California Dreamin'

I've come to realize that what I idealize about California is really not the California I live in.

Well I won't back down
No I won't back down
You could stand me up at the gates of Hell
But I won't back down
No I'll stand my ground
Won't be turned around
And I'll keep this world from draggin' me down
Gonna stand my ground
And I won't back down.

It's really a disappointment to me that I did let this world drag me down and now I am backing down. I'm about 40 miles too far inland, and saddled with a job that takes all my time and a commute that sometimes makes me want to kill people.

It probably did me no good that my first two trips to California were vacations... first to Disneyland in 8th. grade and then a drive down my senior year for spring break to hang out at my college roommate's parent's house, trips to Disneyland and lots of hanging out. To be sure, it was further from the beach, but I didn't shave all week. I just relaxed. This was where the goatee was born.

So I might still maintain that I'm a Southern Californian accidentally born in Washington State, but I am not a Monrovian, an Arcadian, heaven forbid a Glendorian or worse yet, Pasadean. (Granted, by birth, Rachel is a Pasadean by birth, but she and Huntington Memorial Hospital are two bright spots in an otherwise unpleasant city.)

I am a Santa Monican, a Venetian, Los Angeleno (but only the nice parts). With a much better job, I'd be a Beverly Hillite.

But those are not to be, I'm afraid. And so in this place where people have taken a desert and made their dreams, I have fallen short, chosen poorly and am forced to re-examine everything.

However, this is not a time to pity. This is a time to explore the possibilities that change can bring.

(Hey Google... stop listing me as spam. I bought a single share of your stock today. At $412 + $10.99 transfer fee, it was all I could afford. Thanks for then dropping $6.)

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Here Turkey, Turkey

Happy Thanksgiving.

What an action packed and quick weekend. I don't feel like it necessarily needed to be longer, but I wish I had gotten a little more done. I lost count of the number of trips to Home Depot and Target.

The weekend started with an episode of Lost. The nice thing is, by the time we stand around the Marian's desk discussing it, the next episode will be only two more days away.

I found some wood in our garage that was left over from another project and got part of the wall redone in the laundry room. Sadly, Home Depot decided to be closed on Thanksgiving. I think that's a tragedy, because it would have been the perfect day to do more in the laundry room. I made a great start and I love my new jig/orbital saw. It worked great, though measure twice, cut once isn't good enough for me. I think I need to measure at least four times from now on. But, I'll get more wood soon, finish the job and then repaint the room, put down some stick-on tiles and consider the job done. My original plans were too fancy and the effort and money would be overspent if I were to do that. So I've scaled back some and plan to do "good enough" instead of a fancier job.

We also ate really well on Thanksgiving, and then ever since then. Lori made a smaller spread than in past years, but we still had all the good stuff. Lori's mom joined us as well and we had a really nice relaxing day.

We also met with our advisor. In addition to reviewing how we should improve our home, he showed us two others in the neighborhood. In some ways, we're incredibly well off, considering. Turns out that a number of the projects we were thinking we needed to do, we don't need to do. And because of timing and because of the lower number of projects, Lori's starting to see the light on paying others to do the work.

Tim and Sarah joined us for dinner last night and that was really nice. They were dropping hints about thinking about having kids. Not spreading any rumors, but they're now apparently ready to entertain the idea. (woo hoo!) After dinner we sat in the living room and managed to have a grown-up conversation and play with Rachel at the same time. That was cool.

Today we slept in and didn't go to Sunday school. (We had gone to church Saturday night.) Then we had small group and got a bunch of cleaning done around here before having a video conference call with my parents and grandma because they wanted to see Rachel.

Then I had to make a late run to Albertsons to get cough medicine for Rachel. Of course, I tried to use the self-checkout because I'm impatient (anti-social?) and I got held-up because you can't by cold medicine without an age verification and Albertsons never has people over there by the self-checkout. Very annoying. (Another reason I prefer self-checkout -- last week we went there and I used the regular checkout and they put a 24-pack of Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper underneath the cart and I didn't see it and we got home and didn't have any Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper to drink.)

So now it's 10:40 already and we're starting to wind down and get ready for bed. I have no idea how it gets so late so quickly. Ugh... have to be up in 6-1/2 hours and I know it will be at least 30-45 minutes before we're in bed and who knows how long after that before I fall asleep.

Good night, y'all. Goodnight Google censors.

Next Blog

I've been hitting the "Next Blog" button a lot lately. I guess it's because I know that there won't be anything new on MSNBC.com, News.com or Google Labs and there isn't really much else on the internet of interest. I could make some more videos of the little one to post on Google Video. Or I could fire up Google Earth, but I know I'll just stare at Seattle some more. You'd think that alone would be enough to get me fired up and get on track with the part of Project Restart that involves me going on the internet and telling more people about me. But so far, I haven't. I guess I've been more introspective about what I'm thinking and putting down on the blog, and curious about what others are writing about. (I'm not mentioning Google just because I'm trying to kiss up to them and get un-spam-blog-blocked, but honestly, they do have a majority of the only websites I regularly frequent on the internet.)

I have to say... I haven't found a lot that I've wanted to read on the "next blog" button. Like me, people type a lot in their posts... And lots of people don't even bother with punctuation and spelling and stuff and that makes it difficult to read.

But I have been cheered to find that others are writing to complain about not having enough time to actually write. And others are wondering if they complain about their lives on their blog, will others care? I'm happy to hear that I'm not alone in those ponderings.

Anyhow, I have sat at this computer in the darkened kitchen long enough. I think I'll go have some milk and see if there are any chores that I can quickly do before sitting down with Lori to unwind in front of the TV.

One of these days I'll do another "120 seconds of lit" or post another picture (new pictures of the little one posted yesterday on Flickr, e-me if you don't have an invite yet) or do something creative. I yearn to be creative beyond home renovation.

Progress Goes Slowly

Progress on "Project Restart" has been going rather slowly, and we really need to pick up the pace if we're going to keep to the schedule.

Tomorrow we're meeting someone who will advise us on how best to spend on home improvements to maximize our eventual sale price. I'm looking forward to this because at the moment, all we have our own ideas, some notes we've made from watching "Designed to Sell" constantly and about a bazillion dollars in Home Depot receipts. Cruel trick... you can save the receipts for purchases made that improve a home, but Home Depot's cheap receipts fade after a few months to where they're unreadable.

I had hoped to redo the laundry room this weekend, but the timing wasn't right and Home Depot had to go and be all closed yesterday. What's up with that? I was able to buy a jigsaw and did find a huge piece of plywood in the garage so I did get a big piece of the easiest part of the work done.

Perhaps tomorrow after the advisor has come and gone I'll be able to convince Lori to accompany me back to Home Depot to get some more plywood.

We did de-clutter the nursery tonight. Now every time you walk in there, it just feels good. It joins the bathroom and the living room as having been de-cluttered. I wondered aloud why it took something like this for us to get to that stage. She thinks that people don't live that way. I think that it's possible that people do. She conceded that it could be possible and we both agreed that it would be really tough to live that way.

We'll do a little more sorting tonight and I'll move some more stuff to the garage tomorrow before the advisor gets here. But we're also going to have to start calling to get quotes on getting flooring put in for some of the rooms and see about what we can do for flooring on our own in some other rooms. But the kitchen, that's the biggest project and I'm really not looking forward to it. I think to do it correctly will require tearing out some walls and if you only count weekends, we've got something like 10 days left. That's scary.

Say it aint so, Google!

I love Google. I'd love to work for Google.

To my disappointment, Google's Spam Robots have flagged my blog as possibly a spam-blog. That's like a knife in the heart.

On the other hand, to get my blog un-spam-listed, a human being at Google will review my blog soon to make sure that I'm not spam.

So, yay, another reader.

Yes, Google, this is not spam. Useless drivel that's probably another fine example of why the internet is filled with mostly useless hot air, but not spam. I think my three or four readers would agree. (That's you, Lori, Kevin, Allison and Janeal.)

On the other hand, Google, I am all for having the word verification requirement on all posts. I don't know how you handle that with the mail-to-blog, but there are so many annoying blogs under the "next blog" button that if we cut could down on those, cool. (Another suggestion: a "don't show me blogs like this" button [yeah, too many words], similar to what you have on the deskbar.)