Wednesday, August 31, 2005

What Part of "Crush" Don't You Understand???

I was at work until 9:30 last night getting a job ready to go. Two of the items on the run were new ones, that have an opening cut into the tops of them, for a distributor who our salesman calls "the Mister Magoo of packaging" LOL!!! Anyway, I'd told 'em from the beginning that we don't do that type of thing on this type of run, and the response I kept getting was "just run it, we'll "crush cut" the opening into it. I (and Sammy and Rafael) both keep contending its going to look like shit if you try that.
Anyway, when I finally got in to work this morning (8:20 instead of six, anyway) the first thing I hear is the plant manager saying they couldn't run the job because its crushing the parts, and it looks like shit!!! ROLLEN' MY FUCKIN' EYES!!! Actually, when he started I was telling him "let me guess, its looks like shit?" Long story short, we end up blowing more than half the day messing around with it and getting the machine going. Glad I get paid by the hour!!! Oh yea, I talked to the salesman who was the one who said to crush cut it to begin with, and he acted like he'd never heard of the project!!! UNBELIEVABLE!!! Actually, unfortunately, all too believable.

I'd just typed a big old paragraph on how my sister (middle child, myself being youngest) is now officially homeless, and the damned spellcheck just kinda ate it!!! Damned thing. Anyway, here's the short version cuz I aint typing all that again. My parents bought her a mobile home and she got evicted from the place it was on for hanging around the wrong people or some damned thing. My mom gave her $2000 to find a new place and she and her boyfriend pissed it away. My mom has been trying to help her for about as long as I can remember, and I think she's about at the end. At what point does it stop being helping and become enabling??? Its got to be hard being a parent in a situation like that. My heart goes out to the both of them.

Monday, August 29, 2005

And Home Again!!!

Back from San Diego!!! Vacations are nice, but its also nice to be back home when they're over. It was a good little weekend. The drive down there was kinda rough, but we made it there OK. After getting our stuff moved in we went to Silver Strand State Beach. It was already pretty far on in the afternoon, but it was cool. Nice beach, very fine sand and no rocks, and very flat going out into the water. The surf was very light, but there were still guys out there with their surf and boogie boards!!! The older went out pretty far several times, while the younger played in the sand with me quite a bit.

The next day we went to Sea World after breakfast, and stayed there all day!!! Me and the older went on the Atlantis water coaster, a smallish coaster, but fairly innovative. It has an elevator that the boats go up in at one point, very unexpected. They have a great penguin exhibit. Got to see the dolphin show, and get right down in the front row for the Shamu show. Not the best for viewing, but we did manage to get soaked, which was the main purpose behind sitting there. That brings me to another point I wanted to make mention of, on both the Atlantis coaster and the Shamu show, there was a group of black people, and they put on ponchos before!!! I don't get it, why would you sit in the "splash zone" and do something like that??? To me, its like taking an umbrella into the shower!!! Anyway, we stayed until 10:00 when they did the firework show. The poor younger one was so tired he would hardly stop crying the whole time we were going out into the parking lot. He had such a fun time though!!! I'm glad we got to go.

The main reason I didn't go down there on Friday and come back Monday was I had a physical therapy session scheduled that afternoon, but then I went and completely forgot about it!!! I did the same thing last Friday too!!! Guess I can't have an appointment in the afternoon and expect to make it!!!

On Saturday morning before we left, I went ahead and shaved my head down to skin. I've been wanting to do that for a while. It doesn't feel exactly like I thought it was going to. I think I've gotten that out of my system now, it took a lot of work to do, and it'll be a lot to maintain. Just had to try it, though!!! I think it would look pretty good, if my scalp were to get tanned so it matched everything else up there!!!

Thursday, August 25, 2005

Back to School

Today was my first day back at school, Fullerton College. There were hardly any people in the beginning class, and a good amount in the advanced class. I wasn't sure how it was going to go for me, because I haven't been able to log in online. Primarily because I forgot my password, and every time I attempted to do a recovery it was not sent, even though they said it was. I went to admissions, and they had a bank of computers there to register on. Amazement of amazements, I finally remembered my password!!! Got signed up and turned in my application. Back in the classroom, I checked my E-mail and had the confirmation there. OK, great, now to sign up for my class. Went to log on to do that, and it can use either your student ID number (from last year) or your SSN, and use your birthdate as the password. I tried both, and neither would work. Tried using my old password, and that didn't work either. After three tries, I wouldn't let me try again. Grrrrrr..... The instructor gave us our first project, and I got the main part drawn, but I wasn't able to save it because I wasn't logged on. Oh well.

Got home and played a little RuneScape, finished off the dragon slayer quest. I've been working on it for the last three nights. Now I've only got one free play quest left... with my primary character anyway. I'm getting a membership for my firstborn, and may end up getting one for myself, too.

Saturday we're leaving for a little road trip vacation down to San Diego. I put in a request for a vacation day Monday a couple weeks ago, and haven't heard a thing about it. I hope they haven't forgotten, but I have a feeling that they probably have. Typical of my work. Anyway, I'm looking forward to it!!!

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

The News at 10

Well, here it is Wednesday night and I haven't blogged since Sunday... Here's some of the high points of my last few days:

Monday I managed to get two jobs programmed and ran on my Fadal CNC machine. I feel confident enough to claim it as my own now!!!

Yesterday I had an appointment with my doctor after therapy on my finger. I waited three freakin' hours for the doctor to see me!!! I think that's the last straw, I'm firing her ass. I need to get a doctor who works Fridays so I don't have to be missing work to go there. I hadn't eaten all day, so when I got out of there I went straight home and had some lunch, and it was 2:45 by the time I was done. I shined on going into work, I aint going to be there until 2 A.M. and have to come in the next day at 6, no no!!! Because of that, I did have time to watch a video I'd rented over the weekend and hadn't watched yet. "How to Kill Your Neigbor's Dog" it's called, and it was in the comedy section. I didn't find it that funny. Not enough dog killing for my tastes I suppose.

My eldest son got the results from his standardized tests in the mail the other day. Either the test sets its sights really low, or he's quite sharp. Four 100%'s, and the lowest he had was 80% on statistics, data analysis and probability.

While I was at the doctors yesterday, a guy was next door cutting overgrowth back, and he asked my wife if she wanted him to cut back some of ours too. Of course she said yes, and he did quite a bit!!! I said, "he did all that and you didn't offer him a drink or some pussy or anything???" LOL!!!

Sunday, August 21, 2005

Sounds bad, butt its true...

Something I failed to mention in my previous post, its going to sound bad after going out for a "boys night out", but MY ASS IS SORE!!! LMAO!!! Those go-carts have no padding on the seat areas. Talked to Sammy today, and he said he feels like he's got an indian burn on the top of his ass crack!!! And I'm bruised on the middle of my spine, both my shoulder blades, upper arm and the inside of my knee!!! But mostly my upper ass crack.

Went down to my parent's house today, they bought my whole family lunch at this burger joint, Paul's Place. It has a large covered patio with lots of plants for a dining area, and they serve very generous portions. I had a carne asada taco salad, and could only eat about half of it. Got back to their house and skinned my boys and my own head again, probably for the last time this summer. Then we went swimming. Oh yea, I also shaved off my mustache this morning. (how you like that, Lilly??? Look a bit less satanic??? LOL) Check my new look out here!!! Actually looks alot like my nephew did last time I saw him, I think. Wonder if he still looks the same, I haven't seen him in too long.

Speed, Heavy Balls and Live Music

As promised, my good friend Sammy took me out last night for a boys night out. We started out by going to a go-cart track in Carson near the Goodyear blimp airport that I've seen forever but had never been to. It was fairly awesome, we had a lot of fun. The carts could have been more powerful, and in better repair, but it was great. There's an oval slick track, a turbo track, bumper carts, and a big track (super track, I think they called it). We got 90 minute wristbands, but they let us go on one after they'd expired. We ended up going on 7 different races, and kept it pretty even. Going into the last one we were 3 and 3, and I won the last one, but it wasn't really a clean win so I didn't want to claim it. Kept us even too!!! After that we went back to his house, and I was hearing live music being played, and it sounded pretty good. We discussed going and finding where it was coming from, but we wanted to hit a bowling alley too, and it was getting late. (The go-carting was planned, but the bowling was spontaneous, even tho we'd discussed going bowling sometime) We went and bowled 2 games, which I took him both games, which kind of surprised me. Neither of the games was real high scoring for me, but he was showing me technique, so I wasn't playing my usual game. Of course, we'd both had some to drink. I don't even remember the scores, but I was at 99 going into the 10th frame where I spared, then got 6 or 7 more. What does that make, 115 or something??? They were closing soon, but we stopped in the bar and listened to part of one karoke song. Sammy had told me about how it was all black people in there when he'd gotten beers for us and was saying I should go in and sing something. I said, "yea, but what would I sing??? I know, I'll do Lou Reed's "Take a Walk on the Wild Side"!!! You know, I'd be singing, "and the colored girls go...." LMAO!!! Got back to his place again, around 1:30 or 2 maybe, and the live music is still going on, so we decided to go check it out. It was coming from the church across the street. I said, "its gotta be Methodists, because Baptists don't swing like that!!!" I figured it was going to be a youth dance or something. There were 4 guys at a table outside and we asked if we could go in. They said sure, and we went in. Turns out it was just the 5 guys in the band playing up on the stage in a little gymnasium. We listened for a while, then Sammy was saying that the electric guitarist wasn't that tight with the rest of them, I should go up and tell them I'm an agent from North Hollywood and I have a guy with a Les Paul who they should try out, etc. I could not do it with a straight face. We went up and talked to them some, and Sammy was critiquing them and giving 'em pointers and stuff. There was no one running their board, so I went up into the loft and was tweaking the settings, Sammy was directing me by waving his arms around and such. They improved significantly. Sammy has a much better ear for such things than me. He got up there and played on the drums a little, and the electric guitar some. It was pretty amusing, we did tell them we were with Star Enterprise records. Ended up not getting home until around 3:30, which threw off my day and explains why I'm blogging at 2 in the morning!!!

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Happy Belated Birthday, Madonna!!!

I had forgotten that Madonna has her birthday on the same day as mine, although she's ten years older. I heard this morning about her horse accident yesterday. First thing I thought when I heard about it: I wonder if it was a "horse accident" of the sort that Catherine the Great supposedly died from??? Ah, why do I always go to the lowest common denominator???

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

Happy Birthday to ME!!!

I had a pretty good birthday today... Considering I had an appointment with my orthopedic surgeon this morning and ended up being at work until 8:45 to make up my hours. What made it good, really, was that all the people who are important in my life remembered and acknowleged it, for a change!!! Not that its a huge deal to me if its forgotten, but its always nice, ya know. The plus side to having to go to the doctor this morning, I was able to make it to Fry's Electronics before it, and pick up a 6-quart crock pot they had on sale for $15.99. My 4-quart one got broken a while ago, so now its replaced. Happy Birthday to me!!!

A few interesting things in the news I've noticed the last couple days. In the park I go by about a half mile from my work, there's what they thought was a cayman in the lake. Now they're saying its a gator. They're not usually indigenous to these parts. People had been feeding it tortillas and french bread. Another story on the front page yesterday was how the abortion pill has caused five deaths. My thought when I read it: Isn't that what its susposed to do??? Irony at its finest. The third thing I saw in the paper today, not a story but a print ad. The headline was something to the effect of "if you don't watch it, your T.V. will suck" referring to cable or whatever costing you money. My thought: If you do watch it, it will likely suck anyway!!!

Sunday, August 14, 2005

Back on the right foot

I had a pretty bad day yesterday. Should have known not to go into work on Friday, one of my normal days off, it started my whole weekend off on the wrong foot!!! Tried to go to the bank, and they were just barely closed when I got there. Drove to the AAA to renew my tags (already late!!!) and they were closed. Took my wife to the beauty supply to get her some hair dye, and they didn't have her color. I'd parked in the lot across from the beauty supply store, and the rent-a-cop was on my case about not parking there (even though the lot was half empty at that end) and I'm going to have to move my car. I sent my wife across the street to the store and got in the car and began circling the aisle that I'd been parked on. I think that pissed the piece of shit guard off, he starting saying into his walkie talkie to call the police, loudly, every time I was circling by, and one of his asshole co-workers came over on the other end and was watching me going around and around. That part was actually pretty enjoyable, messing with the scary rent-a-cops!!! Anyway, after a pretty much bust of a trip out I came home and started cutting the lawn. Got about 3/4 of the way through, and the mower started bogging down, then quit altogether. I took it apart, and one of the brushes was out of place, and the magnet had a little piece broken off. I fixed it up, but one of the contacts to the windings was completely gone, and, while it worked, it was shooting off large sparks and no doubt knocking the remains of the brushes to pieces. Fortunately, I was able to finish off with my weed eater.

Today I found an ad in the paper for a camera phone at a decent price. Showed it to my wife, and she elected to get it for me for my birthday in two days!!! I'm looking forward to that, but I'm going to miss the flashlight that's built into my current phone. I used that a lot more than I would have thought. Took my firstborn to my parents house, they're taking him to family camp this week. Then we went over to my good friend Sammy's place. He'd bought a DVD burner, and it wasn't working exactly right (well, actually not at all). I checked it out, and apparently it was just a couple of the pins on the main plug got bent funny. Straightened them out and it worked fine. He grilled up some steaks (HUGE steaks) and green tomato salad and onions and mushrooms. Mmmmmmmmm!!! Then we played video games for a while. A much better day today!!! Hope this trend continues the rest of the week!!!

Saturday, August 13, 2005

Not Another Blog!!!

I signed up last night for MySpace. I haven't done much to it yet, but saw it had a blog spot on it, too!!! Just what I needed, another page to update!!! I was thinking I could just put the same thing on both of 'em, cuz I have neither the time or inclination to maintain two separate blogs!!! If you're checking this on MySpace, you can check my other one here at Blogspot. OK, now I'm linked :Þ

Updated my Wallpaper page this morning.There's another for me to maintain!!!

I ended up going into work yesterday, unusual for me. Thursday evening I modified my first CNC program and started in on machining some castings, and finished 'em up yesterday morning. I tried to write a program do drill a bunch of holes, but something didn't work out the way I'd planned, so I had a day of frustration. Guess that's to be expected when you're trying to learn something new. Had therapy on my hand in the afternoon, or I probably would have been there all day trying to get it right.

Friday, August 12, 2005

Still Here

Its been a long time since I've posted (for me, anyway). I wrote my first CNC program on the machine last Tuesday!!! It came out good. I modified the program today, cleaned it up some.

Last weekend I went camping with my dad, firstborn, and my nephew (the ADHD poster chile, I swear!!!) at Lake O'Neill on the Camp Pendleton Marine base. It was pretty cool. Friday we went to the theatre on the base and saw Herbie Fully Loaded. It was predictable. Lindsay Lohan was about the best thing in there, although I don't think you ever saw her face and her skateboard moving in the same frame. Saturday we went to Legoland ALL DAY!!! I always enjoy that place. They have a new dinosaur coaster and a ride called the Knight's Tournament, that basically is a robotic arm like they make cars with with a seat on the end. Its cool, you can choose your intensity. Sunday we went out on the lake and went mini golfing.

So that's what's new with me!!!