Didn't Tom Petty say...

The waiting is the hardest part.....

I'm pretty sure it was Tom Petty that sang that. (I could be wrong, but I sure hear his voice.)

So yeah I'm in the waiting pattern. There are times it's fine and good and no worries. There are times where it just drives me fsckin crazy. I want to know if I'm getting the house or not, but then again I don't want to know too soon. Friday is pay day, I get my W2, I can do my taxes for this year. If I'm getting the house I can claim the First time Home Buyers Tax Credit and get $7,500 because I bought a house. If I am smart (and I like to think that I am) I'll put that money into it's own ING account and let it earn me some interest, and then use it for things like Property Taxes, etc. (all those little things they forget to tell you about when you're looking for that house.) Call it a 'housing cost' fund. It would be nice to have that as a 'cushion' for the first few years so I'm not scrambling to cover those expected and unexpected things that pop up.

Nerve wracking and exhilarating all at the same time. Buying a house that is. 30 year fixed mortgage...talk about commitment. (see even with the vacation from these blogs the spelling didn't improve.) So can I just do one thing at a time that is like this?? No I've got to end up meeting this great guy and go through trying to get him in my life, and buy a house, and try to not freak out over the budget crisis in the State of California and how I'm a State employee, and if something major doesn't happen soon I could be getting IOU's instead of pay checks. I'm some how thinking that the mortgage company isn't gonna take an IOU on my brand new mortgage.

The answer to dealing with all of this??? BEER. (if you really think about it BEER can be the answer to almost everything.) Bass was on sale at Safeway. It's been YEARS since I've had Bass. So I bought a 12 of it today.

So just a quick update.

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Hugz to you all.


Spell check does work!!! This internet thing just might catch on!!!

time goes by

Days go by and still I think of you.....

And so we start another blog.. but then VNV Nation comes on and I feel compelled to put some lyrics down.....

"I know it's hard to tell
how mixed up you feel
hoping what you need
is behind every door
each time you get hurt
I don't want you to change
cause everyone has hopes
you're human after all

The feeling sometimes
wishing you were someone else
the feeling as though
you never belonged
this feeling is not sadness
this feeling is not joy
I truly understand
please don't cry now"

Now onto the blog

Where to start??? New bowling ball??? Offer on a house?? Boyfriend????
(yeah I've been a busy boy.) Black Widow Venom is the bowling ball. Very nice ball, and yeah I know I'm back to Hammer. ( Non bowling geeks can skip the next paragraph or two.) See way back when...1993 or maybe even 1994...I was out of the Army, back home and bowling....well it was time for a new ball. The guy in the pro shop (Dorn) told me I should move up to a 16 lb ball and not keep the 14. I was concerned that I would drop the heavier ball. Dorn told me that I'd have no problems with the weight. As it turned out he had a couple of 'used' balls from Nikki G (women's pro bowler, born and raised in the Vallejo area) So he felt one of her old Hammer balls would be a good next step for me. (I think it was the blue one first then the red one.) So I started this bowling journey with Hammer. (I think Dad had a black one, 14 lb and I took that over as I got better) So full circle in a way.

The ball is very NICE and it's one of the few that tells me what I'm doing by the way it hits. (Ok they ALL do that if you just pay attention) I rolled a few games with my nephew just to break it in. We did this BEFORE league bowling that night. Then we bowled 3 games in league. Yeah no one ever said we were smart. So 6 games bowled on thursday. After the first set of three I thought I had it figured out. The first game in league, I fought that ball and tried to steer it, control it. Make it do what I wanted it to do and not just let it roll. 151 was the reward for all that work. (Now at this point some people would be bitching about how bad the ball sucks, and how they just blew $200 plus on a brick......etc, etc.) I knew I had to go back and let the ball do the work. All I had to do was stay behind it, follow through, and hit my mark. The ball would do the rest. Second game.... 203. (Hmm seems to be some logic to this.) So third game comes up (6th game I rolled that night if you've been following along.) and I've warmed up to this ball and KNOW that if I just let it do the work it can be an amazing thing. Last game.....232. Pretty SWEET if you ask me. That was 6 games that night and it's been FOREVER since I've rolled 6 games in that short of a span. So yeah I'm liking my new ball.

New house.... well the reality of life in these times has hit and through the twists and turns it seems as though I can actually BUY a house. (yeah there are many factors here and details that won't be posted.) Suffice it to say that bargains abound, and my act has been pulled together. I looked at 10 different places last Monday, and only two were contenders. The one I put an offer in on is the best of what I've seen and really too nice to be in my price range. It is a foreclosure so I'm sure that's why it's a bargain. Granite counters in the kitchen, a master suite with walk in closet and a bathroom that I could LIVE in. I'll have pics up when I know it's mine. (look for a post by Tuesday next week). Excited??? Hell yeah..

So I met this really amazing guy and damn..... what can I say?? damn.. went out to 1220 last Saturday and it was just soo good. Matthew Baker was just soo great. He gives my man one of his CD's to welcome him to the Energy family. Later on in the night Matthew gave me some great advice, and shock of all shocks I'm actually following it. "Let the past go, all of it. Do the unexpected and just follow this for as long as it lasts." Or words to that effect. (Bartenders were pouring STRONG that night.) It was just how he said it and when he said it. It definately hit home and I'm following that bliss.

Bitter Ball 13 Feb, 2009. Yeppers it's on the Hornblower boat again. Couple of hours out on the bay. Kid Loose, DJ Ajax, Matthew Baker, GHR, Trevor Simpson... Party time!!

Ok I'm out.. it's late and I gotta get up early.

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Hugz to you all!!!

A tale of two meals.....

So here you'll have it a couple of ideas to spur your cooking. Last night was bowling night, so that means it's gotta be a quick meal. I was thinking along the lines of ground beef and beef rice a roni.. (quite tasty and quick) I wanted to do something a little different this time around and knew I had a Pepperidge Farms sausage in the freezer. I thought that would give a different spin on the flavor. So I got home and pulled out the sausage, went to grab the box of rice a roni...and saw a box of Long Grain and wild rice mix. So I decided that would be better on the flavors... since I was already adding things I grabbed a can of petite cut tomatos also.

I start the rice cooking then slice up the sausage to brown it up. yes it's fully cooked and ready to use, but I like the taste when I cook it more. Since I'm adding stuff I figured I should saute up some onion to mix in. Garlic, you gotta mince up a couple of cloves and mix that in. (this is kinda how my mind works while I'm cooking...I straighten the steps out below.)

Cook the long grain and wild rice according to the package directions. Mince/chop an onion, add some EVOO (Extra Virgin Olive Oil) to the pan, heat then saute the onion. While the onion is cooking, slice up the sausage. Take the onion out of the pan and then cook the sausage. Drain the grease from the sausage. Deglaze the pan with some white wine. (seriously whatever type you prefer. I generally use something fairly cheap, but a bottle I would drink.) At about this time the rice should be done. Dump the rice into the pan with the sausage, add the onion and minced garlic. Open the can of tomatoes, drain, then add to the pan with everything else. Stir it all together and turn the heat to low. Cover and let it simmer for 5 to 10 mins. (lets all the flavors mix and build....) Enjoy!!!

Soups have been on my mind lately. Probably due to the cold weather and I like a good hearty soup. I did a beefy onion barely thing earlier in the week. So I had orignally planned to do a chicken thing with great northern beans, and whatever else fell into the pot. The beans hadn't been soaked so they were out. (yeah I use the dried beans.) I ended up doing a variation that I made up as I went along. (is that possible??? Hell yes) Bratwurst for the meat, chicken stock (yeah I've found some great packaged stock, it's lower in sodium than Swanson broth/stock) Onion, garlic, corn... as it was coming together I decided some rice would make it hearty and replace the great northern beans... (so the original idea was a chicken/corn chowder kinda thing.) Can you see the flavors? Taste the ideas here??

There are so many other options that you can do here. Variations on the basic theme... Red or Green bell peppers, green onions, even some fresh spinach... parsley, thyme to bring a citrus/lemony flavor...

Never be afraid to try. Get the flavors in your head and then you'll see how to combine them. There is no one 'right' way to do it. Endless variations...

Ok I'm getting hungry again and that's not always for the best....

Hugz to you all
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Christmas fun

Ah yes I am just about Apple certified to work on all versions of the MacBook. (In my house now there are an iBook G4, a MacBook Pro, and two of the new MacBooks.) I've upped the memory to 1 Gig in the iBook. I doubled the memory in my MacBook Pro to 4 Gigs. I replaced the hard drive in my MacBook Pro so now I have 320 GB of space instead of the 120 GB it came with.

I found this fantastic website called ifixit.com and they have the most amazing guides that show and tell you how to replace these things. Now if you aren't used to opening up computers this is not something I would try. If you do something wrong you could seriously damage your computer.

So I had to open up my MacBook Pro quite a few times, swapping the hard drives because I forgot to do a back up, then because I forgot the password to my Time Capsule. All in all it was a great experience because now I have absolutely no fears on opening up my computer. So it was much fun and I've learned soo much. So now it's like I have a totaly new computer. 4 Gigs of memory, and 320 GB hard drive. Sure it's only got a 2.2 GHz core 2 duo chip but the very new ones only have a 2.4 or 2.5.

I am very happy....I can wrench on a mac.

More to come....

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Hugz to you all

Christmas music

You knew I'd do it eventually.

A christmas story......of another kind.

My dear friend Karen sent me this one and I'm reposting it here. It touches me on a deeper level because I remember the year I was the soldier on guard.

The embers glowed softly, and in their dim light,
I gazed round the room and I cherished the sight.
My wife was asleep, her head on my chest,
My daughter beside me, angelic in rest.
Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white,
Transforming the yard to a winter delight.

The sparkling lights in the tree I believe,
Completed the magic that was Christmas Eve.
My eyelids were heavy, my breathing was deep,
Secure and surrounded by love I would sleep.
In perfect contentment, or so it would seem,
So I slumbered, perhaps I started to dream.

The sound wasn't loud, and it wasn't too near,
But I opened my eyes when it tickled my ear.
Perhaps just a cough, I didn't quite know, Then the
sure sound of footsteps outside in the snow.
My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear,
And I crept to the door just to see who was near.

Standing out in the cold and the dark of the night,
A lone figure stood, his face weary and tight.
A soldier, I puzzled, some twenty years old,
Perhaps a Marine, huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled,
Standing watch over me, and my wife and my child.

"What are you doing?" I asked without fear,
"Come in this moment, it's freezing out here!
Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve,
You should be at home on a cold Christmas Eve!"
For barely a moment I saw his eyes shift,
Away from the cold and the snow blown in drifts…

To the window that danced with a warm fire's light
Then he sighed and he said, "Its really all right,
I'm out here by choice. I'm here every night.
"It's my duty to stand at the front of the line,
That separates you from the darkest of times.

No one had to ask or beg or implore me,
I'm proud to stand here like my fathers before me.
My Gramps died at ' Pearl on a day in December,"
Then he sighed, "That's a Christmas 'Gram always remembers."
My dad stood his watch in the jungles of ' Nam ',
And now it is my turn and so, here I am.

I've not seen my own son in more than a while,
But my wife sends me pictures, he's sure got her smile."
Then he bent and he carefully pulled from his bag,
The red, white, and blue... an American flag.
"I can live through the cold and the being alone,
Away from my family, my house and my home.

I can stand at my post through the rain and the sleet,
I can sleep in a foxhole with little to eat.
I can carry the weight of killing another,
Or lay down my life with my sister and brother..
Who stand at the front against any and all,
To ensure for all time that this flag will not fall.."

"So go back inside," he said, "harbor no fright,
Your family is waiting and I'll be all right."
"But isn't there something I can do, at the least,
"Give you money," I asked, "or prepare you a feast?
It seems all too little for all that you've done,
For being away from your wife and your son."

Then his eye welled a tear that held no regret,
"Just tell us you love us, and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we're gone,
To stand your own watch, no matter how long.
For when we come home, either standing or dead,
To know you remember we fought and we bled.
Is payment enough, and with that we will trust,
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us."

PLEASE, would you do me the kind favor of sending this to as many
people as you can? Christmas will be coming soon and some credit is due to our
service men and women for our being able to celebrate these
festivities. Let's try in this small way to pay a tiny bit of what we owe. Make people
stop and think of our heroes, living and dead, who sacrificed themselves for us.

LCDR Jeff Giles, SC, USN
30th Naval Construction Regiment
OIC, Logistics Cell One
Al Taqqadum, Iraq

Anniversary Blast

"I had a little bit too much." Can you say Lady GaGa doing a stage dive at the end of her set??? Can you say Cyndi Lauper dancing barefoot on stage?? Can you say "Damn that Morgan Page is a HOTTIE!!!" ?? Can you "make love like a stranger"?? Did you know that DJ Ajax makes it better??? Did you know that there is a former member of Destiny's Child that isn't Beyonce and has talent??? Did you see Kid Loose wrap up the night with a set on the main stage??

All this and more happened last night at the Energy Anniversary blast.

If you were not there you missed THE party of the year. It was hands down the best party Energy 92.7 has thrown. The flow was good, acts kept hitting the stage, and it was a great time. Part of it could have been that Julie was there. I was going through Julie withdrawal. We have too much fun when we hang out.

Ok gotta run...time for the No Tap tournament.