I couldn't resist. On the side of my my hotmail account, there's an add for Windows 7. So I just have to click. This brought me to a page of the top-ten reasons to "upgrade" to 7.. (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/compare/top-ten-reasons.aspx) . #10 Manage devices more easily.



I hope Microsoft doesn't try to sue me..... My devices rule. They even look like 'the' devices.

Darwin Warning

If you need this warning, I'm sure that Darwin will take care of you.

Red Light Green Light

I've decided. A red light means "stop". A green light means " the light just isn't red". Amen.

Mac vs PC(Windows)

What is the deal with these ridiculous commercials for Mac and PC(or is it Windows)? I'm a Mac, I'm a PC. Well, actually, that's incorrect. I will concede, the guy saying "I'm a Mac" is correct. If you consider that Mac makes the computer and the , very important part here, the OS. So when the dumbass is saying " I"m a pc" , he's only half right. Because a PC is a just that, a PC. It has nothing to do with the operating system. It would be more correct to say " I'm Windows". Last time I checked PC meant Personal Computer. It has no correlation to the operating system. Granted that probably only 3% of the computers worldwide use alternative operating systems, this logic is still flawed. I thought these companies were smarter than that.

This message brought to you from my PC, running Ubuntu 8.04 with Firefox 3.0.3. Is it still a PC now bitch?

Point at people you don't like?

As seen on a seltzer water bottle.

Happy Saco!!!

This weekend was the annual Saco River Canoe Trip. This takes place in Brownfield Main, on the Saco River, and consists of camping, canoeing , and as you might have guessed excessive amounts of drinking. This was my first time going on this trip. Justin and Tracy invited Jay, Jocelyn, Josh, and myself.
It all started on Friday afternoon, after all the packing, and running around was completed we hit the road. Shortly after checking in at the office, we were at the campsite, with the first beer of the trip open (Even though the "first" beer was actually drank at my place).
That night we drank, ate, and played frizbee. We crashed probably around 10 or so , most likely later. Waking up at 0500 was almost refreshing. Something about sleeping out in the woods, it has that affect on me. For some reason, eggs and bacon taste way better cooked outside on a portable grill ( Along with a beer) .
We packed up everything, and by now the vans had showed up. Somehow the bag with my tent in it got misplaced. Bummer, I never found it, and no one ever saw it. Anywho Josh and I shared a canoe. I hadn't been in a canoe in forever. I used to go with my Dad all the time, and it slowly came back to me.
There's nothing quite like seeing people on every beach, camping, partying and yelling "Happy Saco!" on every turn. Greetings were usually exchanged when passing most were friendly.
We beached after several hours of rowing and set up camp. Which was weird, because I didn't have a tent, I ended up bunking with Jay and Joc. I guess at this point it didn't matter anyway... haha..
By sunday I was beat, and out of beer. I think we were all feeling it. IT seemed as though we went less than half way on saturday, and saved the brunt of the paddling for sunday. I guess in a way that was better maybe, work off the booze and be kinda normal for the drive back home.
To make a long story short, it was a great weekend, and I"m glad I had some great friends to share it with. I'm already planning for next year!

Dan

PS. Quote of the weekend "You're doing it wrong...."

Bean a Long Thyme

Yes, the title it suppose to titlate you into loud outburst of laughter and joy. I halve a spell checker two. So don't criticize me. Things have been going good. I applied for that position at work that I had mentioned when I first started working there. I haven't heard back yet on it. I do know that they are still interviewing people for it. I have a feeling I won't get it. THe interview was wierd, didnt' ask any technical questions, we just kinda shot-the-shit, for like 45 minutes. Plus it is different to get an internal interview. I mean, the interviewer doesnt' have to go over benefits, what it's like to work there.. etc..
I've been taking swimming lessons at the Y. A guy I work with is a life guard there and has been awesome at teaching me. My whole life I could barely swim, only if I absolutely had to, and now I've almost got it figured out to where you could throw me off the side of a boat and I wouldn't care. It's an awesome workout. Do like 1000 yards or so.... just when you think you're in shape. haha.
I've been laying of the drinking the past week. I feel a ton better. Have more energy, and more motivated to do stuff. Go to bed early, wake up early, get shit accomplished. I love it.
I took a trials motorcycle for a rip today. That's a blast. It was actually so fuckin' cool, that I would sell my dirtbike and get one of those.... It's more my style. I dont' know if anyone has seen the stuff I do on my mountain bike, but just picture me doing that on a bike that resembles a dirtbike more than a bicycle. I stil want something to ride on the road though. That's where it's at right now. I have a good lead from someone at work. Jeeze I have to write in here more often this thing is way too long.

Moved and Living

So , the move went smooth. It's been a blast so far. Closer to work, and everything else. Like if you go shopping and forget to get something.. it's no big deal, cause there's a store right up the street. I've been cooking, ALOT. We already had a waffle party, wich seemed to go over pretty good. Its sooo nice to not have the parents around. I finally got rid of all my boxes, so I"m moved in. I've also been the handyman around the place, I"ve figure that the land lord is going to owe me money by the end of the month.. hah.. jk. Just have to grab some more furniture , and we'll be all set.

Alive and just moving...

Lots of changes in my life lately. The new job has been going well, and I"m already in line for a new job, at the same place I work. Apparently my name is first on the list for an engineering technician opening. I haven't been officially asked yet, but it's coming soon. It wouldnt' be a lateral move in the career sense, so if the money stayed the same, I think I might do it. The job is more up my alley, not that the one I have now isn't, but it would be more of what I know and like to do. More engineering stuff, but with the practical hands on part. I like to work with people who are smarter than me, so I can learn.
ANd moving in the other sense. Jay is going to have a new roomate. Its all going down this Friday. I had to do it, Jay just woudln't stop bugging me... haha... and it is like a 15 min ride to work. Can't complain.

PS.. I have a girly friend I kinda fancy, but more on that later :-P

Rockford and Me

My Rockford head unit is dying..... WHat to get to replace it. ANy suggestions? Also, I started the new job. It's been good so far, close to home, amazing benefits.. yeah that's right, amazing. We'll see how it goes from there. I just finally got into where I"ll be working. And no , I can't bring a laser home.

Since Last time......and Adventures

I figured that since I haven't posted anything in quite some time, it was time to. Where to begin. Well, in relation to that post I had months ago, about finding a new job. I did find a new job. It wasnt' as difficult as I had anticipated to tell the person that I usually work with that I might not be able to work with him anymore. He took it rather well, and I was able to use him as a good reference for the new job. I havent' started yet, and I don't actually know if I have it, but I"m about 90% I do. I'd be an electronics tech again, but I"ve seen how this place works out. It will be different than past jobs I"ve had. Something to look forward to. ANd also, it's not that far of a drive. ABout 40 min or so. Which I can't complain about. It may even involve me moving to say , um, worcester. Who knows. I dont' know what the offer's going to be yet. But will see.
Today seemed like a marathon of adventure. I know a person who flies model RC airplanes. HE told me to stop by sometime he was flying , check it out, and you can go mountain biking out of the same place. SO I stopped by today. Had a blast. I actually flew a plane around for a while. It's alot harder than it looks. THese guys down there make it look like a piece of cake. WEll, I suppose with enough practice. I just kept getting my left and right screwed up, becuase when it's flying towards you, everything is backward, then away from you it's like normal. I"m just glad I had an expert hooked to my controller so when I messed up, he could make it alright again. haha I"m almost inspired enough to get one. I always wanted one when I was a kid. SO I know all about it. But it was like a dream come true to actually fly one.
Then the rest of the adventure included some mountain biking, starting at the recycling center in Sturbridge. It's sorta near 84. I head off down this cart road and somehow ended up at Bigelow HOllow. Which is not a bad thing. I actually rode there on Thursday, so I already had a map handy. That place is awesome. Then I took the Ridge Trail the whole way back. That trail is awesome. I"m not sure how it compares to other trails over there, but it had enough logs, drops , technical climbs and sweeping turns to keep your attention. I'd definitely hit that place up again. Maybe next sunday. There's also suppose to be a fun-fly, at the same place. I guess it's like a big ass party, but with remote control planes..

Game On

This all started on Saturday when my brother in law told me he had 2 red sox tickets. " Hey you want to go? " " Sure, I"ve never been, it should be awesome". So yesterday we headed off to Boston, took the T. Stopped at Game On, which is an amazing bar , let me tell you. There must be at least a million dollars in bigscreens and tv's in that place. The food is also really good. After eating we headed over to our seats. I was amazed to walk up to field level. When you see it on TV it looks like that place is huge. But it's just a regular baseball field. WE headed over to behind 3'rd base, because I know my uncle gets seats there sometimes and figured he might be at this game. He wasn't. We sat down for a minute in some seats right behind 3'rd base, to talk to these people we met during dinner, who actually had seats in that section. It wasn't crowded and we ended up sitting next to them for the time we were there. Which I enjoyed cause you have a way better view than the seats we had tickets for. It started to rain, but we kept our exposed seats. By the sixth inning and the sox only had like 1 run and Minn. had like 5 we decided to leave. Those you that know me, know I"m not a baseball fan at all, but I might have changed my opinion about it. I'm still not sure it's a sport, but I do have a better opinion of it than I did before. I know I couldn't' hit a ball coming at me at 95, never mind catch it. I'd go see another game for sure. Maybe next year, when the red sox start winning.

MIA

I just spent the last week in N. Conway, NH with the whole family, immediate that is.. mom, dad, the brother and sis, their respective counterparts and kids. A fantastic time was had by all, at least I had a fun.!! I brought my mountain bikes, which was a good idea. I did find some OK trails. I wish I could have had more time, met with some locals.. found out where they ride. Off the Kancamagus, was the first place I hit up. Very wet. Seemed more like hiking trails, even though the map I had insisted they were mountain biking trails. :-P The next day I headed up to BlackCat mountain, which was behind the condo we were staying in. Sweeeeeeetttt.. trails.. I found this sick free ride, downhill trail, hooked up with some other people. I wish I had a free ride bike..... Probably went downhill for like 20 min..... at least. Then they even gave me a ride back to the top.. HOw nice.. THere is some fantastic food in that town. The highlights for me were the Flatbread Pizza Co, and Tuckerman's Tavern. Zeb's is also an interesting general store, that has everything from candy to sauces to candles to toys ( I know if Nicole is reading this, she probably wants to give me a lesson in run-ons.. sorry, it's my blog. :-)
Of course I also enjoyed hiking, I wanted to hike up Mt. Washington.. but well, lets not go there. I did go horseback riding though. I don't really like horses,But I figured, you only live once. It was worth it. and the girl giving the tour was cute too, so I can't complain. Guess my horses name? SIlver. HI Ho..
TO sum things up, the vacation was needed, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I wish it lasted a few more weeks.

Brrrrrrrrrappppppp

So this weekend, I worked all day saturday. Fun fun..... THen sunday, I dusted off the dirtbike.... and started it up. I met Corey and some of his friends out in Millbury. Corey was on call, and guess what?? He got called. SHit, he was the tour guide. That left me and his friends to go exploring. WE rode for about an hour and half or so...... SOme pretty decent trails, open.. on the power lines... nothing extreme.. When I got back I called up the Corey. He was just about done... THe other people I went riding with were pretty laid back, and friendly and all... but they had been riding since ten and headed out. SO I grabbed a sandwich, and hung out.. Corey showed up.. Then we did some serious riding.... He took me down these train tracks... it was kinda sketchy. in between roads.... houses...... to this gnarly sandpit.... OH.... I forgot how much fun it is to ride in a pit... 3 rd.. pinned.... and just rippin' around.... go straight up then blow it around.... god... I love that shit!! Some serious drops off the top trail into the pit.... I wanted to hit one up. but it was gettting' crowded..and I didn't want to land on top of someone . SO We ended up riding for like 2 1/2 hours.... I was beat.... ANd we outwitted the po po too!! haha..

I bet you never noticed this!!!

So I just renewed my registration for my truck. ANyone ever read the instructions that come with the little sticker? Of course I'll be the only one amused by this, but I'm posting it anyway. First I draw your attention to "Step A".. . clean number plate...". NOw I draw your attention to "Step D" ... on REAR number plate".. That sucks.. I just cleaned off the front number plate..NO wonder there wasn't a sticker there already!! Brilliant!!

PS

In regards to the last post I put up... WE got these free jeiger shirts . Awesome. After washing mine, I read it, to find out, it's from the 2005 tour........ Check out that shit Jay.. hhahahah... NO wonder they're free!!! I guess we have to go next year, to get a shirt from this year... haha

No one bit me!!

Alright, so Friday I took the day off, packed up the grill, and went to sounds of the underground with Jay. There was suppose to be 4 of us.. but hey, what's wrong with canceling at the last minute? So it was just the two of us. I've never tailgated before, it's a blast. About the grill, I borrowed one of those pop-up grills with the cooler underneath. People would stop by and ask about it, say it was cool., ask a bunch of questions.... you'd have thought I parked the spaceshuttle over there by the reactions I was getting. I'd love to do that again. Gwar puts on quite the show. You could tell who was in front by the color of their hair and clothes. They were spraying this blue and red shit all over the place. Then they killed the president, and a hungry dinosaur started eating the band members! And what outrages costumes! Talk about rockin' out with your cock out! haha.. (only Jay will get that) After gwar, we hit up the tailgate again, and got refreshed, cooled off, and fueled up for the next three bands, in flames, as I lay dying, and , yes my fav... Killswitch. I lost my favorite pantera hat somewhere(I'll get back to that in a minute) . It was great. Killswitch did a cover of "Eye of the Tiger" that was cool. Those guys fuckin' rock. I was hoping for a few new ones, but they didn't play any. Back to my hat, I lost it in a mosh somewhere, and after everyone started leaving, I started searching. Everyone was picking up hats and putting them in a big pile.My hat was nowhere to be found. I gave up, Jay told me to forget it. On the way out......... There it was... no where near where I lost it..

Lessons, Retirement

Seems I only ever write about my weekends in here. WEll, I'm not going to change that now. I spent this weekend out in Newburyport, MA. On the ride up we stopped by the Kittery trading post. That made me just want to take up some new sports. My uncle retired, we had a big bash for him. I stayed at my cousin's house, wish is just amazing to say the least. I havent' seen any of my relatives from out there in years to be honest, so it was nice to see them. That was saturday. Sunday involved all of us going downtown. There is some nifty stores down there, let me tell you. I got a new life is good shirt, at the life is good store. I went jogging down by the water. That was awesome. I think a ran a little slow so I could also enjoy the houses. There 's some beauties out there. I never really paid attention to any of that when I was younger. Now I think it's pretty darn cool. haha. I never would have guessed that. IT's just amazing how fast people grow up though. THe last time I saw my cousin's kids, they were little, now they're almost as tall as me. Where did it go?
Two fridays ago I spent a few hours with a friend of my dads, whom I" also known since I was younger. He's an amazing piano player. He sorta gave me a lesson. I've always been at this point where it seems I just can't get any better no matter how hard I try. To me, I can hear what is wrong, but I just dont' know how to fix it, or it doesn't sound like what the music tells me it should sound like, but I dont' know how to play it like that. So hopefully a lesson here and there will give me some inspiration and make my playing more enjoyable!

Mt.Os erruption

What a fantastic time saturday. Jim had this cookout, cookin, out, in , out.. It all depended on the weather. ANd somehow I ended up cooking, but I love doing that anyway. Anywho, Boccee ball, was interesting. We had to be careful with them, cause I think Jim wanted to bring them back to the store? I dont 'know if he did. It was nice to see all of Jims old friends, whom I've gotten to know over the years. I took a couple of motorcycles for a ride. I've never ridden a street bike before, and here I am, trying out a cruiser and a rice rocket on the same day within minutes of eachother. I"d love to get a bike. Probably a cruiser though. I think a good time was had by all. The trip to the carnival, that was intersting. The usual St. Mary's carnival. except with all sorts of beer and alchohol involved. I tried to play sweet with this lady there so we could get a ride back to jims, That didnt' pan out.
Of course no trip to the carnival is complete without a stop at the Female Review at Robbies' Place. Hmm. I think I almost wanted to get kicked out, just so I could say I got kicked out, of a bar in ware! It was definitly a fun, interesting time. Everyone else went back to jim's, Me being determined to a get a ride from that lady we ran into earlier, ended up walking over to Gabe's, with Pete, that girl and her friend. Needless to say that didnt' work out. I'm sure Pete would have loved the ride. What a long walk......
I'm a little fuzzy on what happend after that, I do remember talking with a few other people, then it was like 03:30, and there was not place left to sleep so I went home....

PS.. Putting Mentos into Soda does work!!!!! More experiments are needed!!

Hard Tale

Jeeze, finally slowing down after this weekend. Friday night over Jay's new place. FUn with Stella and cards. yum. That apartment rocks!! I wish I wanted to move to worcester. Then saturday night went out to the Huke Lau, it was good . My friend had a little graduation get together there. THe prime rib was good. Got to see some of my old friends, wich it seems we all have different schedules lately so we never hang out.
Sunday brought on a busy schedule too. It actually involved me having breakfast twice, but that's ok. A bowl of oatmeal is no substitute for a ham and egg sandwich at the local restaurant with good company. Then I was offf to Holyoke , Josh and I went biking in hadley. The weather was nice, overcast, but cool and comfortable. Good riding weather. and it wasn't as greasy as I thought it was going to be. I just need to study the map of that place a little better. Everytime I go there I"m usually following someone, so I get lost easily on my own. That place freakin' rocks though. It was interesting , cause it's the first time I've road a hard tail off road in like a year. Totally different. I"m not going to go into explaining it hear. It's still just as fun!!! And that of course ended with hitting the Moan' and Dove for some exceptional brews.