The Final Word in Caffeinated Consumption

So for any of my windows using friends out there who use Twitter, I have a question. Do you use a twitter client instead of the website, and if so which one?

Well Denise is out having dinner at a friends and here I am all by my lonesome - at least until my hockey game tonight at 10. Good thing I have a curled up kitty in my lap and an XBox 360 for entertaining fun!

As Luca Brasi once intoned, "May your first child be a masculine child."

Whelp, it's a boy!

From Assorted

My pumpkin this year. Let's go Buffalo!

 Well our new hockey season started out with a whimper last night rather than with a bang.  All right, it was a pretty loud whimper as it was a close game.  We lost 2-3.  It's strange playing with a whole different group of people.  I've played with the same bunch for so many seasons in a row that you just take some things for granted.  On the ice I think things will be fine.  When you're a positional player, even when with different people, your play doesn't change terribly much.  Just have to get a feel for my defensive partner and whether or not he's going to be more aggressive offensively, or whether he'll be more stay at home.  I'm fine if he wants to jump up in to the play more often as I'm a bit more conservative in my defensive play.  In the locker room one change was painfully apparent.  At the end of the game there was no friggin' beer!  Actually I've heard from other people who have played for this team that they are very much "play and go home", and generally don't have a couple beers or go out afterwards.  If true, that will be very sad.  That was one of my favorite things about my former team.

 Yay!  The defensive driving course is complete!  Now the Lizard will cut me a break on my insurance.  Woo!

 Well we've been back in Ithaca since about 9am, but after napping, cleaning up, and catching up on stuff it's just about... well.. it's now... right now.... wait, no back then, but now now.... right... anyway.

Of course now it's just about time to go to the defensive driving course part 1 that I'm sure will do wonders for my already sleepy and out of sync brain.

 It's our last day here in California. It's been a most excellent trip.  Yesterday's king crab dinner was very tasty.  Yum.  Today we'll have lunch with Denise's parents then go see the niece and nephews for a bit before dropping off the rental car and hopping on a plane back home.  We leave California on the red eye.  Sit in Newark for a few hours butt early in the morning while we wait for the first flight to Ithaca.  We should be back sometime 9amish EST in Ithaca.  Though likely we'll pass out as soon as we get there.

Dinner last night was awesome.  We went to a restaurant called Mastro's which was just fabulous.  I finally got to have the garlic and lobster mashed potatoes I had been dreaming of for the past two years.  I was not let down.  However I found a new favorite thing when we got dessert and had their Butter Cake.  Oh dear lord I'm not sure any dessert will ever hold up next to its memory.  I'm still a little bit full now just thinking about all that dinner.

The other fun part was that we drove to Mastro's in this!

Today will be a little more low key.  Spending some more time with her parents and seeing her sister Elise.  Then heading out to dinner with Elise and Steve to some Indian place.  mmmm.  Sometime this weekend we'll be taking the boat out to Catilina Island for the day.  I really need to get rich so that I can be come accustomed to this life style!

Updated to include proper spelling and link to Mastro's.

We've been here a couple of days now and its amazing how quickly my overall stress/bitterness levels drop whenever I manage to leave Ithaca.  It's been a nice trip so far.  Today was the adventure of buying a webcam for Denise's parents and setting them up with Skype so that they can see the baby and talk to it/etc. when it's born.  The joys of modern technology.  And I always love hanging out with the brother-in-laws.  They are a lot of fun.  Tonight we're heading out for some super-tasty fancy dinner, and the long fabled Garlic mashed potatoes with lobster and a butter fountain.  Been dying for this for 2 years now.  Tonight the dream is realized!

Speaking of which I should probably start getting ready. 

 The Sabres have signed Mike Grier to a one year contract.  He played for them a couple seasons ago (when they went to the conference finals), but they let him go.  No, he's not the guy he lights up the lamp, but he is a grinder, is always involved in the play, and never gives up on the puck.  He was always one of my favorite players to watch, and it'll be great to see him back in a Sabres jersey!

Here's a picture!

Sorry people, but I have to inform you that Armageddon is nigh.... Denise is pregnant.  Yup.  We're having a baby.

:D

 I'm happily using my laptop once again!  It's been almost a month since my laptops HD started making clicking noises right before its untimely demise.  I now have a brand new shiny drive in it, and all is well.

The silver lining is it gave me a chance to actually test the restore from Apple's Time Machine.  It went smoothly, took about an hour to transfer everything over, and all has been running just fine.  Nice when a product actually works.  It's also a good lesson in why you should do regular backups, you just never know when hardware is going to fail (or for that matter any number of problems that could compromise your data).  When it happened I was annoyed, not worried.  Not only do I have the Time Machine regular backups, I also have a cloned image of my drive that I make monthly, as well as regular offsite backups of all my documents and photos - basically the things I can't replace simply by downloading and reinstalling some application.  What can I say, I'm paranoid when it comes to backing up (well, when it comes to a lot of things having to do with computer systems).

So remember.  Backup.  Backup.  And then backup! :D

Happy birthday lady(seity1)!  You're even older now!!!

But that's okay, I still love you!

The front porch was cleaned, anti-mildew applied, and sealant and primer put on.  Since then it has not stopped having some form of percipitation long enough for me to actually get the paint on.  Even those days when it doesn't rain much at all its been enough so that it would ruin drying paint.  Looking at the 10 day forecast is not promising for the front getting done anytime in the near future.

Guess that gives me plenty of time to paint the dining room instead.

For those who hadn't heard, forgotten, or just maybe missed it.

Tonight, 7pm @ Rogue's for wings and beer!

Our living room has a ceiling fan and light now!

With everything re-arranged and the brand new front door it's almost like a new room!

Replacing the light switches(most of them) and adding GFCI plugs where needed took a lot longer than expected.  Still need to pick up a few more switches (miscounted how many we needed) and install them, but I think the hardest of the lot are done now.  This house, it should come as no surprise, is very oddly wired.  Figured most of it out.  Sorted out what I could.  Finished all the touch up painting in the guest bedroom.  Tomorrow I'll have to move everything back in the to the guest bedroom and get it all set up.  Hopefully we'll be installing the ceiling fan tomorrow as well.  It'll be nice to get all this sorted away so I can start putting things away and cleaning up.  Piles of random stuff everywhere.   I don't know how people can live in "project houses".  Just the clutter these minor ones has created has been enough to drive me batty.  Oh well, not too much left to do before it all gets sorted out.

Today is our 1 year anniversary, and to celebrate we're going to be ripping out our front door and installing a new one.

Home is where the power tools are!