There are a great many things on my mind, and a great many things going on in the world.  Thusly, this post, as the title suggests, is a collection of said thoughts.

Firstly, the weather.  Wow, it’s been hot!  And the rain…the rain…and the rain…not only serves to make things even more humid, but uncomfortable.  To illustrate, we were driving and due to the massive rainstorm that was occuring at the same time, I was sweating profusely.  This – in my humble opinion – is the worst feeling.  It is extremely uncomfortable and when it occurs, I cannot wait to get home to take a shower.

Last month, I also attended a wedding.  This was the first wedding that I had been to in three years, so I had to buy a new suit.  I’m a comfort creature, so that made buying nice clothes a task unto itself.  “Never again,” I say…until the next time.

The wedding was not too bad.  Not being a fan of weddings in general – primarily because I have to wear the monkey suit, which stresses my comfort level – I had a pretty good time.  The food was good, the music wasn’t bad, the hall was nice and cool, and the ceremony (despite us being late) was enjoyable.  It was held at Carmen’s Banquet Hall in Hamilton, and that was the first time for me in that venue.  Good luck in your journey together, Tanya and Mike!  I wish you much success and happiness.

This is my first post in over a month, which shouldn’t be unnoticed.  Alas, with the many things I have on the go this blog has been somewhat neglected of late.  Unfortunately, there is only so much time during the day though.  I think what kills me is the fact that because I have been spending a lot of time at my girlfriends house in the city, I have had to alter my schedule and routine somewhat.  Toronto, much like Oakville, has a bunch of parking nazis running around enforcing all sorts of bizarre traffic rules.  Ergo – you can park on one street until 7:00 in the morning, and then on another street from 7:00 in the morning until midnight.  As a result, I have to get up early and move the car on my days off of work (it’s not a problem when I’m working because I like to get an early start on things.  We always have a decent amount of work to keep us busy so it helps to be optimized).

Speaking of work, we have had a summer project that kept us busy, installing various amounts of software throughout the High Schools.  It was fun, as we decided to create a new image for some of the machines that did not have them.  This not only sped up the process greatly, but I think will provide a more satifactory user experience for the students – we only need the legacy machines for another year as they will all be replaced.  That will likely be the summer project next year and it will be a much larger endeavour than this past one.  I am looking forward to the challenge.

Switching gears a bit, I finally finished the Brad Thor novel that I had been reading, Foreign Influence.  I have always meant to do a write up of Brad Thor’s novels, as they are excellent reading for those people who enjoy the Tom Clancy genre of novels.  Like Clancy’s novels, they should be read in the order that they were written.  It is beyond me why Hollywood has not yet made a movie out of one of Brad Thor’s novels.  The movie would be a box office hit for sure.

What else have I been up to?  Well…the three of us (Myself, my girlfriend and her daughter) made the trip to Black Creek Pioneer Village recently.  I had never been there, and did not have any expectations, however I must say that I was very impressed with the village.  It took us over six hours to go through the place, and we took a ton of photographs.  It was a great day – a tad humid – to browse through the buildings.  Anybody interested in a bit of history from the Greater Toronto Area (as many of the buildings have been moved to the Village from their original locations) will be thrilled to tour the site.  Kids especially I think will get a kick out of it.

I had really wanted to go to the Toronto Zoo this year, as it has been high on my list of things to do for a long time.  Alas, we did not make it, but I hold out hope for next year.  The zoo is a big place, and I don’t think we can do it all in a day, but that is just fine with me.  As long as the sun is shining, it will be a fun time to be had by all.

Oddly, we have yet to visit High Park at all this year.  We’ll have to make a concerted effort to change that before long.  We usually take the dog, and I’m sure he’s missed the bathings of whipped cream and chips that we usually provide.  In fact – speaking of the dog – he’s been behaving much better recently, which is rather odd for him.  We haven’t walked him as much as we should though, and in general not paid as much attention to him as in the past, however this is just another sign that we have all been quite busy.  It’s no excuse, though.  While the dog is not human, it is still a living, breathing creature.  To that end, he needs to be taken care of and we have not been doing that.

On that somewhat sad note, I’ll wrap up this post and continue some more in the (hopefully) near future.

As I sit at the kitchen table, alone on a quiet Saturday morning, I wonder why things are the way they are.  Why are we here on Earth and what are we supposed to do with ourselves?  I look at the events going on, specifically the World Cup, and think to myself.  I look at the global whole, the happy people, the sad people, the poor people, the rich people.  People who live in luxurious mansions, and children living in abstract poverty.

Is the world supposed to be yin and yang?  A counterbalance for everything?  I guess these are questions that could be debated endlessly.  Who knows?  Does God know (if you believe in Him)?  And to that end, if you do believe in him, why does He allow terrible things to happen?

Deep thoughts indeed, and far more questions than answers.

I think I’ll go back to reading the Sports page.

It’s not that I have lost my desire to write, but alas, this past month I have found myself far to busy to contribute to my blog.  Perhaps that comes down to better time management skills, or re-allocation of priorities.  Inevitably, however, there is only so much time in the day and thusly, something has to be sacrificed.

I have been spending a lot of time working.  I have been working at my job (of course, because I have to pay the bills) and we have had some projects that are taking up a lot of time.  I have also been doing a lot of work at Grace’s house.  We have a laundry list of projects that we have wanted to get done, and the weather has cooperated (to an extent – many days have been very hot and this week has been particularly rainy).

By trade, I am a computer guy.  This means that I work on computer systems all day.  It is my primary hobby but also my job and how I feed myself.  Typically, computer geeks are not very handy and to that end I do not consider myself good when it comes to fixing things up.

Yet, sometimes I do surprise myself.  A lot of the stuff that I have been doing here are things that I have never considered doing before.  For example, yesterday I built (from scratch) a pantry.  I did it all in one day, as well.  I used SmartDraw to lay out the design, and then I did all the measurements by hand (because SmartDraw, being friendly to use, does not allow you to measure things out in fractions.  Everything has to be rounded to the inch.).  I went to Home Depot and gathered the wood, and then had them cut it on their saw.  Lastly, I brought it home and assembled it.

It’s the first time I have done anything like this and I was thrilled that not only did it turn out perfectly straight, but all my measurements were bang on accurate.  I also really enjoyed the challenge as it allowed my to expand my rather narrow scope of vision about what I am capable of accomplishing.

Aside from building the pantry, we have accomplished a lot of other things as well.  We added shelving to the kitchen, which was a challenge unto itself.  I was getting really frustrated because I purchased a stud sensor to try and figure out where to drill the holes for the shelf brackets, and it didn’t work well at all.  Then, we couldn’t figure out what height we should hang the shelves at…which when people start getting personal can result in some somewhat hard feelings.

However, despite those problems, we overcame the obstacles and installed two perfectly level, at the right height shelves in the kitchen.  It also helps that Grace’s sister is a fantastic painter and covered up the holes I mistakenly made while trying to install the shelf brackets.  It looks like new.

While hanging the shelves, moreso due to my frustration than anything else, we switched gears and installed an outdoor speaker system in the backyard.  The backyard has been a big project.  We have spent many many hours on it and thankfully, we are in the final stretch.

About a month ago, we built a playpen for the dog so he wouldn’t run around the backyard shitting everywhere.  This involved cutting down a blueberry tree and and removing a boatload of weeds.  From there, a lot of sweeping and sorting took place as we cleaned out a lot of junk out of the garage.  This allowed us to start installing the speaker system.

I purchased the speakers from Wal-Mart about a month ago because they were priced absurdly low.  Ten dollars each.  Having worked in the industry for seven years, I know for a fact that these speakers generally sell for at least eighty dollars each.  And – even at that price – they sell very well.  Needless to say I bought all of the ones Wal-Mart had on sale.

Initially, I was not sure as to how I would install them.  Of course, I wanted to do it properly.  I’ve never been one to take shortcuts, and this project would be no exception.  The trick was figuring out how to wire the speakers to ensure that the wires would remain in good working order for years to come.  I solved that problem by purchasing electrical conduit and installing it around the house, the fence, and the garage and running the speaker wire through it.  Thankfully, Grace has a small backyard so it did not cost a lot (though we still used close to 300′ in speaker wire!).  The only speaker that I am missing is an outdoor subwoofer, but I have yet to find one at a reasonable price.

It will be nice to have movie nights under the stars.  We have an old projector that will serve the purpose well, and we’ll hang up a bedsheet for the screen.  It’s not the best video solution, and there are much more professional ways to do it, but in the interim it will work well.

During this time, we tackled the front garden as well.  This is a half-completed project as it stands now.  In the front of the house, there are two areas where we can plant.  The top area we have planted vegetables and a couple of weeks ago, we finished it off.

We have not had a change to work on the bottom area of the garden.  It is a smaller area and will require just as much work as the top area, primarily because we have to re-level the patio stones.  Gardening is a burden for me because I do not like it, due to the fact that I have allergies plus I do not know anything about plants.  Ergo – I content myself with doing the heavy work and turning the earth.

As it stands now, Grace is busy organizing the kitchen now that she has a lot more shelf space.  I am happy to say that I am not helping out in any way – it’s her kitchen so she can put things wherever she wants.  I was just the facilitator.  Yesterday, I sat her watching Grace’s sister and daughter offer suggestions and try to assist in the organization.  Maybe its experience, but I just sat back, silent.  Too many chiefs and not enough indians.  The only person who works in the kitchen is Grace and to that end, I think it is best that we leave her alone to organize it however she so pleases.

Today, I slept in (a rarity for me) because Grace is not feeling well.  In fact – the time is 1:16 pm and she is still sound asleep.  I am going out to pickup some speakers for the kitchen so that she can play her music while she is organizing it.  I forgot to mention that I wired the kitchen at the same time that I wired the backyard, as it all plays off of the same home theatre reciever (zone one and zone two, gotta love it!).

We still have a great many things to do, but we are completing them one by one.  It’s the only way to get anything done.  I pride myself on being a highly organized and strategic person, and those skills are coming into play given the amount of stuff on our respective plates.

Once again this year, I had the opportunity to visit Montreal.  This is the third time in the last three years that I have been to Montreal, and once again the city did not disappoint.  Montreal is a fabulous city, and one that I would have no problems living in.  The culture is diverse, and the majority of its inhabitants are bilingual.  This – to me – is important because my French is very rusty.  This is not to say that I would not grasp the language fairly quickly if I was living there…but you know, feeling lost due to a language barrier bothers me.

This time, I took my camera and I took a ton of photos.  The last couple of years, I did not take a camera and after the trip ended, I was kicking myself for not doing so.  Hindsight always being 20/20, of course.  This year, I made up for it in droves by taking over 1,000 pictures.

In any event, we (me and a couple of guys from work) booked a trip up to Montreal to witness UFC 113 live in person.  I was previously in Montreal for UFC 97 and UFC 83.  Each of these events are awesome to attend live in person and I urge anyone with an interest in Mixed Martial Arts to make an effort to attend at least one live event in person.  The atmosphere is electric and the UFC puts on a great show.

The main event was a rematch between Lyoto “The Dragon” Machida and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua for the UFC Light Heavyweight Title.  In their first encounter at UFC 104, the champion Machida retained his title in a very controversial decision.  Many people thought that Rua had defeated Machida – ergo the immediate rematch.  The second fight did not disappoint, as Shogun became the new UFC Light Heavyweight Champion with a devasting first round knockout.

Many people believed that beating Machida was impossible.  His style – Karate – is unique to Mixed Martial Arts and up until his first fight with Shogun, he was considered virtually impossible to hit.  If you can’t hit your opponent, you certainly have no way of winning the fight.  In the first fight, Shogun solved the Machida puzzle by using low leg kicks and aggressively punching.  This threw Machida off of his game and forced him into counterpunching randomly.

The strategy was similar for the second fight.  However, this time it did not take Shogun that long to solve Machida.  He used the same strategy to pummel Machida and knocked him out at 3:35 of round one.  He caught Machida with a hard right that knocked him down and then followed with a shot to the eye to finish the fight.  It was a quick fight with a brutal knockout, which made many fans happy.  It was a decent fight in my eye, and while some people wanted to see a longer fight, I was just happy that it ended decisively. 

Personally, I have never been a big fan of the judges.  The judging in Mixed Martial Arts is more often than not very suspect.  The judges – however admittedly – have a very difficult job to do.  They sit at ringside (on three different sides of the cage) and watch the fight from a singular angle.  They do not have the benefit of commentary, television, or instant replay.  As a result, it is entirely possible that they may not see something that is pivotal to the fight.  Thankfully the judges did not play a factor in the outcome of this fight.

In the co-main event, Josh Koscheck defeated Paul “Semtex” Daley via unanimous decision.  Koscheck used his wrestling and neutralized Daley throughout the bout.  The match was not without controversy, however, as Koscheck “pretended” to get hit with an illegal knee in the first round (which cost Daley a point).  It was not honorable in any way.  After the bout, Daley punched Koscheck in frustration.  That is a definite no-no and earned Daley a one-way ticket out of the UFC.  Many people thought that firing Daley and banning him from the UFC forever was far too harsh, but in my opinion an example had to be set.  It is no different than Renato “Babalu” Sobral not releasing the choke on David Heath at UFC 74 following the bell.  I don’t care if the fighters don’t want to be friends, or shake hands following a fight, but there can be zero tolerance of aggressive actions outside of the cage (or in this case, the fight itself).

The fight of the night was Jeremy “Lil’ Heathen” Stephens vs. Sam “Hands of Stone” Stout.  This was a back and forth affair that saw Stephens take the split decision.  I have to admit that even though the fight was close and the crowd did not like the result, the judges scored the fight accurately.  Stephens won the first round, and I think eeked out the second, but Stout clearly won the third round as Stephens tired.  I was hoping that Stout would have been able to finish the fight, but ultimately Lil’ Heathen’s chin held out against the barrage of rocks thrown by “Hands of Stone.”

The comedian of the night award had to go to “Filthy” Tom Lawlor.  At the weigh-ins, he did the funniest Dan Severn impersonation that I have ever seen.  I was in tears, laughing so hard.  Then, on the way to the cage, he was doing his best Apollo Creed impersonation.  It takes balls to come out to “Living In America” in Montreal.  He lost a very competitive fight to Joe “El Dirte” Doerkson.

The “OMFGWTF” award of the night went to Jason MacDonald, who, two minutes into his return to the Octagon, landed awkwardly on a takedown and broke his shin in two places.  This was the first fight of the night and it was a very sickening injury.  I’m sure his opponent, John Salter, did not want to win in that manner, and I would like to see these two fighters rematched because I think that their styles could make for a very competitive fight.

The “Disappointing Fighter of the Night” easily went to Kimbo Slice.  Kimbo – via his reputation – has (had) a lot of hype behind him.  He faced Matt Mitrione at UFC 113 – and was stopped via strikes in the second round.  Mitrione is a very large man in need of a tan, and much like his unofficial nickname on the tenth season of The Ultimate Fighter, he reminds me of the meathead from Archie Bunker fame.  I even made up the name before I knew that he was coined with it by Rashad Evans.

Regardless…Kimbo did nothing in this fight other than throw a few wild punches.  Mitrione took him down at will, attempted submissions, and generally used his reach to out-box Kimbo at his own game.  I was hoping that Kimbo – after four years of training – would be able to show some kind of takedown defense, but alas I was disappointed.  Kimbo was cut from the UFC following this fight (a move I did not agree with as the man only has one UFC loss on his record), and hopefully he lands on his feet in another organization.  Normally I wouldn’t care where I fighter goes, but Kimbo seems like a decent guy who is doing everything that he can to earn a living to support his wife and kids.  Inside the cage he is menacing, outside of it he seems like a big quiet teddy bear.  His fortunes are likely best served in Japan, where they will pay top dollar for fighters who have that type of aura and charisma about them (…in Japan, the actual ability to fight is almost secondary…).

Patrick Cote made his return to the Octagon after an eighteen month layoff due to injury.  His opponent was Alan Belcher, a rising condender in the 185 lb. division.  The ring rust was evident in Cote less than a minute into the bout, as he was unable to find his range against Belcher.  He submitted to a rear-naked choke in the second round, after Belcher dropped him on his face (obviously, stunning him).  I was surprised that Belcher won, I had picked Cote in this bout despite the layoff.  Moreso, I was suprised that Belcher won via submission – it is not something that he is known for.  I had predicted that these two guys would stand and slug with one another, but given the fact that both of these guys have dynamite in their hands, I guess they were leery of each other’s power and decided to turn it into a mat war instead.

In other fights, Mike “The Joker” Guymon defeated Yoshiyuki Yoshida (by decision, for which he was very emotional and very happy), Johnny Hendricks (who reminds me of an Ewok-in-training) defeated T.J. Grant by decision, Joey “The Mexicutioner” Beltran defeated Tim Hague (by decision), and Marcus “The Irish Hand Grenade” Davis defeated Jonathan Goulet by strikes in the second round.

All in all, it was a fantastic event, and of course I will attend the next one in Montreal if I have the means to go.  It was better than last years event (UFC 97, which was marred by the snooze-fest between Thales Leites and Anderson Silva), but not as good as UFC 83 (which featured Georges St. Pierre rematching Matt Serra).  It goes to show you how much the main event plays a part in the overall quality of the show.  If the main event is good, then people will remember that the show was great.  If it is not, then they have the notion that they got ripped off.

While in Montreal, we did a few other things.  On Friday, we ventured up to the Bio Dome and the Olympic Stadium.  We just saw the outside of the Stadium, because to be honest none of us had the desire to go inside.  The monstrosity that is the hotel that looms over La Stade Olympique should, in all honestly, be torn down.  Actually…just tear the entire thing down and rebuild it.  I think that Montreal would benefit from a classic stadium, using architecture from the 1800′s (much like Camden Yards in Baltimore…I’ve always loved that stadium).

The Bio Dome is a unique place.  I have never seen anything like it.  It looks (and is) huge on the outside, but because it houses so many various environments it does not take long to walk through.  It is basically an indoor zoo.  You start in the Tropical section, which will take you about twenty minutes to walk through.  In the twenty minutes though, you’ll drop about ten pounds.  I have to remember that this is not the environment for me – I don’t like it when my breasts sweat.

I did enjoy the wildlife though.  Birds, a crocodile, something that looked like a flamingo…they were all there.  As well, a myriad of various tropical fish.  There is no way that I could identify them all, but I have the pictures with the names on them.  What I liked was how the environment completely changed as you went through the different areas.  Thankfully, the sub-arctic envirionment was behind glass, or it would have been mighty cold (though I would have loved to have interacted with the penguins).

After we finished up at the Bio Dome, we took the Metro (which runs on tires and railroad tracks…tires!) to get to the Bell Centre for the UFC 113 Weigh-Ins.  We were early so we stopped by La Belle Province for a quick bite to eat.  La Belle Province is a burger joint, with their claim to fame being $1.00 hot dogs.  The food was palateable, but I would have preferred something a little more decent.

The weigh-ins were a very good tease to the main show – Tom Lawlor’s impersonation of Dan Severn standing out – and the history of Lyoto Machida and Maurico Rua for those who were not in the know.  Say what you will, but the UFC does a great job building up their shows.  The weigh-ins were covered live by ESPN, another sign that the sport is gaining more mainstream popularity.  There were approximately 6,000 people there for the weigh-ins and pre-fight buildup.

We went up and down Rue Saint Catherine a few times, and we stopped at Reubens for a nice large smoked meat sandwich.  We did a fair amount of shopping, because Saturday was a really shitty day.  It rained and the wind blew like crazy.  That was o.k. though – in my previous two stops I had never been through the Montreal underground (where all the good stores are).  The Bay is eight floors high!  And of course, we went through all eight floors, just to see how they laid out the store.  Then, we went into the main mall and wandered around where I found a few MMA t-shirts.  The other guys found some shirts that they were looking for as well, merchandise that they couldn’t find in Toronto.

The goods in Montreal tend to be a tad higher priced than in Toronto, but they offer a much better selection and quality of product.  I don’t mind paying good money for quality, though i do mind paying $75.00 for a t-shirt.  The MMA t-shirt business is a gold mine, in that you could manufacture these shirts for less than $20.00 – and sell them for at least 100% profit.  If I had any chops with respect to designing and marketing, I would probably get into the business.

We filled up our remaining time by eating in various restaurants around the city (St. Hubert, of course!!!!!) and watching the playoff series between Montreal and Pittsburgh.  Montreal was the underdog in this series, and we were fortunate enough to catch Games Five and Six while in the city.  The fans in Montreal are extremely passionate about their hockey club, and as they were (unexpectedly) climbing deep into the playoff picture, people were out in droves to support their club.  Even in McDonalds – they had big screen televisions and people were glued to them.  You don’t see that in Toronto – because you actually have to qualify for the playoffs first! 

As in previous years, I would have liked to have gotten down into old Montreal a bit more.  It’s funny, even though you plan the time to do things, you invariably never get to see everything that you want to see.  It’s a good thing that I keep going back.  Eventually I’ll see it all!  Montreal is a fantastic city and I wouldn’t have much problem living there full time.  As it stands though, I’ll settle for visiting regularly.  Even when Mixed Martial Arts is eventually licensed in Ontario, and the UFC puts on a show here, I’ll still make the trek up.

Happy Easter, to all those who celebrate it.  I know for myself, the four day holiday is most welcome and though I have not done much of significance for a couple of those days, I did manage to get the laundry done.  Actually, the washing machine got the laundry done, now it’s my job to fold it all.

Regardless, I generally do not celebrate the Easter holiday as I am not very religious.  For many Christians, it is the holiest of holy days.  For many corporations, it has become (like Valentine’s Day) another cash cow.  Call it the commercialization of Easter.  Chocolate companies probably do the majority of their business around this time.  Easter bunnies and Easter eggs abound.

The weather co-operated and was wonderful.  Friday was relaxing, and I was hanging out with the girlfriend when we made the spontaneous decision to go to the United States to do some shopping.  The border crossing was clear and we breezed right through.  On Saturday, we spent the entire day going through the stores (I did not buy too much, as anyone who knows me understands that I have no patience for browsing).  It’s all good though, as I need the exercise and walking is about as good as you can get.

Sunday wasn’t a bad day either.  The laundry got done, although not much else did.  I rested up (because you know, all that walking and driving kinda catches up to you when you are not in shape!) and puttered around on the computer.

Easter Monday did not work out as well as I had hoped.  I was pretty sick, vomiting all over the place.  I had make some steak, chicken, and potatoes the previous evening and perhaps something disagreed with me.  I know I ate more than I usually do (I have been making a conscious effort to slowly cut back how much food I eat), yet the only thing that came up was juice.  Everything else had digested and thusly passed through the other hole (yep…gross).

It’s looking more and more like I will have to get this stomach issue diagnosed futher.  I will have to gather my medical records and see a specialist, as I do not want to continue having these problems.  It’s funny…or ironic…I never had issues up until a few years ago.  I have always had an iron constitution.  I have always maintained, however, that if I got something, it would be something good…and unfortunately I was right on with that prediction.

Regardless, although the weekend ended on a somewhat disappointing note, the rest of it was great.  Next weekend will be even better, I think…but those details shall remain private. 

Normally I shy away from explicitly endoring a company, but in this case I am going to make an exception.  For those of you who live in the Oakville area, if you would like to order a pizza I would highly recommend Mama’s Pizza.  The Oakville location is owned by Marco, who makes the absolutely best pizza that I have ever had.

All of the ingredients are fresh, and the dough is rolled thin with no crust.  There are over fifty available toppings, and over twenty specialty made pizzas ready to order.  Furthermore, for the true Italian in you, they have Brio!

They are located at 2335 Trafalgar Road, and the telephone number is 905-257-3114.  Ask for Marco and I can pretty much guarantee that he will make you the best pizza that you have ever had.  Price wise, you will pay a little bit more for the food, but the quality that you get is well worth the additional cost.  Trust me on this one – I’m a fat guy who loves to eat.

This is not an endorsement of Mama’s Pizza as each location is franchised, and the quality of the food varies.  For example, the Bathurst and Eglinton location served me up one of the worst pizzas that I have ever had, and my complaints to head office fell upon deaf ears.

The title could be a euphemism for any number of government conspiracies or military slang.  But it isn’t.  Really.  I cleaned the dog today. 

He’s not my dog.  I do not own a dog.  His name is Buddy and he belongs to the girlfriend.  He is a purebred black cocker spaniel.  He whines a lot, barks for no reason, and is as sharp as a bag of ballpeen hammers, but he is very loveable and would never bite.  As with any dog, he will eat everything in site and then some.  And most of the time, he smells worse than sweatsocks in August.  Yet, he is strangely endearing.

So, I took it upon myself to not only clean him, but shave him down.  I really wish I had taken before and after pictures.  I took off so much hair that I could have made another dog.  It’s too bad the cancer society does not take dog hair donations because they could make some pretty nice wigs with all the hair that came off of this animal.  It took me over four hours to cut the hair, groom the dog, cut some more, groom some more etc…  You get the picture.

I picked up an animal clipper set from Wal-Mart to use in the pits, on the ears, and the privates (yeah, I shaved the dog’s balls).  It was the best thirty dollars I could have spent.  The fur came off and everything was even.  It was like putting a hot knife through butter.

During this time, I thoroughly washed the dog not once, but twice, and brushed him with a rubber conch-type comb to get all the excess hair out.  When I was done, it was like we had a brand new dog.

Scary enough, I think the dog enjoyed it too.  Normally he is afraid of me and won’t even come out of his dog house, but once we got him out and started cleaning him his attitude did a complete one hundred and eighty degree turn.  Maybe he was feeling neglected or something, I don’t know…but in the end, all is well and good.

As an aside…I picked up a couple of pig ears for the dog, and he was on them faster than a fat kid on a ham sandwich.  Wow.  Those were his rewards for being good while being cleaned up.

If I was an inventor, I would invent some kind of automatic dog-washing station.  Something that you could put the dog in, and it would automatically give him a thorough bathing and cleansing.  Maybe a good scrub down too.  How about a car wash for dogs?  Or a washing machine for dogs?  Hehehe…maybe one day I’ll design and patent one.  It would have to come in different sizes, or maybe I could make it adjustable.  I would sell it for little profit, because I would also make sure that I sold special dog-soap for it.  That’s where I would make my profit.

..that planning and executing a birthday party for a 12-year-old would be so time consuming?  Add to that exhausting.  Throw a cold and a full time job on top of said issues and you have a recipe that will keep you quite occupied.

In all honesty, however, I really don’t mind.  It requires a lot of strategic planning, teamwork, and organization.  I am fantastic at everything except for the teamwork thing part of things unless everyone is pulling their own weight.  In this case, that is definitely happening, so to become completely contradictory for a second I suppose I’ll label myself fantastic there as well.

I am handling the technical end of things, as that is what I love to do best.  Things probably wouldn’t go as well if I was the cook.  I like to eat and while I do not mind cooking, it would be a lie to say that everything that comes out of the oven when I am done is edible.  The effort is always there, but the execution is not.

In any event, this journey started last week when the girlfriend and I travelled down to Buffalo to do a little bit of birthday shopping, picking up both presents and groceries.  For the record, doing some of your grocery shopping in the good old U S of A can save you a decent amount of money.  Some stuff is priced the same, but most canned goods, snacks, and of course alcohol are far less expensive.

From there we hit up some of the dollar stores to grab decorations, all of which will be put up tomorrow evening after work.  My role is to play the amateur DJ.  I will be floating around, taking photos, and making sure that the music is constantly rocking.  I will also be videotaping the entire event.  Should be fun!

Edit:  The previous entry was written prior to the party, on March 4th.  Below is the aftermath…

On Friday evening, we went to setup the technology and the decorations for the event.  I got everything setup from a technology standpoint and tested everything to ensure it was running.  Somehow, we were missing an adapter for the camera, but Grace went out and purchased one.  Four hours later, we still were not done.  But regardless, we went home and got a few hours (literally) sleep and returned to finish on Saturday.

We got to the location on Saturday and finished the setup.  We unpacked all the food and unloaded the car for I think the fourth time.  Truly, it felt like we were moving in.  I have never seen so much food in all my time, though I must say that it is better to have too much than too little.  The food was delicious and I would have eaten more except for the fact that I was not feeling well.  I was in a lot of pain, and combine that with a lack of sleep and it did not make for a good day physically.  Truly, I should have not gotten out of bed but when you say that you are going to do something, you get off your ass and you do it.  I did not mention how I was feeling to anyone because that would have caused them unneeded worry.

Regardless, I think that the party went off pretty well.  We took lots of photos and had video running the entire time.  The video, clocking in at some seven hours, will have to be edited down to a more manageable size.  That type of project is within my bailiwick to do, and after I am finished my book project it will be first or second on the list (before or after our Christmas videos).  We had food in abundance, a great cake, lots of kids, some loud music, and a lot of fun.  Everything may not have gone completely to plan, but I think everyone managed to have a great time.

As usual with an undertaking of this size, we ran into a couple of hiccups, but we overcame them.  We always do.  Such is the definition of teamwork.  Sometimes it’s not pretty, but the only thing that matters to me is the end result.  And quite honestly, with only two people doing the majority of the work (specifically during the party itself), we pulled it off pretty good.

As a final note, driving home after two long days with less than six hours sleep is not recommended.  I was falling asleep on the road and quite honestly, I don’t know how I made it home.  I don’t even remember driving home until I pulled into the garage.  A word to the wise, pull off the road if you feel dozy.  Trying to be a man and fight through it (as I did) is not the sensible thing to do, trust me.

Did you know that Valentine’s Day was established in A.D. 496 by Pope Gelasius I to celebrate love and affection between intimate couples?  As you can see, it was initially a holiday that was not based in any sort of commercialism; that did not occur until the nineteenth century with the sending of cards.  The 1960′s brought on the sending of flowers, and the holiday is the second busiest of the year for the flower industry, second only to Mother’s Day.

Sometimes, the fact that you are “supposed” to get flowers or some sort of loving gift for your beloved bothers me.  Why should it be on this day that you have to profess your love for your significant other, and then follow it up with a gift of some sort?  Don’t get me wrong – I enjoy giving – but I don’t think that it should be on this particular day.  Make it a day that is significant to the both of you, or better yet – how about a random day?  Just show up with flowers, a box of chocolate, or anything else that might tickle your fancy.

In any event, that’s my rant pretty much any year.  Now – onto better news.

This year, my Valentine’s Day was the best one yet.  The details are private – but I had a great time with a bunch of people who are close to me.  We did the usual Valentine’s stuff, but we also had a great time shopping in Buffalo, and dining out at Quaker Steak and Famous Dave’s.