Ain’t Misbehavin’

A few weeks ago, I went to the farmers market across the street here in the River Market to meet Pam. I needed to get some cash so I could purchase some fresh fruit so we went to the ATM inside the City Market, but it was out of order. A couple of blocks from there a Bank of America drive-thru ATM. There is no bank anywhere near, just a 3 lane drive thru that has/used to have 2 atms and 1 night deposit box. Recently, one of the ATMs was broken and then removed, so now there is just one ATM. It’s always funny to me to see how many people drive up to the night deposit box expecting it to be an ATM even though it is clearly marked up above the lane. Anyway, we got to the ATM and got in line behind a couple of people and cars. It was amusing to see people drive up and have to get in line behind pedestrians. I took a picture, but it didn’t turn out as well as I would have liked.

Jesse needs to update his blog

Due to my working night shift at the hospital in Seattle, I got sick. That was 2 weeks ago, and I’m still sick. I went to the doctor last week and he gave me cough medicine with codeine, a steroid pack, and benadryl to fight what I assumed was an upper respiratory infection. When my condition hadn’t improved a week later I went back. I had barely finished explaining my symptoms and he had already finished diagnosing me. He ran tests to confirm, but he was right: I have mono. Mono knocks you out of commission for several days. I’ve spent the last few days at home barely conscious taking vicodin and Mucinex. It was fine at first, but I started getting bored. Then just in time, my new TV arrived!
I got a 42 inch Vizio LCD HTDV. I struggled with whether to get 720p or 1080p. I decided to be cheap and get the 720p. I am not big into electronics, and anything is better than my old TV. My friends tell me there isn’t much content currently available in which 1080p would really make a difference. I was originally looking for something a little smaller, but I found this 42 inch and decided the price was good. And Tiger Direct has no taxes and great shipping rates.
It sucks to be sick and stuck at home, but at least I get to spend time with my new TV. And I think I’m starting to get a little better.

In March I went to Seattle for a week for work. I was working 12-hour night shifts in a hospital helping the end users during the go-live of some of our software. Because of my crazy work hours I really didn’t feel like doing many touristy things. But I did get to eat dinner with my friend Lincoln at a place called Earth & Ocean. I had the ahi tuna and it was pretty good. I also got to experience latte art - I got a leaf and Lincoln got a heart. Dinner and coffee happened the first night I was there. Then I worked all week. The morning after my last shift my coworkers and I went to Voula’s Offshore Cafe where we ate Hobos! A hobo is an egg scramble with hashbrowns and peppers and cheese and other stuff mixed in. It was pretty good, a ton of food! After breakfast we went back to the hotel, packed our stuff and went to the airport. I got home at 8 pm that night, not having slept in over 24 hours. Seattle was really pretty, but it was good to be home.

A marketing evolution: old bottle on the left, new bottle on the right. Apparently slanted writing makes it better.

Build your vocabulary and feed the hungry. See the faq here. So far I have donated 1920 grains of rice, and I have a vocab level of 40.

My parents gave me some money for my birthday, and the first thing I bought was a coffee press. I had to buy coffee and a coffee grinder as well. I got a cute red Mr. Coffee grinder that allows you to set the number of cups and the desired coarseness. It matches my red toaster and red blender. I am not a sophisticated coffee connoisseur, but I can tell the difference between pre-ground coffee from a drip coffee maker and freshly ground beans used in a french press. For me it’s mostly the robustness of the flavor and the finish that lasts forever. So this is one of my new interests, educating myself about coffee and finding great beans to use with my new toys. Let me know if you have suggestions!

I think I have a decently nice apartment. And I know apartments are never perfect, especially when they are not brand new. Ask me on an average day and I will tell you I like my apartment. But every time I deep clean I notice all the little things that are wrong with it that annoy me. Things like the fact that the baseboard under the bathroom cabinet is 1/2 inch longer than the cabinet so it sticks out on the end. And someone was really sloppy with concrete so it dripped down on a brick wall. These are things that you would never notice if you came to visit me, and most of the time I don’t notice them. But one of them catches my eye every once in a while. I figure I pay a decent amount in rent that maybe I could find a place that didn’t have these kinds of things. But then I also think that some of this is because I live in a loft in a building that is really old. I know that apartments have to be thrifty so they don’t go over budget, but I think things like the baseboard are just things that people were careless with, and they could have fixed it without costing anything more.

Sometimes this makes me want to move to a new apartment, but I don’t know if I will find what I want for the same amount of rent. I know what I would like; I found it when I was looking for apartments when I first moved to KC. I want this, but I do not want to pay that much. I am morally opposed to paying much more than I currently do in rent. If I knew that I planned to be in KC for a while I would start looking for a permanent home. At least then if I was paying more each month it would be for ownership; I could live with that. But I wonder if I would have the same problems with a house. I would really like a condo, but I think that is a bad investment because condos here are super expensive compared to houses, and the value of a condo doesn’t increase over time the way a house’s value does. I don’t want a yard, and I don’t want to have to maintain the outside of a dwelling. But maybe I will get tired of apartment living soonish and decide to take the plunge after I save up a little money for a down payment. I will have to sign a new contract at my apartment in June. If my rent goes up, I guess I will have more incentive to find a new place.

I’m currently sitting in the airport in KC waiting on my flight. I booked this flight about a month ago, and I chose this flight because it was great timing. Leaving at 7:10 pm gave me plenty of time to wake up, clean my apartment, pack, get to the airport without rushing, and arrive in Dallas at a reasonable hour for my parents to pick me up. It’s snowing here in KC, enough that you can’t see the lanes when driving up I-29 even though they probably plowed about 30 minutes before I drove through. Of course, the snow means my flight is delayed. I expected this. When I left my apartment around 5, my flight was delayed 30 minutes. I drove up the interstate slowly, and got to the parking lot around 5:45. At this point my flight was delayed 1 hour. (I get text messages on my phone updating me on the status of my flight.) I took the shuttle to the terminal, and my flight was delayed by 2 hours by the time I got inside. By the time I got through security, my flight was delayed by 2.5 hours. Apparently the plane is stuck in Chicago (go figure, that never happens). So now I’m sitting here typing this to kill the time since I still have 2.5 hours left to wait, assuming my flight is not further delayed.
Update: My flight ended up being delayed 5 hours. I got into Dallas as 2 am. Luckily I was flying into Love Field and there was no traffic at 2 am, so I got home pretty quickly and got to go to sleep.