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So now that I’ve got this cool new GMail account I’ve realized that I don’t get a lot of email. Makes me wish I kept in touch with people more, but I think I’ve burned a lot of bridges as I traveled through life… burned them or let them rot and collapse under age. I post on LiveJournal to tell the stories of my days and my life, but the personal connection isn’t there like it is in email. I talk to friends daily, the people I truly consider my close friends. I know some of us have had odds at times, but we’ve always mended our differences. There are others though that I have lost touch with, and no matter how hard I try to find them, they’re gone forever. Some I find, never to hear from them when I try to contact them. Some I find, just to find that the contact information I have is no longer valid. I have friends who still talk to and contact their friends from childhood. My childhood was quite secluded. I was a very shy child and thus never made a lot of friends. So, even though I went to school with pretty much the same people all through school, I never really had the same friend year after year. I think a lot of it had to do with where I lived. I didn’t really live in a neighborhood, there were no other kids anywhere near where I could walk to or ride my bike, so I was kind of isolated. The only friends I could make were the ones in my class, and since my classmates changed every year, it didn’t lend itself to making the same friends.

So now, here I am, in my early 30’s and I’m jealous of people who have childhood friends or chat with people other than those they work beside. I find myself lucky that the people I work with are actually my friends, but sometimes I feel the need to diversify. I’ve been guitly of being a hermit, too. Refusing to go out and do things with people when the opportunity arose, and as a result, have lost the chance of making good friends out of casual acquaintences.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not unhappy with my life. Sometimes I just wish there were more people to share it with, and that I still knew some of the people I’ve known in the past.

I’ve decided that my bike ride on Tuesdays and Thursdays is getting easier. That’s the first real sign that I’m actually doing something when I go to work out and ride. I’ve upped the weight on a lot of the Nautilus machines, but not substantially (except when I realized I was doing way too little on them the first week), but the ride home is much more of an indicator to me. The first few times I had to really push myself to get home, especially the ride up Bell (relatively steep, long incline). Now I can usually do it with just a little heavy breathing by the time I get to the top. When I start to get near the house, I used to coast as much as possible and nearly collapse against the garage door exhausted. Now I start finding newer, longer detours home so I can add an extra quarter or half mile. Even yesterday, when I got to one of my standard detour turns, I decided I just wanted to get home. But then when I came to one of the other detours, I took it and still added on another quarter mile.

When I got home, instead of collapsing on the floor, heaving and trying to drink some watered down powerade, I was industrious enough to go out and put up the new hammock. Yes, I said new hammock. The last one was eaten, we assume by squirrels. Why do we assume that? Because they hate us and eat everything we own.

I want to game. I haven’t played in a game in over a month and I’m starting to get the shakes. I ran my Spycraft game the other day, and while it was fun, and I loved running it (even if it was kind of chaotic and self-destructive at times), I haven’t had the chance to play anything since, shit, I don’t know when. I’m starting to need my fix again. Nick! Steve! Derek! Somebody! Help!

I haven’t been playing as much City of Heroes as I’d like either. I’ve noticed that it’s harder and harder to catch people on; well, except Tennessee Slim (et al). As a result of none of my higher level friends being on, I’ve been playing my lowbies a lot more lately. Kher Minu is turning out to be a really fun character. And I pulled Mick Mannock out of the closet and dusted him off so I could level him to 8 last night. Much fun was had. Crap, now I’ve talked about it enough that I’m wanting to play again. I wonder what Mick Mannock and Texas Ranger would work like together. Two blasters, dealing lots of damage, but with no blockers. Should be interesting.

Oh well, time to do some work.

Yay! My backpack website is back!

http://www.outdoorproducts.com/

Well, Classroom Orientation numero uno is done and I only have two more today.

Unfortunately one is at 6:00 tonight so I won’t be able to go to the rec center this afternoon. I feel like I need it though, my back is a bit achy and I need the movement of the torso rotation machine. I never realized how good the workouts would feel after I’d gotten into them though. I mean it’s still really easy to skip, I’m not like uber dedicated to that way of life yet, but I feel better for going and I feel a sense of accomplishment when I’m done. I find that I stand taller and straighter now than I did before, even though I can see any physical changes. I’ve been going for, I think, almost two months now, but I’ve lost track. I need to make a note as to when I started so I can keep track, but for the most part I’ve gone pretty regularly. there was the week that it was closed and I actually took 14 days off (mostly because of days I normally wouldn’t go bookending the days the rec center was closed). For the most part though, I’ve been pretty consistent. The same is true of my cycling, even though I’m really only riding about 4.5 miles, two days a week, it’s still refreshing and a positive experience…

oops, gotta go.

Last night I rode home with my new hydration backpack for the first time. I could actually fit all my clothes, shoes and crap I carry with me every day in it, and it holds 2 liters of water. It wasn’t uncomfortable at all (not that I expected it to be, but it was more weight than I’ve carried while riding before) and was actually quite comfortable. Like any new bag though, I have to learn where everything goes. The only thing that bugged me even a little, was that the water bag (or bladder as it’s called) sweats a little since I put ice in it. That made some of the things I put in the larger compartment a little damp, but not so much that it was bad by any means. I went online to see if there were any accessories for the pack, but the web site seems to be suspiciously missing. I hope I didn’t get a really good deal on it because the company has gone out of business, not that I wouldn’t be able to replace the bladder and tube with any other hydration system since it’s not exceptionally custom to the backpack itself. Now if the backpack has problems, well, then I’m kinda screwed.

Anyway, the rec center was HELLA crowded yesterday. I’m hoping it’s still just all the people who just realized they have this free membership, but will realize next week, they don’t really want to work out. I saw a bunch of people kind of messing around, trying to figure out what everything was. I’m really counting on those being the people that realize that it’s called “working out” for a reason. Amazingly enough, I still got in and out in a pretty short amount of time. The ride home was fantastic. It was about 89° yesterday so it wasn’t the least bit sweltering and the breeze was really cool the whole time. I got to the last turn on my ride and turned the wrong way. Probably added about .25 to .5 miles to the trip. Drove by a faculty member’s house to see if I coudl catch him out in the yard. Wanted to talk to him about some stuff, but he wasn’t around. I got to talk to him this morning though, about his computer and his trip last week.

Last night we watched some TV and I got on City of Heroes. Played around with Furious Badger a bit, hadn’t played him in a while. He’s getting much stronger, but still pretty vulerable if things turn down the wrong road. Ran around with Tennessee Slim for a bit and when we finished a couple of missions, he logged off and I switched over to Mick Mannock, my fire blaster. I need to get him up to 14th so he can upgrade his hover to fly. Hover is just too damn slow, and after playing Furious Badger with his Fitness and his Soooooooooooper Leap, all modes of transportation are impatiently slow.

I’m looking forward to playing some more tonight, but after this loooong day, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to pry myself off the couch.

LUAU!!!

For a Livejournal feed of my PhotoBlog, add pelmoblog3 to your friends list!

Well, I had a bunch of Gmail invites, but I gave them all away suckas!

well, it’s the first day of the new semester and so far things aren’t horrible. Only had to sit in the lab for about an hour this morning until a lab attendant walked up looking for work. The down side was that the lab was insufferably hot, as was the entire building. It’s finally gotten down to a tolerable 78 here in the office, but that’s because we’ve got a fan blocking off the entire doorway, blowing in the cool air from the hall. I still have some scary gaps in the schedule right now, but I’m sure, as it does every semester, things will work out. I will, however, have to hire at least two people. I”ve got three good resumes on my desk, but I should still post a sign in the lab. I think I’ll just post up my old sign that I used years ago, it’s still current, for the most part.

Hmmm, as I look at it, it could probably do with a couple little changes… I should still have the file.

Anyway, so I started reading the WoD book this weekend after finishing up Homeland – Book I of the Dark Elf Trilogy. Derek hit the nail on the head with his description. He said it was kind of a combination of Call of Cthulu and Hunter: The Reckoning, with a bit of X-Files thrown in for good measure. All good sources, all good moods, all good in one book.

So yeah.. uh, gotta do some work.

It’s the last day before the semester starts and of course this is when things inevitablly go wrong. We’ve had a really good track record the last three semesters running, so it’s only fate that brings this semester to our knees.

We re-image all the machines every semester. This is so that they are clean and uncontaminated, and so that they have the latest greatest software. This semester was going great on the rebuild until Wednesday. I got the image for the PCs all updated and functional and pushed it out to the systems. When it finished, 12 didn’t boot. We determined they were all from the same lot and must have a hardware conflict. For four hours, we tried to repair the problem, but finally resorted to installing Windows back onto one and updating with SP2 and windows update. Things are good with that one now. We pulled the image and pushed it out to the other 11 and of those, 4 didn’t boot. They are from the same batch, but have a different video card, so there’s a driver issue and we couldn’t even get into safe mode or anything to reinstall it. So I’m now reinstalling windows on those 4. Next semester I’m at least going to insist that we buy all matching video cards for our lab machines.

Anyway, so while we’re in the middle of all that, we have a second batch of lab computers that get a slightly different image that includes some special software, software that needs to be configured special after the re-imaging. We started to push out that image, to all 22 machines at once, and, of course, it stops half way through. We end up having to cancel the push and start it all over, only this time the machines won’t connect to the network in order to recieve the image. We try all kinds of things to get them to connect and then I run into Steve who comments that a system downstairs is not talking to the network. We run some other tests and it seems we’re not connecting at all. I try to call HelpDesk, who manages the campus networking (where we manage our own school’s networking) and the phone won’t even connect. WTF? So I call them on the cell and tell them we’re landlocked from campus.

Shortly after, connectivity seems to come back and we’re now back on track with our imaging. Nick and Steve are off eating right now and I’m typing this with crossed fingers hoping the cast will complete.

Oh, and to top it all off, I need to congratualte and berate Nick for getting a new job and leaving me right when I need him the most. He’s moving across campus and I’ll be without a lab tech right at the most critical week of the year. Oh well, congratulations you bastard.