when I do, I usually lose it. I’ve actually been thinking of installing a Z Boost wireless extender in order to make the cell situation tolerable. Anyway, lately I’ve just had my cell phone forwarding to the home phone, and I think my cell phone may be feeling neglected, because it played a trick on me today. My wife was having issues with our new cordless phone running out of juice, and the manual was unclear as to if I could transfer calls from one handset to another (they all run on the same line). Anyway, I wasn’t sure, and didn’t want her to get dropped from her conference call, so I borrowed a neighbor’s corded phone as a fallback. So after she got off the phone, I was testing the cordless by calling my cell phone, but since the reception is so bad, I had the phone in one spot by the window and was just using the hands-free bluetooth from the car in order to talk without moving the cell phone. But it wouldn’t pick up. So I clicked the green button on the bluetooth again…no sound. I’m cursing, and then I notice my phone is lit up. The bluetooth has initiated a call. It has called my neighbor back.  The one who had just lent me the phone. I just called her and (it would appear to her) just cursed at her for giving me a bad phone. Nice one, dude. I think back  - oh man, what did I say exactly while cursing at my bluetooth?

‘Why won’t this <<expletive>> work!?’

Wow, that was a classy move. So I ask you, would it have not taken some evil wizard to devise that perfect way for me to put my foot in my mouth? How did my phone manage to do that? I could not have thought of a better way to show my nice, new neighbor that I am a complete clown. Really.

My phone and I are no longer on speaking terms.

Today as I scrounged around the house looking for a plastic bag to use for trash (we don’t have a kitchen trash can yet - it’s on the list), I suddenly had a little moment. I pulled the brown bag from inside a plastic bag like they do in New York (forget ‘paper or plastic’ - you’re getting both), and I smiled at the receipt and take-out menu stapled to the paper bag. It was from Pizzabolla, a nice little pizza joint on the corner of 92nd and Amsterdam.  Then I saw the plastic bag was emblazoned with I [heart] NY. I was verklempt. For the first time since leaving 9 months ago, I had an acute moment of loss. I really do miss New York.

Now I know how Tom Petty felt when he wrote that song that goes ‘the waiting is the hardest part.’

Still waiting for our stuff to arrive from New York. It’s a long story, but basically our moving company, Ben Hur, decided to store our stuff in the Bronx rather than in the Los Angeles area. Apparently  they don’t care about things like our Bill of Lading that states the destination as ‘Storage, Los Angeles, CA.’ So, when I called the day after we closed on our home, they said it would be a week or so before our stuff shipped. Well, it was 2 weeks before they bothered to get it onto a truck, 22 days and counting later, we are still without our belongings. This wouldn’t be quite so annoying were this not the 9th month spent living from our suitcases. Needless to say, we are SOOO anxious for the stuff to arrive. Everything is in place at the house - washer/dryer hookups were installed, garage door fixed, front yard dug up to fix a water leak issue, deck repaired, plumbing and vent issues fixed, gas run to the outdoor grill, satellite & DSL in place, house cleaned, yard trimmed back and weeded (mostly). I’ve been very busy. Now, if only we could finally, finally, finally get our stuff and actually move into the first place we’ve ever owned, everything would be right in this world. Well, I mean that in the micro i’m-only-really-talking-about-my-world sense. And also that doesn’t count finding a new job - I still have to do that.

Please, oh please Ben Hur, call me today to say you are delivering tomorrow. I am ready for this moving saga to end.