Wasting Time

As you can see I am not working. Hence the blogging. But, believe it or not I am at work. Working the mall gig today. On days like this, I wonder if it is even really worth it. I have made a whopping $32 for myself today. I'm strictly commision and I haven't really sold a damn thing all day. But, Saturdays is what makes up for it. When I am here all by myself, allday (11 hours). That's where the bread is at. I can't even people watch on a day like this because all there is are people in wheelchairs, with walkers or zipping by at 50mph in a motorized cart. Sometimes I think it would be cool to see a motorized cart accident. Two of them collide leaving one with a flat tire and a bent rim. The other with a torn off fender. Maybe the geezers will even start to beat each other with their canes. Then, Tuesdays would be interesting. But, that never happens. At least I have some blogging to catch up on.

Mmmmm Chili

My Aunt made some awesome home made chili a few weeks ago. She was kind enough to give me some. Unfortunately I haven't gotten to it until today. How good it was. Very meaty and just the right amount of spiciness. A big bowl of chili for lunch and some crackers will do you good. Hope it doesn't give me gas. I think I might be making a run for the china department in Dilliard's shortly.

Power Bill

Okay, Autumn just needs to hurry itself on over here and quick. Went to go pay the power bill today, it was $127! Now, I know you all are laughing and wishing you had a power bill that low. But, I also live in an apartment, turn all the lights off when not needed and keep our A/C at a moderate temp of 76-78 degrees. Normally our bill is between $65 and $80, so this caught me slightly off guard. It's just so hot out that our A/C is constantly running. Unfortunately, since we rent, I have no control over the efficiency of the building. $127 isn't outrageous or anything, just out of the norm. "Come on winter!"

Preseason Football

So... our Bucs won their first preseason game! Not a bad start. Especially since they were against a pretty decient team, the New England Patriots. After the first quater there was zilch on the score board. By the fourth, the game was tied 10 to 10. The clock ran out and it was still tied. The Bucs won it with a field goal in the end. Not a bad start for the Bucs. There was a pretty good turn out at the Ray Jay as well. Looks like people are getting psyched for this season. I know I am.

Football Season!

Thank God football season is on it's way back. I didn't get to see much of last season because I was always at work. But, this year I should be able to catch almost all of the 1pm games, all the 4pm games and all of the night games. And if there are some I might miss... I've got DVR. I'm sure my Aunt is not only excited about the new season but also that she now has DVR as well! The first Bucs preseason game is this Friday against the Patriots. It's a home game for the Bucs and it's @ 7:30pm for those of you not in the know. I'll be DVRing it.

I Say, You Say, They Say

I was in the restroom today and I started to ponder. I've done a post like this before about soda, pop, coke and the many other names people use to describe a carbonated soft drink. I call the restroom a restroom. But, others might call it a bathroom, toilet, shi@@er or the loo. Funny how there has been so many slang terms created for things. What do you call it?

Little Early

For those of you that thought my post "Christmas Already?" was jumping the gun, I've got another one for you. I was walking to the food court today, since I'm still in the mall for a bit longer, and walked past Yankee Candle. In their store front windows were these big silhouettes of a ghost and a Halloween moon. That's right, their whole store front with tables have all kinds of Halloween product for sale. Now, I know that Halloween is closer than Christmas is, but Christmas is also a much larger celebrated holiday. Plus, studio projects take time. It's nothing like retail. As Mr. Fab said to me, "Christmas? Good God man, you are even ahead of Wal-Mart on this!". It looks like Yankee Candle has just jumped on the wagon with me.

And He Said, "Let There Be Rain"

And he sure did bring it. It was nice and soothing to go to sleep last night with the sound of rain outside. The pitter patter on the window that has that rhythmic beat that puts you to sleep helped me out. Since I am still a little bit congested, I happened to wake up twice in the middle of the night. Possibly around 3am and again around 5am. Both times I woke up I noticed it was still raining outside. When the alarm went off this morning, it was still raining. Everything was and is soaked. I had to run in the rain to get to the car, stepping in a few puddles along the way. It rained so much, that one of the main thoroughfares I travel to the studio on was blocked off because it had flooded. Puddles everywhere, roads flooded, yards flooded and retention ponds near full, it has been raining long and hard. I know we needed the rain, but I don't know about all this. It's supposed to rain the rest of today and the next few days on top of it all.

The Rain Came Falling Down

So, yeah, it's Florida and it's summer time and it therefore rains on a daily basis. Lately it would rain off and on throughout the day, but never really enough to soak the ground. But, today... it rained and rained and rained. It was good heavy rain. So heavy that when I was driving, I was stuck in traffic moving at 30mph because you couldn't see but two feet in front of you. Unfortunately, I think some of this rainy weather has not helped with my health. I've had a nasty, scratchy throat the past couple of days. Nothing else, just a nasty throat. Oh, and of course the stuffy nose that comes with it when you are trying to sleep. Oh, well. Just a little cold.

My Space

I changed around my MySpace page last night. I haven't updated that thing in forever. It was still talking about when Nichole and I first moved into our new place, which we have been at for at least half a year now. I didn't really change the look, just changed a bunch of the content. Swing over and check it out if you like.

Drew Carey?

The replacement host of The Price Is Right has been decided. Drew Carey will replace Bob Barker as the host of the long running The Price Is Right. I don't about that. I guess Drew is as good as any. I'll have to see how he does. Not that I really watch The Price Is Right anymore. I did notice that Drew Carey got fatter. I thought that was interesting.

New Suspension

I just put new shocks on my truck the other day and it rides so much better. My Blazer Xtreme is already lowered 2 inches in the front and 3 inches in the rear. I lowered it using spindles and blocks probably about 2 years ago. Riding on stock shocks at this height will wear them down. I've been noticing that it was riding kind of funky and I didn't like it. I also knew that soon I would start towing trailers from time to time for our live production company, Full Wave Sound Live and I'm wanting to get a waverunner as well. I figured I better get some new suspension. I purchased my parts off of Summit Racing and they were here in 2 days. Then to have them installed, I'm lucky enough to know Nichole's cousin's husband who owns his own shop. So, I Tuesday I went over there, had him install them and bam! All new ride. It definitely rides a lot smoother, yet it is also stiffer. Just the way it should be. Now to put it to the test of towing trailers.

Tomato - Toe-Mah-Toe

I came across this cool study in my technology board. They were doing a study on phones and what people call certain types of phones like cell phones, home cordless phones, satellite phones, etc. The had a link to this cool study about whether people call it soda, pop, coke or some other name. Check out this cool graphic that was created from this study.

Old Ybor City

Last night when Nichole and I were in Ybor, it was like a ghost town. It is summer so all the kids have gone home from college, but jeez. Only three bars were open, maybe. There was hardly anyone on the street. I remember being there on Tuesdays and it was just like the weekend. They have the new rule of no beer on the street and they also leave the road open every night, even Saturday nights. The beer thing I can understand, but to leave the road open is ridicules on the weekends. There is no need to drive down 7th ave. There is hardly any parking, not that anyone would be doing street parking on a weekend anyway. That's what the garages are for. It seems that with all the "cleaning up" they are trying to do in Ybor, it has pretty much killed it's nightlife. I was unaware that The Masquerade (a concert hall) closed and that club Hedo and The Amphitheater also closed. The Amphitheater used to be my place to go on Saturday nights a couple of years ago. Nichole and I used to frequent Amphitheater weekly. It was always a blast. Although, the last time we went, it was lacking something. Now I know why. There are still a few of the good clubs left like Prana and The Castle, but everything else is either closed or has turned into a coffee shop. The new party spots are Hyde Park and all the clubs not on a strip. It just saddens me that Ybor isn't the party place it used to be.

Gameworks

Nichole and I went to Gameworks in Centro Ybor last night. We had a good time. It's fun to play games and drink. Lol. Even though we had a good time I was turned off by it. The bar reeked of stale beer when you would go up to order. A lot of the games are old and have been there since it open. The place was also in general just dirty. But we still had a good time.

Windows Live Writer

I am posting this blog using Windows Live Writer. Blogger had a blog about this in the dashboard and I figured I might try it out. It is from Microsoft and is still in BETA. It does have some cool features like, as I type this it is showing me exactly what it will look like in my blog. I also like that this is a separate program, so you do not have to open a browser and surf over to Blogger and then log in. You just open up the program and start typing. It will then publish your post for you. Pretty cool.

Sweepstakes, Prizes, Giveaways, etc...

Just within the past few months I have been blogging, signing up for free products, doing surveys and winning entries into sweepstakes and grabbing raffle tickets. I still haven't won a thing. Well, I guess you can't include the free stuff, because it isn't within the guidelines of "winning". We have received a lot of free stuff too. But, I have probably entered at least 35 sweepstakes and entered some of them more than 50 times. One survey company I participate, NPD in allows you to enter points into sweepstakes. I have 75 points in an Alaskan cruise sweepstakes right now and another 100 points divided up between some other prizes. Will I win? We will see. I have not won anything yet. At least I can always count on Pinecone to send me $5, on average, once a week for doing their surveys. Thank you Pinecone Research.

Browsers

You know, the things you use to view web pages? The most popular web browser is Internet Explorer followed by Mozilla's Firefox. Others might be using AOL or MSN as their browser. I am a Mac fan. My XP laptop even looks and acts like a Mac. So when Apple released Safari for Windows, I ran right over there and downloaded it. Safari is Apple's browser. It is said to be the fastest browser available yet one of the simplest. I believe it is. Since downloading it, I have used it daily and only use IE when downloading Microsoft Updates since they can only download with IE. Pages load a lot faster and pictures pop up instantly. There is no loading of individual elements separately. It is still in Beta, so there are a few glitches but very few that I have found. I have only found 2 pages that do not load and Apple gives you the ability to report a bug so they can take care of the problem. Damn, I sound like this should be a sponsored post and I should be getting paid.

Paypal Sucks

We all know how there are tons of spam and phishing emails sent out daily. All of mine go into the junk mail and then deleted. The other day I noticed I had $200 missing from my bank. After some research I find out that Paypal paid some Shyper Communications on my behalf. What is this crap! I made sure both parties were aware of this and demanded to get my money back. Paypal was able to reverse the charges, but had to put a hold on my account. Come to find out, they haven't even received the money from my bank account yet even though it has posted to my bank. The lady then tells me that as soon as they receive the money from my bank, it will be available for me to dump it back to my account. Absolutely ridiculous. She then tells me about how secure Paypal is and I called her out on it and claimed BS. I do not open up any of the spam emails that claim to be from Paypal, so don't tell me I did something wrong. If it wasn't for Ebay I would never deal with this crappy company ever again. This is the third time this has happened to me and I know some others that have had problems too. I don't know what their problem is. I do all kinds of online monetary transactions and Paypal is the only one that has issues. If they were so secure, they would find a way to stop all the phishing and spam emails that claim to be them or at least differentiate themselves from the fake emails. 

Technology

I have a MDA from Tmobile which is a pocket pc with a cell phone built in. I subscribe to the unlimited internet access plan that they have. With this plan, I can surf the web, browse full web pages, check my email, have my email automatically download, get directions, instant message and even "Google Earth" all on my MDA! As long as I have a cellular signal, which I always do, I can access any part of the internet whenever and wherever I want. My MDA also has the ability to connect to any wireless network just like a laptop and with the same speed you get on a laptop. It also has the ability to create and edit Word and Excel documents. I use almost all of the features on a week to week basis if not everyday. While I am out of town this weekend (I will not be taking my laptop) I will be using my MDA to check my email, keep up with the news, get directions and phone numbers, and maybe even post some posts.