Plans for the Weekend

I did nothing productive tonight except clearing out some memory on my TiVo by catching up on Heroes! The season has improved.

I'm really feeling the urge to purge! I stopped by an open house last Sunday after church because I've been gettin' the itch to buy a house. I chatted with the owner/seller for about an hour and during the course of the hour, we talked about living a simpler life. She said she listened to a book on CD where the guy (Wayne Dyer maybe?) said that you only use about 20% of your stuff. It's true. I was already feeling the need to purge the closets and shelves, but even more so now!!

The plan is to clear out some space in my drawers and be ruthless about the game closet. Some of them have never even been opened, especially the old "American" style ones. Those are definitely going to the Goodwill so I can free up some precious shelf space! I'll probably do that while I'm waiting for the cable guy to show up. Yes, you heard correctly. By 4 PM tomorrow afternoon, I will have clear television reception! Yea! I have plans to hang out with Travis tomorrow night, though I'm not sure yet what we'll be doing.

Sunday morning is church (oh, that requires a post!) with Shane and then maybe some band practice? I need to email my bandmates to see if they're free... For a weekend that I tried NOT to plan, I haven't been very successful. At least I have all day tomorrow at home!

Other to do items I need to squeeze into this weekend:

• Birthday gift for my nephew
• Make Christmas list
• Decide about Christmas cards
• Bake cookies
• Buy shelves for my kitchen pantry
  

Man, I better get to bed!

Work Update

My company was purchased by another company yesterday. They bought us and two other companies in the Southern California area. I think it will be a good change for me. The good news for me is that they want me to be in charge of the accounting for the three companies, which would be a promotion for me. The upside potential is unknown at this point. They gave me a decent raise in my salary, but it's not as much as I thought it would be, but is it ever?? Additionally, it looks like I'll probably switch out of the current bonus pool for all employees at my current company and participate in one for the management of the corporation. My new boss said the "new" bonus pool will pay me more than I'm getting now in the general bonus pool. The other perks I have are staying the same.

Making a lot of money is great, but I have a pretty rich life outside of work and I really don't want to feel like I'm sacrificing that just for more money. For me, life is about more than money. I have no problem working hard. I just don't want to be stuck at the office for 50-60 hours a week and driving all over Southern California and being so exhausted from work that I can't enjoy my real life. If it's for short bursts, fine. But if it was consistently like that, I'd have to look elsewhere. The good news is that I have been working with a woman who works for another company owned by the same corporation and she really likes the corporation and my/our boss. She also seems very together and is a great worker. I enjoyed the last couple days she was in the office. So the signs are good that I will like working for them. But since it's an unknown, I've been considering all possibilities.

The big question is what the change in my workload and responsibilities will be. That can only be really assessed over the next few months. So my plan is to see how the next 90 days go and go from there.

Changes at Work

I seldom talk about work on my blog. Mainly because it's a pretty low-stress, good place to work and I get paid well. I have worked here since 1995. It used to be privately owned until the owners decided to sell it to an investment group in 2004. The sale of the company didn't bring about any changes. However, there are some changes brewing that may bring about real change. BIG change. I don't know whether that will be good or bad for me, but all signs indicate that they will be good. I think the new owners will be a good fit for the company and I am thankful for that. I'll post more details once I find out what they are!

It's been very comforting to know that if they're bad, I can always leave and find another job. Thankfully, since I don't live paycheck-to-paycheck, I have the freedom to have options. If I had to, I could take my time finding a different job. I doubt I'd have any trouble landing a new job, but I realize that it's been a long time since I've looked for a job and the job market is tough. I know more than a few people who were out of work for over six months!! That said, I'm certainly not looking to jump ship because I genuinely like my company and my co-workers.

I should have a much better idea of what the general plan is by the end of the week. Until then...

Werewolf T-shirt

If it's not a Guitar Hero or B-52's t-shirt, I usually don't pay much attention... but how can I pass up *this* shirt? It's so darn cute and offered by Game Ink!! Pre-orders are due by 11/30!!



They offer free shipping if you order 3 or more shirts... Who's in? There's also a very cute "That's How I Roll" t-shirt and "Your Place or Mine?"

eHarmony Date #8.2

We met at the golf course to hit some balls at the driving range and on the putting green. I could get really good at golf if I put in the effort. I can definitely see why people enjoy it. We made a bet on the putting green which cost him a beer.

We went to dinner and the food was fine. At the start of dinner, I brought up a topic that had come up during our first date and really kinda stuck with me. It's too long to go into here, but I asked him more about it and the additional information he gave me didn't really help me feel any better about what he had done. He asked me out for a third date and I said that I'd think about it. After further thought last night, I think the answer is "no." So I'll be sending him an email to let him know.

Snippets of the conversation I had with him needs to be put in a completely different post called "The Top 5 Reasons You Should Be Judgmental." It certainly has been an active topic of conversation lately!

Sunday Plans

I'm up earlier than I'd like to be considering I went to bed pretty late last night. I'm going to finally go visit a nearby church that I've been meaning to go to for a year! Finding a church can be tough! Making the TIME to find a church has been tough. I really need to try to get less busy. I say that every few months and then I get busier and busier and then feel overwhelmed. I need to do a better job managing that. I will have to if some changes happen at work. More on that if it actually happens. Hopefully I'll know this week.

I also have a second date with eHarmony guy #8 today. To be honest, I am just so-so looking forward to it. I probably shouldn't have found this annoying, but I did. I'm playing games on Friday and he texts me around 5 PM to ask what I'm doing at the moment and later that night. Answer to both questions? "Playing games." Then he asks me out for a movie that night. I was like, "I can't, I'm BUSY." I guess most non-gamers might find it odd that I'd be gaming instead of going out to do "normal" stuff, but I was annoyed because I clearly said I was doing something that night. If I was free, I would've said so. I think most women know that if they wanna go out with a guy, when he asks, "What are you doing tonight?" You indicate that you're free. Not a big deal, but still kinda annoying.

I'm trying to keep an open mind though, so I'll go. But if I'm not feelin' it by the end of this date, I think I'm done.

Rock Band Tryouts

It's been out for less than a week and already my eyeballs feel like they're going to fall out. We had band practice all day and even band tryouts because we had more than four people who want to be in the band. We're still testing everyone's skillz to see who's going to make the cut. Travis is trying out Monday night! Tryouts in Glendale!

Rock Band is awesome!

Everyone knows how much I love Guitar Hero, right? Well, I think I might be a Rock Band convert. And here's why...

1. Rock Band has an awesome song list, mostly done by original artists.
2. The drums are so much fun!! And challenging in a whole new way.
3. The way the crowd sings along!
4. You can make your very own customized rocker.
5. The "photo" action shots of band members as they go on stage right before a gig!

My downstairs neighbor's mom is in town and she called me around 11:30 AM to ask me to turn down the music. It's the middle of the day! And it wasn't that loud. Next time I might not turn it down. Later they called (and I had the TV turned down) and they said, "The music's fine, but can you be careful about the foot banging..." because someone was playing the drums.

Some of the guys can be a bit energetic while playing. Man, I really need to just bite the bullet and buy a house.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I am pretty much ready for dinner now. The turkey is picked up and ready to be cooked, butter is softening, cranberry dishes are made and everything is cut and ready for stuffing and squash casserole!

Now I just need to make a list of the stuff I'm thankful for. The #1 thing would have to be my friends. More than anything else, life would be meaningless without them.

Have a great day! Enjoy the time you have with your friends and family. Time is the most precious commodity we have. Use it wisely!

Rock Band

My package of Rock Band from Amazon.com is "Out for Delivery"! It should be here any moment... Ah, no plans on Saturday means plenty of Rock Band! Who's with me?

Cash'n Guns Live at BGG.CON

I took a video of a group of us playing Ca$h'n Gun$ Live. When I tried to upload it to YouTube, it was WAY too big. After some searching on the FAQs, I found an uploader tool they have for big, giant files. Now let's see if they work properly!!

OK, after someone who's never played C'n'G Live pointed out, what the heck is going on? Here's how you play...

You split up into gangs. The object is to get the most money. There are five rounds. The gang leader looks at the available cards and distributes them among the gang. If you get shot with a gun (not a shotgun), it takes two shots to "kill" you. A shotgun or grenade will kill you instantly. Whoever's left standing at the end of it gets a share of the loot!

These are the available "weapon" cards:

• Bang, bang, bang - you have a single gun (your hand) and you get one shot
• Double guns - You get to use double guns (BOTH your hands!)
• Shotgun - Make a shotgun motion with your hands, the person you kill gets to take one step backwards and spread their arms out. Whoever they can touch gets wounded (like one shot from a gun)

These are the available "click" cards. If you have one of these, you make motions like you have a "weapon" card, but you don't actually get to shoot anyone.

• Grenade - if you get shot, you can take one jump in any direction and spin around a la Wonder Woman and whoever you touch is killed.
• Backstab - if you are wounded/killed, you can backstab someone with your left hand (if you can reach them)
• Kevlar - you can ignore your first shot/wound. This doesn't protect against shotguns or grenades.

Once it's clear who everyone is shooting at, people have the option of chickening out. If you chicken out, you move out of the line of sight while the rest of it gets sorted out and you're back in for the next round. If you don't chicken out, you are killed, go to the hospital and sit out for a whole round.

So this first video is people running around getting position. The second video is the chickening out of one Mr. Rubbo and the resolution of the rest!

The Set-up


The Resolution

Signed up for cable AGAIN

Last year I had cable for about six months because they were running a special for about $40 for basic cable. Then it jumped back up to the regular price of $66 a month, so I canceled it. I just got a flyer in the mail about the cable company offering a package deal: Internet, phone service and cable for $90 plus taxes. I already spend $60 (including taxes) on my phone plus DSL, so I signed up for it. I figure it'll be nice to have Food Network again and be able to watch Heroes without the extreme fuzzies. Plus, if I stay home to watch TV, I could easily save the extra $40 a month it'll cost me. I just hope I can make sure my TiVo is all in line and ready to go.

Home from BGG.CON 2007

I just got home from BGG.CON 2007. I will have to go back and clean up previous blog posts sent from my phone (it doesn't like apostrophes for some reason), but the short of it is that we had a pretty fun time! I will also have to blog in more detail about events at the con.

It's late though and I really need some sleep. Zzzzzzz...

BGG.CON Day 2

I didn't get a chance to blog yesterday. The con is so much fun. We rocked the puzzle hunt! We came in 6th but that was pretty good considering a few teams are practically professionals! We placed ahead of one of them. More imprtantly, we came in ahead of Erin and her team.

I ended up staying awake til 8 AM. I was pretty tired. Tonight is the game show and I am looking forward to it. I am actually helping not participating. :-)

We just had Baby Back Shak today. I have pictures and they will be posted when I get home.

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BGG.CON

We barely made our flight yesterday morning. I had to RUN from security to make it on time. Once we got here, we ate some fried chicken at Babes Chicken Dinner House. The fried chicken was pretty good, but no Mrs. Whites!!

We got here and helped setup the library and then headed out to Thee Forks for dinner. It was awesome. I will give more detail when I get home and I am not posting from my Treo!

I already played Agricola once today! I was interviewed by StarTelegram.com today! The videographer said it would be posted Friday afternoon. I will have to check for it tomorrow.

More to post later! Tomorrow is the puzzle hunt. Oh and the Mavs KILLED the Spurs!

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BGG.CON

We barely made our flight yesterday morning. I had to RUN from security to make it on time. Once we got here, we ate some fried chicken at Babes Chicken Dinner House. The fried chicken was pretty good, but no Mrs. Whites!!

We got here and helped setup the library and then headed out to Thee Forks for dinner. It was awesome. I will give more detail when I get home and I am not posting from my Treo!

I already played Agricola once today! I was interviewed by StarTelegram.com today! The videographer said it would be posted Friday afternoon. I will have to check for it tomorrow.

More to post later! Tomorrow is the puzzle hunt. Oh and the Mavs KILLED the Spurs!

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Weekend so far

I was at So Cal Games Day all day today & managed to play Agricola two times!! We played the easy version with only the E cards and it was awesome. It must've been for me to be willing to play a second game with FIVE players. Our five player game took about 3:15 to play. The rules added another 20-30 minutes. The replayability is so awesome. We could play that game for the rest of our lives & never play the same game twice!

I also played Cuba and Ubongo Extrem. Those were OK, but not the best, especially compared to Agricola. The running joke was Dave walking by asking, "Are you *still* playing that?"

Tomorrow, I'm planning on going to church, Din Tai Fung & then MORE gaming!! And more Agricola!! I'm totally looking forward to it!

Oh and one more date tomorrow nigt. The third of the week.

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Pretty much packed

I am pretty much packed (less toiletries) and am getting ready to head out. Something funny happened yesterday... I got a text message from eHarmony #8 and turns out we're on the same flight this morning. He's transferring in Dallas to go to Ft. Lauderdale for a guys weekend. How crazy is that? I told him to quit stalking me already!! So, we'll see how seeing him after two hours of sleep goes.

We got to bed SUPER-late last night, partially due to another "quick" game of Agricola that was started around 10:30 PM. On a gaming note, we used the E & I decks and what else? It was awesome... That game just keeps getting better and better. I can't wait to play it every day!!

Leaving for BGG.CON tomorrow!

Wow, today has just FLOWN by! I've been trying to get everything done, but didn't succeed. At least the stuff that got left is stuff that's OK to wait until my return on Monday.

And, for the record, Agricola is like gamer gold. I've received more than a few requests from my long distance gamer friends for me to teach them how to play Agricola. And I will be happy to. I feel like I'll be able to recite it in my sleep by the end of the weekend!

My Coolio BGG.CON schedule thus far...
Wednesday: Going for a fancy steak dinner, then setting up
Thursday: Gaming and going to the Spurs vs. Mavericks game
Friday: Puzzle hunt with my hand-picked, totally awesome, smarty-pants team!, Transamerica tournament
Saturday: Game show and more gaming!
Sunday: Gaming plus going to the Redskins vs. Cowboys game

It's going to be a packed weekend. I want to play Agricola once a day if possible while there, eat lots of BBQ and play lotsa Time's Up and Werewolf! OOOOoooo... Ultimate Werewolf!!!

Oh, I feel sorry for everyone NOT going. It's going to be a blast!

Hypothetical Situation

It's often interesting, but almost pointless to talk about hypothetical situations. I say it's pointless because so many times, people say they'd handle a situation a certain way, but then don't actually follow through. How many people think or say they wouldn't put up with a cheating spouse and yet don't dump them when it actually happens? Probably more than you'd think.

During all three dates I had this past week, the topic of cheating on a spouse came up in one fashion or another. A couple were stories about friends and how things were handled and one was a hypothetical situation.

The question was, "If you found out one of your friends was dating a married man, would that affect your friendship?" To me, the answer to that is a slam dunk. It absolutely would affect how I thought of that friend and if it was clear to me that it was going to continue, I certainly would not make an effort to keep up a friendship with that person. Someone who would knowingly contribute to the downfall of another person's marriage is not a friend I want to have around. I know there are always circumstances, but in the basic sense of that hypothetical situation, that was my answer.

Then came the "What if"s... And then more what-ifs, which I totally understand on a certain conversational level. But then on another, why so many questions about that particular topic? I'll have to ask him the next time I see him.

Busy Sunday

I got up on time, made it to church, got to dumplings and played Agricola AGAIN!!! I officially am smitten with that game. I then had a date with eHarmony #9 and it was good. He already asked about a second date and I think going will be a good idea. I worry though that he has too much morally gray area for me. I am not completely black and white, but I definitely have fewer shades of gray when it comes to right and wrong than a lot of people. After dinner we started talking about all types of hypothetical situations and he seems to have lots of wiggle room. But it's late and that will have to wait for another evening.

Weekend so far

I was at So Cal Games Day all day today & managed to play Agricola two times!! We played the easy version with only the E cards and it was awesome. It must've been for me to be willing to play a second game with FIVE players. Our five player game took about 3:15 to play. The rules added another 20-30 minutes. The replay-ability is so awesome. We could play that game for the rest of our lives & never play the same game twice!

I also played Cuba and Ubongo Extrem. Those were OK, but not the best, especially compared to Agricola. The running joke was Dave walking by asking, "Are you *still* playing that?"

Tomorrow, I'm planning on going to church, Din Tai Fung & then MORE gaming!! And more Agricola!! I'm totally looking forward to it!

Oh and one more date tomorrow night. The third of the week.

eHarmony Date #8

I went out last night with eHarmony date #8. It's hard to believe that he's only the eighth guy I've dated from that site. It seems like there have been more. Maybe I haven't cataloged them properly!

We met for sushi and he looked basically like his picture. He was late due to ungodly traffic last night (it took me 30 minutes to get to Encino!), but he called to let me know beforehand that he was stuck and I had a book with me, so I didn't mind.

Basics: He seems pretty nice and we never ran out of stuff to talk about. He's from New Jersey originally so he is on the sarcastic side, which he had warned me about beforehand. I had a really good time and I think one of the highlights of the evening was our Yankees discussion.

Somehow we got on the topic of baseball and he mentioned that he's a big Yankees fan. I scrunched up my nose and said, "Ew, I hate the Yankees!" He was like, "WHAT?! Maybe we should end this date right now! Do you follow baseball?" I said, "No I don't, but I follow it enough to know that I hate the Yankees!"

I hated to break the news to him, but I said, "Dude, EVERYONE except Yankees fans hates the Yankees!" He tried to deny it, but I said, "Really? How much money ya got?" He decided we'd do a token bet and we each put up a dollar. The bet was that we'd ask 10 people and give them the option of (a) love 'em, (b) hate 'em, or (c) don't care.

Results? 40% of people polled hate the Yankees! He wanted to find SOMEONE, ANY-one who liked the Yankees so we polled a few more people passing by our table about it and finally found one who did say that the Yankees are in his top 10 favorite baseball teams. So, I revised my statement to: "80% of people polled who had an opinion, HATE the Yankees!" And I put his dollar in my purse.

He asked me out for our second date before we even left the restaurant. He's into golf and I told him I like the driving range, so we're going to do that. He said that he'd call me sometime after Thanksgiving to set-up plans for the weekend and I strongly suggested that he not wait that long because the weekends get booked up quickly! He took the advice and emailed me today to set-up the date. So, we'll try one more and see if there's a spark. I wouldn't have said "yes" to a second date if I thought there was no hope for a spark, so the next date will be the tell-tale one.

Freezepop Concert

The Freezepop concert last night was pretty good. Much better than I was expecting, but not as good as Chris thought they'd be. He said the sound was messed up. But according to Liz Enthusiasm, she said that this was the best LA show they've had because the sound has been F-ed up at other shows.

The surprise highlight of the show was Ming & Ping! The music was interesting and good. I kept LAUGHING though because there was a guy dancer on stage with him who was dressed up in an organ grinder monkey outfit!! It was pretty funny!

OH! I almost forgot... I was talking with the Duke after the show and he said that they have a song on this new game that just got released for the iPod called Phase. So, all you iPod users, check it out!! It's supposed to be like Frequency or Amplitude, but not quite as difficult!

After the show, the band was downstairs signing CDs, so I had them sign the newest one that has "Less Talk More Rokk" on it! Here are some pictures! I love the Duke's shirt!!

Liz Enthusiasm and me

Me and the other Sean Drinkwater

Me and the Duke

Christmas Shopping

It's now November. Usually by now I've purchased at least a few Christmas gifts. I hadn't made any progress, but last weekend I bought my first official Christmas gift! I need to start making progress, like now!!

Here's a not-so-shocking confession: I have too much stuff. I have too many cookbooks, too many books, too much clothes/shoes, and in general just too much stuff. I need to spend some time purging it bit by bit.

Therefore, anyone who is interested in doing the "no-buy" agreement for Christmas, please let me know! I'm perfectly happy to have our gifts to each other be to spend time together, which is much more valuable to me than anything material.

That being said, I'm going to start making my Christmas list and budget today. Which means, I will start buying stuff soon. This is a friendly reminder to those of us out there with Amazon wish lists, please take a few (or several) minutes and update them!! Delete items you've received (maybe for your birthday in June!) and add other things that have popped up on your radar since then. Even more importantly, please double check the priority of the gifts. Is the thing you added to your list five years ago STILL the "highest" priority? Take the time and review it!

Who's on the list? How much to budget? I have lots of friends and clearly, I can't go around spending $50 on each of them, as much as I'd love to! I have to pare down the list. Most likely, besides my family and a couple co-workers, I'm only buying gifts for friends I see on a very regular basis... And then pick a reasonable amount for each of them. I hate picking an "amount" because I love finding the perfect gift and thinking "THAT'S the gift for ________!" Sometimes it might be $10 or $30.

What are you planning on doing for gifts this year? How much do you plan on spending?

Vacation Time

I was working on updating and reconciling the vacation time for all the employees at work and reviewed my own account.

I have been on vacation for 33 days this year (so far!), with another 3 days scheduled off for BGG.CON. Plus, I'll get another week off between Christmas and New Year's because my company is shut down. We have the option of using vacation time to cover two of those days, but I probably won't. I have been off of work for almost two months this year and that's not including holidays.

WOW! And of those days, 20 were paid, so that means, by the end of the year, I'll have 18 days off without pay. I didn't realize it was so high. That's almost a month's worth! I knew I had taken a lot of days off, but putting a number on it like that was shocking!

The breakdown: I earn 10 hours a month of vacation (three weeks a year) and I started the year with about 9 days of vacation. So, I still actually have a day or two on the books. But I think I better save them up because I'm already starting to plan the trips I want to take next year!! I might have to consider taking less vacation time though... or not. Life is for living, right?

Domestic Gaming Goodness

I spent most of this evening doing six loads of laundry, catching up on my overflowing TiVo and discussing Thanksgiving with Chris. Meanwhile, he cut and started sleeving Agricola. The reason? So we can play it this Saturday at So-Cal Games Day! There are 360 cards and we finished about half of them. He did most of the work, but I helped by cutting a chunk of them at the end. He took home the rest to finish them up by Saturday. It's taking a TON of time!! I'm going to be very picky about who I let play my game. Even better, Chris and I have an Agricola wager. We'll have to wait til the end of the day Saturday to see who wins!

Also, my original plan for Wednesday night was to go to the Guitar Hero Bar, but once I was told Freezepop ("Less Talk, More Rokk" anybody??) is playing Wednesday night at the Key Club, I rescheduled and made plans for that instead! I wonder if they'll be any good in person! We'll find out!

Weekend Recap

Friday started out with a Guitar Hero par-tay that rocked all night. Saturday brought us yummy carnitas tacos and lots of fun conversations. I also went to Best Buy to return the extra copy of Guitar Hero III that I had pre-ordered. It didn't show up until October 31st!!! It should've been here Monday, but UPS sucks.

I went to see Before the Devil Knows You're Dead with some friends last night at the Encino Town Center. OMG, there were so many OLD people at that theater! It was weird! The movie itself was pretty good. Slow paced, but intense. And, Marisa Tomei is smokin' hot. Geez. How old is she? (IMDB says she's almost 43!! WOW!) She has the body of a 20-something year old!

Then we went to the Maui Sugar Mill Shack and again, it was filled with old people! There was a decent band playing though so we had fun watching them. Then we stayed up way too late talking. I don't think I got to bed before 5 AM all weekend long!

Today was filled with shopping with Nikki. I got a SUPER cute dress from Banana Republic for about $15. It's awesome. I can't wait to wear it! I also got a bunch of other stuff. It's really been a while since I've gone clothes shopping. I need to do that more often. But before I do that, I need to clear out some space in my closet. I have perfectly good clothes that I just never wear. I need to just purge all that stuff.

I didn't get some stuff done (like LAUNDRY) that was on the original plan, but I will do that tomorrow night. I also need to sleeve Agricola with the English translations of all the cards. That should pretty much take up all of Monday evening. For a pretty busy weekend, it was actually relaxing and fun.

Coming up this week: laundry, hiking, GH bar, and two dates! One with an eHarmony guy and the other with #5.

Guitar Hero Achievements

I had a Guitar Hero party last night and we rocked the house!! Til 4:30 AM! My downstairs neighbor loooooves me! I did warn him though. What else can I do? I did also turn it down after midnight.

Luckily, Pearl had never played so she watched all the tutorials for me, scoring one of the achievements. We scored some of the others too like the 500 note streak! I'll post a link to my progress later.

Guitar Hero III: Online!

On Wednesday, I decided to try playing Guitar Hero III online. Since I was playing online, I hooked up the headset to my guitar. I played a quick match, but I couldn't hear anything through the headset and since I've never played any console video game online, I wasn't sure if it was even working or I had it hooked up correctly. So, after I beat the first person (on hard, I should've gone to expert), I created a match and hosted it. When it got to song selection, I was talking to Chris and we decided I should try "Evenflow" since we haven't unlocked that one yet and thus, haven't had a chance to play it.

I played that on expert and I ended up losing by about 7K points, which isn't much. So I say to Chris, "Hey, not too bad considering I've never played it before." All of a sudden, in my earpiece I hear, "You've never played that song before?" The other guy could hear me talking the whole time!! It was pretty funny!

I also played a couple matches on Thursday and got friended by a couple guys. Soon I'll have a whole Guitar Hero gang online! The online play is so cool. I love it because it gives me the chance to play against people that can beat me by double my score, which is a great challenge. I love it!! I seriously could hang out in my apartment for the next month straight busy with all the Guitar Hero, reading, cooking, TV, movies and oh yeah, board games.

I was joking with Chris the other night and told him, "Any hope I had of finding a boyfriend who doesn't already live in my apartment has just flown out the window!" because the online play is that cool!!

Evan's Homemade Costume 2007

I am sure all of you remember Evan's costume from last Halloween... how could you not? It was an awesome homemade Lego-Man!!

Whenever I have kids, I want to make homemade costumes for them. I think that would be so much fun! And way better than some canned costume from Target!! I know I'll never be as handy as my sister is, but you have to admire the handiwork!!

As you know, I am a big fan of food (hence all the photos of what I've eaten or cooked!), but really it's a family thing. We all love food! Including my 7 year old nephew who apparently has watched one episode too many of Rachel Ray's show and goes around asking if we're going to use EVOO (extra-virgin olive oil for those non-foodie types out there). He's not your "normal" 7 year old in some respects. So, they started doing research on what food costume ideas they could use for Halloween and narrowed it down to a California roll or the winning costume...

I present to you, my nephew Evan, the Lipton tea bag. Yes, you read correctly...



Oh, isn't that adorable!?!

NaBloPoMo 2007

I tried this last year and it didn't work so well, but that isn't stopping me from trying it again this year! It should be easier now that I have web access on my cell phone! That way, when I'm out of town for BGG.CON, I can still post!

The way I see it, between my new Xbox, a new GH, Rock Band coming out later this month, dating, cooking, and catching up on posting about Essen/Europe, I should have PLENTY to write about. Now let's just see if I can be remotely disciplined about it!