Roughly 9 months ago, I was informed by the director of the Adult Services Division that due to the combination of financial mismanagement and a Republican in the governor's management at the state level, our county government was being fucked up the ass monetarily and my position was being cut at the end of this year (plenty of notice, thankfully). Though obviously in somewhat different... Read More
Well, Minnesota has a budget this year. A budget that addresses a $3 billion budget shortfall by cutting $3 billion worth of funding to things like education, health care, services for the increasing number of unemployed and/or homeless people fucked by the failing economy and the housing bubble's burst, and oh yeah, jobs. But they don't count, because they're -government- jobs. Number of people served... Read More
My DSL is acting up. Again. For the thousandth fucking time. And I just don't want to deal with it or Qwest any longer. So I looked for alternatives. I have -one-. Comcast. Not exactly known for their excellent service or forward-looking policies themselves, although they're looking at least a bit better at this point - better speeds for the price and lower service/installation fees.... Read More
To be fair, it's a lot easier to meet savings goals when you usually make at least 300/shift. Then it's just a matter of working an extra shift if you had unexpected expenses. The only downside is when I get sick, then I get REALLY behind and stressed out.
Well, life's been pretty much the usual for the last month. Work, videogames, hanging out with friends. I did get to do my taxes opening day for once, as my work now posts all the W-2 info in the payroll system and I can access that from home. So, I've also already received my tax return and promptly blew most of it on goodies. Specifically,... Read More
Back home. Got to spend plenty of quality time with parents, grandparents, and even my grandpa's sisters, who I almost never see. Showed Up a couple times to those who hadn't seen it, to general delight. Got a crockpot, which I used to cook dinner a couple of times (Cincinnati-style chili, tagine of chicken), which both went over well.
God, we gave up on getting the bitch downstairs to take part in any of those responsibilities. We just get our pettiness out of the way by shoveling everything but her side of the stairs and front porch.
Well, finally caught a bus that took nearly 8 hours to finally deposit me in Des Moines (usual trip time 5h30), but I am here, and with family, and bepresented, and so things are good. And my foresight in loading this netbook with videos served me well.
Bit grumpy right now. Oh, I'm looking forward to Christmas, at least in potential. But this is way earlier than I have ever wanted to be awake, and why? Because I opted to go to visit my family via 7:30 am bus. Which in itself is not so bad - I did have a choice in the matter and went with the one that got... Read More
I'm psyched. I just got back from my first date. Not, you understand, my first date with this particular girl, although it is that, but my first date, full stop.
We saw The Men Who Stare at Goats. It was hilarious and very well cast, and we laughed at approximately the same points, which bodes pretty well for shared sense of humor. We then wandered... Read More
This netbook is a definitive success. It's no powerhouse, but it runs secondary computing substantially better than my ancient and creaky Mac, and has a number of smart concessions to the necessarily shrunken keyboard space, while packing in more helpful keyboard functionality than most I've used. I'm particularly thankful for the key combination that toggles the trackpad. I definitely appreciate having the trackpad for on... Read More
I've linked to Jenna Moran (creator of the incredible indie RPG Nobilis) before, but I recently discovered that she'd put a whole bunch of free PDFs of various RPG-related content on her site back. If you're interested in roleplaying games and/or systems, you really ought to check these out. If you're not, but you like unusual, evocative fantasy concepts, there's enough material here in examples... Read More
Okay. A helpful friend with a car and some fiddling at the ridiculously inaccessible UPS shipping center later, and I has (replacement) Xbox. So, back to Arkham Asylum. One plus of that whole experience is that Microsoft support was thoughtful enough to include a 1 month Live Gold subscription card, which should nicely compensate for the time I wasn't able to use on my active... Read More
I really liked Susan, too, but if you haven't read the books you can't really understand what's going on, and that was the biggest flaw to me. Also, my white extensions didn't turn out the way I wanted them to, so it annoyed me to look at them.
Have I mentioned that I hate signature required delivery? Have I mentioned that I hate it a really really lot? That I think it fucking defeats the entire purpose of having things shipped to my door? Yeah. Fuck.
Also, I hate Microsoft. Seething hatred.
Specifically - my Xbox 360 broke. Many of you may know this already. I shipped it off, it arrived, they "repaired"... Read More
