*Gold*, Jerry! *gold*!

In another week or so, probably during the 5 week break before my fall classes start, I'm going to finish unpacking and setting up my bonus room. Finally, after approximately 2½ years in this house, I'll get everything unpacked and in its place. And for some of this stuff, it may be the first time out of a box through several apartments and a few houses since I moved away to pursue my bachelors degree in 1992.

I'll be posting pictures here and showing it off. Let me say though, that most of the memorabilia setting about; Star Trek stuff, Alabama stuff, toys, etc., was bought by me, or more than likely by my mother (love you, Mom!), since I graduated college in '96. You see, almost everything I had that pertained to my childhood burned in my parent's house somewhere around '93 or '94? I don't know, I'm not good with dates. But it was all there; Darth Vader's Tie Fighter, my Snow Speeder, the 1st run Boba Fett action figure with the rocket pack on his back so that he didn't fit in either of the previous mentions (along with the awesome carrying case full of other action figures), a ton of vinyl records including Twisted Sister's Stay Hungry (and some that were handed down from my parents, like Kenny Rogers and The First Edition), cool Bear Bryant posters and knick-knacks, and sadly (it seems as I am running out of boxes) my bag full of miscellaneous dice.

However, a few moments ago I opened a box and struck gold! Well, as good as gold. A few momentos preserved from my childhood. Just a couple of things that I felt I couldn't live without as I packed my things for Tuscaloosa. A lot of that stuff has been lost to roommates or rummage sales over the years, but not these ...precious... sorry, I Golemed out there for a sec. I'll let you peek at the picture before continuing on.

(click to embiggen)

Ok, see that one right there, the one facing you? That is my Dungeon Masters Guide! (AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide - Revised Edition, December 1979) Bought when I was ten. That next one moving left is the AD&D Players Handbook - 6th Printing, January 1980. Continuing on is the AD&D Deities & Demigods - 1st Printing (as far as I can tell), no date, copyright 1980 with the forward written by Gary Gygax dated 1 May, 1980 followed by the AD&D Monster Manual - 4th Edition, August 1979. Hot diggety!

And the best one of all?! See that non-descript looking little white folder on the far left next to the Monster Manual? No, just to the right of the breadboard... That thing holds the red D&D Player's Handbook from the red box! along with the blue D&D Expert Rulebook and the orange D&D Expert Game Adventure "The Isle of Dread"! YEAH! It does!

I'll even one up that. Do you know what else it contains? It contains my first. character. EVARR! According to the character sheet, a 150 year old elf named, Olion. Wow. How cool is that?! I won't give his stats here because I can tell just by looking that I may have fudged the rolls a bit. *cough* Also there are some awesome monsters that I created complete with stats and descriptions, and a few dungeons drawn on graph paper.

Along for the ride in that box were some Calvin & Hobbes, The Far Side, and Garfield books that I managed to hold onto also. I know I used to have umpteen more Garfield, but their numbers have dwindled over the years. [sadface]

SPEECH! SPEECH!

This is the weekend I begin my graduate studies. I'll be getting a Masters of Engineering in Construction Management from the graduate program at The University of Alabama at Birmingham. To kick it all off, we are having a "boot camp" this weekend, eight hours on Friday and eight hours on Saturday. Included in the schedule for Saturday is a 3-4 minute presentation from each student to introduce yourself and tell everyone a bit about you, and give you the chance to learn about the others that you will be studying and working with over the next 18 months. I've been writing down notes on what I want to say, and now that it is time to start putting it all together, I thought that this would be a great time to post the draft here on the blog.

I want to include a bit of interaction. Since this is a short presentation, I want to do it right up front. So, I plan to begin in a standard way by giving my name and where I'm from. At this point, I plan on asking if anyone has heard of the town. I'm counting on two things here; 1) that we are presenting to the whole group and not smaller sub-groups and 2) that a good percentage of the people have lived in this area for a bit and that a few like to vacation at the beach. Usually, in a crowd this size (25-30 people), there is at least one person that knows where I'm from because it is on the way to the beach. ...and they have gotten a ticket driving through there. Even if no one has heard of it, it gives me the opportunity to engage the crowd and it is still a bit of trivia to start out.

After some feedback, I think moving the hobbies to here is the right thing. So I will begin the quoting of what I want to say here, and then break in after the hobbies for more commentary on the setup of the next part.

"Now, to tell you a little bit about what I like to do. Whenever I have to write out my hobbies on a form of some kind, it usually goes like this: video games, computers, softball, guitar, Mustangs. And that is about how they stack up in order of my current involvement. My main recourse for r&r time lies in video games. It is something I enjoy and can pretty much be done on an anytime, anyplace basis. It started back in the 70's when my parents bought a Pong console for the family to play. My current recourse is my Xbox 360 and Xbox Live, coupled with all of my online friends that I have met through the site: geezergamers.com. I also enjoy tinkering with computers and have a home network setup with a home-built file server that we use to store all of our media; pictures, music, videos, etc. I've recently gotten back into softball, only to realize that I'm getting way old! But I still enjoy it as much as ever, and will continue to play until my body won't let me anymore. I have a few guitars kicking around the house. My favorite style is the Fender Telecaster, of which I own 3, along with two acoustics. I can't play all that well (strictly bedroom picker), but it is great relaxation. I just recently sold my Mustang, a 1970 Mach 1 with a 351 Cleveland and 3 speed automatic. I may buy another classic someday, but for now I am content to ride my motorcycle when I miss the 'Stang..."

Next, I plan to tell everyone that I have a Bachelors degree in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Alabama. Following from here, I want to type out (in quotes) the version that I hope comes out while I am talking. :)

"Now, I would like to tell you that engineering was my choice; a product of my own free will. My parents, however, will tell you that it was destined to be. My mom likes to tell the story of how I argued with my 3rd grade teacher over a math problem... and won. Not on the answer, because she had it right, but on how she performed the math to get the answer. I don't remember that incident, but I'm sure it didn't help me when I lost the argument later in the year that 'David Copperfield' was not a fictional character, but a real person; a magician in fact. I suppose she wasn't going to let an 8 year old win two arguments in one school year. Not long after, around Halloween, I was in my room with the door closed, and called for my mom to come in under the ruse that I had a question or something. As she opened the door, she was greeted by a ghost falling down from the ceiling right in front of her face. I had taken a yard stick, some screws, hooks, nails, and a bit of fishing line and created a linkage connected to the door that would lower the ghost in front of the victim as they entered my room. It was at this moment, she will tell you, that she knew I would become an engineer.

My dad's story is a bit different, but along the same lines. His first clue was when, around the same age, 8-10, I completely gutted 4 CB radios that he had laying around his workshop. Now, if you don't know what a CB radio is, do NOT say anything, because then I will really feel old! He will swear that I did this to learn how they worked, and part of that is true. I took the first one apart to try and learn its inner workings. The rest I took apart because I found magnets in the speakers of the first one! :) For my dad, the certainty came a few years later, around age 13 or 14. My parents had decided to put in a swimming pool. Before ground could be broken, we had to remove several tall cedar trees from the area. When my dad, one of his older brothers and my mom were all consulting and waiting on me, the 13-14 year old to tell them where and how to cut to make each tree fall in the desired direction, and not onto our house, was his a-ha moment.

So for me, I had high aptitude for both math and science (specifically biology), probably equally, but my passion was in biology. I loved it! So when the time came to go to college, I knew what I wanted to do; become a marine biologist! So I began researching, and there just weren't many opportunities in that field at the time, and the compensation left a lot to be desired. So, I decided; engineering! :) So, I guess my parents were right, because in the end, it was my analytical mind that led me to the engineering path. Ironically, I chose mechanical engineering for the sole reason that it was the only one that did not have a public speaking class as a requirement in the curriculum... So, by the time college graduation rolled around, engineer hiring was at the lowest point it had been in probably 10 years, meanwhile, environmental awareness had boomed, and a marine biologist could write his own ticket, and get to live on the beach of their choosing anywhere in the country. Obviously my destiny wasn't in fortune telling...

Despite the down turn in engineering upon my graduation, I was able to become gainfully employed. I went to work in the coal mining industry for Jim Walter Resources in Brookwood, AL, a subsidiary of Walter Industries in Tampa, Florida. I had a great career there for 10 years, moving up from a draftsman at the machine shop, to the resident engineer at #4 Mine. While there, I had the opportunity to learn many aspects of business management by being involved in engineering, budgeting, business planning, and construction projects. I felt, upon leaving, that I had been involved in, and responsible for, some pretty big construction projects.

...then I went to work for Southern Company. I entered the company a few years ago in my current role of Quality Engineer, involved in vendor surveillance on capital and new construction projects. A few weeks in, I was asked to visit one of the construction sites to look at some structural steel that had just been received. What I saw when I got there was beyond belief. When I say acres, it just doesn't do it justice. I want to use something that sounds more grandiose, something biblical almost. There was an equipment/material staging area there that was hectares (since it is bigger than an acre, sounds impressive, and I don't know any biblical units... :) ) of land partitioned off and filled with ...stuff... and I thought, "What have I gotten myself into!" So, the desire to learn more about the management of these large construction projects along with the opportunity to open up further career paths within Southern Company leads me to be here today. I look forward to working and learning alongside all of you and being apart of helping everyone here reach their goals."

I'm going to do a few run throughs tonight and see how long it is. I hope I don't have to cut anything, and I seriously hope it doesn't run short. :)

Let me know what you think.

Parks closed. Moose out front shoulda told ya.

Time for a major update! Well, just a long one, I guess.

We had a pretty good holiday weekend. We slept in on Friday (of course). That evening we drove to the inlaws for some supper and fireworks. Glenda's mom and dad had fixed quite a spread! There was a big pan of grilled ribeyes, a big pan of grilled chicken, baked beans, squash casserole, loaded baked new potatoes, chips with bean dip, and garlic bread. I stuffed myself silly. Then to top it off, we had homemade vanilla ice cream with Oreo Bon Bons in it. Awesome! Afterwards, we watched the kids shoot some fireworks and then headed home. I can't remember if I played some xbox that night or not. I wanted to try and finish GTA4 this past weekend, but I fell short.

Saturday we slept in even later than Friday. I called the neighbors to see if they wanted to come over and eat dinner with us. They have 3 boys, 1, 3 & 5 (I think) and they all came over to eat and hang out. I grilled some burgers and some bacon-wrapped scallops. We also fixed some garlic pasta, mac & cheese for the kids, and some french fries. Then we fired up the Wii for some Wii Sports action. Reg and Danielle were playing baseball, and Danielle was batting. At one point, she swung the WiiMote to hit the ball, and the oldest boy walked in front of her at the same moment. She nailed him in the back of the head and he went down flat on his face! He was ok, but I know it hurt for a few minutes. It was one of those where you know everyone is ok, and then you can't help but laugh but you try not to. They took the boys home to put them to bed, and then Glenda and I went over to their place for some Taboo. We got home about 1:30am, and I played GTA4 until about 4am.

Sunday we slept in even later... then we got up for a few hours and then went BACK to bed. I finally got up around 7:45pm, and didn't go back to sleep at all. We watched "Deja Vu", I played GTA4 for a bit, and I set up my ARCHOS 705 media player with the plug-in to download my DVR'ed shows from my DishNet receiver via the USB port. I copied about 20 hours worth of movies and shows over to it, so it will be ready when I travel this week.

So, I should crash early tonight since I am running out of steam already and it's only 3pm.

I see where the buyer of my Mustang has upped the selling price on his website. I hope that means that he will soon be leaving me positive feedback on eBay since he hasn't bothered to do so yet.

On a sad note, my neighbor Reg sold his motorcycle. While I'm glad for him, because he kept it over a month and made money off of it, I hate it because we had some nice rides together. Three out of the last four Sundays, not counting this past one, we took a night ride. No traffic to dodge, nice and cool compared to the heat of the day, just relaxing all around. I hope he will be able to buy another one soon, but I think he plans to take care of some bills first so it may be a while before I have a riding partner. My other neighbor Justin sold his also, but he is getting ready to move, so I would not have him as a riding buddy much longer anyway.

Fuel woahs

I realize that it is Thursday and that I still haven’t posted about the 4th Annual GGSE Meet n’ Greet, but I’m going to do a topical one today. For now, I’ll just say that we had a blast.

Ok, so gas prices are up, averaging $3.62 across the country. Crude oil is up to $120+ a barrel. However, there is no fuel shortage! We are still putting oil into the reserve! Why they heck am I getting cut off at the pump? I have a 26 gallon tank. I fill it up. I drive it until the low fuel light comes on. (For me, that is about every 3 days) It usually takes anywhere from 21-22 gallons to fill it back up. So now, when I get almost there… the pump cuts off. At $75. This happened last time, 2-3 years ago, when prices jumped significantly. The pumps would quit at $50 then. And I’d have to restart and have an extra charge on my visa for 1-2 gallons. And they add these little signs, “Please be courteous to other customers and limit your purchase to blah, blah, blah.” Look, if I don’t buy it now, I will be back in less than 3 days. It’s unavoidable. It’s gonna happen. Why are you forcing me to stop more often than I have to? THERE’S NO SHORTAGE!

Argh!

And don’t even get me started today on the stations that remove the handle lock on the pumps. Hello, there is already a perfectly capable safety device in there… But that is a rant for another day.

Anyhoo, I am getting ready to make my first ever vehicle purchase that will be influenced mainly for the sake of fuel economy. I still haven’t decided which route to take. On one hand, I could buy an 8-10 year old car with 100-150k miles on it for around 3-4k, pay cash, and it’ll pay for itself in 8-10 months. After that, as long as it keeps running, I’m coming out ahead, and when it quits, I buy another. On the other hand, I tend to drive vehicles forever. I bought my truck new 9 years and 160k miles ago. I could buy a new, or almost new, economy car. That way, I know it will be getting optimum gas mileage for awhile, and I know I will keep it long enough to make it worthwhile. Also, some of them are available for 0% financing. Anyone out there have an opinion on it?

Gettin' on my lazy butt

Well, since Mojo has updated his blog twice since my last update, I figured that I needed to get off my lazy catookus (or on it, I guess) and write something.

The first update to give is my Dad's status. If you are reading this, then you probably already know that he had a heart attack a few weeks ago. They kept him in the hospital for a few days and then let him go home. This is his third, and with the damage done by the first two coupled with the fact that he had quintuple bypass about 7 or 8 years ago, along with the current blockages, they decided that surgery isn't an option. It poses too great a risk and not really any benefit at this point. He is going back next week for his tests to see if he has healed enough to insert a defibrillator/pacemaker under his skin.

He needs to take better care of himself by eating right, exercising, and quit smoking. I really only get a one-sided story because I talk to my Mom mostly, but she is complaining because he continues to sit around, and he is a bit afraid of any exertion at this point, when really, he needs to be exercising. He just needs to be smart and take regular breaks and not over-do it.

As far as the sister stuff goes, I took Furg's advice and went for a ride to clear my head. I've been enjoying the bike immensely, and the weather keeps getting better and better. I've added some chrome pieces and I have some smoked blinker and taillight lenses and a chrome piece for the front fender in-transit via UPS. I'll post some pics when the last of it is installed.

Glenda and I, my neighbors Justin & Val, and my coworker Gene all rode into Tuscaloosa on Saturday for lunch. We were going to eat at a Japanese steakhouse, but they were closed. We ended up at Wilhagen's Sports Bar for burgers and beers. We went back to the house and I dropped Glenda off and Gene and I decided to ride about 60 miles south of my house to a bike rally. The directions we had were bad, and we ended up going about 1.5 miles down a dirt road before deciding to turn around. We figured nothing was down there, and if it was, we wanted no part of it. :) When we made it out to the main highway, we decided to go a little further. Not even 2/10 of a mile up the road was the sign pointing to the actual rally. So we got all happy and headed down there. Well, about 5-600 yards down, THAT road turned into a dirt road. We decided, "Screw this!" and turned around and headed home. The drive was incredibly nice, though. When I got home after 120 miles, that aftermarket seat with the driver's backrest for $799 was looking like a helluva deal...

And just to make Furgs extrememly jealous... Gene now has 3 bikes! He has an American Ironhorse "Outlaw" chopper that he bought in Knoxville. About 3 months ago, he decided he needed something for cruisin', so he bought a brand-spankin' new Heritage Softail with a 103 kit and some aftermarket pipes on it. Then, about a month ago, we were in the Harley dealership, and he decided to make an offer on one of the Thunder Mountain "Keystone" choppers they had in the dealership. Man, that thing is sharp. I need to get him to send me a pic so I can post it.

New Ride

Well, I haven't had the time to sit down and create a topical blog every night, or every other, like I wanted. So, I'm going to try a daily update format like my buddies Sal and Casey, with a topical post scattered about. I've enjoyed reading their updates.

So, I somehow convinced Glenda to let me get a bike. We are probably going to start trying to have a baby soon, and I wanted to go ahead and buy that big toy first, or it'd probably never happen. I've found a good deal on our inter-company classified ads. The only problem is that the seller works at one of our plant sites about 7 hrs away. He's agreed to meet me partway. I'm still trying to work out the logistics of getting it home if the weather is bad. I hope to meet him this weekend. The bike is a 2004 Kawasaki Vulcan Classic, 1600cc. It has several extras, including nice saddlebags, a windshield, and Vance & Hines pipes. It only has 5900 miles on it.

Glenda seems interested in riding. I hope it is something that she enjoys so that we can ride together occasionally.

This'll be the biggest bike I've ever driven. 800cc is the biggest I've ridden before.

The plan now is to sell my Mustang (1970 Mach 1, 351 Cleveland). I'll need to change the oil, clean the carburetor and get it ready when spring rolls around. I paid 6k for it, and I've put about $2500 into it. I rebuilt the engine, had the block bored .010 and bought new pistons, new cam, rebuilt the automatic transmission, put on a stall converter and put an edelbrock 850 carb on it. It still needs a little work and TLC (very little) to have a nice Sunday driver. The electrical system needs replacing. It has a serious ground that drains the battery real quick. The timing really needs to be tweaked because it is a bitch to start. The power steering valve has a bad leak also. It needs to be replaced. I just don't have the time, or the drive, to work on it anymore. That is part of the reason for the bike. It is something I can go out and ride and enjoy without spending all of my spare time on maintenance.