I waited my whole life to 'arrive', but when the time came life passed me by

figure out where that's from and I will give you a shiny gold doubloon. Really, a doubloon. I killed a pirate king a while ago and I got all his doubloons, and apparently BestBuy doesn't accept them. Go figure.

It's T-25 now - I've got a big presentation at 12pm that I've been working on the past 3 days. I started Monday night, worked until 7:30pm - Tuesday I worked all day on this beast until 9:15pm (a nice 12 hour day) - and this morning I finished off the remaining two slides about 11am. Now I'm just in a holding pattern until the meeting - which will probably suck.

I went skiing this weekend! I had never gone before, so I was a little apprehensive - but it shares a lot of similarities with rollerblading (a fact which the wife has probably heard like 600 times. Poor woman. Seriously, if you want to mess with her, tell her you heard skiing is like rollerblading - but Im not responsible if she snaps and punches you) so I was teh awesomes. By the end of the day I was shooting down the slopes like a ninja...on skis? The best lesson I learned during rollerblading that I put into use was to not be afraid of falling. Esp because the only thing I had a really hard time with at first was slowing down/stopping, so I would bail out to avoid shooting off the mountain.

Anyway, the comics are calling - I will come back later.
Dys

The fish passed me by led by fish hooks, I hit pop flies and caught their strange looks

2 Skinnee J's - always eclectic, mostly intelligent

I may have received my funniest prank call ever last night. Tell you more? I'd be glad to! My personal cell rang last night about 7pm - as the caller ID said 'restricted', I figured it was some telemarketer so I picked up (my curiosity will be the death of me one day).
Me: This is Tom. (It's a habit from work, I answer phone calls I don't know with my name)
Caller: Hi, this is Jessica with the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office. We'd like to ask you some questions.
Me: (thinking this will be asking for a donation) Sure, fire away.
Jessica: Well, we've had several complaints about you hanging out at elementary school playgrounds and taking pictures
Me: (Laughing hysterically) I don't know who you are, but bravo - this is hilarious!
Jessica: (totally serious) Sir this isn't hysterical, this is creepy. We'd like to send some officers over to talk with you.
Me: (still laughing) Sure, send 'em on over!
Jessica: Do you have any weapons?
Me: (wait a minute, that sounds like a valid question) Nope
Jessica: And will you be home tonight?
Me: Yep, all night.
Jessica: Ok sir, someone will be by shortly.
[phone call ends]

Now, I laughed my ass off - but a little tiny part of me worried that I had made light of an actual phone call, and that the police would be at my door directly. I am happy to say that no one showed up last night to arrest me or accuse me of being creepy. The worst part is that I have no clue who did that great prank call or why - I didn't recognize the voice, the number was restricted, and none of my friends who usually do this type of thing were in on it. I called the usual suspects to congratulate them on their genius, but they honestly had no idea what I was talking about (either that or they have become the best actors ever). So, I guess it's one of those things that will come out a few years from now, and we will all have a good laugh.

Gone to take some pictures,
Dys

Changes in Lattitudes, Changes in Attitudes

Whew.

Physical therapy would be so much easier if I didn't have to actually do it. The heating pads are great, I like those - but when he tried to rip my shoulder out of it's socket I was having second thoughts.

I would like to brag on myself that I sent random flowers to my wife today. Random because there was no special occasion, not random like I put weeds from the side of the road in a box and sent them.

Why do they schedule so many meetings, and when am I supposed to get work done? I miss the days when I wasn't important. Those were good days - I could go catch a movie accross the street and not miss anything, and when I came back people would always think I was working late and they'd be like "Man, you are a hard worker!". I always giggled at that, personally.

[/randomness]
Dys

Take a ride, take a shot now

[10:00]Ah, good ole Portishead. I had this song years ago, then lost it in one of the computer disasters. I had forgotten about it until a random car ride, wherein I re-discovered the mellow grooves of "Dummy" (the entire album) and in particular "Sour Times" (the song from which the post's title came from).


[10:30]I'm not sure, but I think someone subscribed me to a popcorn mailing list. That's just evil, folks.


[14:00]While this weekend was enjoyable, I can't help but feel like something was missing.


[20:00]"This job turns young men old, and old men into corpses."

Saw this sentence and had to post:
[The game "Mass Effect"] With it's "over the net" capabilities virtual orgasmic rape is just the push of a button away.

I'm curious as to why the author threw 'orgasmic' in there. I mean, I would have totally got 'virtual rape' - hell, I'm the guy that a couple of months ago randomly used the term "victory rape" - I don't remember the exact context but I think I lost and I felt violated. But I don't know, the orgasmic thing has got me thrown there. Would orgasmic rape be worse than regular rape? Is it like rape and rape light?

Dys

the Sun may rise in the East at least it's settled in a final location

What a difference a bag of nutter butter bites can make. Before them, I was sad. Then I had them and enjoyed their peanut buttery goodness, and I was contented. In 30 minutes or so, the massive amounts of corn in the cookies will take hold and I will no longer be content. I guess I should consider this halftime or something.



So my own personal QOTD a tie, actually - let me tell you both and maybe you can determine which one you like better.
1) When someone said that I was in the dark about a project, I said "I'm so far in the dark that my canary just died"
2) "Work is so stressful I'm considering taking a part-time job as a bartender to cut out the middle man."



This SB:O thing has really gained legs, huh? Pretty soon I'm going to turn on the tv and see a commercial for it ("Give us 5 days, and we will have something to show you for the first hour: sponsored by the Nebraska Department of Tourism"). There's already t-shirts in the works. Hahahaha, I just imagined a great one - let me see if I can mspaint a rough picture of it.
While that was the first phrase that came to mind (I know, there's something wrong with me that I could whip that up in roughly 1.5 minutes), I almost went with "SB:O 2008 - Because we had nowhere better to go!".

Well, I'm officially running out of steam. I will post again, maybe.

Dys

wrap your world around me

I guess I'm sticking with the song theme - a bright and shiny penny for you if you figured out that the song was Natasha Bedingfield's "Love Like This". She has a soulful voice for a skinny white chick - I was quite surprised when I first heard her album Unwritten.

It's been a long day, although technically it really hasn't. Mornings are always stressful for me - I set the alarm to go off so I can get up at a reasonable time (either 7am or 8am depending on if I'm shaving that morning) but it's always hard for me to wake up. Most days my back has been hurting so I've gotten zilchy good sleep and wake up exhausted and in pain, which really causes the morning to drag out. I still get into work between 9-9:30am most mornings, and since there isn't an established time to be in by I suppose it's ok, but I still give myself grief over not being able to come in earlier. This morning I got into work at about 9:15ish, but my badge didn't work. Usually no access to the building means "I hope you didn't have any nice shit on your desk, cause you ain't never getting it back" but thankfully today it appeared to be some sort of mistake with the security system. Hey, note to employer - if you are going to fire me, do me a favor and do it at the end of the day so I don't have to get up early tomorrow. Thanks!

I've been feeling a little low at work the past few weeks - my old boss was never really around so I was working in a vacuum and mostly killing time (which sucks) and then in December I found out that I would be reporting to a newly promoted boss who was actually based in the US (even better, in the same office building!) - the catch is of course that new boss is a total 180 from old boss, so where I used to run the show on behalf of an absent landlord, now I am a soldier transferred to a new unit that already has veterans. I don't know if you've seen Die Hard 2, but I think it's safe to say you know what happens when a soldier gets transferred into a new unit. That's right, they get Tom Hanks killed. No, wait... you know what I mean. Oh well, I guess I can only wait and see how the chips fall. It's just a pain in the ass going from one extreme to another at work.

Speaking of work, I guess you can tell I'm posting in this blog instead of actually working - I'm probably just stalling out. I know there are a few things I can do, but see paragraph above as to why I'm the color of apathy. Maybe I will do a couple of things, then go to the mall and use one of these gift cards to get some new clothes. Why blog, that's a marvelous idea!

Dys

good times, bad times

(The title refers both to this weekend, and a Godsmack album Cap'n gave me a few weeks ago that I finally got around to)

So, here we are again. Me, my blog, and .... well, I would imagine that's it as no one knows I am back to posting again. Can't blame them for leaving - I think I haven't updated since April '07, so 8 months absence is a good reason to not follow a blog. I've always been kinda sketchy about blogging, as things came up and I had a short attention span. Things are a little different now (I'm older, wiser, and.... ok, at least I'm older) so I have a renewed faith that I might be able to sit down and dump out the contents of my brain on a semi-regular basis.

This past Saturday was the mass for my grandfather - I was accompanied by Carrie and her parents, so that wasn't terrible. There were a good amount of cousins. etc. that I hadn't met before, but I was on PR detail so it was ok. For those of you who haven't seen it, PR detail for me is when I walk around introducing myself, making small talk, and taking care of people. It's usually in a work environment, but every once in a while my mom needs me at an event and I put on a suit and go into PR mode. [side note - I think it's easier for me to do it if I'm wearing a suit, weird.] It is something to behold, I recommend checking it out if you have a chance.

After everything on Saturday, I came home in some pain from my back... which unfortunately steadily got worse. I ended up getting a tension migraine from the spasming back muscles and took a nap, but couldn't shake it. I can feel it even now on the edges of my consciousness, which means theres a good chance I will have had this migraine for 2 days. It definitely laid me up most of Sunday - a headache that makes you throw up is never a pleasant thing. The only real benefit is that I had some netflix movies at home, so i was able to catch up on some cinema. I watched 'Eastern Promises', which was a decent, fairly predictable storyline about Russian mobsters. It starred Viggo Mortenson, Naomi Watts, and Viggo's penis. Seriously, it should have been mentioned in the credits - you see it for a good 10 minutes or so. It had a few over-the-top violent scenes, but if you aren't that squeamish you can get through it. I'd give it a solid C+, and say if you like the genre its not a bad watch.
Since I'm reviewing movies, I should also mention that I watched 'Rush Hour 3' - if you liked the first 2 you'll like this, because it's basically the same movie. Let's be honest - if you watch this you won't do it for the plot or story or character development, you'll do it because Chris Tucker is crazy (even after he found Je-sus and decided to stop cursing) and Jackie Chan is a funny monkey (even though he is slowing down too, but you cant blame him - I think he's 74 or something). I'd go with a C - its standard Hollywood junk, but entertaining.

Well, that's it for now - I'm sure at some point we will meet again.
Dys

Open up my head and let me out little baby

For those of you who aren't rooted in the Dave Matthews, it's a line from a song I felt was appropriate, "So much to say". (Because, you know, I feel like I have so much to say. Get it?)


So, it's 2008. It's been a wild ride so far. I obviously can't complain about 2007 too much because I got married and went on an awesome honeymoon, got a new tv, and lived just a little more happily. I'm going to try to avoid a recap, and start off with where I am now.


1) [Deleted]


2) Thomas Andrew Kapes (my grandfather) died on 12/28/2007. I wasn't that close to him, so it's been easier to deal with - but not easy. My mom and dad are having a much harder time with it, so I'm just trying to be there for them and avoid any of the b.s. that normally comes along with associating with family. The aunts and cousins are already acting like stinking vultures, so there's still a chance I may punch someone out at the funeral.


3) My back is still incredibly crappy. I started down the path to get it fixed, but it's difficult - I'm supposed to take 2 different types of muscle relaxers (they make me sleepy so it's gotten off to a rough start); use some special medicated lotion on the muscles, which is hard to remember and even harder to follow through on if I actually remember; go to physical therapy (I do plan on calling them today to set up an appt, I swear); and get trigger point injections - which suck. I feel like I've been absent-minded recently and have a terrible time trying to plan anything, so all these things together have made me put the process off, until I woke up this morning in so much pain I was re-motivated.

Well, I'm sure there's more but I'm going to start off small. See you later, taters.

Dys