i don't even know where to start

Yeah, I know that I write about being busy all the time, but this time I'm serious. These past two weeks have just about worn me out.

We traveled to Ohio last week for my Uncle David's funeral. He'd been fighting hard against some health issues for a couple of years, and has a chance to rest now.

We used to play basketball at all the family reunions; the uncles vs. the nephews. All us kids thought we were the shiznit bc we could run circles around the old farts. All we had was youth, though, they had experience and brains and teamwork and discipline that actually wins games. They whipped us nearly every time.

It was like the story of the old bull & the young bull, looking at a bunch of cows in the next field. Young'un says "Hey, let's run down & jump that fence and do the dirty with one or two of those cows!" Old bull says "I'd rather stroll down to the gate over there and take care of all those cows."

Dave used to drive me crazy when we played ball. He'd be dressed in blue jeans and loafers, toothpick in the side of his mouth, "Old Fart" ball cap turned backwards on his head. Looked like he was ready to change the oil in the car, not like he was playing full-court with the kids. He made me crazy bc he was always in the right place at the right time on defense, picking up all the loose balls. He made me crazier with his outside shot - it was MONEY. He'd put the ball up from all over the court, and it was the sweetest, gentlest shot, every time.

And he smiled past the toothpick when he shot, well before it went in the basket, bc he already knew it was good.

Thanks for helping me learn to look for the gate, Uncle Dave.

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Recapping the rest of these couple weeks....

School is slamming me hard this semester. I've got a week & a half before getting a small break before starting the fall term. These two classes have posed the heaviest workload I've had in the past 3 years.

The kids are all fully back in school now too. They're still happy about seeing their friends, and haven't really gotten too much homework yet.

Kid1 has turned in notice down at the Hole. He got promoted from shift manager to assistant manager at the ice cream shop, and got a decent raise to go along with it. I'm totally proud of the work that he's been doing, even though I'm nervous that the extra money might take his focus away from school.

Before the trip to Ohio, I ran a short triathlon in Reston. It was a bit of a surprise; we were out riding one morning, and found out the race was taking place the following morning. After a couple quick phone calls & emails, we all got invitations to race. I felt really good, but my run is still the weakest point. I've got another, more official, race coming in a couple weeks, and I'm hoping I can step it up a little bit before then.

This past weekend was top shelf. We did the whole day Saturday at the Buffett lot party, our group of 20 sharing smiles and drinks with 25,000 of our closest friends. With no recovery time, Sunday was Block Party IV. The crowd only measures in the hundreds, but we do our best to shut down the whole neighborhood. Augur treated us to another excellent show in the afternoon before heading over to headline Jimmy's later in the evening.

I need a rest.

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Here's a creative puzzle game that'll force you to think a bit. The game is good, the puzzles are challenging, and there's cute little toons between levels. With all this intelligence focused on the game, no wonder the title is about as dumb as you can get: Blocks with Letters On.

Perfect Balance is kinna like Tetris on a teeny tiny little platform.

One for the simpletons: mini-golf + human cannon = ragdoll fun!

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There's a reason some kids are slow:


The interwebs should come with warnings.

Superpenis!

(from EatLiver.com)

Jen sent a video. I watched a different one. The video starts here:


This is why you're fat. Mmmmmmhmmmmmm; breakfast pizza, complete with gravy, bacon, & eggs.

I'm on a Boat, Navy-style. This either a really good home-made vid by a bunch of bored sailors, OR it's a really good ad paid for by the Navy. (My gut tells me it was sanctioned. The editing looks professional, and getting footage from inside and outside the helicopter seems a bit tough to pull off for a video prank.)


A little pedo-bear, just for you Mikey...


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my give-an-effometer is kinna low this week

The meter is barely moving:


Again, with the crazy week at the office. The IT guys are still on a witch hunt, trying to prove that there are bad employees lurking in the office, wasting the interwebs connection. They're spying on everyone, and sending out nasty-grams to anybody who connects to facebook, pandora, or even BLOGGER! (maybe I'm using that as an excuse for my tardiness today, maybe not.)

(Shut up, Mikey, I said tard-i-ness not 'tard-ness.)

We've been trying and trying and trying to explain that the connection just can't handle the job. The office has a 7Mb pipe, shared between all 100+ people. As a comparison, I have a 20Mb connection in my basement. C'mon, my kids can do that math.

My entire day was spent spinning in circles at 100mph, and getting nothing done. I tried to leave early, and still couldn't do it. Working late without an accomplishment really blows chunks.

Outside the office, though, things have been cruising pretty well. A couple of the Fam have been visiting from out of town, and we got to hang out a bit to laugh and break bread, and then laugh at the broken bread.

Kid1 is back to school this week. Not down at the University, but here at the community college. It would have been cool if he figured out a way to go back to campus, but we all know that didn't work. Registering for, and getting his tail into class at the CommColl is the best decision he could have made given the parameters of his situation. Plus he's been holding two jobs all summer long. That boy just might dig himself out of the hole after all.

Kid3 attended his Freshman Orientation at the high school yesterday. He switched school zones over the summer when he moved into his dad's house, so the orientation was both to the new school and to a a whole rack of new kids.

The girls have both been working full time all week, rehearsing for the ColorGuard routines. They've got all day practice with the band, with a couple evening practices thrown in just to make sure they don't get too much rest before summer is over.

All the kids are back to school just after Labor Day, so you know they're just thrilled.

My school has been whipping my tail this semester. Heavy work load, combined with an actual degree of difficulty, I've been having to put legitimate effort into it recently. No worries, I can shoulder the load for another couple weeks to finish the summer semester, it's just a temporary PITA.

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It sounds simple, there's Just One Level, but grrrrrrrrrr ....

This one is a real winner. Scrabble, typing, speed, and pressure, all in a simple little game. Try it. You think it'll suck, but it's real sneaky.

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Hahahahahaha! From start to finish, they've got it mapped!

Toothbrushin' was never so much fun.
Um, yeah.... Jules, this makes me kinna UNcomfortable.


mmmmmm.....children in their tummy!


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performing on demand

You may or may not be surprised to find out that I don't actually compose the FridayWaster on Friday. If you hadn't caught on before, I'm flattered that you think I'm that efficient or productive. Generally, I collect things and sift thru submissions during the week, assembling them into this post. When Friday actually rolls around, I scribble a quick couple paragraphs as the intro, and *poof* thru the magic of the interwebs, the Waster is born!

Not this time.

We've had a number of issues with networking and connectivity at the office recently, and I've been over-the-top busy trying to convince our corporate IT geniuses that they need to address it. Here's the over-simplification: We deal with data on the scale of 8,000,000Mbits, and our average network connection is 3.5Mbits/sec.

(yes, techies, I roughly converted a terabyte to bits, so the regular people can comprehend the variance in scale.) (yes, techies, I know it's not really that simple.)

I don't get why they don't get it. I feel like I'm explaining to a toddlers that we need to feed the goldfish else it starves to death.

And I'm not on the "good list" anymore. If the IT guys know Santa, my Christmas is screwed. They're playing a lot of dirty tricks and implementing a lot of silliness, and just generally being an irritation. PITFA.

So I've been offline at work all week, and I didn't want to spend my own time on this. It's called the Waster for a reason. But now I'm at home, writing the Waster, and trying to get it done in under 15 minutes. I'm at about 9 already....

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Max Damage! I haven't played it yet, but the title is perfect.

And a word game for the erudite readers. Both of you.

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Jules has a doggy style suggestion:


Tracy! Wanna truck?


Donna found some stormtroopers doing the darndest things.

DING! My 15 minutes are over. I'm getting off now. Off line, sorry for scarring your brain with the accidental visuals.

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crying about everything

I posted a Calvin & Hobbes comic a couple weeks back that generated more complaints than any of my whining ever has. It was the one where Calvin was being all growed up, and Hobbes turned back into a stuffed animal. Very sad. I hate when I have to be growed up, and people hated that I posted a sad comic. Maybe this will make up for it. Calvin older, but much happier...


Work has been kicking my tail these past couple weeks. We had a huge project in the works, moving our entire server room to another location up the street. The physical move took place this past weekend, but that was the easy part. Getting everything to play nice in the new network was simply a struggle. Practically every dependency we had on corporate infrastructure failed. There are a few network people who might be selling BigBites or driving pizzas in the near future...

School has been whipping up on me too. Quantity, mostly, not the challenge. We're all adults in class, so it's retarded to have us copying pages of sample code from the textbook. We have jobs & kids & housework to take care of. Teach the lesson & move on. If the students can't handle it, then we're mature enough to shoulder that responsibility. Personally, my reimbursement is pro-rated based on my grades, so you can be damn sure I'm going to smoke every single class.

Stupid people earn a lesser reimbursement; just count it as part of their stupidity tax for the month. Lump it in with their 23% credit card bill, pay-day loan, furniture rental, and shopping at BestBuy.

We had all the kids at home for dinner last night; first time in a couple weeks that we were all there at the same time. It took a while to realize what was bothering me about dinner, but eventually it clicked: We have too many damn kids. Seriously. WTF was the idea? Once they all get mated and start spawning, holidays will be a freaking clusterfck. The FirstLady will be cooking a freaking emu at Thanksgiving.

I'm intentionally not discussing anything football. I told the Skins last night that I was ready for some football, but they didn't seem to hear me.

Anyways, it's been a long couple weeks, and I'm really really really close to having a couple days off. The weekend should be pretty low-key - just hanging with the fam & grilling some burgers & brats.

These are the circles that have been running around in my head this week:


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Multi-tasking isn't just for work anymore.

I hated these maze games in real life, I don't know why I'm posting this one.

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I lied. One little football tidbit. Chris Cooley explains the league's dress code, and the fines they have to pay for violations.

Surprise church car-chase. Wait for it....


How to date out of your league. Trust me, I know alllll about this.

Dom still has a lot to learn...


Ha! SpongeDog SquareHead!


Go for it, Granny. I don't plan on getting old, either.
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another quickie

My scheds are all out-of-whack this week. The girls are down in NC at their grandma's beach house, and the boys are off doing their own thing. The house has been relatively quiet all week. I wish it was as much fun and games as it sounds, though.

I've been working on a big PITA project in the office for the past couple of weeks. It's finally wrapping up this weekend. I stayed home from work all day today, but working late night tonight and all day tomorrow. Fun stuff.

I didn't even get to enjoy my day at home (other than adding jalepeno Doritos to my toasted PB&J sandwich for lunch). I spent the day working on yardwork and schoolwork. I'm sooooooo tired of writing term papers. Wah.

I finally got registered for a 2009 triathlon. I effed up the registration for the Luray race by waiting too long. I'm set & ready to go in the Taylor Love race, except for planning the afterparty. The finish line is right across the street from Jimmy's....

With all the late hours I've been working at the office, I've been riding home in more and more traffic. Realizing more and more that people are DUMB.

The other day, I'm on the bike trail, crossing a 4-lane 45mph highway, Sterling Blvd. I have a stop sign, and I'm not inclined to get smashed, so I've stopped. Genius in the beige minivan stops to wave me across.

Gee, that's nice, but there's another lane of traffic flying right past the driver's window of her dumb minivan ass. So I keep sitting at my stop sign, and she keeps waving me across, with bigger and bigger arm motions, the rest of the traffic keeps zipping past her, and the cars behind her start blowing their horns. After a minute, she decides that she'll be on her way, and gives me a huge shoulder-shrug while driving past. 100% completely oblivious that she was nicing me into becoming the hood ornament on an F-150.

Second pet peeve of the week - If you can't drive it, park it.

Most of the roads around here are comprised of nice, wide lanes. I hear they drive trucks on these roads sometimes. Big trucks, like with trailers and deliveries and stuff. I'd guess that the average lane width is at least 12' wide, maybe more even.

So don't drive in my blind spot, just pass already and quit hovering. Don't drive on the wrong side of the road when you finally get the nads to pass me.

There's plenty of room for both of us, honest. Unless you're driving Tony's big Budweiser straight truck, we can all fit. There's room for your 6' wide Hyundai, my 18" bike, the window tray from Sonic, and the dog from Vacation still tied to the bumper.

If you can't share that space, park your POS and call a taxi.

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Only one game this week, but totally worth it. Red Remover will challenge your brains and dexterity, as well as your will to focus on working this afternoon.

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The Smoking Gun tracks down the losers (creative, yes, but still losers) involved in PrankNet. Besides reading about all of their pranks, the best part of this story is the number of times the words "...in his mom's house..." are written.

SP (you'll always be "SP" to me) has some help with your online shopping: things to avoid! Stay far, far away from Robert in Huntsville. He's trying to impargent womens.

Doesn't matter... your job is NOT this awful.

How much do can you drink before you die? Use this simple web-app to figure it out cocktail-by-cocktail.

Barstool Sports simplifies things a little bit this week: celebrating candy & lollipops. I love a good sucker.

Sometimes it's really easy to spot a virgin...


Why is this news? Why is anyone surprised? Everyone spies on everyone, allies or enemies. That's just the way it is.

The 100 most offensive jokes ever!

Better than Roxanne's Revenge, the Fairfax Rap Response to the Arlington Rap!


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