Warm & Cozy

This weekend I was at the grocery store and I caught a whiff of those cinnamon pinecones. I love that smell this time of year. I start envisioning myself holding a mug of Apple Cider or Hot Cocoa or a Chai Latte, just inhaling the yummy smells coming out the top.

I know it's still warm outside, and fall has only just begun, but I can't help getting a little excited. The beginning of a new season is always exciting, especially when the temperatures promise to turn around. I start thinking of waking up in the morning to hear the rain coming down, or curling up on the couch in my pajamas, wrapped in a blanket, reading a book or watching a DVD with a fire in the fireplace, or spending time with my family for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

By the time March rolls around, I'm sure I'll be longing for the day I can finally pull my skirts back out of the closet, but for now, I'm excited to pull out my coats and scarves.

M&M Wars

Found on Craigslist:

Whenever I get a package of plain M&Ms, I make it my duty to continue testing the strength and robustness of the candy as a species.
To this end, I hold M&M duels.

Taking two candies between my thumb and forefinger, I apply pressure, squeezing them together until one of them cracks and splinters. That is the "loser," and I eat the inferior one immediately. The winner gets to go another round. I have found that, in general, the brown and red M&Ms are tougher, and the newer blue ones are genetically inferior. I have hypothesized that the blue M&Ms as a race cannot survive long in the intense theatre of competition that is the modern candy and snack-food world. Occasionally I will get a mutation, a candy that is misshapen, or pointier, or flatter than the rest. Almost invariably this proves to be a weakness, but on very rare occasions it gives the candy extra strength. In this way, the species continues to adapt to its environment.

When I reach the end of the pack, I am left with one M&M, the strongest of the herd. Since it would make no sense to eat this one as well, I pack it neatly in an envelope and send it to M&M Mars, A Division of Mars, Inc., Hackettstown, NJ 17840-1503 USA, along with a 3x5 card reading:"Please use this M&M for breeding purposes."This week they wrote back to thank me, and sent me a coupon for a free 1/2 pound bag of plain M&Ms. I consider this "grant money." I have set aside the weekend for a grand tournament. From a field of hundreds, we will discover the True Champion.

-author unknown

The Grocery Store with Six Kids

Someone sent me a link to this auction on eBay. This woman has six kids, and one of them snuck some Pokemon cards into the shopping cart while whe wasn't looking. She writes up a pretty comedic story behind why she didn't notice. Definitely worth a read.

Pleasant Surprise

This morning Emma called. Bobby said he thinks that is the first time Emma has called him instead of her just being put on the phone. She wanted to know what time and how long Caelyn's birthday party was. Bobby told her that it was at 1pm, and that he expected it to run two or three hours, and she asked if he could pick her up at 12:30 so she could go. "Of course!"

We were a little surprised by it, but we were both glad she could come.

We picked her up and stopped at Target to pick up a gift. When we were leaving Target it was just starting to sprinkle. By the time we were entering Norco on the freeway (a mere exit away) I swear we were again in a monsoon. The birthday party was rather mellow, which was nice for a rainy Saturday afternoon. Emma had a good time, and after a few hours (when she was supposed to be back) she asked if she could stay longer, so she called home and asked if she could come home later, which she did. She did eventually have to get back though, and wasn't too happy when that time came.

The Perfect Boots

I swear I've been searching for the perfect brown boots for years. You would think that boots would be easy to find, but it seems downright impossible to find a plain pair of boots - boots that don't have something trendy about them, like a super pointy / squared / overly rounded toe or super skinny / chunky heel, or some random unnessecary decorative bow or buckle. I just want a plain pair of knee-high dark brown boots with a normal toe and a moderate (but high) heel. I like some of the more creative ones too, but I don't want to waste my boot money until I have that first basic pair. This should not be as difficult as it is.

(I have a cheap pair of camel colored boots that I got when I was in high school, but I need a dark brown pair, and now that it's getting cooler again, I need boots. I'd like a better black pair (again, I have a cheap pair), but at least the ones I have are the right color.)

I finally found the perfect boots a year ago, and of course they retail for like $400. I finally went down to the Charles David store at South Coast Plaza yesterday to try on boots to get the right size with them. They no longer carry the Cheerful, but I figured any boot from them would do. I wanted to make sure their sizes didn't run large or small. I picked out a similar looking boot and asked to try on a size 7. I put it on, and the foot fit so perfectly, and felt so comfortably that I was even more impressed with my perfect boot (I'm guessing that they make the foot of their boots similar, it's usually the outside that differs). Then I zip them up and... it will only zip up to just below my calf muscle.

Nooo. What if my perfect brown boots won't fit on my calves? Do I have to start my search all over again? But the salesman said that those were the regular Charles David boots, and the Charles by Charles David line ran with a thicker calf. So he pulled out a pair of those for me to try on. This time they zipped up almost all the way, and the salesman said that once the boots are purchased they can stretch the calf a couple inches and they should fit.

But of course, they don't carry the right boots there at the store. I found them online, and for a good price. Now I just had to get back to a computer and look them up again to find out if they were Charles David or Charles by Charles David.

I got to work and looked them up. Charles by Charles David. YES! Not only that, but they are a few inches shorter than the boots that I tried on, so there should be less stretching to do. So they are now ordered and I should have them soon.

A Strange Encounter

We picked Emma up and went over to Shakey's to pick up dinner. Thankfully we'd called the order in beforehand, because the line took forever. While we were standing in line, Emma was debating out loud whether she should be a writer or a marine biologist when she grows up. We told her she could be both.

The guy behind us was listening, and started saying something to Bobby about his 2 year old over holding the table with her mom. Then somehow he's stretching the arm of his shirt to show bobby the tattoo on his pec - not sure what it was, but the guy was totally tweaking. He was shaking, and couldn't hold still, and eventually had his feet on the counter and his arms on the bar behind him doing those reverse push up things. I looked over at him and noticed that the tattoo on his neck read "F*ck You" in cursive.

Um... who they heck tattoos that on their neck?! He was clearly on something very strong. Emma was just ignoring him (thankfully) and continuing her conversation with me. She glanced over at him one time, paused, and then turned back at me with this what-a-weirdo look on her face. I felt bad for his two-year-old.

We were also glad that we'd placed the order to go, because all we wanted to do was get out of there.

Smart(phone) Decisions

I finally caved last week and said we could go down to AT&T to get Bobby a smartphone. He'd been looking at the iPhone, and the Blackberry Curve. Then I told him about something I'd read in Fortune Magazine about the founder of Wikipedia.org. He uses an AT&T 8525 - bought it the same day the iPhone came out and mentioned he thinks he was the only one in the store not buying an iPhone. So then, of course, Bobby wants to look at the 8525, which is also the most expensive smartphone AT&T offers.

He eventually decided on that one. It has Windows Mobile, so you can open Word and Excel and PDF documents on it; it has Wi-Fi, a touch screen and a scroll wheel, and just about everything else, and is 3G. The iPhone only has two features over this phone - the visual voicemail, and the nature of the touchpad. But the iPhone lacks a number of more useful features that this phone does have.



Today he picked me up from work a little early so we could try to get the phone before picking Emma up, but both the shop in Norco and the shop in Mira Loma said they didn't have the phone in stock. When we walked into the second shop to ask, they guy answered with "Nah, no one carries them. They are too expensive to carry in store, so anywhere you go they'll have to order it." Hm... I'm guessing that's because this is Mira Loma. They'll have them in stock at the shop near South Coast, if they don't have it in Fullerton.

After we dropped Emma off at the end of the evening we headed to the AT&T store in Fullerton, and sure enough, they had the 8525. So we renewed the agreement on one of our lines so we could get the good price on the phone. Bobby then stayed up all night setting it up.

Thermodynamics of Hell

The following is supposedly an actual question given on a University of Massachusetts at Lowell, engineering dept.'s chemistry mid-term.
The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant. One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell.

Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially.

Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same,the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and the pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "it will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you", and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number 2 must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct...leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."

Crazy Week

Work has been hectic - I am in the final throws of reviewing quotes for a new server, and at the same time we are in the process of re-organizing the office. On Thursday of last week I got the OK on a new server and to replace over half the desktops in the office. It was a rather exciting moment. This has been something I've wanted to do for years.

On one hand, they were doing some serious re-construction of the office - moving cubicles, tearing down a wall, constructing new cubicles (they are supposed to be finishing tonight), and on the other hand, I'm trying to do my normal work, which I'm already behind on. The re-arranging leads to computer issues, which I'm supposed to try to fix, and then my boss is panicking slightly because I'm falling behind. Each day it seemed I wouldn't even be at my desk most of the day because I'd be running all over fixing problems, and then I'd sit down to 45 unread emails.

Then, this morning I get into work, and check my personal email to find the bad news. The White Stripes concert that I bought tickets for has been cancelled. My money is being refunded, but I was really looking forward to it. But what can you do?

After work today I went out to the new Yard House in Fashion Island with some of my co-workers to wish farewell to one of our interns - Chantel. We had a good time, and I wound up hanging out for three hours.

We don't normally do this for interns when they leave, but Chantel was a very good intern and in general a pleasure to have around. Those interns are few and far between, but I can probably still rememeber all of their names. I wish Chantel well in her future endeavors.

Hard Work

Bobby has been working what seems like constantly every day lately. Every night this week he was up late - 2am, 2:30am, 4am, etc. And all day. His current project, bidding on new projects, helping my borther and dad with the plans for the brewery....

This morning when I went to wake him up before heading out the door, he couldn't be dragged out of bed. He said he was considering dropping his Friday class - he just has too much on his plate right now. Today he finally finished the design for the project he is currently working on. The other day he received a call from the general contractor for his last job - they want him to do a couple more jobs for the same client. They like working with him, and that's always nice to hear.

Right now he's at his buddy's house - his buddy got a drum set, so Bobby brought his guitar set up over and they are jamming. I think it will be good for him to take a break. Hopefully he'll get to relax some this weekend too.