Come As You Are

Your True Nature by llScorpiusll
Username
The quality that most appeals to you:	Empathy
In a survival situation, you:	Play dead
Your hidden talent is:	Resourcefulness
Your gift is:	Irresistible attractiveness
In groups, you:	Play an organisational role
Your best quality is:	Your protectiveness
Your weakness is:	Your antisocial nature
Quiz created with MemeGen!

The Sound of Silence

today was my first full day alone. and how sweet it was. didnt have to answer to anyone. didnt have to please anyone. just do what needed to be done. nothing more. and becauseof it, i had alot more free time. good times.

as for the days events, took posession of my uncles explorer for use today and tomorow. took chica to the vet for her first round of vaccinations. and went to work. i was kind of nervous about leaving the dog alone... but when she got back from the vet, she went right to bed. and when i came home while running erands, i checked up on her and she was still asleep. and after work, when i got home, she was STILL asleep, having never moved. so... twas a good day. though somewhat uneventful. but ill get over it.

on a side note, i have 23 bucks in borders credit. what should i buy? im thinking some newer stuff as my library is already well stocked in the classics? any sugestions? anyone? anyone? anyone?...

Beast of Burden

about a week ago, during hell week at work, the father of the owner of the company approached me and asked me if i would help with this salvation army thing that was going n the 23rd (today) i said yeah whatever. so i had to go to this place (which turned ot to be what apeared to be a church connected to a hall) to help clean up after what was billed as an "open house" but from what i saw was little more than a bunch of old people stuffing their faces.. whatever.

most of my work was actually doen to help the departing caterer load her van. i had to move a couple crates of glasses to her vn as well as an ice chest and table linens. i also transported 2 boxes of sparkling cider from one dusty cluttered office to another. i was then asked to help set up tables for tomorows bible school. but first, the floor needed to be vacuumed. i guess the guy that i was helping set up tables with decided it was my job to vacuum.. since he went and got the vacuum cleaner.. and then handed it to me. yay. (this is my favorite part) so i turn of this delapidated old hoover.. and a cloud of dust explodes from its bag area. i notice a small hole at the top of the bag area and a steady breeze coming from it. awesome. so im vacuuming with what is not really a vacuum cleaner.. but a vacuum recycler, everything that i ran over with it was subsequently launched straight into the air. unfortunately, i often found my face between the vacuum and the "air." i dunno what the hell i was ackomplishing.. but i did that for a few minutes (while the caterers wrapped up the food. YUM!) and when they were satisfied that the dust had been sufficiently disturbed, we finished setting up the tables and i took a few more things out into the van. took out a couple bags of trash and i was outa there. geez. that was not good times.

i came home to an even dirtier situation... figuratively speaking. blah! im done.

Emotional Rescue

all day ive been hearing about this new show on FX called Rescue Me. it stars Dennis Leary as a New York City fireman. ater all the positive reviews its been getting i have been curios about it. i just watched the first episode. it was very good. emotionally heavy at times.... but with some great humor mixed in as well. its not a drama, its not a comedy. i think they call these things a "dramedy" w/e you call it. i like it. its more real then dramas or comedies... since real life isnt so dramatic or funny, but more a mix of both.

anyways, for those who didnt catch it, Dennis Leary plays an NY fireman and is obviously a veteran of the job as the show opens with him addressing a group of recruits. he gives them a quick drill instructor type lecture and mentions 4 of the firemen that they lost on September 11th. the 4th of wich was his best friend and cousin. after the speech he goes and sits in his car... where the aforementioned dead friend is sitting. it took me a second to realize he hallucinates about dead victims. its kinda creepy... kinda sixth sense like. but the conversations he has with his dead cousin are pretty funny. aside from that the show covers the antics that go on within the firehouse as well as his drama at home. i recomend you guys check it out. thats all for now chaps.

Drive My Car

man thats sucks big time....
my friend melissa was in a car accident several months ago... she was on her way to school when she found herself in the middle of a 4 car pileup. she was driving her brand new 2003 (or 2004?) Toyota Carolla S. not only was she really shaken up about the experience, but she really loved that car. she barely tappedf the person in front of her... but the person behind her plowed into her rear. she had burns on her face and arms from the airbag,  and her back, neck and arms were sore for a couple weeks.  the car was totalled. it took a couple of months before she would even talk to me about it. pretty scary.
 
anyways, after a while she started to look at other cars that she might buy with the insurance money. she bought the carolla because she couldnt aford a tacoma. but she really likes the infinity G35 and Lexus IS300. she figured she could take the insurance money, and add to that money she has earned since and get an even NICER car. she was excited about the prospect for a while. then... she just kinda stopped talking about it. then, wednesday, after months of not even talking about cars, she asks me about the Audi website. i thought to myself: cool, she wants to talk cars... she wanted to look at both the Audi and BMW sites with me. i was thinking she'd be really excited when i tell her about the upcoming Audi A3 and BMW 1 series.... which should fall within her price range and still give her the performance and prestige of owning a German Luxury Sports car. i myself was getting excited. in case you havent caught on.... im pretty obsessed with cars.
 
anyways, she signs on earlier and she is noticeably upset. aperently she got a letter that the accident was 100% her fault.
WTF?!?!??!!?!?!
how can it be her fault if she was car #2 in a 4 car pileup.. thats physicly impossible..... her car was caught in a space smaller than her car!!!!! it was unavoidable!!!!!!! and clearly she didnt affect the decidion of the person in front of her.... nor did she do that much damage to him/her. i dont fucking get it. all i know is that she is distraut about the whole situation. and frankly i am both baffled and pissed off.  BLAH!

Sick and Tired

i just typed a novel and when i clicked post it "couldnt find server" so guess what? yer getting the version that can be found on the bok jacket.
 
last 2 days i worked for about 15.5 hrs. 9.75 on thurs and whatever is left on friday.
 
im tired as hell. sore all over. especially my back.
 
however, i did buy a couple CDs today. Contraband  and The Reason. good stuff. tootles.

Nobody Home

good news my adoring readers... as fate should have it, my job as a real estate photocrapher has once again brought me to the area neer the aforementioned Extreme Makeover Home. i promised you guys new pics, and this was my chance. as luck should have it, we once again have a listing in Penngrove, this time ON the same street as the house, but further away than the other house that i photgraphed monday. as it turns out, today was the completion day, and the family was brought in today, just hours after i was there. anyways, this is how it went down:
 
knowing that i would probably hit a bunch of trffic in the area i approached casually, but as it turns out, they actually had the road around the house completely blocked off. there were cars parked nearly a mile away from the house for people who wanted to get a look at the finished house. i didnt know they were showing it off. (this is before i found out that this was the day of the unveiling) so as i aproach i eventually hit a road block and the guy there basicly told me to comeback tomorow. now i HAD to get in :-D so instead i went around the other way hoping i could, at the very least, reach the house i HAVE to take pictures of.  but sure enough, there is a roadblock there too. i try again with my "photos for a real estate listing" thing again. this time the guy says for me to pull over as he checks with... someone. he eventually comes back ant tells me to go ahead, but i have to go in, do my business and leave. so i go in, drive to the house, take my pictures and pull down the driveway..... now i can either turn right and go back the way i came..... or turn left and head toward THE house. i turned left. luckily there was a huge bus going by (i guess it was bussing people to the area) and i just kinda snuck in behind it. as i aproached, i whipped out my work digicam in hopes of sneaking in a pic. then, as i turn left at the intersection RIGHT in front of the house, the bus stops and i am kinda stuck behind it. it is then that i realize that i can see the house clearly in my side view mirror. so i roll up my windows (to provide some privacy) and pic up my camera and casually take a picture out my passenger side. the resulting picture can be seen on my photo blog (seeing things under "links").

so then, back at work during our party i notice one of the poeple there has the blue "extreme makeover" tshirts on... and is notcieably sunburned. small world i know. i over hear him telling other people that they unveiled the house to the family... which would explain the roadblocks, the tour buses and the huge crowds of people. so... i guess the lucky family is, as i type, enjoying their brand, spankin' new huge house built specificly with their daughter in mind. i couldnt believe that i was looking at a completed house that was nothing but a skeleton of studs on monday. its crazy.  ill try and go back, when there isnt a huge mess of people, and take ssome descent pics.. but thats the best i could do and not get in trouble.

Bring It On Home

i read in the paper last week that a house in the nearbye town of penngrove has been selected by ABC to be on their show "extreme makeover: home edition." the girl who wrote in is aperently alergic to the sun... and her family lives in a small farm house on a couple acres of land. penngrove is the closest town to the Petaluma, where i live. in fact, it is the only town that actually borders petaluma as there is a "green belt" of un-associated rural land completely surrounding petaluma and penngrove. anyways, so i saw it in the paper and thought it was moderately interesting... which is probably what yer thinking....

well this is where it gets a litle bit more interesting.. but just a little. my cousin said her friend lives across the street and that ABC is using her land to park all their trailers and equipment for the constrauction. hmm.. a little more interesting.... so on monday i was suposed to go take pictures of one of our listings in penngrove. ive taken pictures of it before... its a nice big 2.1 million dollar mediteranian style house on an acre or so of land. the house is imaculate and pretty big. when i went the first time they were thinking of putting in a pool. the second time i went was to get higher quality shots because it was going to be in a magazine. the problem was that they had begun on the pool and there was a gigantic pile of dirt in the backyard... which kinda messed up the view. so on monday i was going to take more pictures... mainly of the newly completed pool. when i get to within a block (a country block mind you) i suddenly came up on an army of cars, trucks, trailers and workers swarming around the area... i suddenly realized what i had just driven into. as it turns out... the chosen house is reight nextdoor (if you can call it that) to our listing. the house, which i had seen and thought nothing of before, was completely different. i dont remember what it looked like in person as it was nothing special... but i saw the picture in the paper.. and you can kinda sorta see it in pne of the pics i took before. but now... it was dramaticly different... it was about twice the size, though still just a skeleton of studs and truces. there were at least 6 people on the roof, a bulldozer on the side and a crane in front, as well as countless other workers inside, outside and across the street where it looked like the infield at a nascar race. it was only day 4.

Beautiful Day

so... I'm at the game. and ken, I'm sure, would be happy to know that it is bright, sunny and warm. :-P

side note: the cable car race was interesting...

so yeah, great game. shmidt is owning the dbacks... and holy shit! michael tucker just hit an inside the park homer! awesome!!! that was awesome.

blah. they're calling it a triple and an error. o well... either way, he hit the ball, he got home, and the ball never left the park. so yeah, the giants are up 7-1 at the moment and the game is far from over as it is still in the 6th. I hope they keep shmidt in... they blew it last time.... ok, that is all.

She's Gone

nothing really new to report.. other than that i may go to a giants game tomorow. if my dad can get some tickets.

also... where the fuck did margot..... go? heh, margot go. funny. oh, sorry. yeah. her blog is gone. where are you hun?

Seeing Things

i have decided to demolish the illfated project: spitfire. and have replaced it with what is essentially a cross between a photoblog and an image hosting site. so.... it will have both actual relevant pictures to what's going on.. like a real photo blog, and it will have random pictures that i just needed to get online, to be hosted and used elsewhere. it is located under my links section as "seeing things."

Stairway to Heaven

update on the accident: Brett Callan, the 16 yr old who was in the back seat and suffered brain injuries died on Saturday morning. he had been in a coma since the accident and had never regained consciousness. criminal charges MAY be brought against the driver, also 16.

man that sucks. as if it weren't bad enough that the driver of the car has to live with seriously injuring his friends, the trauma of being in a serious car accident and the death of one of his best friends.... now he faces criminal charges. i really hope the family of Brett Callan dont pursue those charges as the emotional pain of feeling responsible for your best friends death is punishment enough.

man. how depressing. i really dont know what else to say. excapt drive carefully.

Welcome

the newest member of the family... chica. our brand new 4 week old chihuahua puppy.

Dogs

thanks for the comments. my sister is leaning more towards the grey
chihuahua... only because we know pretty much exactly how it will look
as an adult. the muts were nice and playful.... but we have no idea how
big they will get. my sister really wants a small little dog that she
can have for herself. and I think what she has in mind is a lap dog that
is small eough to carry around and stuff. and if the dog grows to be
like 15-18 pounds... I don't think she'll be carrying it around much.
and from how the guy described the father of the muts, it sounded to be
long and stubby legged.... dachsund like. and my mom doesn't like those
dogs. I'm not all that crazy about them either.

I would prefer getting the dog from a shelter or whatever... and we've
been checking regularly for months now.... but small dogs are pretty
hard to come by. they go quik as they are quite popular. unfortunately,
we never found any dogs that we were really interested in getting. but
the point is, these dogs are already here and whichever we get, its
gonna get fixed. my mom mentioned maybe getting the chihuahua to breed
since its purebred.... but I shot that down pretty quickly. I am well
aware of the mass euthenasia that's going on and I fully support the
efforts of rescue shelters and stuff.... but this opportunity presented
itself and it would seem to be too good to pass up... since we don't
have to worry about competition for the dogs like we would at a shelter
where hundreds of people have access.... these dogs have been offered
exclusively to us.

so yeah.

Good Day Sunshine

I am coming to you live from bakersfield, california. as I lie on the
living room sofa bed trying my damndest to fall asleep. but its rather
warm...
my day began bright and early at about 8:30. I still had yet to pack
both my clothing and equipment. so I quickly grabbed my bag from under
my bed, through in some shorts, tshirts, socks, and swim trunks. I then
grabbed the playstation, through it into my backpack along with all of
its accessories (contoler, cds, wires, screen) and I was good to go by
about 9. after we packed up our stuff in the truck we took my dog to the
kennel and headed out for sf. there we picked up my aunt, and within
about a half hour we had left for SoCal.

my mom drove most of the way while I either enjoyed the isolation of the
front seat and my ipod, or the dread of the cramped backseat and the
begining of shrek, our in flight entertainment.
I took the helm for the last hour.

we arived in McFarland at about 3:45. we took a load off and said out
hellos. I tried to settle in but the unexpected humidity was bothering
my knee. aside from that the weather was nice and sunny and hot. as the
sun set later the temperature dropped to a very pleasantly moderate
temperature. anyways....

eventually some friends of my aunt came by with thei dogs. they have a
beautiful miniature pinscher, the dog I REALLY want, but is not
available. the 2 puppies they brought, however, were for my sister to
look at as she has wanted a puppy/dog of her own for some time now. the
puppies were cute, but we are unsure of how big they will get or what
they will look like.

after they left we headed over to the highschool, where the festivities
were to take place. after staking out a claim in the football field and
having a bite to eat, my mom, sis, aunt and I took off to look at some
other available dogs. these, however, were purebred chihuahuas and a few
weeks younger. in fact, they were still nursing to some extent. the 2
they had were tiny little balls of flabby dog that barely resembled
dogs. they were cute indeed, but not very responsive as they were soo
young.

anyways, my sister now faces the choice as to wich dog to get. it would
seem no matter the case, we will go home with a new member of the
family.

which do YOU think we should get?
one of the half mut and half mut mixes that are about 6 weeks old and
prolly free...
or one of the purebred 4 week old chihuahuas for 80-100 bucks? any
thoughts?

Tea For One

There are currently 5 people online on my buddylist. 3 are me. the other 2 are away. 1 of them i never talk to. the other is at the movies. wow. how pathetic is that.

my sidekick just signed off. on its own. even IT has left me.

Babe I'm Gonna Leave You

i SHOULD be packing. but i'm not. tomorow morning, bright and early, my family (my mom, bro, sis) will set out for the flourishing metropolis of McFarland, CA. of course i am being sarcastic as McFarland has a population of about 6000 or so. anyways, we're gonna stop by SF to pick up my aunt and head down for their anual 3rd of July Festivities. thats right. 3rd. they always do it on the 3rd. i dunno why. i dont care. anywats, i am marginally looking forward to that. its a nice, old fassioned small trown corn on the cob type thing. meh. w/e.

we will prolly stay at either my aunt's or cousin's house in Bakersfield. my aunts house is nice, i guess. but there is little for us "kids" to do. as the adults tend to sit around and talk. at my cousin's however, he has a pool table/ping pong table as well as a pool and hot tub. that might prove to be good times. plus he has an extensive library of music that i dipped my iPod into last time that i wouldnt mind "sampling" again. that will definitely be good times. he has ALOT of freakin music. if anyone has any requests... kemme know. i'll have my sidekick of course so.. yeah. oh.. quick quote from yesterday as heard within there hallowed walls...

my mom: "emily (my sister) come unload the dishwasher... thomas, empty the sink (of dishes)"
me: "doesnt that require that the dishwasher be emptied?"
my mom: "FINE! clean the grill" (big ass George Foreman grill)
me: "where? its too big to clean on the stove..."
my mom: "clean it on the island" (which is full of food and dishes that need to be washed... in the dishwasher)
me: *staring at island*
my mom: "EMILY! THE DISHWASHER!"
me: "here, i'll unload the dishwasher, then she can load it, and i will clean the grill"
my mom: "NO!... you do what i tell you to do!"
me: "YOU KEEP GIVING ME JOBS I CAN"T DO!"
my mom: "why is it so hard for you to do what i tell you?!?!"
me: "I CAN'T PHYSICALLY DO THESE JOBS UNTIL EMILY EMPTIES THE DISHWASHER! WHAT ARE YOU SOME KIND OF KITCHEN NAZI!!"
my mom: "don't say that! that's racist!"
me: "i'm not racist!... you're the nazi!"
~my sister finally empties the dishwasher and leaves some dishes on the island~
me: "i can't clean the grill until the island is clear.."
my mom: "why weren't these put away?"
me: "because she cant reach where they go?" (she can easily reach)
my mom: "these go in the bottom cabinet..."
me: "well what are you asking me for?!? she was the one who was suposed to put them away..."
my mom "i wasn't asking you"
me: *looks around at the empty room* "then who the hell were you talking to?!?"

AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ok i'm done.