January 30, 2004
Isn't there a football game or something else like that this weekend??

So it's superbowl weekend. I couldn't care less about who wins the damn thing, but it's an excuse for everyone to have a party. Just to cheer for someone, I'll probably be cheering for the Carolina Panthers, only because I saw them play live this year. I would like to believe that I was the inspiration for this playoff run. The Panthers looked up at me, about 200 rows up in the second to last row, and I gave them the thumbs up and that "go get'em" look. And now look at where they are. But I still believe they may get trounced by New England and their 14 game win streak. It might not even be close, but I'll cheer for the underdogs. If it is close, however, Carolina will pull it out. They always seem to find a way to win at the end, as I was a witness to (darn it you Redskins).

And anyways, they gave me a free Panthers hat, what has New England ever given me? (As you can see, my loyalty is easily bought).

And of course we can't forget about the Super Bowl commercials. All that needs to be said is - Female Gladiators (broadband only) - featuring Beyonce, Britney, and Pink. I'm not even sure if Pepsi will be showing this, especially when they've got a new promotion to push free itunes downloads and they've only bought 3 minutes of commercial time and this commercial is 3 minutes alone. I know it's going to be shown overseas though. At least it's here for you to enjoy. You can preview some ads at this link - Super Bowl commercials .

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KB Toys has announced that they are closing about 350 stores. Check out the list to see if your local KB will be having their going out of bidness sale. Another list of 200+ stores comes out next month.

January 28, 2004
My car's state inspection didn't go so well. I "passed" but I don't want to say too much more as it might incriminate me or the person who passed my car, but I did need to get some work done on it. First, the brakes were worn, and that was expected. No biggie there. Second, the tie rod on my front right tire was bent. I was told that this is causing my tire to wobble, which I never noticed before.

So I get both of these fixed yesterday for a discounted price of around $150 (but it should have been $200). But now the handling on my car feels all screwed up. The steering wheel isn't aligned and I can now feel the tires wobbling. I'm sure I didn't get screwed by the mechanic though, because he's a family friend, but I'm sort of upset since I didn't feel anything was wrong before and now something is surely wrong. I'm taking it back tomorrow. Buying a newer car seems more like a possibility now.

I really need the handling to work properly right now because of all of the iced up roadways. It's been a mess the past few days with all of the snow and freezing temperatures. I have gotten used to driving on icy conditions though. Since I work at night, I'm always going to and coming back from work at the coldest times of the day. I know all about "black ice" and freezing roadways. A couple of years ago we were going through the same conditions and things cleared up. The weathermen and traffic guys were saying the roads were back to normal, and about a day after I hear this, I go to work and I hit a patch of ice at midnight that causes me to spin and hit a walled fence at ODU, right in front of my work. Nothing major happened to the car, just some scratches on the bumper, but ever since then I've been more cautious on nights with freezing temps. And right now I'm hearing people saying that things are back to normal, but I know it's still cold at night and I'm still wary of driving to work at midnight.

January 23, 2004
Todays date is 1/23/4... That doesn't happen too much, although it was 1/2/3 last year. And later on this year will be 12/3/4. So nevermind, I guess it does happen on occasion.

I'm going to be taking my car in for an inspection today. I'm always a little leery when doing so because the old clunker is barely staying together. I always wonder if they will catch some little hitch that will keep me from passing. I, myself, know that it shouldn't pass because
1. the gearshift sometimes sticks, sometimes keeping the car from starting
2. the engine is a little shaky, and may cut off when it rains
3. the suspension needs some work
4. the darn fabric on the roof is held up by a bunch of thumbtacks.
5. the gauge lights don't always work (and for a while the gauges themselves were kaput)
6. and a bunch of other little things that they usually don't catch or just let go.

In fact, I've been curbing the spending a little lately just in case I need to fix something expensive when I get it inspected. My inspection used to be due in December, but I was usually low in the dough because of Christmas. So a few years ago, I (illegally) held out until january (late in january too) to get my car inspected and get that January sticker to help out with the funds.

Hopefully things will go well for me... But just in case, I'm going in with a little ammo, which I'll explain later when I let you know how things go. (No, I'm not giving it up to some mechanic to let him pass me, for those of you with dirty minds...)

This may be it for my car though. This may be the last inspection as I'm already trying to figure out if I can manage to buy another car by the summertime. It's been a good 13 years and it looks like I may need to move on. I'm already looking and budgeting...

We're in the middle of the college basketball season, which is probably my favorite sport. I can now focus my attention to basketball as the NFL is basically over with just the Super Bowl left next week. But it's been a bad week for my favorite teams - UNC and ODU (for obvious reasons). ODU was off to a great start, winning about 6 or 7 in a row until this week. Now they've lost 2 in a row. They are a better team than I expected before the season started, but that's not saying much as they've sucked the past few years. And now the UNC Tarheels are starting to stumble after a good start. They lose last week to Maryland, but rebound from that with a win over #1 Connecticut. But they only follow that with a loss to Florida State last night, who they should have beat easily as they had a 24 point lead and just had to cruise to the victory. There is still 2 more months to the season and these teams are already stressing me out.

January 22, 2004
Happy New Year... or at least by the Chinese Calendar. Today kicks the Chinese New Year, with 2004 being the year of the monkey. It's like the biggest holiday in China. Basically the whole country will be shut down for the next few days as they celebrate. And if you're born in the year of the monkey, you're supposed to wear red underwear this year to ward off evil spirits, that goes for you born in '68, '80, or '92. There's a whole bunch of other traditions and superstitions that go along with it too, but I only know what I read in the newspapers. I think I'm going to celebrate today with some General Tso's Chicken for lunch.

Speaking of Calendars, I finally bought one for 2004. I'd been waiting forever for them things to drop in price, and they finally dropped to $3. So I'm looking for a cool movie calendar (like the Kevin Smith Calendar or Lord of the Rings or something), or something with nice photos that isn't too artsy, but all the good stuff has already been sold. That's what I get for waiting til nearly February, so I had to just settle for one with half naked asian hunnies on it (those of you at work, use common sense before clicking that).

Since I mentioned Kevin Smith, let me mention that he's just released the trailer to his new movie, Jersey Girl. (Quicktime, Windows Media, RealMedia) I always get excited about Kevin Smith projects, although he's warning everyone that this is going to be a different movie - not as raunchy (pg-13) and not as indie. Not like the other 5 movies that were part of the New Jersey Trilogy (now what's wrong with that sentence?). Oddly enough, this is movie of his with Jersey in the title. But it looks like a cool little movie to look forward to in March. I've been waiting forever for this, and hopefully, it doesn't fall upon the same Benifer curse that plagued Gigli.

I've been tired a lot this past week, I guess because I'm working an extra day this week. While a lot of people got an extra day to rest this week, I had to work an extra day. It's only thursday and I'm ready for the weekend.

Another Friends & Family Sale starts today - 30% off coupon at Footlocker or Champs Sports.

January 16, 2004
Hmmm? Something looks different? Did you get a haircut? Lose weight?

It's a holiday weekend for some. And oddly enough, my weekend gets shortened because of the holiday. I'm working Sunday night/Monday morning because the other guy that works with me gets to have this holiday off. I get the next one, but that doesn't come until Memorial Day in May. At least I'll get the overtime pay plus the holiday pay.

January 15, 2004

Making Lu feel at Home while he was here for the holidays

There's nothing really going on with me right now, but that's probably because it's to cold to be doing anything. And with this week being the beginning of the spring semester, I'm still really busy at work.

So since nothing is happening with me, I'll give you some Lu News. Well he went and bought a new 1 bedroom condo in San Francisco for $360,000. For that much, he could of had a huge 4 or 5 bedroom house, but that's life in the bay area.

He'll be moving into the new place around the last week in february, so I'm thinking of heading out there in march. But I also wanted to go to New York/ Connecticut/ New Jersey around that time also. It's one or the other for me because I'm not making the big bucks like Lu. I've got a boatload of vacation time to use up though.

January 11, 2004
Luan is expecting to add to his California adventure by buying a condo today. This will be his second attempt at buying one but he feels better about this one. A few weeks ago he had started to buy a condo but 3 days later decided not to do it due to the $400,000+ price tag. He is going up against 2 other buyers today for this place, a $360,000 condo with 1 bedroom and 1 bath. You can check out the place at the OceanView Village website. I believe he's going for the smallest condo available. It's got a nice shopping area with a Bally's and Starbucks (what isn't near a starbucks in SF?) and the BART (SF's mass transit) is one block away.

If Luan buys this place, it looks like another vacation to San Francisco may be in the works for me. Last time I was there, we moved his stuff from one apartment complex to his new apartment. It was an easy move because he moved to a place about 50 yards away, it was literally across a parking lot and around a fence.

January 10, 2004

Outside right now (I just took this picture a second ago)

Somehow a weather forecast of a few flurries with little to no accumulation has turned into a snow storm with an inch or so on the ground, and it's not supposed to stop until tonight. So it's snowing pretty good right now and it's pretty cold outside. I guess I'm going to be staying home today watching more movies. Or sleeping.

Work is still very busy. We're still closing stuff up from over the holidays but we're also rushing because the spring semester starts tomorrow. This may just be the busiest time of the year for me at work. I'm starting to feel like I need a little vacation or something. And this is after coming back from a holiday break.

January 7, 2004
Happy New Year everyone. It's been extremely busy at work as we're trying to catch up from the holidays so I'm keeping this short for now. Everyone should be adjusting back to normalcy as we get back to a 5 day work week. I hope the holidays were enjoyable for everyone. If things ease up tomorrow at work, I'll try to write about what I did over my Christmas break.