Here is an awesome picture Marc took on my camera phone at the picture house the other night:
First off, why isn't there a Mister America pageant? Sure, I'd rather look at girls in bikinis than men, but I'm all about equal opportunities for the sexes.
Okay, so I moved in yesterday. I slept in my new apartment last night. I need more furniture. Going from a tiny dorm room to 709 square feet is like a move from a patio home to a...uhhh...larger patio home. You get the idea.
I've been spending the last two days getting stuff organized and all that. Really, it's not all that much, it just takes time. Especially because I take breaks here and there to check my vitals (e-mail, myspace, etc...).
Living in Mission Viejo so far has been like living in a small town. It's got 90 some thousand residents, but everything I need is literally within blocks. Ralph's supermarket is two. Blockbuster is four. I guess my bank is more like a mile and a half. Whoa. The best part is, my office is less than a ten minute drive. I don't even have to get on the freeway!! It's a good thing I'm going to be auditing all over the place not in the office a whole lot, though, or I could see myself not leaving Mission Viejo for weeks at a time. I don't even feel like I'm even in LA/OC because I don't have to use the freeway to go anywhere really. But hey, the nice thing is, San Diego is an hour to the south, Hollywood is 55 miles to the north, and Vegas is 4 hours to the west. Love that.
I'm going to be living without cable television for the first time in my life. Sure, I had about a 6 week stint back when I moved to Texas, before they equipped our rooms, but at least my rabbit ears worked. I tried the antenna last night and I got nothin. The only shows I'll really miss that can't be seen online is reality type stuff. I'll live. I'm hoping by the fall I can sign up for the poor-man's basic cable.
I start work on Monday. I'm a little nervous. I bought a 10-key calculator so I can practice and at least have that down when I start. Marc told me I should stop by the office tomorrow and let my boss know I'm moved and ready to start Monday and all that. I'll try and show up conveniently around lunch time...I'm still a poor college student at heart. I didn't tell y'all...our company's 15 year anniversary is this summer. Everyone is getting flown to Vegas on a Thursday and we're having a company dinner, being put up at the Bellagio for two nights and other tickles and grins. Yes!!
Okay, on to pictures of my apartment and stuff...
Here's some pictures from the last week...
Well, I officially have an address in Orange County, California. Well, kind of officially. I still have to sign the lease on Tuesday, but for all intents and purposes, it's mine. I passed the credit check and all that business. I'd move in sooner, but yeah, it's not ready yet.
The first place Krysti and I went to yesterday was not good. The bathtub had rusty stains around the faucet and the lighting was awful and depressing. No way. It sort of bummed me out and had me thinking the day was going to be a bust. I figured that all the apartments we'd look at would be similarly yuck -- because they were in the same price range.
The second place we went to was only $40 more but 400% better. We drove in and it was already apparent that it was a lot nicer. More what I was expecting. Spacious (not cramped), large palm trees (my favorite), Spanish architecutre (yes!) -- the typical California look. When we saw inside of the unit, it was nice also. Even though the place was built in 1987, I couldn't tell. It smelled new inside and was just overall a nice place...it should be more than it is, although it's already a lot compared to most other states. California doesn't require that fridges be provided to renters, so I'm having to rent that, too. Kinda sucky, but better than buying one right now.
The best part is that I have a wrap-around patio with a view of the hills all full of houses and a nice view of the mountains in the background. I am going to love that. I will post pictures next week or something. Also, there's a man-made lake just down the street than I intend on walking or rollerblading around after work. It's 3.2 miles around. And free. Gym membership be damned!
I would point y'all to the website of the apartment complex, but I don't need any stalkers. I'll just tell you it's in Mission Viejo, 3 miles from work, and 1.5 to Saddleback Church.
That's all for now. I can't believe I'm going to be living in California next week. Dreams can come true. Now, I'm just going to be broke for awhile while as I adjust to the sticker shock of everything here.
So here it is...short and un-boring. I forgot to adjust some of my voice levels...the music is kind of loud and then when my voice comes on, a little quiet. Adjust accordingly...
Whoa.
Krysti and I went to Cirque du Soleil's presentation of the Beatles "Love" last night at the Mirage here in Las Vegas.
Whoa.
I had no idea what to expect, really. I even avoided seeing the trailer, so nothing would be spoiled for me. Oh boy, was it worth it. I can't even begin to explain it. Just so cool.
Of course they built a whole auditorium just for this show, because it's already been there a year and will probably be there several more. It took the place of Sigfried and Roy's show. It's probably the closest I will come to seeing the Beatles in concert. They used HD images on huge white curtains hanging all over. There are over 6000 speakers in the room...three in each headrest, too!
It started kinda of weird, but that's to be expected. As soon as the first real song kicked in and things really started to happen, I just was overcome with something. It was so awesome. My eyes welled up. I thought, I better not be like this the whole time or it's going to be hard to see.
A big shout out goes to my brolaw Marc for the hookups. He got us these $125 tickets for nothin'! I'm really excited to live only 4-ish hours from Vegas. There are so many shows here. There's four more Cirque shows in town...I would like to see the rest of them in the next couple of years. I told Marc he has a standing invitation to hook me up with tickets. My weekends are free indefinitely. I'd even go see Barry Mannilow.
Jerry Seinfeld is in town later this summer, Jay Leno is in town this weekend. Fun stuff.
What I loove about the idea of living in SoCal is that Los Angeles and Las Vegas are close and anything that's everything happening in entertainment comes to these cities. I dig that I'm going to be living where things are...happenin'. Ooooh!
You have to see a Cirque show before you die. Put it on the list.
I decided that since I need to be watching the budget over the next few months and the fact that I'll be living in California - I need sandals, I'd get the illustrious Faded Glory brand (?) from Wal-Mart. Only $8.96!!
I got them home and was tightening the strap on the buckle, when the poke-through-the-hole thing on the buckle broke. Just popped right off. Faded Glory is just a blip on my fashion radar. I'm done.
My brolaw Marc scored Krysti and I tickets to The Beatles' Love - Cirque Du Soleil show for Friday night at the Mirage. Apparently, it's the hotest ticket in town. I've never been to a Cirque show before, and I hear this is THE one to see. There are some perks for having a brolaw work for a resort in Vegas. Oooh yeah!
I arrived with my Dad in Las Vegas on Monday afternoon. I'm going to be staying here with my sister and brother-in-law for a couple of weeks until I can shop for apartments and find something to move in to. Memorial Day weekend is the target move date.
My car somehow made it through the desert and the mountains of NW Arizona and SE Nevada. It may be her last journey like that; I don't think she needs to go through it again. Mable was a dream, though. She got me West. Just a few more hours to travel.
We've been having problems setting up the wi-fi in this place, and I can't hardwire into the cable modem because of MAC address issues (and no, this is not the MAC as in Macintosh, unrelated). I've been using the neighbor's wi-fi when it's available and when the 6% signal strength can be picked up and held without dropping.
I've been putting together furniture and things and hope to finally relax some today or tomorrow. I have a lot of reading I want to get done, as well as DVD watching. I need to also find out from my work what the dress code is...because I'll need to buy some new clothes.
I intend on spending some time editing my graduation footage into a 2-3 minute video in the next week or so, also. We'll see if that happens.
For now, I'm homeless.
On my list of things to do this week, my last week living in San Antonio, was to rotate my tires. I bought the bad boys last December. They took me to California and back lickety-split. I highly recommend Discount Tire Co./American Tire. They have inexpesive tires (Arazonian radials, anyone?) and free balance and rotations for the life of the tire. How exciting, right?
Anyways, I like to watch the tire guys work through the window, mainly because it displaces boredom. I never really understood how they balance tires, or even what it really meant. I had an idea in my mind. Well, seeing how they do it is nothing like I envisioned. They put the tire in this big incubator type thing, that spins it around and somehow decides which side needs more weight on it. And then they pound these metal weights on the rim. Who knew? Kind of interesting. While he was waiting to open up the balancer, the guy was twirling around his pounder tool (maybe it was a hammer) kind of like a drummer twirls his drumstick. Rock star? Not quite. Cool? Very.
These guys look like they have a good time, too. If I was in for a life of off-white collar work, I might think of that place. I wouldn't fit in, no, but they are always busy and I'm sure their work lives go by fast. What more can you ask for? Well, probably a lot, but a quick 9-5 day is a start.
On to another topic: Tom Green.
Most of you associate him with his show on MTV from way back when. If you ask someone on the street to describe Tom Green in one word, it would be "obnoxious" or possibly "annoying." I'd even go as far as to say "annoyingly obnoxious" or "obnoxiously annoying." Anyways...since he's been off of MTV and gotten over his brief marriage to Drew Barrymore (not bad for a dork from Canada), he's been kind of quiet.
I rediscovered him during the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy in 2006. He was doing segments for the Tonight Show (yes, I know, I am one of the rare twentysomethings that thinks Jay Leno is funny). It was weird to see Tom Green not being the wild and crazy Tom Green. His humor was toned down quite a bit. Maybe just not as outrageous..or...disgusting. I think he's wonderful at just being a normal guy and interacting with locals.
Now he's doing his own show again. Live, on the internet, out of his living room. It's actually pretty groundbreaking; he's a pioneer of sorts. I haven't been able to really watch it much, because my internets at school are stinkier than the smell of breakfast. That's going to change soon, though. Recently, he's been traveling across Canada in an old Lincoln Continental, talking to locals and just doing his thing. He's been filming during the day and editing/uploading video at night. I think he got that idea from my road blogs, but I'm not going to spend months in litigation with that.
I'm really enjoying the more grown-up Tom Green. He said he wants to do some of his old antics while on this trip, just to get it out of his system. Like buying 12 cheese pizzas, lay them all out on the sidewalk and roll around in them saying "my bum is on the pizza" while people walk by with confused looks on their faces. I am all for that, just as long as it's not his main schtick.
It's kind of inspiring for me, too. I really enjoy taking my video camera on the road and being able to edit the video in my hotel room or whatever. I know I haven't done it much at all, except for my first "Get a Job" video blog, but I have ambitions to do so. It'd probably be easier if I had a video guy with me, and I could be on camera, but I gotta work with what I've got. I'm hoping I become less timid with my video capturing.
I had a guy scold me on Hollywood Blvd last August because he was performing an impromptu rap on the sidewalk and said I could only record if I paid him. This, of course, is not true. He has no legal right to tell me that. But I was a wuss and was afraid he would send his posse after me...who were all probably wearing those big "Cat and the Hat" type hats you buy at Six Flags, just like the one he was wearing.
TomGreen.com
One of my roommates cooked breakfast this morning. Like bacon and eggs or something. I hate the smell of breakfast. It wouldn't go away all day. And now, at midnight, he's making it again.
I move out on Friday.
I move out in a week. It's great. It's hard for me to sit and concentrate when I'm watching teevee, though. I'm constantly thinking what I can put in the 3-4 boxes I have left, to maximize their use. I'm NOT going to buy boxes. I think it will work out.
I'm going to trash a lot of my kitchen stuff -
a) because it's nasty and,
b) to conserve space.
I tried to pay my rent on Tuesday, but they told me I didn't owe anything for this month!! Yay! That will pay for my gas for the move!!
Until I had to get Mable's compressor fixed yesterday...for $870. It's okay though, it's like she's got a new set of lungs.
Today = more studying. My first final is tomorrow night at 5. Then one Monday, Thursday and Friday. I graduate Saturday at 1. I can almost taste it.
My Q-tips are almost gone (If you've been reading my blog for over a year, you know what I'm talking about)!!!
Yeah, it's true. This is going to be the most fascinating thing you ever read. I picked up some cheap-o beans from the supermarket the other day -- but wait, aren't all beans cheap? Yes. So nevermind that.
I was curious where they were made because who's heard of the brand Sun Vista before? I'm an avid bean buyer, and I haven't. Turns out, they were manufacuted by Faribault Foods in good 'ole Faribault, Minnesota...the town I happened to be born in and lived in until I was 11. SO COOL.
I only have two days of class left. Tomorrow and Tuesday, May 1st. Then it's finals time. My first one is Saturday the 5th at 5pm. Yes, my school is so ginormiousish that they have to hold finals on Saturday.
I've narrowed apartment choices in OC down to like a dozen or so. Hopefully, I can see my first choices on day one, and won't have to spend another day looking at them when I go out to tour them the end of May.
My sister Krysti is moving to the Vegas May 5th. This makes me happy. She will only be 4.5 hours from my front door. It will be nice to have family close to share the non-major holidays with.
My family is coming here for my graduation TWO WEEKS from tomorrow! This is really happening, apparently. Graduating college.
All you loyal readers are in for a bit of excitement the next several months. That is, if you get excited over my blogs. Graduating, moving, starting a new job, making new friends, adjusting to my new life as a boy in Orange County...I'm sure you can't hardly wait! I know I can't.
There is a downer to all of this, though. I'm leaving behind two of the best friends I've ever had. Although Tony already moved to Waco last January, at least he's been close enough to see if we wanted to (which we have once!). He was my first real friend here in town. I met him via his spouse Lindsay (they were engaged at the time) through our college ministry. We ended up hitting it off somehow and spent many times playing racquetball (I never beat him), smoking cigars, and watching "The O.C." and Spurs games. I'm going to miss him.
The second feller is Chris. I met him very randomly. He and his wife Erica were at our Life Group one night as part of an interview process to work with the college ministry. Well, that didn't work out, but we did. After that chance encounter, I didn't see him for several months. I knew that he worked at the Target by my chiropractor tho, so when I was over there once, I stopped in to pick up some Kraft Mayo®, and I ran into him. We exchanged numbers. Then we didn't talk for another month. Then we met up at Starbucks one night (the night of my being dumped, by the way). Slowly we started hanging our more and more, and now, after a year and a half, it's 2-3 sometimes 4-5 times a week.
In the past, you'd have to pull my teeth to get my to want to go out more than a couple times a week. Well, now I'd almost rather hang out with Chris than by myself, which is kind of weird for me. I'm used to being a homebody. I think it's because we enjoy doing the same things. I don't know why I didn't realize this before, but it helps to find friends that like to do the things that I like to do. Who knew?
Well, he's moving to Chicago on Monday, so I don't feel like I'm leaving him behind. We're both going our separate ways. I've never had a friend like that guy before.
With Tony and Chris both, they are the kind of friends that I'm certain I'll be buddies with as I grow old and my hair turns from white to whiter.
I'll probably reflect on my time here in San Antone in future blogs, but for now, I have to say...Although this wasn't exactly part of my plan to live here, it's worked out better than I could have imagined, and I would only trade it for a date with Rachel Bilson wouldn't trade it for anything.
So Sunday was a day of birthdays. My BFF Chris had his. My Grandpa Hellickson had his. And my nephew Titus had his as well. I wasn't there, but here are pictures from Grandpa and Titus' birthday bash:
I thought my visit to the InkSell.com store would be just another visit to the ink store. The girl working there seemed to want to sell me more than ink. After she looked up my customer profile, she asked where my area code is from...and well that got the ball rolling. She was asking me all sorts of questions. Good thing people aren't busting down the doors at 1pm on a Monday to buy ink.
Too bad I'm moving, I just might have asked her out to coffee. That's right, I just might've.
I sort of feel like the girl at the dry cleaners is smitten with me, too. Everytime I go in there, which has been a lot this semester, she seems to fumble with things and be all smiley.
Or it may just be that I have stuff hanging out of my nose.
My Blockbuster online queue is up to around 195 movies and TV shows. It's daunting. It could be far more. I also have an Excel spreadsheet listing the mass of TV-on-DVD sets I intend on watching someday. When something new comes out, I add it to the Blockbuster queue or the Excel spreadsheet. The problem is, then it's at the bottom. It may take years to get to. That's not fair!
I've decided to use a random number generator to put me at ease. That way, everything has a fair chance of being selected. It's also unpredictable, which I kind of like in this case.
You might think I consume too much media if I have to go to these lengths. I'm not sure. Maybe so, but it's what I like to do with my free time.
I also like to have my 15,000 songs(it's taken me 10 years to reach this milestone) in iTunes on party shuffle. So sue me. In the car or walking to class, I usually only listen to albums. I keep it real sometimes.
In figuring out what to keep and throw away for the big move coming up, I am faced with a dilemma. I have 4-5 big Case Logic CD binders all filled up. Thing is, I haven't pulled them out since sometime in the winter of 2006. All of my music is on my hard drive. All of it is backed up on DVDs. What do I need to keep the CDs around for? I don't. But I think it would be a huge waste to chuck 'em. I suppose I will hang on to them to show the kids one day when they ask what a CD is.
I cleaned our microwave a couple of weeks ago and apparently got some 409 on the circuit board. Well, it wouldn't work for about 12 hours until it dried out. Then it was fine. Well, now it's not working again. I took it upon myself to go to Wal-Mart and get the cheapest microwave ever made. I've never bought one before, so I figured they'd be $75 or something. No! It was $43.88!! It could have been less because the cashier didn't bother coming around to my cart to scan it, she instead asked me how much it was. Me, being an ethical accountant (we didn't used to have to qualify that, by the way) told her $43.88. She had to type a description along with her price input. I don't normally like to use one person to make an assumption about the whole, but she typed in "macrowave."
On the way out, I noticed an advertisement for a new line of Diet Coke. I think it was called Diet Coke Life. And folks, soda drinkers now have an excuse to drink soda to their health. You see, this new Diet Coke has vitamins and minerals in it. Just what we need. I gotta hand it to Coca-Cola though, genius. Absolutely genius.
Well thank you! I officially accepted a job offer yesterday. I will be working as an auditor at an accounting firm in Lake Forest, California. For those of you not familiar with the area, Lake Forest is a planned community in south central Orange County, just south of Los Angeles. It was created in 1991. Weird, I am older than a city. And sad, that was the last time the Twins won a World Series. Lake Forest is ranked as one of the safest cities for its size (58,000) in the country. This means I don't have to lock my car or my apartment, right?
I am also officially excited. My dream of living in California has been years in the making, and it's finally going to happen!! I'm going to have grown up job!
I have six weeks until I graduate and nine or so until I start my job. Yessah!
Associated Press
April 03, 2007 2:53 PM EDT
LONDON - Keith Richards has acknowledged consuming a raft of illegal substances in his time, but this may top them all.
In comments published Tuesday, the 63-year-old Rolling Stones guitarist said he had snorted his father's ashes mixed with cocaine.
"The strangest thing I've tried to snort? My father. I snorted my father," Richards was quoted as saying by British music magazine NME.
"He was cremated and I couldn't resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow. My dad wouldn't have cared," he said. "... It went down pretty well, and I'm still alive."
Here is an awesome picture Marc took on my camera phone at the picture house the other night:
First off, why isn't there a Mister America pageant? Sure, I'd rather look at girls in bikinis than men, but I'm all about equal opportunities for the sexes.
Okay, so I moved in yesterday. I slept in my new apartment last night. I need more furniture. Going from a tiny dorm room to 709 square feet is like a move from a patio home to a...uhhh...larger patio home. You get the idea.
I've been spending the last two days getting stuff organized and all that. Really, it's not all that much, it just takes time. Especially because I take breaks here and there to check my vitals (e-mail, myspace, etc...).
Living in Mission Viejo so far has been like living in a small town. It's got 90 some thousand residents, but everything I need is literally within blocks. Ralph's supermarket is two. Blockbuster is four. I guess my bank is more like a mile and a half. Whoa. The best part is, my office is less than a ten minute drive. I don't even have to get on the freeway!! It's a good thing I'm going to be auditing all over the place not in the office a whole lot, though, or I could see myself not leaving Mission Viejo for weeks at a time. I don't even feel like I'm even in LA/OC because I don't have to use the freeway to go anywhere really. But hey, the nice thing is, San Diego is an hour to the south, Hollywood is 55 miles to the north, and Vegas is 4 hours to the west. Love that.
I'm going to be living without cable television for the first time in my life. Sure, I had about a 6 week stint back when I moved to Texas, before they equipped our rooms, but at least my rabbit ears worked. I tried the antenna last night and I got nothin. The only shows I'll really miss that can't be seen online is reality type stuff. I'll live. I'm hoping by the fall I can sign up for the poor-man's basic cable.
I start work on Monday. I'm a little nervous. I bought a 10-key calculator so I can practice and at least have that down when I start. Marc told me I should stop by the office tomorrow and let my boss know I'm moved and ready to start Monday and all that. I'll try and show up conveniently around lunch time...I'm still a poor college student at heart. I didn't tell y'all...our company's 15 year anniversary is this summer. Everyone is getting flown to Vegas on a Thursday and we're having a company dinner, being put up at the Bellagio for two nights and other tickles and grins. Yes!!
Okay, on to pictures of my apartment and stuff...
Here's some pictures from the last week...
Well, I officially have an address in Orange County, California. Well, kind of officially. I still have to sign the lease on Tuesday, but for all intents and purposes, it's mine. I passed the credit check and all that business. I'd move in sooner, but yeah, it's not ready yet.
The first place Krysti and I went to yesterday was not good. The bathtub had rusty stains around the faucet and the lighting was awful and depressing. No way. It sort of bummed me out and had me thinking the day was going to be a bust. I figured that all the apartments we'd look at would be similarly yuck -- because they were in the same price range.
The second place we went to was only $40 more but 400% better. We drove in and it was already apparent that it was a lot nicer. More what I was expecting. Spacious (not cramped), large palm trees (my favorite), Spanish architecutre (yes!) -- the typical California look. When we saw inside of the unit, it was nice also. Even though the place was built in 1987, I couldn't tell. It smelled new inside and was just overall a nice place...it should be more than it is, although it's already a lot compared to most other states. California doesn't require that fridges be provided to renters, so I'm having to rent that, too. Kinda sucky, but better than buying one right now.
The best part is that I have a wrap-around patio with a view of the hills all full of houses and a nice view of the mountains in the background. I am going to love that. I will post pictures next week or something. Also, there's a man-made lake just down the street than I intend on walking or rollerblading around after work. It's 3.2 miles around. And free. Gym membership be damned!
I would point y'all to the website of the apartment complex, but I don't need any stalkers. I'll just tell you it's in Mission Viejo, 3 miles from work, and 1.5 to Saddleback Church.
That's all for now. I can't believe I'm going to be living in California next week. Dreams can come true. Now, I'm just going to be broke for awhile while as I adjust to the sticker shock of everything here.
So here it is...short and un-boring. I forgot to adjust some of my voice levels...the music is kind of loud and then when my voice comes on, a little quiet. Adjust accordingly...
Whoa.
Krysti and I went to Cirque du Soleil's presentation of the Beatles "Love" last night at the Mirage here in Las Vegas.
Whoa.
I had no idea what to expect, really. I even avoided seeing the trailer, so nothing would be spoiled for me. Oh boy, was it worth it. I can't even begin to explain it. Just so cool.
Of course they built a whole auditorium just for this show, because it's already been there a year and will probably be there several more. It took the place of Sigfried and Roy's show. It's probably the closest I will come to seeing the Beatles in concert. They used HD images on huge white curtains hanging all over. There are over 6000 speakers in the room...three in each headrest, too!
It started kinda of weird, but that's to be expected. As soon as the first real song kicked in and things really started to happen, I just was overcome with something. It was so awesome. My eyes welled up. I thought, I better not be like this the whole time or it's going to be hard to see.
A big shout out goes to my brolaw Marc for the hookups. He got us these $125 tickets for nothin'! I'm really excited to live only 4-ish hours from Vegas. There are so many shows here. There's four more Cirque shows in town...I would like to see the rest of them in the next couple of years. I told Marc he has a standing invitation to hook me up with tickets. My weekends are free indefinitely. I'd even go see Barry Mannilow.
Jerry Seinfeld is in town later this summer, Jay Leno is in town this weekend. Fun stuff.
What I loove about the idea of living in SoCal is that Los Angeles and Las Vegas are close and anything that's everything happening in entertainment comes to these cities. I dig that I'm going to be living where things are...happenin'. Ooooh!
You have to see a Cirque show before you die. Put it on the list.
I decided that since I need to be watching the budget over the next few months and the fact that I'll be living in California - I need sandals, I'd get the illustrious Faded Glory brand (?) from Wal-Mart. Only $8.96!!
I got them home and was tightening the strap on the buckle, when the poke-through-the-hole thing on the buckle broke. Just popped right off. Faded Glory is just a blip on my fashion radar. I'm done.
My brolaw Marc scored Krysti and I tickets to The Beatles' Love - Cirque Du Soleil show for Friday night at the Mirage. Apparently, it's the hotest ticket in town. I've never been to a Cirque show before, and I hear this is THE one to see. There are some perks for having a brolaw work for a resort in Vegas. Oooh yeah!
I arrived with my Dad in Las Vegas on Monday afternoon. I'm going to be staying here with my sister and brother-in-law for a couple of weeks until I can shop for apartments and find something to move in to. Memorial Day weekend is the target move date.
My car somehow made it through the desert and the mountains of NW Arizona and SE Nevada. It may be her last journey like that; I don't think she needs to go through it again. Mable was a dream, though. She got me West. Just a few more hours to travel.
We've been having problems setting up the wi-fi in this place, and I can't hardwire into the cable modem because of MAC address issues (and no, this is not the MAC as in Macintosh, unrelated). I've been using the neighbor's wi-fi when it's available and when the 6% signal strength can be picked up and held without dropping.
I've been putting together furniture and things and hope to finally relax some today or tomorrow. I have a lot of reading I want to get done, as well as DVD watching. I need to also find out from my work what the dress code is...because I'll need to buy some new clothes.
I intend on spending some time editing my graduation footage into a 2-3 minute video in the next week or so, also. We'll see if that happens.
For now, I'm homeless.
On my list of things to do this week, my last week living in San Antonio, was to rotate my tires. I bought the bad boys last December. They took me to California and back lickety-split. I highly recommend Discount Tire Co./American Tire. They have inexpesive tires (Arazonian radials, anyone?) and free balance and rotations for the life of the tire. How exciting, right?
Anyways, I like to watch the tire guys work through the window, mainly because it displaces boredom. I never really understood how they balance tires, or even what it really meant. I had an idea in my mind. Well, seeing how they do it is nothing like I envisioned. They put the tire in this big incubator type thing, that spins it around and somehow decides which side needs more weight on it. And then they pound these metal weights on the rim. Who knew? Kind of interesting. While he was waiting to open up the balancer, the guy was twirling around his pounder tool (maybe it was a hammer) kind of like a drummer twirls his drumstick. Rock star? Not quite. Cool? Very.
These guys look like they have a good time, too. If I was in for a life of off-white collar work, I might think of that place. I wouldn't fit in, no, but they are always busy and I'm sure their work lives go by fast. What more can you ask for? Well, probably a lot, but a quick 9-5 day is a start.
On to another topic: Tom Green.
Most of you associate him with his show on MTV from way back when. If you ask someone on the street to describe Tom Green in one word, it would be "obnoxious" or possibly "annoying." I'd even go as far as to say "annoyingly obnoxious" or "obnoxiously annoying." Anyways...since he's been off of MTV and gotten over his brief marriage to Drew Barrymore (not bad for a dork from Canada), he's been kind of quiet.
I rediscovered him during the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy in 2006. He was doing segments for the Tonight Show (yes, I know, I am one of the rare twentysomethings that thinks Jay Leno is funny). It was weird to see Tom Green not being the wild and crazy Tom Green. His humor was toned down quite a bit. Maybe just not as outrageous..or...disgusting. I think he's wonderful at just being a normal guy and interacting with locals.
Now he's doing his own show again. Live, on the internet, out of his living room. It's actually pretty groundbreaking; he's a pioneer of sorts. I haven't been able to really watch it much, because my internets at school are stinkier than the smell of breakfast. That's going to change soon, though. Recently, he's been traveling across Canada in an old Lincoln Continental, talking to locals and just doing his thing. He's been filming during the day and editing/uploading video at night. I think he got that idea from my road blogs, but I'm not going to spend months in litigation with that.
I'm really enjoying the more grown-up Tom Green. He said he wants to do some of his old antics while on this trip, just to get it out of his system. Like buying 12 cheese pizzas, lay them all out on the sidewalk and roll around in them saying "my bum is on the pizza" while people walk by with confused looks on their faces. I am all for that, just as long as it's not his main schtick.
It's kind of inspiring for me, too. I really enjoy taking my video camera on the road and being able to edit the video in my hotel room or whatever. I know I haven't done it much at all, except for my first "Get a Job" video blog, but I have ambitions to do so. It'd probably be easier if I had a video guy with me, and I could be on camera, but I gotta work with what I've got. I'm hoping I become less timid with my video capturing.
I had a guy scold me on Hollywood Blvd last August because he was performing an impromptu rap on the sidewalk and said I could only record if I paid him. This, of course, is not true. He has no legal right to tell me that. But I was a wuss and was afraid he would send his posse after me...who were all probably wearing those big "Cat and the Hat" type hats you buy at Six Flags, just like the one he was wearing.
TomGreen.com
One of my roommates cooked breakfast this morning. Like bacon and eggs or something. I hate the smell of breakfast. It wouldn't go away all day. And now, at midnight, he's making it again.
I move out on Friday.
I move out in a week. It's great. It's hard for me to sit and concentrate when I'm watching teevee, though. I'm constantly thinking what I can put in the 3-4 boxes I have left, to maximize their use. I'm NOT going to buy boxes. I think it will work out.
I'm going to trash a lot of my kitchen stuff -
a) because it's nasty and,
b) to conserve space.
I tried to pay my rent on Tuesday, but they told me I didn't owe anything for this month!! Yay! That will pay for my gas for the move!!
Until I had to get Mable's compressor fixed yesterday...for $870. It's okay though, it's like she's got a new set of lungs.
Today = more studying. My first final is tomorrow night at 5. Then one Monday, Thursday and Friday. I graduate Saturday at 1. I can almost taste it.
My Q-tips are almost gone (If you've been reading my blog for over a year, you know what I'm talking about)!!!
Yeah, it's true. This is going to be the most fascinating thing you ever read. I picked up some cheap-o beans from the supermarket the other day -- but wait, aren't all beans cheap? Yes. So nevermind that.
I was curious where they were made because who's heard of the brand Sun Vista before? I'm an avid bean buyer, and I haven't. Turns out, they were manufacuted by Faribault Foods in good 'ole Faribault, Minnesota...the town I happened to be born in and lived in until I was 11. SO COOL.
I only have two days of class left. Tomorrow and Tuesday, May 1st. Then it's finals time. My first one is Saturday the 5th at 5pm. Yes, my school is so ginormiousish that they have to hold finals on Saturday.
I've narrowed apartment choices in OC down to like a dozen or so. Hopefully, I can see my first choices on day one, and won't have to spend another day looking at them when I go out to tour them the end of May.
My sister Krysti is moving to the Vegas May 5th. This makes me happy. She will only be 4.5 hours from my front door. It will be nice to have family close to share the non-major holidays with.
My family is coming here for my graduation TWO WEEKS from tomorrow! This is really happening, apparently. Graduating college.
All you loyal readers are in for a bit of excitement the next several months. That is, if you get excited over my blogs. Graduating, moving, starting a new job, making new friends, adjusting to my new life as a boy in Orange County...I'm sure you can't hardly wait! I know I can't.
There is a downer to all of this, though. I'm leaving behind two of the best friends I've ever had. Although Tony already moved to Waco last January, at least he's been close enough to see if we wanted to (which we have once!). He was my first real friend here in town. I met him via his spouse Lindsay (they were engaged at the time) through our college ministry. We ended up hitting it off somehow and spent many times playing racquetball (I never beat him), smoking cigars, and watching "The O.C." and Spurs games. I'm going to miss him.
The second feller is Chris. I met him very randomly. He and his wife Erica were at our Life Group one night as part of an interview process to work with the college ministry. Well, that didn't work out, but we did. After that chance encounter, I didn't see him for several months. I knew that he worked at the Target by my chiropractor tho, so when I was over there once, I stopped in to pick up some Kraft Mayo®, and I ran into him. We exchanged numbers. Then we didn't talk for another month. Then we met up at Starbucks one night (the night of my being dumped, by the way). Slowly we started hanging our more and more, and now, after a year and a half, it's 2-3 sometimes 4-5 times a week.
In the past, you'd have to pull my teeth to get my to want to go out more than a couple times a week. Well, now I'd almost rather hang out with Chris than by myself, which is kind of weird for me. I'm used to being a homebody. I think it's because we enjoy doing the same things. I don't know why I didn't realize this before, but it helps to find friends that like to do the things that I like to do. Who knew?
Well, he's moving to Chicago on Monday, so I don't feel like I'm leaving him behind. We're both going our separate ways. I've never had a friend like that guy before.
With Tony and Chris both, they are the kind of friends that I'm certain I'll be buddies with as I grow old and my hair turns from white to whiter.
I'll probably reflect on my time here in San Antone in future blogs, but for now, I have to say...Although this wasn't exactly part of my plan to live here, it's worked out better than I could have imagined, and I would only trade it for a date with Rachel Bilson wouldn't trade it for anything.
So Sunday was a day of birthdays. My BFF Chris had his. My Grandpa Hellickson had his. And my nephew Titus had his as well. I wasn't there, but here are pictures from Grandpa and Titus' birthday bash:
I thought my visit to the InkSell.com store would be just another visit to the ink store. The girl working there seemed to want to sell me more than ink. After she looked up my customer profile, she asked where my area code is from...and well that got the ball rolling. She was asking me all sorts of questions. Good thing people aren't busting down the doors at 1pm on a Monday to buy ink.
Too bad I'm moving, I just might have asked her out to coffee. That's right, I just might've.
I sort of feel like the girl at the dry cleaners is smitten with me, too. Everytime I go in there, which has been a lot this semester, she seems to fumble with things and be all smiley.
Or it may just be that I have stuff hanging out of my nose.
My Blockbuster online queue is up to around 195 movies and TV shows. It's daunting. It could be far more. I also have an Excel spreadsheet listing the mass of TV-on-DVD sets I intend on watching someday. When something new comes out, I add it to the Blockbuster queue or the Excel spreadsheet. The problem is, then it's at the bottom. It may take years to get to. That's not fair!
I've decided to use a random number generator to put me at ease. That way, everything has a fair chance of being selected. It's also unpredictable, which I kind of like in this case.
You might think I consume too much media if I have to go to these lengths. I'm not sure. Maybe so, but it's what I like to do with my free time.
I also like to have my 15,000 songs(it's taken me 10 years to reach this milestone) in iTunes on party shuffle. So sue me. In the car or walking to class, I usually only listen to albums. I keep it real sometimes.
In figuring out what to keep and throw away for the big move coming up, I am faced with a dilemma. I have 4-5 big Case Logic CD binders all filled up. Thing is, I haven't pulled them out since sometime in the winter of 2006. All of my music is on my hard drive. All of it is backed up on DVDs. What do I need to keep the CDs around for? I don't. But I think it would be a huge waste to chuck 'em. I suppose I will hang on to them to show the kids one day when they ask what a CD is.
I cleaned our microwave a couple of weeks ago and apparently got some 409 on the circuit board. Well, it wouldn't work for about 12 hours until it dried out. Then it was fine. Well, now it's not working again. I took it upon myself to go to Wal-Mart and get the cheapest microwave ever made. I've never bought one before, so I figured they'd be $75 or something. No! It was $43.88!! It could have been less because the cashier didn't bother coming around to my cart to scan it, she instead asked me how much it was. Me, being an ethical accountant (we didn't used to have to qualify that, by the way) told her $43.88. She had to type a description along with her price input. I don't normally like to use one person to make an assumption about the whole, but she typed in "macrowave."
On the way out, I noticed an advertisement for a new line of Diet Coke. I think it was called Diet Coke Life. And folks, soda drinkers now have an excuse to drink soda to their health. You see, this new Diet Coke has vitamins and minerals in it. Just what we need. I gotta hand it to Coca-Cola though, genius. Absolutely genius.
Well thank you! I officially accepted a job offer yesterday. I will be working as an auditor at an accounting firm in Lake Forest, California. For those of you not familiar with the area, Lake Forest is a planned community in south central Orange County, just south of Los Angeles. It was created in 1991. Weird, I am older than a city. And sad, that was the last time the Twins won a World Series. Lake Forest is ranked as one of the safest cities for its size (58,000) in the country. This means I don't have to lock my car or my apartment, right?
I am also officially excited. My dream of living in California has been years in the making, and it's finally going to happen!! I'm going to have grown up job!
I have six weeks until I graduate and nine or so until I start my job. Yessah!
Associated Press
April 03, 2007 2:53 PM EDT
LONDON - Keith Richards has acknowledged consuming a raft of illegal substances in his time, but this may top them all.
In comments published Tuesday, the 63-year-old Rolling Stones guitarist said he had snorted his father's ashes mixed with cocaine.
"The strangest thing I've tried to snort? My father. I snorted my father," Richards was quoted as saying by British music magazine NME.
"He was cremated and I couldn't resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow. My dad wouldn't have cared," he said. "... It went down pretty well, and I'm still alive."
