Days 10 & 11
So go figure that the day I get the internet accessible on my laptop, I don't make an entry. But you know what this means? LJ-Cuts!
Day 10
It's amazing how much I can't remember after one day. All the details that were fresh in my mind, completely wiped after a full night's rest. This is probably because I started the day pouring concrete. The street gutter is more like a prefabricated curb that was tilted to act like a gutter instead of the wide angle gutters used everywhere else. As such, pulling into the driveway has been a slow and excruciating process because the bump is so damn big. I had bought three bags of concrete and quickly discovered this wasn't enough. I did manage to ease the pain of entering the driveway, but it's obvious now that another three bags will be necessary to complete the job, and this doesn't begin to cover the extra amount necessary to extend the fill to the side of the driveway since half the time a vehicle is parked on the grass, typically the Equinox or whichever vehicle Heather decides to bring over.
After the concrete fill I was pretty much wiped out. Took a shower and rested for a bit before Vikki's relatives came over to visit. Paola, Chris, Kristen and her parents. Chris delivered a 6 foot ladder which I've been needing to work on other projects around the house, such as figuring out why the dryer duct doesn't blow through to the outside, causing multiple cycles to dry clothes and a puddle to form in the utility room from the condensation. Paola, Chris and Kristen visited for about half an hour, also delivering a plethora of food which we are all thankful for. Her parents stayed another two hours before heading back to Paola's to pick up their belongings and to head to the airport and back to Miami.
Things were relatively uneventful at the house after that, but certainly not elsewhere. I headed to the Home Depot to pick up a digital multimeter to troubleshoot the radiator fans not working on Vikki's car and ended up picking up some cat-5e and rj-45 connectors while I was there. On the way back I got a call from Vikki, she was leaving for Paola's since Karina caused a stink resulting in getting slapped by her grandfather. It's pretty sad, really. She hates her home life and I can't blame her, but she doesn't have the tact to keep herself in check. Young, rebellious and pretty much out of control. Either way her boyfriend called the police who thankfully did nothing. The girl needed a good slap, if not a full fledged beating after some of the comments she made the past few days.
Anyway, I found Heather, Trolle and their friend (now my friend?) Dallas home alone at the house when I arrived playing Guitar Hero World Tour. Of course I joined in and actually ended up on the drums at some point. I kid you not, drums on Guitar Hero is a completely different animal than on Rock band. Much more natural, really. On Rock Band I had a hard time playing on easy, but on Guitar Hero I quickly found myself struggling only slightly on Hard and even clearing some of the easier songs on Expert. Vikki escaped having to take her parents to the airport and came back to join us all. Once Rain arrived from work we headed to Steak 'n Shake for dinner before splitting our separate ways.
At some point, I think right after coming home from Steak 'n Shake, I made an Ethernet cable long enough to stretch from the router on Vikki's computer desk in the loft to my bedroom, granting me internet access pretty much anywhere in the house until my new wireless card comes in. But the big thing was installing Reason, a music creation program that I played around with until 4am before realizing how tired I was and passing out.
Day 11
Today I awoke to writing an official PC Technician resume and sending it out to as many companies as I could find on Craigslist, Careerbuilder and Monster. I also found myself fed up with the fact that the tilting wall mount for my HDTV still hadn't arrived and it was day 7. I wrote an email to the eBay seller before heading downstairs. Not 30 minutes later, FedEx arrived with the wall mount. As of 2pm, I have an HDTV hanging above a fireplace. I pulled a new cable through the wall and swapped out the cable coupler for a cable splitter. I also pulled down the somewhat broken blinds on the large downstairs window facing the front yard and re-hung it on the window above and cut it down to size. Now there's a significant amount of shade in the afternoon, with the only unshielded light coming in from the super-high semi-circle window above all the others.
Honestly the rest of today was uneventful. Vikki and I went through everything we could find and couldn't locate a MIDI adapter to connect her MIDI keyboard to my laptop. The M-Tools device she has is only a pre-amp for direct audio input, not a MIDI controller or adapter, leaving the MIDI keyboard completely useless. Rain prepared a dinner of pineapple chicken with corn and mashed potatoes, which were delicious and consumed feverishly. Likewise, I haven't touched my Blackberry all day. It's a rather nice feeling knowing that I'm able to set it aside and not worry about it. And to top things off, I've still got six cigarettes left in a pack I opened 30+ hours ago. Usually I'm a pack per day, so this is honestly a significant decrease.
I found myself really missing Tampa for the first time since I moved up here. Besides the random call from Mike yesterday, I haven't spoken to anybody in Tampa besides my parents and my former employer. I had a lot of time to think about where I'm at right now and the fact that I haven't gotten a single call back yet from anybody is starting to weigh in heavily upon me. No calls, no interviews, nothing. Have I made the right choice by moving up here? Will I find a job in time to stay afloat? Sadly, only time will tell. Plus it doesn't help that almost every prospective employer wants me to have a valid Georgia driver's license of all things, so it looks like I'll have to do that part sooner than later. Plus I still gotta get Progressive changed over into John's name so that's something to deal with, and soon.
I suppose that's all for now. The rest of the evening was spent watching Doctor Who and Reno911 episodes, so nothing really spectacular to write about there. Doctor Who is highly engaging and Reno911 is really starting to hold my interest for the first time. I'm not sure if it's boredom or a new appreciation for the show's humor but either way, I'm glad I'm enjoying it.
Take care my friends.
Day 10
It's amazing how much I can't remember after one day. All the details that were fresh in my mind, completely wiped after a full night's rest. This is probably because I started the day pouring concrete. The street gutter is more like a prefabricated curb that was tilted to act like a gutter instead of the wide angle gutters used everywhere else. As such, pulling into the driveway has been a slow and excruciating process because the bump is so damn big. I had bought three bags of concrete and quickly discovered this wasn't enough. I did manage to ease the pain of entering the driveway, but it's obvious now that another three bags will be necessary to complete the job, and this doesn't begin to cover the extra amount necessary to extend the fill to the side of the driveway since half the time a vehicle is parked on the grass, typically the Equinox or whichever vehicle Heather decides to bring over.
After the concrete fill I was pretty much wiped out. Took a shower and rested for a bit before Vikki's relatives came over to visit. Paola, Chris, Kristen and her parents. Chris delivered a 6 foot ladder which I've been needing to work on other projects around the house, such as figuring out why the dryer duct doesn't blow through to the outside, causing multiple cycles to dry clothes and a puddle to form in the utility room from the condensation. Paola, Chris and Kristen visited for about half an hour, also delivering a plethora of food which we are all thankful for. Her parents stayed another two hours before heading back to Paola's to pick up their belongings and to head to the airport and back to Miami.
Things were relatively uneventful at the house after that, but certainly not elsewhere. I headed to the Home Depot to pick up a digital multimeter to troubleshoot the radiator fans not working on Vikki's car and ended up picking up some cat-5e and rj-45 connectors while I was there. On the way back I got a call from Vikki, she was leaving for Paola's since Karina caused a stink resulting in getting slapped by her grandfather. It's pretty sad, really. She hates her home life and I can't blame her, but she doesn't have the tact to keep herself in check. Young, rebellious and pretty much out of control. Either way her boyfriend called the police who thankfully did nothing. The girl needed a good slap, if not a full fledged beating after some of the comments she made the past few days.
Anyway, I found Heather, Trolle and their friend (now my friend?) Dallas home alone at the house when I arrived playing Guitar Hero World Tour. Of course I joined in and actually ended up on the drums at some point. I kid you not, drums on Guitar Hero is a completely different animal than on Rock band. Much more natural, really. On Rock Band I had a hard time playing on easy, but on Guitar Hero I quickly found myself struggling only slightly on Hard and even clearing some of the easier songs on Expert. Vikki escaped having to take her parents to the airport and came back to join us all. Once Rain arrived from work we headed to Steak 'n Shake for dinner before splitting our separate ways.
At some point, I think right after coming home from Steak 'n Shake, I made an Ethernet cable long enough to stretch from the router on Vikki's computer desk in the loft to my bedroom, granting me internet access pretty much anywhere in the house until my new wireless card comes in. But the big thing was installing Reason, a music creation program that I played around with until 4am before realizing how tired I was and passing out.
Day 11
Today I awoke to writing an official PC Technician resume and sending it out to as many companies as I could find on Craigslist, Careerbuilder and Monster. I also found myself fed up with the fact that the tilting wall mount for my HDTV still hadn't arrived and it was day 7. I wrote an email to the eBay seller before heading downstairs. Not 30 minutes later, FedEx arrived with the wall mount. As of 2pm, I have an HDTV hanging above a fireplace. I pulled a new cable through the wall and swapped out the cable coupler for a cable splitter. I also pulled down the somewhat broken blinds on the large downstairs window facing the front yard and re-hung it on the window above and cut it down to size. Now there's a significant amount of shade in the afternoon, with the only unshielded light coming in from the super-high semi-circle window above all the others.
Honestly the rest of today was uneventful. Vikki and I went through everything we could find and couldn't locate a MIDI adapter to connect her MIDI keyboard to my laptop. The M-Tools device she has is only a pre-amp for direct audio input, not a MIDI controller or adapter, leaving the MIDI keyboard completely useless. Rain prepared a dinner of pineapple chicken with corn and mashed potatoes, which were delicious and consumed feverishly. Likewise, I haven't touched my Blackberry all day. It's a rather nice feeling knowing that I'm able to set it aside and not worry about it. And to top things off, I've still got six cigarettes left in a pack I opened 30+ hours ago. Usually I'm a pack per day, so this is honestly a significant decrease.
I found myself really missing Tampa for the first time since I moved up here. Besides the random call from Mike yesterday, I haven't spoken to anybody in Tampa besides my parents and my former employer. I had a lot of time to think about where I'm at right now and the fact that I haven't gotten a single call back yet from anybody is starting to weigh in heavily upon me. No calls, no interviews, nothing. Have I made the right choice by moving up here? Will I find a job in time to stay afloat? Sadly, only time will tell. Plus it doesn't help that almost every prospective employer wants me to have a valid Georgia driver's license of all things, so it looks like I'll have to do that part sooner than later. Plus I still gotta get Progressive changed over into John's name so that's something to deal with, and soon.
I suppose that's all for now. The rest of the evening was spent watching Doctor Who and Reno911 episodes, so nothing really spectacular to write about there. Doctor Who is highly engaging and Reno911 is really starting to hold my interest for the first time. I'm not sure if it's boredom or a new appreciation for the show's humor but either way, I'm glad I'm enjoying it.
Take care my friends.