Yay!

Ok, I don't have my camera with me, but I am excited to post. I just got a phone call, finally, from my doctor's office, about the results of a routine STD test I took on Monday. I had to worry, even though I knew I had no reason to. I had had protected sex twice since the last check in December. My stoopid brain imagines all the damn worse case scenarios, though. Grumble, grumble, stoopid brain. Anyway, yay! Now, I can get back to thinking about life things.

Listening to: the faint country music they have playing over here at the office/communtiy center place.

That was one of the bestest movies I ever sawed

I had heard from a few people, including my mom, that Gran Torino was just an eh movie. Holy crap, it's been a while since I've laughed so hard at a movie. It was also an intriguing look at social issues, such as neighborhood degradation, the relation between crime and poverty and social acceptance, the ability to adapt and overcome, the life of a long-term significant other after the other has died and how some people in this world make death necessary, whether you like it or not, whether you hold hands across the world or not, well try to or, more likely, not.

Today's collection is really just phenomenal sky pictures, mostly, I think, with the exception of the last one, which is setting up the brain sucker over here at Shalane's before doing laundry. I came on over here to go ahead and do laundry because my usual laundry day is tomorrow, when I would be picking up the kids. We have switched back to the school routine, which is me getting the kids on the weekend. Since, Shalane and the kids are over at her girlfriend's, it's the perfect opportunity for me to do it to it.

The sky pictures started with my post-library adventure yesterday. I went to an Acura dealership to see if they had any of my dream car. Then, I went to the mall to purchase some undergarments. I have been relying on my spares, boxers, prior to laundry days too often. I hate boxers. They are too hot and not restrictive enough.

There isn't much of a clear transition between yesterday's awesome frickin sky and today's. This morning it was quite impressive as I headed on over here. Ok, I think I am brain suckered out. I believe I will go do what I do best, get horizontal for a nap on the couch while I wait for the dryer buzzer.

Listening to: #1 Crush, by Garbage.

I love this new leash deisgn

Once again, mostly the awesome sky. The sky pictures today, were taken on my trip here to the libaree. From here I plan to go to the mall, which I may picturize. Anyway, the trip here was noteworthy, yet prolly mundane to most. I went past Munn park downtown and through downtown, which I love.

The real significant thing in today's life-tracking entry, is the first picture, a new leash design. I am really diggin this new design. It's much easier than the ones I made before and I like the rope better anyway. I plan to sell them for just over my cost and donate 100% of the profits to the Polk county Animal Control, or something like that. My instinct, would be to just give it to the SPCA. However, I think the SPCA here, in my opinion, of course, is wasteful. They just built a new building that is as big or bigger than the old one. If this building was to accomodate more animals, at least some, I would be more understaning, but, no, it's just for the staff and training rooms, from what I see. Whatever it is, it's not for the animals, which already fill the meager kennels. I volunteered at The Virginia Beach SPCA and I loved it. They had more space for the animals than the people, as it should be. They had room for prolly twice the dogs, same cats, rabbits, and any other wildlife that someone would bring in, like the baby bird and nest that fell out of some lady's tree.

I think I will continue my journey now. I have had my fill of the brain sucker right now.

Listening to: Dragula, by Rob Zombie.

I got my car back, yay!

I am sitting over here at Shalane's, hangin out with the kids after bringing them home. I am reading about what may be the answer to my life purpose that I have been seeking. I uploaded the usual gob of pictures of life-tracking and the sky. I am loving this Windows Movie Maker. It has made uploading way more pictures to my blog hyah easier and much quicker than much less were before.

First, something I thought of this morning while listening to the 'soft rock, listen-while-you-work' station, which I rarely do because I hate the radio and have an ipod thankfully. One more thing I am very thankful for, very, similar to this metabolism that allows me to eat whatever and not work-out yet remain not only slim but tone, is the fact that there is apparently some inherent thing in humans that transcends environmental factors. What the heck am I talking about? This, I am thankful that, despite the best efforts of my mom and the 80's, I am not a metrosexual. I am close and had to claw my way out of the pit. I love to decorate, design, sew, shop, dress nicely, be clean, read, listen to people and consider other people in my actions, but, BUT, I also like to wrench on greasy things, get dirty, sweat, sleep wherever, fix things and feel the roughness of hemp rope. So, anyway, I am just thankful again. I have thought about it several times, but, like the sky, it is worthy of constant reverence. I am thankful for my spine, the sky, food, the ability to fix and better things, music, creativity, ability to see, ability to write, ability to drive, an awesome car to drive, the best girlfriend ever who licks my face anytime...

As this pictorial begins, the sky is showcased, once again. The sky then surrenders the spotlight for Neriah's Open House pictures. At first, I was annoyed that he was being moved from his school, which is about a mile away across the street to a few miles the other way to some new school. After seeing the school, I was pleasantly surprised. It is a brand new school, this will be its first year, that they built to eliminate the need for the trailer classes they just removed from their campus. It is very nice and really a hair further than his old school. It's still in this nice area so I feel confident it will be a good school. Hopefully, it will rival the Fishhawk schools, which are among the best in Florida. After we went to his open house, we went on down to Rhianna's new school. Her's is new because she's going to the next level. She is going to be a high school kid. Woot! Yeah, be excited or die of fear. ;-p This night was a New Student Indoc. It just offered the lowdown for all the freshmen and others moving into the area. Her Open House would be the next night.

From there, we went on down to the beach bum paradise in Sarasota to spend the night with my sister and retrieve her for our trip down to get my car in the morning, leaving her's with her. I really dug borrowing her car for a while. A TL is a sweet-ass car. Ironically, I actually prefer my car. The TL is much more car, but not only do I prefer the better gas mileage and ability to use regular unleaded gas, my little Saturn Ion is more comfy, which is really ironic. When, it was still Emily's car and she rode in it with me I hated it. It was so uncomfortable. I was uptight whenever I drove because of her sensitivity to noise and acceleration. Not complaining, it just is what it is.

On the way, down there, the sky was phenomenal, even wow'er than usual.

Maria, went to bed early because she's old. Erv was still awake and is an excellent host. He served up the dinner they had earlier and then some brownies with ice cream after. Wow. I love that guy. Neriah decided that the hot tub was quite the inviting after-dinner treat. I had to agree with him. We enjoyed a couple trips between the pool and the hot tub in the nice cool evening before retiring to watch a movie before a reasonable-hour-gotta-get-up-and-go-gits-my-car-in-the-morning bedtime. The next morning Maria, Rhianna, Neriah and I began our car retrieval adventure. We went across the Sunshine Skyway and into the heart of 'traffic hell'.

Upon getting my car back, yay, we headed on back under awesome skies to prepare for our departure to Rhianna's open house. Just Rhianna and I went. It was quite different, setup like going to the classes on her schedule, including a six minute travel time in between, which is really tough when you haven't much of a clue about where yer going. It was cool, though. I like the school and her teachers are pretty cool.

Listening to: Mouth for War, by Pantera.

Another boring collection of mostly awesome sky pictures

This one starts off with the best girlfriend ever, once again. The rest is mostly the usual boring pictures of the sky that continues to amaze me every frickin day since I've been down here. There are also some general life-tracking-type pictures interspersed throughout. There are some of my sister's TL that I am still borrowing until I, hopefully, get my car back tomorrow. There are also a few of Neriah and I's adventure for goods. The end is setting up our work area at a table at the libaree and then noticing the woman I told had cool hair was in the background of the picture I took across at Rhianna.

Listening to: Flippers passing by, books and magazines shuffling and rustling.

This awesome life experience...

Ok, I actually have a lotsta write this time AND I actually feel compelled to do so. I am sitting in the libaree with the punk darlings and have had my fill of nosing through single people's profiles.

This collection of life-tracking pictures begins with the most beautifullest girlfriend I ever had. I love her. Then, just my usual gob of boring ol' sky pictures that I am so retardedly enamored by on a daily basis.

I met a new friend, that I was kinda excited about for a minute, at a sports bar that I had never been to, Barnacles. It was quite neat. Since I am not concerned about seeing her there, I may just go again. I was reminded of how enjoyable Happy Hour can be. This place was unlike any sports bar I had seen. The pictures, as they often do, fail to capture the unbelievable amount of TVs in this place. Whoa. So, yes, it was not a long-term friend. She was just outside my target age range of 5-10 years older than me, 47, and that really bothered her. There were, honestly other things. There was no real connection. She was looking for more of a peer. As a full-time beach bum, I was not a match for her White-collar executive-ness. It was another cool experience.

I am less disheartened as the attempts pile up. Fortunately, I am in no real hurry to be in a relationship, prolly thanks to Snickers and her being a affection junky equal to me in intensity. I have looked online, so those attempts are not surprising me in their failed attempts. However, I also am looking everywhere in the real world, too, the libaree, the lakes downtown, the grocery stores, downtown, malls, beaches. It is really hard to find a nice balance between attractive and intelligent with some integrity, leaning more toward the intelligent side. Obviously, my description of what I am actually looking for would make pages, prolly why it's so dern hard. If I was shallow enough, I could just hook up with some hot 20 supm year-old. grumble, grumble.

I also have to restrain myself from acting like a stoopid boy, which is ironically half of what attracts me to someone. The other half is much more than the hot round parts. I am actually more attracted to skin and life experience. Anyway, so I even entertained the idea of being a 'friend with benefits'. Just as I was coming to the decision that that is not who I choose to be, I had an affair as 'the other man'. I again decided, after the fact obviously, this is also not who I choose to be. And again, I decide this.

My sister, Maria, came back from their trip up to Michigan. They had applied sufficient paint and done enough cleaning to the home they just bought up there. So, I ran on down to the Beach Bum Paradise to retrieve my car and return her's, or so I planned, well hoped. I went to the grocery sto with Erv to grab some items and to the hardware sto to get some screws for mounting the new TV. He's working on fixing the old one. It is like three times the size of the new one, whew. They told him it would cost like $600 to fix it. He is shopping around. In the meantime, however, they hasta have a TV on the back porch, pshaw!

Hey, there were some nice melons, 5.99 hmm. Then, my eyes drifted to the end of the aisle, the future, ahhhh, beer. Erv was buying some replacement beers for Maria and forced me to get some Bud Light Lime. Hey, I was a guest, didn't wanna be rude. Upon returning we mounted the new TV, which was a third the size, but still easily visible from over on the hot tub cover, where I had to go to get a wireless signal. Two feet to the right, at the table, I couldn't get that signal. Wow, I was indeed on the fringe of the signal I was borrowing.

This morning, she followed me, in her car, to the place that had recently replaced my catalytic converter. I tried to capture the awesomeness of the trip across the Sunshine Skyway and the other awesomeness on the way to the very helpful repair guys at Ice Cold Air. Yeah, I figure they have earned a plug. ;-p I stayed to verify their verification that it was indeed bad and, thus a warranty repair. It didn't/doesn't take much to check one for bad-ness. I wanted him to share my confidence. After he bumped the side of it with his hand and it rattled, he confirmed it and checked on a replacement. They did not have one in stock, so he said it would take a couple days, but my car could stay inside at night, nice and safe, until then. So, Maria and I returned to her heezy, yo. She said I could drop her off and borrow her sweet-ass TL again until I picked her up to return to retrieve my car. Cool. This life experience is frickin awesome. It was actually nice to drive my car, if only for a bit. I love that car.

Listening to: the quite rustling and shuffling throughout the libaree just before closin time.

Every day is Sunday, oh wait, it really is Sunday...I think.

Wow, I sure am an ugly bastard. I keep trying anyway, thinking maybe I can take a good picture, but it seems pretty hopeless, indeed. Anyway, I decided, the other day actually, that I was going to use this tripod that I've had for years and never used. Today, after sitting it against the wall behind my desk last week, I finally worked up the gumption to actually use it. I was playing with it the other day and finally used the video cable the camera came with. I showed Rhianna and I how this awesome camera would take videos and then display them and the pictures on a tv with the quick and easy RCA cable hooked-up.

Ok, I must insert an intermission here...

...ok, wow, that was quite a nice intermission, no not sex, just a conversation. ;-p

I am not in a writing mood anymore. I think I will go shave this goatee that has kind of developed due to laziness.

Listening to: Mourning Air, by Portishead.

I love this awesome frickin life experience

Ok, this is much easier to upload, but I'm still not feeling like writing, maybe later.

Listening to: The Fan.

I am really diggin this new picture display method

Ok, I am really diggin this, oh wait, I put that in the title. It is cool, though. I set the frame duration quicker, too, so now it doesn't take so dern long. I thought about putting my writings about the pictures in the movie, but then I thought it wouldn't work, so I'll just write down here, which is actually very convenient because now I can write while I wait for it to upload, unlike before when uploading umpteen pictures was a long, painful process.

Anyway, here starts the next step in the life-tracking blog evolution. The collection of pictures starts with the usual full-time beach bum admiration of the awesome spectacle that is the sky, taken to and from getting the kids.

Then, the day finally came. I knew it was close. Neriah beat me at chess. It was the closest game ever...an end of an era.

As I was rounding the street on the home-stretch of our morning pee, poop, sniff, I was taken aback by the awesomeness of my sister's car that I am borrowing. It's one of my top 5 favorites. I have decided I want an RSX, not the TL, for having, but it is nice to borrow. I just filled up yesterday, and Premium is not as easy on the wallet as my little Saturn's regular, but the gas mileage, considering the bigger engine with gobs more power and the roominess is pretty oooook. I just made a trip which required me to go through Orlando, which is already a frickin nightmare, but it was also raining the whole way through, which not only made it stop and go, but also required the use of A/C. I still got 25.6 mpg, frickin Woot! My Saturn averages between 27 and 29! Damn, like I said, the roominess and gobs of extra power make it well worth a mere couple mpg. However, that was in heavy traffic. I think my normal driving, which is pretty mild, could/would get what the Saturn gets or better. Wow. I'm thinking a little RSX, like I want, would be even better, with it's little four-banger.

Ok, enough of my long-winded fantasy. I took a before and after the cream cheese frosting picture. Uuuuuuuuuuh. Rhianna made ho-made, wait, she's my daughter, can't say that, home-made cinnamon rolls with home-made cream cheese frosting. Oh damn. I give her crap about only liking to cook the sweet stuff and being so picky about food. However, I am sure diggin her aspirations of being a pastry chef and subsequent related practicings. Oh yeah, fat boy likes. (for those who don't know, fat boy is my inner child).

I sat on the porch with a coffee before going to the bank. I hadta see if my check for 20k had shown up so I could go gits me that thar RSX.

Ok, I put the Listening to: thing in the movie, so I guess I'll just write...

The End ;-p

I's got an idea

I need some devil horns to go with the new red daytona beach-inspired hue.

Ok, I'm sitting here wallowing in the fullness as Led Zeppelin's Lemon Song plays gently on the surround sound, filling the room in a non-obtrusive manner. I hads me a thunk just now. I needta write a book, The Navy John Diet. The one-meal-a-day-average resulting from laziness and/or a spiritually-focused/dominated mind works well for streamlining the body, but another perq is that it's very cost-effective. Yer beer goes much further. Woot!

Listening to: Heresy, by Nine Inch Nails.

Daytona wow.

I don't feel like writing, right now. I'm drinking and making cornbread. So, I'll just highlight: Beach, beer, boobs, burn. Woot! I am diggin this new posting of pictures method. It will assuredly develop into supm cool.

Listening to: My Own Summer (Shove It), by the Deftones.

testing

***Update: I had to come back and edit this one. I fixed the frame advance speed, so it went from 30 mins. to 3, pshew. Anyway, much more viewable now, besides just being uploadable.

***

I don't feel like writing about this one because I have this past weekend's load of pictures to write about now, but I just wannid to go ahead and use these to test supm new. Ok, this is long, like 30 mins, so you may wanna fast-forward this one. The future ones shouldn't be anywhere near as long, primarily because of less pictures due to the ease of it and also I hope to figure out how to speed up the frame-advance time. I'm just now familiarizing myself with Windows Movie Maker.

Ok, this is seeming not too possible, maybe there are too many pictures. I may just do the next one.

Listening to: Vampires, by Godsmack.