Under the Weather

So we flew into San Jose last night - strait into 180mph head-winds ... so it took an extra hour - making the flight about 6.5 hrs in length - sheesh, I may has well have just flown to Europe! And my chest/head congestion made the ascent/descent pretty harrowing!

Ah well - I stopped by a gas station on the way to the hotel last night, got some Nyquil and dozed pretty good - so, I'm rested and ready for action! Well, more that I'm embracing the fact that I'm sick and lowering my expectations to meet my condition... which is actually quite relieving.

CamelBak

Going to Cali tomorrow! It should be a quick and dirty business trip - but the cool part will be that I get to stay the weekend and hang out with my good bud Tanner in Sacramento and Santa Rosa. Not too shabby!

I bought a CamelBak hydration daypack from the one and only Campmor today on the way home from work - cuz it was accidently marked $30 lower than its $70 tag! Then... I got it home, tried it on without a coat - and I have never worn such an uncomfortable backpack! The straps dig right into your neck... and the "bonus" feature of having the water line run through the arm strap makes that strap stiff and even more uncomfortable. So... I'm taking it back. Dango impulse buys have been leaving me hanging as of late. That is, of course not to say that I haven't been on the market for a good day-hiking pack, it's just that when I put on my stingy hat and buy for cost before quality I usually wind up like this... with a buyers-remorse upset stomach.

Giving Thanks

The Christmas season can make me ungrateful pretty quickly - so many sales, so much dwelling on what I want ... and what I don't have. I find that the spiritual warfare can really get ugly during the holiday season: taking Christ out of Christmas, taking "thanks" out of Thanksgiving and lowering it to "Turkey Day", and trying to focus on other people, but getting so focused on seeing the latest sale item in my own hands.

The truth is - God has given me so much! I have a job that has taught me a lot about life and has challenged me to rise above some challenging circumstances - and all the while, a backbone of support from family and friends that has made weathering the storms even enjoyable! He has taken care of all my needs and even given to me in abundance - allowing me to hike, run, play music, experience NYC, DC, Miami, Puerto Rico, California, and even buy a new computer, new clothes ... and all the while to be well-fed, healthy, and safe.

Praise the Lord for His faithfulness and his abundant Grace! I deserve nothing - but He delights in giving even more than I need! Lord - thank You for Your love and forgiveness. Be alive in my life - and keep me near. Speak to me that I might obey quickly, and be glorified in my praise - because You deserve it so much!

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was wonderful - got to spend it with my boss and his family - and they were so welcoming and hospitable it almost felt like being home! Of course, there's was a New Jersey Italian family Thanksgiving, so there were some differences from my Midwestern German-English-Irish-French family experiences :)

But all in all - it was a tremendous blessing to be with his family and feel welcome. I arrived at 2:30 and didn't leave till 11:00! We just talked the whole time - and played a game that was a version of bingo played with a deck of cards... got the kids involved and deteriorated into a random-noise-match pretty quickly.

Oh - and I almost forgot to mention that I went to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade with Dave and his girlfriend and her parents! One of those lifetime experiences - and even had great weather to boot (60 F and sunny)!

Then today was all about football - and seeing my beloved 'Skers put together a great first half... and then take a squat in the second and give it up in the end. Ahh well - my friends and I stayed at the Husker Alumni bar for the A&M game and cheered the Aggies on to victory over the Horns with some friendly Aggie fans. At the same time, we watched Arkansas steal LSU's BCS Championship dreams - that makes how many top 1o teams who have lost to unranked opponents? Sheesh - upset city this season - I tellya what! (A fun year to have a bad home team - so's we can laugh at the other team's misfortune.)

Today was a bummer - cuz I talked with the sponsors from the Durham, NC position that I've really wanted ... and I didn't get that great of a vibe back. Basically, they can't promise me anything because even if I'm their top choice, the Steering Committee makes the ultimate decision. Really, not anyone's fault - more a consequence of a program that doesn't lean on connections or qualifications, but determines placement based on what "they" decide is "best" for your professional development.

SSSSSNOW!

Well I spoke too soon! It was snowing this morning big flakes and when I got to work, it had accumulated to like 3"!!! Yesssss!

It's one of those days where normally I wouldn't blog cuz I don't have much to say... But it's a habit I don't want to break :)

And I'm listening to the latest album by Angels & Airwaves. I'm a bit let down - not as incredible as "we don't need to whisper" - but it would be hard to follow up any album that rocked as much as that on (thanks Bethy for the cd!) ... but I have to admit I have a soft spot for the heavy delay on the guitars, the busy drums (and over-use of toms), the deep synth behind everything, and the stadium-reverb for the lead vocals. Pretty cool. Perfect running music - like a soundtrack. No kidding.

It was supposed to snow 1-3" here this weekend - but the most we saw of precipitation was a little bit of rain... kind of a letdown. I hope it drops some snow up North so we'll have something to slide down come January when me, Dave, Katrina, and some other Journey peeps hit the slopes for some much-anticipated boarding time.

Okay - I'm gonna go sleep now - g'night!

New Music

Ahh - the week's over and with no roommies in the house, I figured I'd treat myself to a brand new album from iTunes ... and Jimmy Eat World has done it again! Here's some background music for ya's whilst you read me blog -



Ahem ... yes - it's just album art. But that's so you can keep reading my blog. See - I knew you were gonna forget about me.

Today was pretty simple - did the work thing... some dishes... and now I'm avoiding cleaning my room. But tomorrow is gonna rock! Me, Mike, and my friend Lyle (drummer at the Journey) are going mobbin' through the forest tomorrow and we'll cap the day off with a pay-per-view of UFC - Fight Night made possible by my roommate Andy. So - basically, we're gonna man-it up tomorrow and we're not looking back.

But the downside to all this boisterous activity and the travel for work has been that I haven't been able to play music in what feels like ages! It's been almost 2 months since I played at church and almost that long since I've sat down with my guitar and just strummed a while. Shoot - you know what - that's what I'm gonna do with my evening. Gonna listen to some "Let it Happen" (that you're listening to right now), clean my room, go for a chilly run, and cozy up with my guit-box and make some tunes.

Thinner-shears

Quick followup to the haircut... Not as traumatic as the SuperCuts debacle, but I must say, for $40 I did not get proportionally better results.

Suffice to say, she hit me with the thinning shears from the word "go" - and never stopped. So, the "stringy-ness" that Martha was always afraid of creating... yah. It's here. And I'm trying desperately to do something cool with it - but the best I can manage is a lame comb-t0-the-side with no pizazz, no fo-hawk, no spikey. It's like it's not even my hair.

Oh well - it suits me and my corporate job: drab and devoid of volume or life.

...but she left extra hair in the back so it kinda looks like a mullet from certain angles. May be business in the front, but there's a party in the back.

DC and back in a flash

Gotta get to bed - but wanted to note that we had an AWESOME time in DC this weekend - me, Michael (from New Zealand), and Nate (from UNL). Gotta see all the sites - and we didn't even realize going into this weekend that it would be Veterans Day today - so that made the sites even more powerful. In fact, when we were in Arlington Nat'l Cemetery, VP Dick Cheney was visiting the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and they did a 21-shot salute with canons. Big canons.

We also introduced Michael to his first 64 oz. slurpee from 7-eleven ... and with that his first major brain freeze. Soooooo funny - he's slurpin down on it talking about how awesome it is to see all this American stuff (like slurpees) and then silence... me and Nate look over and he's squinting in pain, hand on his forehead and me and Nate just start bustin' up laughing. Ahhhh - what's America without its 64-ounces of brainfreeze...

Travel Scrabble

What a great name - I don't have anything to say about it... it's just that my Travel Scrabble game is still sitting in the back seat of my car from when Amber and I roadtripped out here in June. Travel Scrabble - it sounds like something Animal from the Muppets would say "AAA-AAAA-AAAA - WO-MAN - TRAVEL SCRABBLE - AAAAAA - AAAAAAA - DRUMS - SCRABBLE TRAVEL"

So - had an early flight this morning from Miami back up to Joysey. Really cold here. So cold in fact, that my luggage tag (which is made of a high-quality, supple plastic) snapped in two when I pulled my carryon out of the trunk of my limo. Or maybe it isn't just the cold - and more that it was sooooooooo nice in Miami that my luggage tag committed hari-kuri in protest to the abrupt change in climate. Either way, he is no more - and I miss him already.

Haircut

I'm sittin' here in my hotel room in Miami looking at myself in the mirror in front of me behind the desk and realized that I need a haircut. The hair right above my sideburns has gotten to that so-long-it's-starting-to-curl stage. So now I'm tucking my curls behind my ears and... viola - great - now I look like Corky from "Waiting for Guffman." I can't win.

So I'm feelin a SuperCuts coming on in the near future... what's sad is that it's not a last resort - it's my only resort. Martha - if you're out there - you need to know that I appreciate your shears more than ever! No one does it like the Mert - no one!

Good Night and Good Luck

What a great weekend! Got to hang with my New Zealand brutha Michael Pearce and my roommate Conor all weekend - hiked, scaled the highest mountain in the area, explored the Caribbean cuisine of NJ, ate fish and chips, and went to church. Superheros, you ask? Yes. Yes we are. And we're planning next week's trip to DC!

Diversity training took up my last 2 whole days. I thought it was going to be a total waste of time, but I ended up learning some stuff! Like, if you're in a dominant group (white, male) - that incidents of discrimination against less-dominant groups can go largely unnoticed. In other words, it's tough to see discrimination when you're not the one receiving it.

Cooling Down

So, didn't have much of an eventful Halloween... just realized today that we're already in November when I found trace amounts of frost on my windshield this morning. And that's cool I guess - things have to get cold, just to spite me. It's the way the world works. But it's okay - don't worry about me. I'll stick it to the man someday and move down to Puerto Rico or Honduras or something and live in no-season paradise.