After a lengthy interlude...
Last post: 1 December, 2006. And to think there was a time when I'd apologize for going a week without posting.
So, what's happened in the last year, two months, and twenty-five days?
* On 6 January 2007, I got married. It was a wonderful event, with almost everyone I'd hoped to see, and I can't say enough good about it. The pictures are still up on http://www.ryanandlaurawedding.com, for those who missed it.
* On 12 January 2007, gnutoo and I went on our honeymoon in London. The flight there was terrible (First night of our honeymoon? We spent it on the floor of O'Hare.) We spent over a week there, saw lots and lots of things, and I got very homesick. All in all, it was a wonderful thing. I also bought my second fedora.
* In February, I got put as task lead of a small contract line-item for my project. Small, of course, meant 600+ man-hours of labor and resources. Worked my butt off on that, made a lot of mistakes, and learned from it.
* At the end of May, gnutoo and I bought a house! We'd spent two months househunting after the wedding, and finally found one that we liked. We made an offer, it was accepted, and we closed on 1 June.
* As a reward for my hard work on the aforementioned project, I spent part of June in Florida for acceptance testing. My side of things worked well, the rest didn't. Spent an extra day there cleaning up that mess.
* At the end of June, Laura and I adopted a rescue dog! Kaylee, an insanely sweet Welsh Corgi mix, was rescued from the middle of the road (after being hit by a car), brought to a vet's for six months of surgery and rehab, and was up for adoption online. Laura and I had the best home and conditions for her, and she became our new pet! Watching her run, you'd never know she'd had her back hips rebuilt ("Puppies are like kids," the vet said, "put the bones in the same room together and they'll heal") or that she'd spent six months in the vet's office.
Kaylee basks in the sunlight.
The vicious guard dog at the back door.
Dogs deserve to be inverted.
Wandering through the organized chaos of our office
How could anyone not love that smile and those ears?
"I'm on ur lawns, pickin' up ur radar signals!"
Sniffing the breeze.
Vigilant at the back window
Chewing on her green squig. She has a blue one, too. Doesn't it look like a squig? ("What's a Squig?")
Kaylee loves gettin' her ears skritched. Her daddy likes to skritch them.
As before, puppies deserve to be inverted. And blurry.
* The first week of July, Kaylee spent a week at camp while Laura and I went to Colorado for her family reunion. A wonderful time was had by all until...
* ... I lost a day of vacation because I had to travel to Japan for an installation. The incident in Florida had shaken the customer's faith in our procedures, and they asked that I go on the trip to make sure everything went right. Everything did - if you overlook the "overnight package" that didn't get there until 9 days later, the typhoon that kept us in our hotels (isolated, since I was in a building without anyone else on the trip - and with no internet) for 36 hours, and the fact that Laura had to buy a bed and pick out colour schemes without my help because her parents got into town the day after I finally did (5 day trip became 11 days) and stuff had to be set up. But looking on the bright side, I basically got four days of free vacation on Okinawa.
* Came home to my wife, my house, my dog, and started setting up house. Boxes would remain for six months (heck, we still have a few), but the master bedroom got repainted. What kind of person thinks glossy Barnyard Red is an appropriate color for a bedroom? And then thinks "I know, it needs white paint sponged over it! Oooh, with crackle effects mixed in! And I'll make it matte paint, too, for the contrast"
* Got put in charge of another contract line-item. This one was immediately put on hold by the government (new aircraft, needed more testing) and spent the next nine months like that.
* Spent Thanksgiving here. Helped run the KoC's second Casino Knight, which made a lot of money for charity and the church.
* Went to Louisville for Christmas. It was awesome.
* Celebrated our one-year anniversary! It was even more awesome.
* Hit 200 beers at the Flying Saucer pub. Only took me a year and a half.
* I built Laura a wall for an elevated flower bed. Kaylee helped (a bit).
* Got the above second contract line-item fast-tracked when the government decided to stop extending the period of performance - and told us with six weeks left on it. We require three weeks for testing and fielding software before the end of the PoP, so I got the software done 1/4 done to finish in 3 weeks. To say the past few weeks have been stressful would be understating the situation. But sure enough, we passed acceptance testing last week, and in the next week or so I get to go down to Florida, again, to perform acceptance testing and delivery, again. This time, though, nothing will go wrong!
* In celebration, Laura and I decided to buy a Wii. That was a big mistake, but I'll have to get into the addictiveness of Super Smash Brothers at a later time...
So, those are the major events in my life in the past fifteen months! I hope you've enjoyed reading them. Now, to find a meme or something, so that I can get back to my regular rhythm of posting...
[EDIT: Vicious guard dog, not viscous. There's a difference...]
So, what's happened in the last year, two months, and twenty-five days?
* On 6 January 2007, I got married. It was a wonderful event, with almost everyone I'd hoped to see, and I can't say enough good about it. The pictures are still up on http://www.ryanandlaurawedding.com, for those who missed it.
* On 12 January 2007, gnutoo and I went on our honeymoon in London. The flight there was terrible (First night of our honeymoon? We spent it on the floor of O'Hare.) We spent over a week there, saw lots and lots of things, and I got very homesick. All in all, it was a wonderful thing. I also bought my second fedora.
* In February, I got put as task lead of a small contract line-item for my project. Small, of course, meant 600+ man-hours of labor and resources. Worked my butt off on that, made a lot of mistakes, and learned from it.
* At the end of May, gnutoo and I bought a house! We'd spent two months househunting after the wedding, and finally found one that we liked. We made an offer, it was accepted, and we closed on 1 June.
* As a reward for my hard work on the aforementioned project, I spent part of June in Florida for acceptance testing. My side of things worked well, the rest didn't. Spent an extra day there cleaning up that mess.
* At the end of June, Laura and I adopted a rescue dog! Kaylee, an insanely sweet Welsh Corgi mix, was rescued from the middle of the road (after being hit by a car), brought to a vet's for six months of surgery and rehab, and was up for adoption online. Laura and I had the best home and conditions for her, and she became our new pet! Watching her run, you'd never know she'd had her back hips rebuilt ("Puppies are like kids," the vet said, "put the bones in the same room together and they'll heal") or that she'd spent six months in the vet's office.
Kaylee basks in the sunlight.
The vicious guard dog at the back door.
Dogs deserve to be inverted.
Wandering through the organized chaos of our office
How could anyone not love that smile and those ears?
"I'm on ur lawns, pickin' up ur radar signals!"
Sniffing the breeze.
Vigilant at the back window
Chewing on her green squig. She has a blue one, too. Doesn't it look like a squig? ("What's a Squig?")
Kaylee loves gettin' her ears skritched. Her daddy likes to skritch them.
As before, puppies deserve to be inverted. And blurry.
* The first week of July, Kaylee spent a week at camp while Laura and I went to Colorado for her family reunion. A wonderful time was had by all until...
* ... I lost a day of vacation because I had to travel to Japan for an installation. The incident in Florida had shaken the customer's faith in our procedures, and they asked that I go on the trip to make sure everything went right. Everything did - if you overlook the "overnight package" that didn't get there until 9 days later, the typhoon that kept us in our hotels (isolated, since I was in a building without anyone else on the trip - and with no internet) for 36 hours, and the fact that Laura had to buy a bed and pick out colour schemes without my help because her parents got into town the day after I finally did (5 day trip became 11 days) and stuff had to be set up. But looking on the bright side, I basically got four days of free vacation on Okinawa.
* Came home to my wife, my house, my dog, and started setting up house. Boxes would remain for six months (heck, we still have a few), but the master bedroom got repainted. What kind of person thinks glossy Barnyard Red is an appropriate color for a bedroom? And then thinks "I know, it needs white paint sponged over it! Oooh, with crackle effects mixed in! And I'll make it matte paint, too, for the contrast"
* Got put in charge of another contract line-item. This one was immediately put on hold by the government (new aircraft, needed more testing) and spent the next nine months like that.
* Spent Thanksgiving here. Helped run the KoC's second Casino Knight, which made a lot of money for charity and the church.
* Went to Louisville for Christmas. It was awesome.
* Celebrated our one-year anniversary! It was even more awesome.
* Hit 200 beers at the Flying Saucer pub. Only took me a year and a half.
* I built Laura a wall for an elevated flower bed. Kaylee helped (a bit).
* Got the above second contract line-item fast-tracked when the government decided to stop extending the period of performance - and told us with six weeks left on it. We require three weeks for testing and fielding software before the end of the PoP, so I got the software done 1/4 done to finish in 3 weeks. To say the past few weeks have been stressful would be understating the situation. But sure enough, we passed acceptance testing last week, and in the next week or so I get to go down to Florida, again, to perform acceptance testing and delivery, again. This time, though, nothing will go wrong!
* In celebration, Laura and I decided to buy a Wii. That was a big mistake, but I'll have to get into the addictiveness of Super Smash Brothers at a later time...
So, those are the major events in my life in the past fifteen months! I hope you've enjoyed reading them. Now, to find a meme or something, so that I can get back to my regular rhythm of posting...
[EDIT: Vicious guard dog, not viscous. There's a difference...]