It has been a very busy weekend. I’ve not had the time to prep pictures for posting. I will try to get to it soon…

We have been hard at work on the new place. It is now fully wired for surround sound, satellite, and ethernet. I can patch satellite, cable or an off-air antenna into any room of the house. All cables are hidden away. We did a very professional job. Even better, all connections are tested and working. Special thanks to George, David, and Pete for assisting with this large project. It took all weekend to completely finish, but it is worth it.

 The electricians did a great job, and we now have a HUGE fuse box, that has plenty of room for upgrading.

Last night, we finished spackling, and sanding in preparation for painting. We still need to give the walls a quick cleaning, but we will be ready to paint this weekend. We already purchased the paint. We are painting most of the house in a neutral color, but the master bedroom will be a bit more interesting.

We also did some little things, like removing old window treatments, installing a remote control for the master bedroom ceiling fan (thanks dad!), putting out new solar lighting in the yard, and reseeding the lawn.

 Things are coming along nicely. There is so much more to do, and we still need to find time to pack! I think we’ll make it, though!

It is a great house, and we are excited to live there.

We closed on our house yesterday!! I hope I never have to go through that again. It was such an awful experience. I won’t go into any details, but I will say that some people are not nice.

Anyway, the house is great. It needs some sprucing up, but I’m actually looking forward to that part. Yesterday, we started cleaning. (left in broom swept condition, my ass!) Today, the electricians are coming to replace the fusebox, upgrade the electrical service, and add some new outlets. The locksmith will be there, and Permaseal is coming to give us an estimate on fixing up some cracks in the basement.

This evening, We are running wire all through the house… Satellite, Off-air antenna(for HD channels), and ethernet will be installed in almost every room. We’re doing it all the right way, with jack plates in the wall, and fished wire. I’m also going to run all the home theater speaker wire through the wall.

This weekend, we will be cleaning, and prepping walls for painting. I’m not sure what else we’ll be able to get done… Next weekend, we will paint. After that, wood flooring. Then many other things… We are really modernizing the place, though. It is exciting.

We’ll have plenty of space for people to come visit…

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This weeks theme pictures were so good that I’m posting 2 of each!

I finally got to take more pictures today. I was able to take the pictures I wanted for my current theme, as well as a ton of others. I took over 100 pictures today. Some of the best are posted in the photo gallery.

The above image is a panorama stitched together from 7 individual images. The really neat thing is that I was handholding the camera. I used a program called Autostitch to put them together. I think it did a great job.

Most of these pictures were taken on the beaches of Whiting, Indiana. Special thanks to George Timko for helping me to find the best picture spots.

The lat page of pics were taken while waiting for my parents to arrive for Mother’s day dinner at Millers Bakery and Cafe.

Happy mother’s day, mom!

My friend Phil works in the video game industry, and he got to go to E3 this year. E3 is the biggest video game trade show.Someday, he will get me in, but for now, he just tells me about it. His words (edited slightly for spelling and content) follow:

Sorry you had to wait for this. I have been super-busy, But i’m actually off for the whole weekend for once. Woo Hoo!
Read the rest of this entry »

The dogs went to the vet yesterday. I dropped them off in the morning, and picked them up when I got home. Howie (Shih-tzu)Â was just scheduled for his yearly checkup/shots. Molly (Maltese) was scheduled for a teeth cleaning.

Teeth cleaning is a big deal for dogs. The vet has to knock the dog out, so it is a more serious procedure. Molly has never had her teeth cleaned. She had some tartar buildup, which was expected. The doctor also found that she has many missing teeth. I’ve always thought her mouth look a bit empty. He said that it was a normal thing for a small dog. He also found something a bit more alarming… There was a hard mound in the back of her mouth. He thought that it might be a tooth that never finished erupting, so he did exploratory surgery. It was either part of a tooth, or a bone bump. He used a dremel to sand it down, and stitched it shut. He was not worried about what he found.

 So, now the poor dog is in pain. She has to take pain medication and antibiotics. Last night, she sat around whimpering. She was also treatin me like it was my fault. She would have nothing to do with me. She wouldn’t come near me, and stared at me with this pained expression. If you don’t believe a dog is capable of this degree of emotion, you have OBVIOUSLY never met my dog.

She must have forgiven me in the middle of the night, though. She woke me up at 3am, licking my nose. Today she seems much better, and she even took her medicine easily. The best part of all this is that her breath doesn’t smell like death anymore. It still smells, but it is bearable.

Don’t worry. I won’t post a picture of her mouth stitches.

My friend/co-worker Mike sent me this picture of his alter-ego: Kid Fancy!

He plays drums in:

The Thin Man

and

Highhawk

go enjoy their music. NOW!

So, the rain that the weathermen have been threatening us with has finally arrived. Rain means I can’t carry my camera. That means no new pictures.

I hope the weekend is nice at least… I have big plans for my theme picture. It requires a nice weekend… If it is still raining, I will have to find something else to do for my theme…

It always seems harder to wake up on days like this. When the sky is grey, I feel grey too. Or maybe I’m just tired. I stayed up to watch Conan again.

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Sent wirelessly via BlackBerry.

I stayed up late last night to watch Conan. He is in Chicago all this week. I was bummed to see that he went to the Sears Tower with Mr. T… And I missed it! If I had know, I could have been there with my camera. Oh well. Over all, the show was pretty funny. The crowd was a bit too rambunctious for my taste. I thought Sean whatever-his-name-is (from Will and Grace) was a bit boring. I am looking forward to tonight when Dave Chappelle will be on.

I Tivo’d the show for this week. I’m not sure I can stay up so late every night! I must be gettting old. Hooray for Tivo.

On another note, My friends Phil and Reid are going to E3 this week. I asked them to fill me in on all the cool stuff. Hopefully they will, so I can post the inside scoop!!

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Sent wirelessly via BlackBerry.