I am looking at the ocean right now.

This internet thing seems to be working right now, and that's exciting. Yesterday I got up at 4am and flew standby to Portland. It took us 11 hours of waiting to get there, and then we stayed up another 9 hours and par-tayed. And this after I went to bed at midnight the night before. I was so tired people thought I was drunk.

Some highlights I might tell you more about later:

1) A heated conversation between a United agent and a man who didn't know what his itinerary was. Overheard from the agent: "I don't have to look at that piece of paper if I don't want to."

2) A house graduation party with a jazz band playing that reminded me of "Jazz Times Ten" (can you get that reference?), except there were only six of them.

3) Giant, wonderful, green, and majestic trees all over the place. Also, hills and temperatures under 70. Laugh all you want, reader -- I live in Texas and never get to see these things.

4) My wife and I were the last two of the waiting standby losers to get on our flight from Denver to Portland. They called us up to the counter, said they could only take one of us, called some other dude named "Lechter" (as in same as Hannibal) when we declined, then re-called us when they magically discovered there were actually 2 seats left. Poor Lechter. Yeah, he looked a little miffed. Hope he doesn't try to eat us.

5) I just drank something called "Terminator Stout." Tasted like Guinness mixed with ground-up baker's chocolate. That's not good. Why do these people even bother with the "stout"? It's not like everybody's clamoring for it.

6) We passed a sign that pointed to "Namaste Vineyards." LOST aren't the only people digging up that word, apparently. A google maps search of "Namaste" brings up 120 locations, almost all of which are in the Portland area. This means something, I just know it. We also passed a "Dallas, Oregon." Very disturbing.

7) Portland is a really weird city. Really weird. There's tons of natural beauty, but also a bunch of urban blight. The downtown is strangely ugly, despite being bookended by a river and foothills. It's like they took Boulder, CO, stretched it out, and filled in the blanks with trailers, tattoo parlors, Trail Blazer billboards, and rusty steel beams. Plus -- and there's no better way to put this -- it's totally overrun with hippies, and not in a good way. I'm not even sure there could be a good way.

8) The ocean is peaceful, but it's cold up here.

9) The United flight we took from Dallas to Denver had an in-flight entertainment package that included commericals, Access Hollywood (which is really a commercial disguised as a program), more commercials, and an episode of My Name is Earl. I like that show, but it was the episode where Earl works at a fast food restaurant to make up for the fact that he stole a couples' anniversary money (long story). Whenever a sitcom features characters in a fast food restaurant, they always get it wrong. Managers don't just stand around and demean employees all day. If they did, all their employees would quit, and their bosses (the real ogres in the fast-food world because they don't know what it's like to work at a restaurant) would demand their heads on a platter because the numbers would be atrocious and the flow would not be controlled. You can't demean someone who makes 6 bucks an hour, especially if they're competent. That's management insanity on par with licking the merchandise as you hand it to the customer.

10) Sunset's in a couple of hours. I love vacation.

So We've Established There Will Be Internet...

...so I WILL be posting next week. This week has been sparse because of training, leaving my job, packing, delivering pizzas, etc. Next week should be crazy-good, unless for some reason I still can't get online.

Tomorrow I'm flying with my wife...standby...from Dallas to Portland, OR. That should be worth a post right there. Maybe we'll get put in first class with the creepy unctious flight attendants! It'll be great.

God bless you all.

A New Writing Habit

Everything's changin', peoples. This week, I won't be able to blog at work because I'm training a guy to do my job -- that's right, I'm leaving on Thursday! No, not Papa John's, I'm leaving my real job. Then, starting Friday I'll be in the Great Northwest for a week of relaxing, writing, and hanging out with my in-laws. I have not confirmed internet access yet, so it might be a real quiet week here (followed by a period of insane creativity from all the writing I did). Then, the week after that, I start my new job.

It therefore will become necessary to change my daily blogging time -- should it be at night after I get home from the Papa? I don't want to rant and rave about that every night (although some might like it). If I start blogging in the morning I'll have to get up super early, and that might affect the coherence of the posts. Don't worry -- I'll work it out. It just might take some time to adjust, that's all.

Lately I've had a hankering to skewer a Sweet Sixteen episode, since I haven't done so in a while. I'm having trouble getting one from my internet sources, however. Also, I still need to tell you about that Dwarf movie. I almost forgot about that, but not really because its images are burned into my brain. It's really going to be fun, so stay tuned.

Please stay tuned.

Ramblings from Last Night

I'm now working in Ubuntu Linux 5.whatever (the breezy badger -- what a South African native-sounding name), with Open Office.Org's 2.0 version. It's kinda cool, and the bigger buttons (which are the new default) really make it seem more like a "real" word processor, like Word 6.0. It still takes 5 times too long to start up, but it's functional and still the only way I can save something in Word .doc format. Oh, and it's free with no upgrade rip-off path, so I can't complain. You know, every time I say "I can't complain," the person I'm talking to comes back with, "It doesn't help anyway" or some variation of that sentiment. Are our conversations really this pre-determined? We're all a bunch of robots. Or are we?

Forgive the scattered nature of this post. If this blog were my daily LiveJournal or something, it would probably be like this every day. Thankfully, I'm better than that -- until today.

I'm outside, and it's too hot out here despite being nearly 9pm. I came out here for some Peace and Quiet, and to get away from the Dallas Mavericks blowing a chance to destroy the Phoenix Suns in game 6. I'll soon be forced inside because of the bitey bugs, I fear. Plus, a man can handle only so much peace and quiet. Ok, I'm going inside now.

Charles Barkley just said, "Don't call them WNBA fouls." That's an example of why he's awesome, despite his wandering mind and dubious sports points. The other night somebody held up a sign behind him that warned Kenny Smith to watch out because Barkley might eat him.

I looked up "Epth" in google's blog search and found some interesting stuff, including that guy who said I was a pedo*hile. This other dude provided a much more in-depth review of my blog. He caught it at the "LOST + basketball" time of year, and since he's not interested in those things, he gave it an average review. I assume he didn't read too many of my posts, or he'd see this blog has at least 5 or 6 other subjects it talks about on a monthly basis. I'll take his suggestion of improving my archives, though -- he's right, they are unwieldy. Ok, so he didn't use that word, but it he were a better writer that's the word he would have used. My wife informs me that she looked at the site, too, and that it was some sort of dating sight. I guess that guy doesn't want to date me now with my "average content" and all.

My wife wants to get me on a reading program where I read all the classics I missed out on when I was in school. I wasn't much of a "reader," you see. She said I should start with Where the Red Fern Grows and Tom Sawyer and Any Shakespeare Play and go from there. I'm starting with American Gods, which is not a classic but she's making me read it anyway. Or rather, I want to read it. What's that? Oh, and that's right, I never read Tom Sawyer. Heard the Rush song a bunch of times, though. His mind is not for rent by any God or government, that's all I know. Mark Twain is such an individualist.

The Mavs are just throwing this game away. They look like the Bucks right now. Don't they want to win? It's time for Dirk to win this by himself, and add to his German superstardom. Do you, dear reader, see David Hasselhoff at the game the other night? Is he the least cool global superstar we have right now? Why is he so popular in Germany? Are they getting back at us for, you know, the unpleasantness in the 1940's? Someone should tell them that WW II was their fault, and that it's ok for them to listen to U2 now.

I'm just really disturbed right now...got a lot of dissonance in my head...can't figure out what to do...can't stay on one topic for more than 2 minutes...should I jut quit and do laundry...hey, Dallas is within 4.

Do "Parmesan Encrusted Fish Bites" sound appetizing to you? Does something so processed even count as food? Is the nutritional label for this just a skull-and-crossbones? Do they have "Mr. Yuk" stickers anymore?

Today we ate at Gameworks at Grapevine Mills Mall. Yes, we were at the mall. Anyway, I ordered a BBQ Beef Bacon Pizza and received a BBQ Bacon Burger. It had almost all of the right ingredients! I didn't say anything, because I wanted to eat then -- not 15 minutes from then. As the waiter laid it down on the table, my wife and I just looked at each other, knowing that a super-quick decision had to be made. I just thanked the waiter and ate the wrong food, laughing about the mix-up. Does this seem weird to you? Do you think I should have sent it back and waited the 15 minutes for the correct order? If you do, then you need to expand your mind brother. There are things I can put up with, and those I can't. The BBQ Bacon Burger happens to be a mistake I can deal with. It's not like they brought out a veggie burger with extra pectin or something.

Well, the Mavs just won. First time ever in the NBA Finals for them! The Fatherland must be jumpin'.