Made another blog!

Hello everyone,

A late Merry Christmas to you all. Things have been a barrel of monkeys here. CoolWife got me some awesome presents and we got to spend the day with family and even go to Church, which seems like an appropriate Christmas activity. I might have, however, slept through most of church. My excuse is just that it was so peaceful and nice (and warm) in there. We spent the afternoon with CoolWife's fam and the evening with my sister Jenny and her family. They fed us an amazing three-course meal of butternut squash soup, pork tenderloin with potatoes, and an elaborate chocolate tasting for dessert. We then played Blokus and Sequence; both great games. We also had a Google Hangout with just about all my family, which was a party. We should do that more often. We may need to establish some etiquette, but I think it's a great way to get all caught up together. I feel very blessed to have such a great family where everyone gets along.


In other (very unrelated) news, I've decided to start a second blog called Mike Likes Games (mikelikesgames.blogspot.com). It's going to be very video games-centric, so if that's your thing, or the thing of someone you know, feel free to go over and check it out. I'll still post here when I feel like it, but I've been wanting to write more about my classes (in making video games) and gaming, and this didn't quite feel like the right spot.

And a Happy New Year to you!

Brains

I think we're all aware that brains generally look like this.

However, I'm pretty sure that today mine are in a state closer to the following.

You may be skeptical. I'm sure everyone reading this knows enough about brains that if a person's brains were to resemble scrambled eggs with beef, peas, and carrots on rice they probably wouldn't be able to live, much less write a blog post about it. Be advised that I'm averaging about two typos per word as I type this.

I have plenty of evidence on my side to back up my theory, but little time to recount them all. So I'll just leave you with the fact that it took me about five minutes to add up the hours on my time card (which only totaled 37 hours, so it's not like there was anything hard there) and the following little tidbit.

I keep thinking to the tune of "Cat Scratch Fever" and another song with I can't remember anymore even though I last did it about 15 minutes ago.For example: "Check--ing--books--in! Dun dun dun duuuuun!" or "I--feel--hun--gry! Dun dun dun duuuuun!". My favorite so far is definitely "Nope--Chuck--Tes--Ta!! Dun dun dun DUUUUUN!".

Back to School - Fall 2011 Edition

Well, it's been another first week of school.

I don't really feel the need to establish that The University of Utah and BYU are very different places. I think most people already know that. But I'm still going to go over some of the more interesting things that have happened. I think this might just come out in a list form, because there's just too much.

Highlights:
I've gone to Salt Lake City every day this week and have only put 6 miles on my car thanks to public transportation. Yeeeeeah!

Before-mentioned public transportation is free! (It was $90 a year at BYU, which paid for itself very quickly, but they don't offer it anymore.)

I'm registered for four classes and all of them seem like they'll be good. One of them is literally called "Intro to Video Games." Ha! The professor's degree is in English, however, so there will be much writing of papers (about video games).

The art class I need for my program had a few more sections opened up, so I was able to get into that!

The scheduling on my program is pretty strict, so I have a lot of the same people in my classes. Most of them seem really nice, and I've already made a few buddies.

I've made a pretty sweet website for my programming class, which is where we post all our assignments. Check it for updates! I'll be putting a Paypal donation button on there soon, feel free to give!

The campus here is much bigger and has lots of green areas between the buildings. You almost never see a dense crowd, even by the student building where they keep all the food.

There are a lot of cool looking restaurants on and just off campus. There's more than just Taco Bell and Scoreboard.

The library here is very cool. The whole bottom floor is mostly study areas and a cafe.

They totally have Starcraft 2 on the lab computers here. Woo!

Lowlights:
I spend three to four hours on the bus/train every day. Yuck. This is sort of convenient for reading, but most of my reading assignments are online, which means I need to read it all on my little iPod screen (I ain't truckin' my laptop here and back every day). This is would be a lot easier if I had iPad. Wink. Wink. Wink.....

Apparently, Aubrey's sister Martina is the only Mormon girl that attends this school, because all the other ones either just don't value clothing or have lots of tattoos. (This isn't really as prevalent as I make it sound. But it is swift and obvious change from BYU and American Fork. When we saw Martina on Tuesday, she made the same comment.)

I ended up having to drop the "Gender & Social Change" class I was enrolled in. I was actually pretty excited about that class, but it turns out the professor liked to swear a lot and he warned us right out of the gate that he's going to be using racy (or in his words "definitely not PG") material to get concepts across. So....that was the end of that.

Funny story about that gender class: I got to the classroom pretty early because I didn't have anything else going on. But by the time that there were only about five minutes until the bell (actually, they don't do bells here, but you know what I mean) the entire classroom had filled up with only women. I didn't remember if the professor was a guy or a girl so I started to worry what it might be like to be the only man (particularly a married, Mormon, one) in a gender class. Fortunately, a few guys came in just before class started. I let out an audible sigh of relief and the 6 or so girl closest to me all started laughing. I was getting pretty nervous!

I'm taking Calculus....again....

Still haven't been able to find a job. Hopefully when I do find one it'll work with my school schedule.

Well, I think that's about everything. It's been a pretty crazy week. More updates soon.

Oh I went I went a fishin'...

...On a hot summer day. I went fishing outside of Alaska for the first time a couple Saturdays ago. I have mixed feelings about the event overall (spoiler: I got sunburned all to crap, again) but it was a lot of fun. Actually, we did more than just fish. We also rode horses.

This is Milo showing obvious signs of inattention.

Apparently it's a "horse thing" that they need to be retaught to be good little obedient horses on their first ride every year after the long winter break. Unfortunately, winter lasted until August with the horses that we were riding. It was a pretty short trip once Aubrey found out about this. Also, I'm pretty sure Milo was so excited that he forgot to eat breakfast, because he would keep stopping to eat at whatever plants were around. At one point he pulled up an entire plant that was about two feet tall and was carrying it around with us.He then stopped in the middle of the road while we were crossing it and stopped responding to any and all commands/nudges. We didn't get hit by any cars though, as the car that came speeding around the corner saw us in time to slow down and stop.

My first Utah catch. I named him "Butch" (not really).

 But anyway, after I almost died thanks to a horse (which, based on my past experience means I'm maintaining an average of 66% for my life to be seriously threatened any time I get on a horse) we went fishing. We were up in the Uintas, so we went to this giant reservoir named "Starvation" of all things. Rumor has it there's some serious fishes up there, but we sure didn't see any. I don't want to overstate the obvious, but fishing for widdle fishes is a lot different than fishing for salmon. The biggest difference between salmon and these little perch was that I couldn't ever really tell if they were hooked or not. Many, many times I would see my bobber bobbing around, I'd give it a yank, it would continue to move around...yank...still moving...and I'd reel it in only to find that most of my bait was gone. Two of those many times, this very same thing would happen but a very tiny fish happened to be on the end of my line, looking confused. Silly fish, not even enough sense to fight it (or enough weight to be noticeable, which would have been nice).

But we did have a great time. We've certainly got a little bit of the fishing bug. we wanted to go again this past weekend of it didn't work out. We'll definitely get back out there before school starts. 

Aubrey's grandpa Larry. A mountain man if there ever was one.

Aubrey's dad and grandma Patsy.

 Note: The presence of cowboy hats in some pictures does not mean that Aubrey or I ever wore cowboy hats. I feel like this needs to be stated somewhere.

Official Annoucement

You know how I post about a major life change about every six months? I didn't want to let the tradition die, so today we'll be discussing my transfer from BYU to the University of Utah.

When I decided to go into Computer Science, it was because I wanted to go into video game programming. It's just an added bonus that there are about a thousand tech companies that need programmers in this area. So I figured if things didn't work out, I could always just go for one of those other "less awesome" jobs.

Shortly thereafter, I found out about the University of Utah had its own Computer Science program with a game-making emphasis. Oooooh. Then I found out it was ranked #2 in the nation for such undergrad programs. Hmmm..... However, I was hesitant to make such a big change. Having already made one university transfer, I knew that bad things happened to your hard-earned generals and such. When I started my first couple computer classes, I really liked them! But there was a problem: someone put a flyer for the U's game program up in the computer building near the labs. So every time I walked to the lab (which was most days) I saw the flyer.

For a while (like three days), this was okay. Then the thoughts about how I'd rather be there started creeping in. After a few weeks, the longing started. When the semester was close to the end, I started to stop and read that dumb poster from top to bottom once a day and wish I was going there instead. Coupled with my job getting weird and becoming very tired of BYU and Provo in general, I decided to get brave.

Due to the fact that I have a very, very wonderful, sweet, and accommodating wife, she was actually very supportive. We made up an outline and thought about it for a few weeks. Then we took the plunge and I applied to the University of Utah. It took a couple weeks to get the kinks worked out, but I'm all ready to go for the fall. I'm actually excited for school to start. Can you believe that? I know it'll be tough, but I'm very motivated to make things work with school this time. I've even managed to make a few industry contacts (all of which are active Mormons, so there goes that stereotype) that have been very helpful.

To finish off, CoolWife and I decided we should go check out the campus and figure out where my classes are. Here's a couple pictures of me looking like a freshman at the U last week.

The campus is big. Really big. I'll need to get a map of my own eventually.

But hey, one of my classes had a dinosaur on the name plate! How cool is that?

Here's Aubrey with the full-sized version of the dino skull. She was even more excited than I was.

Not that I needed convincing...

Now that my readership is to an all-time low, I've decided to write again.

A lot has changed in the last few months, but we can discuss that later. Today I want to talk about a little town called Fairbanks. The Fairbanks in Alaska. The Fairbanks that I've never had any desire to visit.

CoolWife and I are in Alaska right now. We've had a wonderful time traveling, seeing the sights, eating tasty foods, and hanging out with my parents (photos probably to come). But we sure didn't go to Fairbanks, and one little conversation pretty much sealed the deal for me that I shouldn't bother for the rest of my life.

While we were visiting Denali National Park, Aubrey and I were checking out some gift shops near our hotel. (Also near the hotel: The Salmon Bake. Go there.) One of the shops had something to do with a Fairbanks Bowl Company, which sells overpriced wooden bowls and hires insane people to work at their stores.

"Wait!", you say? "What's this talk of insane people?", you ask? Keep reading.

First I'll set the scene. The store has shelves that go to the ceiling along the walls, and a few rows of waist-high shelves through the middle of the shop. The shop itself is only about 30ft by 60ft or so. We walk in, and after seeing the price tag on the first item by the door I've decided that there's no way I was going to buy something there. But CoolWife likes to look in shops, so we began making our way slowly through the winding rows of merchandise.

After about 30 seconds, the girl manning (or girling) the store comes out from her counter and tells us that everything in the shop was made in Fairbanks, and if we went there, we could see it ourselves. My face must have betrayed my thoughts ("Fairbanks? No frikkin' way.") because she called me out on having frowned when she talked about Fairbanks. I told her that we weren't planning on going to Fairbanks.

Sales Girl: Why wouldn't you go to Fairbanks?
Me: Well, I've never really had the desire.
SG: Are you from around here?
Me: I'm from Anchorage, well, Eagle River actually.
SG: THAT'S why. You've just never been and you don't know what good things are there. First, there's Chena Hot Springs, there's not so many people as there are in Anchorage, and it's pretty much a jumping off point for the wilderness if that's your thing (this last part about "my thing" was said condescendingly).
Me: Hmmmm....

Firstly, the hot springs aren't in Fairbanks, they're another 55 miles north of Fairbanks. If the #1 attraction for your town is another hour out of the way, you might want to restructure your argument. Secondly, I prefer to live in urban areas, and lastly, which city in Alaska isn't a jumping off point to the wilderness? At this point I felt pretty validated about not having been to Fairbanks.

She must have sensed my good feelings, because she sure didn't stop there.

Sales Girl: Yeah, it's not like Eagle River, you can just go off by yourself in the woods and no one will bother you. And if you get lost and die out there...Eh, you're biodegradable.
Me, not altogether sure I heard that last part right: Oh really? So no one will come looking for you?
Sales Girl: Oh no, we'll just leave you out there to die.

This is the point where I got really nervous and figured we should probably get out of there soon. I decided to go for a "diffuse the situation" tactic instead of just running for the door. Also, CoolWife is still with me but not saying anything at all to help me out; she's just enjoying the show.

Me: Oh...well...I lived with a few guys from Fairbanks in college (three, to be exact), they were all really cool guys. They only had good things to say about the place.
Clearly Insane Sales Girl: Where was this?
Me: Idaho.
SG: Yeah, you don't really count has a true Fairbanks Person until you've left Fairbanks and come back. So their opinion probably didn't count.
Me: Oh? Well...they liked it....
SG: Also, winters in Fairbanks are way worse than Idaho or Anchorage. If it's too cold for your car to start, that's just your car's fault.
Me: (Now moving towards the door) Well, I guess you can't plug in every car to make sure they start (I was referring to engine bloc heaters, I just assumed she would know what I meant there).
SG: Also, going to Anchorage counts as leaving Fairbanks.
Me: Right.... Well, bye!
SG: Be sure to visit our store in Fairbanks when you go! If you go....

(Now outside)

Me: Holy crap!
CoolWife: WOW!!! That was amazing! Sorry I didn't have your back in there, but that was hilarious!

At this point, I feel like I should stick up for Idaho a little bit. Rexburg is actually very much like Fairbanks. It's small, really far away from anything worthwhile, and the winter does suck pretty hard. However, those aren't exactly the selling points. Fairbanks appears to embrace those traits. So if you're looking for cold and miserable nine months out of every twelve in a place where your friends and neighbors really will leave you out in the wilderness to die, Fairbanks is your place!

Also, if you ever find yourself in need of a good lawyer that won't cannibalize their own argument, don't ask around at Fairbanks Bowl Company.

50th Post, Woo!

For my grand 50th post, I have only the following to say:

There has been mention that this blog is dead/offline. That is incorrect. I just haven't been posting on it. Also, why hasn't anyone said anything about the triathlon I posted about on Facebook? I'm serious!

- CoolBoy

It was a Christmas Miracle!

I'm not sure where the phase, "Christmas Miracle" came from, but I've always enjoyed it. So much so, that I often use the phrase when it isn't Christmastime at all and just use whatever holiday is nearest Halloween Miracle, Easter Miracle, Veteran's Day Miracle, you get the idea). Sometimes this degenerates all the way down to just a "Wednesday Miracle." But hey, I know I feel like I miracle on some Wednesdays.

Anyhow, as most people already know, I've had a recent Christmas miracle: My car was found!!! Not only was it found, it was right in a BYU parking lot! Right by where I normally park! With plenty of gas and all my stuff still in it, and hardly any extra miles on it... and nothing wrong with it at all....

I know what you're thinking, and no, I didn't just leave it there. I remember distinctly that I didn't drive that day because Coolwife and were going on a date in P-Towne that evening and didn't want to end up with two cars. I was starting to get really worried that I was turning into Tyler Durdan, but then I noticed that the electronic door locks make really strange noises on the driver's side now. So that makes be feel a little more justified.

And just because it's a good story, I'll briefly tell how I found it again. I was riding the bus to school (as usual) and when we were a few blocks away from campus I get a phone call. The call was from BYU traffic saying that the lot my car was parked in had closed and I needed to move it. I responded that my car had been reported stolen about a month and a half earlier, so that was news to me. The lady then got kind of freaked out, and gave the phone to someone else, who I told the same thing, and I was told to come to the BYU police office. After a little waiting, I drove up to the lot with a BYU copper and it was just fine! I drove it away! Woopie!

An Ideal Halloween

Maybe next year.

I was considering writing about the "Ideal Halloween" and noting the irony that I wrote all about Thanksgiving getting passed over for Christmas when Halloween was getting even more eclipsed by both. I never did get around to it. The thing about Halloween though, is that it doesn't just lay around and feel bad about itself. It gets back at you. Hard.

Things had been going well enough, we went to a party on the 23rd. We dressed up as Napoleon and Deb from Napoleon Dynamite and made a sweet spider cake named Rufus.

This past Friday I rode the bus to school as usual, but this time Aubrey came and picked me up from school afterward so we could go on a date. We went to Tucano's with a 1/2-off coupon. Yeah suckahs. That was almost 100% amazing (I quite nearly puked after eating. Turns out you can eat too much of that bacon-wrapped fillet minon). And then we went to Boarders for a couple hours and got a Christmas present for one of the small children we're related to. All in all, a great night. We got home pretty late though, so we didn't go get my car. (We've done this a couple times before. Not a big deal.)

In Utah and, I suspect, many other places the 30th was the (in this case, very rainy) night for Trick-or-Treating. We spent most of the day at Aubrey's parents jarring tomatoes. Aubrey loves tomatoes and will not tolerate canned ones. So every fall she needs to find a source of jarred tomatoes from someone in her family. This year it fell to her to jar her own for the first time. This took approximately 6 hours and we didn't even finish. After she took a short nap, we ordered some pizza, went home, turned off all the lights so Trick-or-Treaters would think we weren't home, and watched a scary movie (Psycho, which was awesome).

Sunday morning-Halloween proper-we got up and went back to Aubrey's parents to finish those freaking tomatoes. We ended up with 32ish quart jars, which was a bit more than Aubrey anticipated, but it doesn't look like we'll be running out any time soon. At about 1, we finally went back to the Park and Ride to get my car. Which was not there. There were 5 or 6 other cars there. But not ours.

After some digging around, we've come to the conclusion that it was stolen. We've filed a report and everything, and now we're playing the waiting game. One could question the wisdom behind leaving a car out in an unsupervised parking lot for a period of 54 hours. But the real lesson here is this: If you piss off Halloween, it'll mess you up.

That's right, I slighted Halloween and then Halloween stole my car. Normally I might put up a fight to something like this, but at this point I'm ready to just come to a compromise with Halloween. From this point on, I'll always make sure to write about Halloweens before Thanksgivings or Christmas, and in return Halloween won't royally screw me over.

Deal.

It's been (possibly) an entire week since it was stolen now. Therefore, it could be pretty much anywhere in the continental United States. So in case you've got any spare time, feel free to check classifieds all over the country for a silver 2003 Subaru Forester with about 130K miles, possibly Alaska plates, and a big dent on the left rear bumper and light. Not just Craigslist, mind you, but local papers as well. Get back to me if you spot anything. Thanks.




Note to They-Who-Took-My-Car: Being that you have all of my personal information from my insurance card, you might have even found this blog. If you did, two things: (1) Feel free to return the car to the lot you removed it from. (2) I expect a full tank of gas. Seriously, it's the least you could do.

Ideal Thanksgiving

Things have been getting spicy up in the CoolBoy clan about the holidays. By "The Holidays" I mean Christmas and Thanksgiving. Not trying to exclude anyone here, just making the distinction. And I'm sure people who don't celebrate both/either holiday can relate to family being complicated and weird holiday fantasies, which is what this post is about. To clarify, this post is not about how my Dad can't just make his own blog to entertain himself with so he doesn't periodically (and arbitrarily) decide he's the internet police and harass people about not posting enough. It would be rude of me to call someone out like that. (Also: Dude. If you want someone to blog consistently, they have to be paid for it. Take that however you want.)

Anyway, looks like my parents will be here for Christmas this year and will be staying with Aubrey and I! We're quite honored to have them staying at our apartment. We're going to have our own little tree and everything so it will be nice and festive. I think Aubrey might even quilt up a tree skirt as well as sew up some curtains for the 2nd bedroom because she's awesome like that. There's also a pretty good chance they'll be sleeping in our bed while we take on an inflatable mattress for the week. Unless of course they want to buy us a house for Christmas. This would solve the bed issue. Until then, we're cool with just changing the sheets for them. Aubrey would sleep on the floor if I would let her. She says it feels good on her back or something. I don't buy it.

I hope our place won't be too small for them. I'm pretty sure we've already warned them that the bathroom door doesn't lock. Not that it matters, since the toilet is back crammed in behind a little wall by the dryer and intruders would only be able to see your knees (note to self: investigate potential of using dryer door as footrest while going to the bathroom).

True to form, my parents are coming for one reason: Grandbabies. You read it here first, my parents will do anything if it means quality time with their spawn's spawn (except move nearby). This is all fine by me, but there have been a few ruffled feathers about the logistics of everything. This is also fine by me. If grandparents are here to visit grandchildren, and grandchildren are visited, that makes the trip (by definition) a success.

This just about brings me to the point of this post. Amid so much kerfuffle about Christmas, Thanksgiving was getting skipped over. Aubrey asked me two night ago what the ideal Thanksgiving would be. I then saw a vision. It was awesome. Fortunately it was dark and she couldn't see the far-off look in my eye at the time. I'll tell you what I saw.

1) Aubrey and I.
2) My family (meaning my parents, their children, children-in-law, and grandchildren)
3) Aubrey's family (meaning her parents, siblings, and grandparents who want to come)
4) Barack Obama and his family (meaning his wife and daughters).
5) A Turducken
6) Everyone listed above eating the Turducken and having a grand time together.

I already know what you're going to ask: What's a Turducken? Turd? Really? A turd for Thanksgiving? A Turducken is not a turd. It is a chicken stuffed into the cavity of a duck stuffed into the cavity of a turkey. I've always really wanted to try one of these. I think they're kind of expensive though, so we might also invite Alton Brown to make sure we cook it right. We would also have another whole turkey or two and a turkey breast for those white meat people. We're talking like 26+ people here, so I hope this will be enough so that everyone gets as much as they want and still have plenty for leftover turkey+brie+cranberry sauce sandwiches on fancy bread on Friday.

Each family unit should bring sides and stuff (I'm providing the birds, as well as funeral potatoes, and a can of cranberry sauce for decoration. Someone else will have to bring the sauce to eat). Brie and fancy bread is a must. Piemakers should make pies. Green salads are preferred over other salads, but a nice noodle one without olives would probably be nice. No salads with marshmallows will be allowed. Something else made of potatoes sounds appropriate. You get the picture. I will tell the Obamas ahead of time that while bringing us some nice wine with their other contributions would be very kind, we would prefer that they brought the white house bowling alley. Or a ton of Izze Juices. It's up to them.

This is the point in writing when I realize that everything in my ideal Thanksgiving is family and food-related. I suppose there will be some activities of some sort. Ideally, I won't be in charge of them, or have to participate if I don't want to. I'll have Cortney check on movies coming out that weekend. Is it cool if I just send the Obama's invite to the white house? Who's done this before? Also, should I tell Barack about the bathroom door on the phone when he RSVP's or just let him know when they get here?

24 0213

Ok, so I cut ahead a little bit. Writing was just bogging me down. But we'll have an update here.

First, the biggest surprise.

Bridezilla: WOW. I didn't see that coming at all. It's one of the two things I didn't. but dang, I never took her for that crazy. The following is a transcript of my IM conversation with Aubrey as I watched (we were talking about a 24/Twilight Mashup, since Bella's parents in the movie are both in 24.

4:46 PM Aubrey: yeah! he's not a vampire! but, if he was, I bet he'd just smash the vultori and be done with it.

me: Holy crap

It would have all been over in 1 book

4:47 PM Especially if the only person getting in his way was Bella's lame sauce dad

Dead vampires everywhere

4:48 PM Aubrey: snap. take that meyer. we could make an awesome youtube video for that if we were that type of people.

me: That's true

4:49 PM 24's over now too. We could probably get little Kiefer himself

Aubrey: oh really? what makes you say that?

4:50 PM me: Well, depending on what he thinks about Twilight, he might be down.

4:51 PM Aubrey: that's true. of course, he might be a big fan.

me: Well, if he's got a sense of humor...

4:52 PM Aubrey: hahaha. true. heck, if stephanie meyers is a fan of 24...

we could get her too!

OR she'll write another book where he becomes a vampire.

me: maybzWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAHH!H!!!!!!

4:53 PM PLOT TWIST!!!

I didn't see it coming either

Aubrey: Wow. I guess not: All caps, elongated vowels, and multiple punctuation marks: you are impressed!

4:54 PM me: dang i love this show

It got me good just there

Aaaaaaaah. I do indeed love it. Except for Kim.

Jin, aka Agent Baker: Haha! More LOST! That was the one other thing.

Sherry: She's a giant B. Didn't need creepy sound effects to see that coming a mile away.

Palmer: Authorizing torture. Didn't see that coming. But I guess that's the beefing-up that Roger wanted.

Roger: Called it.

Kim: I still hate her. I hope Crazy Mountain Man just kills her instead of trying to repopulate LA. That would do us both a huge favor. Bet you wish you wore a bra now, don't you? (Dumb ho.)

The leader guy at the Mosque who did some PR for Islam: Props to you!

Kate: Way to step up.

Rogue Commando with the Nuke: I called you too. But I thought it would be at the end of episode 12, rather than 13, so you got me there!

Jack: Keep screamin'. Keep shootin'. I love ya bro.

24 0206

Ok, time for some more 24. I think this time I'll only pause to comment during the "previously on 24" time, "commercial breaks," and the 4-square thingys at the end. That way it won't take so long (and it might be easier for readers to follow). Also, time posts are grouped by scene.
I think that the Arab ambassador guys were good. Also, the helicopter going down was fake. The fiance is totally bad. Also, Kim sucks. I'd stay away from Nina, Jack. Vampires man...that's scary crap.

2:30 Nina got a pardon! Good for her! Jack's gonna get himself in twouble again.

3:18 Holy unnecessary "WHOOOOOOOOSH!" when Pres. Palmer got out of car. Sheesh.
4:18 HA! It's her! Pres. Palmer's crazy freaking ex wife! I knew it! And why does she keep making eyes at the secretary lady?
5:35 Whatever man, whatever That lady could have to say. I wouldn't listen to her for 5 seconds. No way on the 5 minutes.

6:20 Man, fiance stinks. just kill him now Tony. It'll save people so much time.
7:10 Suck on that, SUCKAH!!!

7:30 Calling it: the media leak is Roger's fault. They're going to blame it on the weirdo from before. But it's going to be Roger.

9:00 George. You're making a mistake. It's easy to tell.
9:18 This is where Jack covers the camera and tries to kill Nina (They stop him though).
10:50 HA!!! Jack's screaming at someone! He needs a new hobby.
11:40 And now he's killing people. Seriously. Learn some new tricks. (Also, called that too.)
12:30 Yeah, it starts out as a "oh yeah, I was just freaking her out" until he actually DOES try to kill her before too long. And then he says stuff like, "Don't let anyone in the room for 5 minutes." Sigh.

[Commercial Break]
OK, we know a few things here: Jack's going to try and kill Nina in a few hours, Pres. Palmer needs to watch out for Cheryl, and Kim's a moron. More on those later (I'm guessing).
[/Commercial Break]

13:55 Bridezilla's still here. I forgot all about her. Darn.
15:00 I can't tell what I hate more: Bridezilla or her tied-up shirt.

15:30 Remind me to say more about that Doctor and Megan's Dad later.
16:20 She made that crap about cell phones up.
16:30 Daddy's other daughter is a vampire now. She'll bite you if you're bad!

17:19 Woo hoo!! Jack's getting answers!
18:20 Well, one answer, anyway.

19:00 HA! It was Roger. That was easy.
19:30 Also, since when as the military gotten anything done in less than an hour?
20:00 Also, he's bluffing.

20:30 Here it comes. Charlie's stealing his only surviving non-vampire child. Now his worst fear for names of grandchildren will just be things like Julio and Altagracia. None of the Resnesmee crap.
22:00 McGill is such a bad name. Good try though, Kim.
22:40 News flash little girl, rule #1 of survival in this show is "Only trust a Bauer when you're far away from them."

[Commercial Break]
Uuuugh, would it have killed them to dye Kim's eyebrows as well? I hate that in tv shows/movies. Also, it came to my attention that Megan's Dad is Charlie on the Twilight movies, meaning that both of Bella's parents are in here. And they're both crazy people. Plus that guy from LOST. This is getting out of hand. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure when we watched Roger tell that military guy something from behind the glass, he didn't tell him what Pres. Palmer wanted him too. It was probably something like "Just make it look like you're not evacuating anymore, but keep doing weird crap so I can further embarrass the Pres." You'll see.
[/Commercial Break]

24:30 No he won't hurt you. He'll sic the vampires on you! Blood everywhere!!
25:50 I wonder if McGill here had any idea that his girlfriend was nuts before this episode. Also, how is any of this relevant to the main plot?

27:00 She's so mousy.
28:00 Yeah dude, don't tell her anything.
28:40 Bad move.
29:15 Guess who saw that coming? ME!!! Also, her prime suspect is That red-haired lady. That must have been what those glares were about.

[Commercial Break]
Yes Palmer, it is one of her manipulations. Also, I'm getting tired of typing. I'm going to save it for something significant.
[/Commercial Break]

32:00 Dear Fiance's Dad: Way to yell at Sister for no reason about stereotypes, because government officials frequently show up at weddings as a result of racial profiling. Classy.

36:30 It's about time Nina started getting freaking and mean. Sheesh.

[Commercial Break]
[/Commercial Break]

38:45 Woah! He broke! I didn't see that coming.
39:20 It was the Dad.
YEEEEEEEEEAHH!!!!!!!!! I got it! Of course, now that it's out, I can only assume the Dad's a patsy. You can only rock that scowly beard and those eyebrows for so long.

40:30 Holy crap! McGill just rocked that guy!! Way to go, man!

43:00 Ha! Jack drugged him. Nina's in trouble.

Just a few things

I forgot my headphones at home again. Work will now feel about 3 times longer. It also means I can't keep going on my 24 binge. That's okay though, I'm sure I'll get to it before long.

Also exciting for today:

1. With all the dead time at work I'm finally getting around to backing up the media stuff on my laptop so I can install Windows 7. I hope it's as much as an improvement as people say it is.
2. There's people coming over today to drop off a couch we're holding on to for my old roommate while he's out of town. They better be nice to Aubrey or bad things will become of them.
3. We've been trying to buy a portable dishwasher from some dude we're calling Dan the Dishwasher Man all weekend. He's a slippery fellow and we're hoping that today will be the magical day that we can pick it up and not have to wash any more dishes by hand. If we get it, it'll be the first time I've lived with a mechanical dishwasher in 5 years. Wish us luck!

24 0205

I'm still kind of undecided on the format here, but I think I'll just write in my running commentary. Times are run time, not "24" time. That'd be way too complicated.

00:23 Eric. That's Jerkface's name.

00:45 If the beard isn't good enough for you, just think about how he kinda looks like Christian Shepard. He wasn't all that great either (The smoke monster version, anyway).

01:14 That doctor lady is full of crap. Am I grossly misinformed, or is it common for new nannies who bring the child to the hospital to be the source of prolonged abuse? It will take the police all of about 15 seconds to "sort that out." Kim doesn't need to worry.

01:19 Jack Freaking Bauer happened, that's what!

02:27 Oop! Just saw "as Nina Meyers" in the credits. I was right!

03:00 Yeah, send Tony. That Groom's no good.

03:50 I don't remember who Chappel is.

05:00 Lynn. That's Red Hair Lady. Wasn't that Samwise's name too?

5:40 Yeah, because running away looks good. Also, that guy's a weirdo.

7:18 Bull crap. I'm calling it.

930: so wait, Nina's been in jail? When was it she ordered the bombing? I don't get it.

1010: and yeah, Jack's totally going to kill her. Wait, he does that in a different season. He does it somewhere.

1110: She's only getting like part of it. Then people are going to freaking out. You'll see.

1224: Dang, they got me. Now she's gonna die though, right?

1300: There we go.

1400: That beard is awful. What else is this guy in? Holy Crap! It IS Christian Shepard from LOST. HE'S BAD! He's totally going to be bad! Just look those eyes and tell me he's good.

1430: Yay Tony!

1500: Yeah, and you picked this day just so you would have an excuse to fly in more terrorists. That's awesome!

1620: Yeah, that's the look of "Oh crap! They're already on to me! Good thing I've already got a story that's going to check out perfectly but someone's going to have a hunch and figure me out eventually!"

1750 Are they ever going to tell us which "Their Country" is? I'm guessing not.

1850: Yeah, don't give it to them. They'll only give you the crappy files or something

2020 And given your camera angles, we have no reason to trust you either, bub (Roger).

2120 Kim, just freaking do what you're told. Please. Once?

2245 Ha. Jack's funny.

2300: Yeah, give Nina a helmet. Jack's gonna thump her widdle head. It's only a matter of time.

2335. I was hoping for a smile out of her. That would make her awesomely bad.

2430: I didn't see the split screen there at first. I thought they were just waaaaay too close for a second there.

2456: The terms are: I'm going to write my name on the walls with your blood once my daughter and her vampire friends get here.

2510 Or she just wants immunity. Whatever.

2627 Hey hey hey! Just like David Wallace! Except Wallace is a patriot.

2710 "It in was a chain email. We must know some of the same people."

2810 "I've got a bomb to blow up in 6 hours. You'll notice that corresponds perfect with the 12-hour mark in the season when crisis #1 always ends and crisis #2 has to start. You'll see!"

2820 Have we figured out what Lynn's job title is yet?

2850 And now Jack's going to find a way to get to Nina. Don't talk to him Michelle. You'll just catch The Crazy along with him.

3140 This is Palmer we're talking about here, Jack. He's doing the right thing.
Wait, Palmer, you just said "eventually we'll make it right." That's like a death sentence in Kiefer's mind. You'll have to clean that one up eventually. See? Look at that snarl!

3200 who the crap is that guy? Oh geez, a Kim boyfriend. That can't been a good sign. What kind of name is McGill? Are you kidding me?

3320 It's official: I kind of love Mason. Too bad he's gonna die and stuff.

3410 Yeah Michelle...don't trust Keifer's purrrrrrrr. He's just gonna kill people in the end.

3520 Bridezilla isn't being nearly as bridezilla-y as she could be. But I do really hate her shirt. Why tie it up like that? That's not classy. It's pretty gross.

3645 "Don't mind my other family in Australia." Claire doesn't count.

3700 Oh, there's the Bridezilla. You'll notice Christian didn't bother to tell her that he did a background check too. Sissy.

3830 Yeah, there you go Kim. Screwing things up. Nice job.

4000: Couch buddies!

4135 It would be Fox News. Being that this show is on Fox.

4310 HA! Camera glare. She's practicing her feral stare for when Bella turns her too.

Watching Old TV

Thanks to Netflix streaming and not a lot going on at work, I've found myself starting up Season 2 of 24. I've also started watching Veronica Mars with Aubrey, and I think we're going to do LOST (I've seen all of it, she only saw season 1 back in high school) at some point too. Sidenote to Netflix: Hurry up on that iPhone app, and it better be free, I'm not going to pay you twice (and don't worry, I definitely won't get Hulu Plus, I won't pay for commercials).

So I figure while I'm watching all this old TV, I ought to be keeping a record somehow.

Anyway, here begins 24: Day 2 (2002).

Some background:
Four years ago I saw season 1, half of 3 (I think), half of 4, and all of 5. Then last year I followed the first half of 7. I'm far from a 24 noob, but there's just a lot I haven't seen and even more that I probably don't remember. But If I actually keep this up, I probably won't watch season 6 anyhow because Wayne is the president. Wayne is stupid. Also stupid: When they killed off Edgar. WTH?

So far I've seen the first 4 episodes, which started at a blessed 8 AM instead of Midnight like the 1st season. That just makes more sense. Here's a plot update and some character forecasts:

Plot: Thanks to torturing some Korean guys torturing another Korean guy, and then forwarding the only words excluded from subtitles to some white guys in another room, who then made a phone call to another guy who was on the boat with The Man in Oregon, we know that LA is going to be nuked "today" by a middle eastern terrorist group. Finding a resolution to a crisis that only lasts one day is obviously the work of one Jack Bauer, so they starting trying to get a hold of him.

Jack, meanwhile, is still on hard times emotionally from his wife dieing in the last season. We know this because he's scraggly and because when he give a gun a meaningful look we get a "wooosh" sound effect. He gets on board eventually and starts killing people almost immediately. He goes undercover with a rather lame anarchist group (featuring both Squareface from The Rock and the nappy bad cop from Date Night) and helps them blow up CTU. (The daughter from Rosanne almost dies in the explosion. That's weird.) He tried to tell The Man ahead of time to worn them but he only gets to talk to Red Hairy Lady and Jerkface stops her from telling The Man in time. At the end of the 4th episode, we find out that the planner of the CTU bombing was given the order, date, and info by some lady that we're supposed to recognize (We can tell that before we even see the photos). I think it's Nina from the first season. I'm kinda rusty.

Character profiles:

The Presidency

• Pres. Palmer: The Man. The solution to every problem ever. The epitome of what Obama wishes he could be. He's just got that voice. And those good hands.
  
• Lady with the red hair: The President's....secretary? I'm not sure what her job is, but whenever Jack tries to call Palmer, he has to talk to her instead. Very lame. I've got the feeling she's bad.
• Jerkface with the annoying, constantly purposeful tone: Also in the Pres's staff. Keeps trying to undermine the Pres and was just "removed" from his job. Don't worry, he'll be back.
• I'd also like to take this opportunity to money down now that Palmer's crazy freaking wife will show up to cause trouble too. She's like that.
  

CTU people

• The office decor: Better than Season 1's but way uglier than Season 4 and on. Good thing they blew it up.
  
• George Mason: Seems nice enough. He's gonna die "Perhaps within a day" so I guess we can count on him in case we need any Butch Cassidies or Sundance Kids. (Speaking of which, remember the time Samwise Gamgee did one of those? That was crazy.)
• Tony before he died twice and shaved his head: Seems fine. Needs a haircut.
• That Michelle lady before Tony marries her: Not really a big deal yet.
• Daughter from Rosanne: Just hurry up and kill her off so we can get Chloe instead.
• Jack: Jack can do two things. He can yell at people and he can kill people, but not usually in that order.
  

Hitherto irrelevant Wedding people

• Bride to be: Annoying.
• The sister: Also annoying.
• The Groom (and cousin just flown in): Totally a terrorist.
• The Dad: Terrorist. Ge with me on this one, good guys don't have bears like that. (Or he's an old Gordon Freeman, which is ridiculous.)
  

Oh, and Kim Bauer's here too and nannies for some weirdo abusive family. Not sure how that ties in yet. I'd be ok if they just cut her out altogether. And the Dakota Fanning knock off, cut her out too.

So that's what we have leading up to episode 5 (Noon to 1PM)

Getting your facts straight.

Ok, just a quick post here, but I'm going to drop a bombshell: Not everything people say on Facebook is true.

I know! Who would have thought that!? For example, a fellow I know from my mission is very torn up about the Health care Bill. He often posts derisive little snippets about it. Today's offering:

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them. -Thomas Jefferson

Yes, well, that's nice I guess. I don't like to argue with TJ, he knew his stuff. However, I won't lie, Imma bit of skeptic so I Googled it. What came back was a page from what calls itself "The Jefferson Encyclopedia" which stated,

"if we can but prevent the government from wasting the labours of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy." - Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Cooper, 29 November 1802^[1]

Note: This passage has often been mis-quoted as, "I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them." Ford and L&B have also slightly mis-transcribed the original text as, "If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy."

So after 10 seconds of effort we now have the truth. Or at least, what TJ actually said, citations and all. And what started out as a statement about the American People preventing government subsidies in general is actually a statement about the government itself preventing waste. The two are still pretty close, and Mission Buddy could probably use the real statement to argue his point, but I don't think it would nearly as easy. Crazy.

That is all.

Postgraduate

Observant readers might have noticed my earlier note about my intention to go into the Food Science industry. Or at the very least, I've changed my major to Food Science. Following such, I've received the question, "What is that?" or something like it from many people. Wikipedia says:

Food science is a study concerned with all technical aspects of food, beginning with harvesting or slaughtering, and ending with its cooking and consumption. It is considered one of the life sciences, and is usually considered distinct from the field of nutrition.

I'll add that it's basically Organic Chemistry with a food orientation. More specifically, the preservation, development, and enhancement of foods (making it so people will want to eat it). This branches out pretty wide, including those who want to make food more transportable/sustainable for those or need it, and those who want to make a food as delicious as possible as to make lots of money of it. I would want to be more of that first group. But either way, as the Western Diet gets worse and people start to freak out about it more, people will (ironically) look to food producers for answers. This means that the industry will continue to grow.

This leads me to my next point: There is currently a 100% job placement rate among food science graduates at all universities (excepting those who go on to graduate studies or professional programs) with high demand for more. Those with a Bachelors degree make at least $50k/yr to start plus benefits. Those with a Masters are around $70k/yr, and PhD's are about $90k/yr. And that's just to start. Did you catch that, Mom? No one will be starving to death.

So while all that is nice, what do I plan to do with it? I'm not too sure at the moment, to tell the truth. I know it sounds fascinating and that I'd rather be part of the "Good Guys" than The Man. But I simply don't know enough about it yet to make a decision. I'll working on some career research and talking to the professors over the summer while things are low-key. Hopefully I'll have an answer for that soon.

Now that I've gotten all that out there, I've received some suggestions of other careers I might pursue. I'll list and address them here.

Doctor/PA: You know, I'm really not sure about this one. I like the idea, but I'm just not sure. Either way, Food Science is a great major for pre-Meds and if I do really well, I'm going to apply for Med School anyhow. I'm not ruling it out, but I'm not making it my focus anymore.

Finance: While being a high-roller businessman seems pretty glamorous, I'm pretty glad to have given it up. This doesn't seem very attractive anymore.

Join Air Force and become a lawyer: I'm not really sure how this one came up. But I'm thinking no.

Become Large Animal Veterinarian, move to Oregon and start practice with my brother. We'll call it "H****** & H******" or maybe even "Kick @$$ Vets." There would probably be a show on Animal Planet about us. Of those listed, this one sounds the most promising as an alternative. High demand, good pay, lots of time outdoors. Not to mention all the time with cute, fuzzy farm animals! I only just recently discovered that horses get all furry in the wintertime! How cool is that? They're like giant puppies!!!

Almost-Broken Promise

Firstly,
Happy Birthday Aubrey! I love you!

Secondly,
I once made a promise that I wouldn't get a Blu ray player until Space Jam comes out on BR because that movie's awesome. I've kept that up so far, But something happened. The completely awesome Fantastic Mr. Fox happened.


Aubrey and I decided that we definitely wanted to buy work of genius. I figured the DVD would be like $16. That's how much new DVD's are on the release day, right? Wrong, they wanted $18 for this one. But I spied that the Blu Ray was $25! I thought those things were like $40. They certainly used to be...you know....a year and a half ago. I guess things change. But back to the point, the BR includes not JUST the BR, but also the DVD, and 3rd disc so you can make copies on your PC and iPod. Cuss Yeah!! So after we went and got tasty Thai food last night after school (thanks, Mom!) we went and picked it up. It's even better when you watch it at home because you can talk about the cool stuff (and, you know, pause it when you need to). Also, I never realized Dumbledore was the voice of Bean. That's freaky.




























Also, Nemesis, you're the only person I know with a BR player, so if you wanted to borrow that disc, you totally can.

P.S.* Just as a note: No, we didn't buy a BR player. We just bought the disc.

So yes, I went on dates, then I got engaged, then…

…Yes, I did get married. For anyone that might not have had a chance to ask me how it is, I’ll tell you the same thing I tell everyone else: It’s great. Two thumbs up!

That was over two months ago now. Life is sort of calming down now. Actually, that’s a lie; it’s pretty wild and crazy all the time. Those people that told me I’d have more free time after I got married were full of it. My brother Dave was the only one who gave it to me straight. Last month Aubrey and I were hometeaching* and someone asked us “what we do for fun” and neither of us had anything to say. After a few seconds I managed to say, “Sit on the couch for a minute?” But then I realized this might also include the things I’d like to do for fun, such as riding my bike and snowshoeing.

As for the things that have been keeping me busy, it’s just the same ol’ stuff.

- We’re still in the process of getting our apartment into “Home Mode,” but we’ve made good strides. If you look at just right angle from the couch, its looks perfect. (Photo forthcoming)

- School is still going. Side note: Don’t get married during school. I know I did it. I don’t regret it. I like being married very much. But coming home to homework when all you want to go home too is your wife totally sucks. A nice, no-homework post-marriage period would have been awesome.

o Another note there: I changed my major a while ago to Food Science. I’m actually really excited about it, but I’m not sure which Food Science-type career I want to pursue at this point. I know I have a very strong desire to stick it to "the Man" of the food industry, but I'm not sure in what way.

- We just got our taxes done: BBBLLLLAAARG! That’s all on that one

- Aubrey’s job is sort of in jeopardy. Not because she isn’t good (She’s the best little teacher in the world! That’s a fact), but because she only got a one-year contract and her school administration are kind of pussy-footing around on what they’re doing next year. So we're crossing our fingers on that one too.

But summer's coming soon. Praise the heavens...