Manic Oppressive

The Safeway that I go to sells these little paper bags of apples. They usually contain 7 or so, and I pick them up fairly frequently because, well, it’s the thing to do.

Unfortunatly, I found glass in the bottom of the bag yesterday, and it was pressed into the skin of the apples on the bottom.

My first thought was, “Man, that would’ve been handy for Halloween.” My second thought was, “I want my money back”. My third thought was “Well, she’d be a lot cuter if she wasn’t into that whole Satan thing…”

But whatever.

San Diego Union Tribune, 12/26/2006

Post-Christmas Shopping Begins

So, as a co-worker puts it, I “accidentally” quit smoking today. So now there’s all this empty time where I could be smoking, but I’m not. What am I supposed to do to fill the gaps?

So I composed the funniest, most profound post that ever has one composed — or thought of composing. And my browser crashed.

Gah!

I was watching the Football game tonight, Denver vs. Seattle. This was difficult for me. When I moved, I decided that I couldn’t abandon my “loyalty” with the Broncos, yet I couldn’t ignore the Seahawks either.

So I told myself, “I have an AFC team, and an NFC team, and blah blah blah”. Well, the ‘blah blah blah’ kinda fell apart tonight when the two went head-to-head.

So I was in a bar, surrounded by Seahawk fans, rooting against them. I wasn’t the only Bronco fan in the place, but we were out numbered. And dang it, 5 turnovers. Err.

Good times being in the minority. Pity I couldn’t yell too loud; I’m fighting a cold.

It’s snowing again right now. I see this as a good thing, because earlier it was freezing rain, which would’ve meant that I had to crawl to work. Snow means I can walk it.

Ahh, and I have a demo tomorrow. In front of customers. Early. This will be interesting.

When I first moved to seattle, and I noticed some of the insanely steep hills, and I wondered what happens when there’s ice.

Now I know. All hell breaks loose.

This is the view outside my apartment window, tilted strangly so I could brace the camera. The angle of this hill isn’t too bad, maybe 7 degrees. Some of the hills are twice that. I imagine a cat would slip just looking up one of those.

Anyway, some of those cars are in control, most of them are stuck. After taking this picture, I went outside and helped get some people unstuck. (First gear, folks.) Then I went inside and fell asleep to the sound of cars trying to make it up the grade.

Also, Seattle Snow makes the best snowballs. Just so you know.

As a member of the ACM, I have more than passive interest in the use of technology for elections. Personally, I see it as a huge risk, but no one asked me.

So anyway, I’m on the sidelines, watching the election and I saw this gem:

Poll workers used hand lotion to prevent the machines from spitting out the cards.*

My first thought was, “Don’t worry, it’s only weird the first time.”

Seriously. What was wrong with paper?

* From this article on Forbes.com.

I was watching a weather forecast, and the weather man was forecasting flooding for today. “Gee”, I think, “Flooding, Why did I move here again?” They’re expecting 2-6″ of rain tonight.

I guess that this isn’t really normal; the expectation is that there will be more rain tonight then there is normally in November. So I feel a little bit better.

Oh, and Mom: Thanks for the umbrella. I actually was able to use it today.

Since I moved up to this pretty little corner of the world, I’ve driven about 1800 miles. That includes a brief jaunt up to Vancouver, B.C., so that’s about 200 miles a month.

That number is higher then it should be. There is a reason for this. Occasionally, I get in my car and just sort of drive. The idea is to learn my way around the city, and cause a sudden increase in blood pressure.

A few nights ago, I decided that I needed to go to Bed Bat and Beeeeeeeeeyond! to pick up a larger-then-life trash can so I can store my recycleables. So after spending 30 minutes trying to park and 5 minutes “shopping”, I decided to learn me some more of that Seattle Stuff.

Now, the deal is that if you don’t know where you are, you will invariably end up on a highway, which doesn’t solve any problems at all for you. And this is what happened to me that night; I ended up on a highway.

Then, about 20 minutes later, I was able to get off the highway. Then I drove for about a month and found my way home, a learned man.