I'm an obtuse man...

proppat @ 2007-06-14T11:20:00

2007-06-14T15:21:29Z

Back from vacation. Long post to follow after I get a chance to look through photos and piece together all the stories...

proppat @ 2007-05-11T23:10:00

2007-05-12T03:19:49Z

I'd definitely have to say that the past 7 days have given me hope for this year. Got much needed hang out time with older and newer friends, I'm getting to know an awesome new "friend," and work hasn't sucked. Lots of ideas for new projects, ideas to kick start old/existing projects, and reassurance that some of them will at least get off the ground. Going up to visit the fam tomorrow. Finally caught up on a lot of errands that I needed to take care of...only a few left.

I've had a pretty positive outlook on life most of the year so far, but things are actually starting to pick up now. I think I like where things are going, and that's a good thing :). I'd like to talk more about everything, but I don't wanna jinx myself.

Also, Fresh Young Sloppy C WILL be a reality. Too bad I don't have the weekend free to work on it...

I own this integer!

2007-05-09T13:52:15Z

F1 18 39 48 1A 9F 7A C2 75 F4 F4 FA FC 70 3A 8D

Go ahead, use it bitches! I'm looking for a reason to sue somebody!

Claim your own: http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=1155

Random thought about Spiderman 3

2007-05-05T12:07:16Z

Hey Spidey, Conor Oberst is calling and wants his look back. Who knew the venom symbiote was so emo?

Also, the movie totally would have been worth seeing if they would have found someway to make Roy Biggins Sandman's sidekick. Just sayin'...

proppat @ 2007-05-04T13:52:00

2007-05-04T18:10:50Z

Today I wore an old Throwing Muses t-shirt to work. I just had the third person today ask me "Why would you throw Moses." Funny stuff.

In other news, word on the street is that Jay-Z may have just died in a plane crash? : / We'll see, nothing in the news as of yet...

UPDATE: Apparently Jay-Z wasn't on the plane.

proppat @ 2007-04-19T14:50:00

2007-04-19T18:51:07Z

So, I was digging around the supply cabinet just to kill time and I found these weird blue rubber finger tips. Apparently they're to help you flip through pages of a book.

So anyway, I put them on all my fingers and jumped into the other room of the office and hissed as a joke.

Coworker1: "Sam, I think that's some of the gayest shit I've ever seen."

Me: ::giggles:: "I know, it's awesome"

Coworker2: "Where the hell did you find those.

Me: "In the closest"

Man, I crack myself up.

proppat @ 2007-04-13T09:18:00

2007-04-13T16:33:19Z

In the past 24 hours:

* - I saw the Flaming Lips. Amazing show. If you ever see them, try to get as close to the stage as possible so you get in line of the confetti cannon.

* - Went to the walk in clinic. Every doctor's office I called was closed or couldn't fit me in. Yay for Zithromax...hopefully I get rid of these sinus problems for good.

* - Had a dream that I drove a pickup truck off the side of the road into the ocean. Whoops. I spent the rest of the dream trying to figure out how I was going to explain to my mom what had happened to her truck.

* - Car problems (again). Had to get a jump to get to work. My door locks were also messed up. I think I'm going to seriously look into trading it in this weekend. I love the car to death, it's pretty much my dream car...but I can't deal with another source of random stress.

* - Submitted my book. Half my office assisted me to make this book bulletproof. Man, I feel like I'm in middle school. I absolutely hate people who have a little bit of power and use it to try and manipulate the system to make everyone else look bad...you know, to take the heat off of them for their poor performance. Me and my boss took the book that the dude who keeps rejecting mine book wrote and tore it apart yesterday. If he rejects ours again, we're going to send a mark up of his book to the end customer and show how poorly written it is. We're preparing to have to battle it out. This isn't going to be pretty.

* - Saw one of the funniest things ever. A bird attacking a squirrel. Everytime the bird pecked the squirrel, the squirrel would jump and yell. The bird just flew behind the squirrel pecking away for at least 30 seconds. Wow...

Early birthday present

2007-04-12T16:04:04Z

Looks like I'm getting an early birthday present today! My friend Craig messaged me last night and asked what I was doing after work. I had no clue. But apparently I'm going with him to see The Flaming Lips tonight. Pretty cool stuff....I'm not a huge fan, but I hear their live show is spectacular! And they're definitely a band I would pay to see if the tickets weren't so much.

Now if I can only beat the deadline and this cold so I can leave the office in time to go and enjoy myself when I get there....heh

I've said it once and I'll say it again...

2007-04-11T12:10:44Z

I really wish you could buy antibiotics over the counter or behind the counter with ID like with Sudafed. Seems like I've caught my yearly sinus infection. This explains why I've had a recurring cold for the past few months. The thing is, I'm in the middle of a work emergency right now and the earliest I can forsee being able to go to the doctor would be late Thursday evening or sometime on Friday. And, like usual, they'll tell me to take Sudafed and hand me over a blister pack of the flavor of the month antibiotics the drug companies are trying to push on us.

Of course I realize the reasons antibiotics aren't available over the counter, but can't we take some kind of sanity test to be able to self medicate ourselves to at least some degree. Because, honestly, if it's common sense for me to realize I should go to the doctor to get a prescription for antibiotics to clear up an infection, I should be able to circumvent the inconvenience of having to go (and pay to go) to the doctor.

As a follow up to the last post

2007-04-10T02:49:10Z

I think I need to learn how to stop hurting myself. Anyone know where to get a cheap lobotomy these days? bleh

Question of the day

2007-04-09T20:04:21Z

What is the difference between being an over-planner and being indecisive?

proppat @ 2007-04-05T06:53:00

2007-04-05T14:05:02Z

I'd like to say that I didn't see this one coming, but that would be a lie. My last book was just rejected. You know, the book that I had to get out the door in a week when I was sick a couple weeks back. The thing about it, though, was that it wasn't rejected because it had big glarring issues, missing information, etc.

It was rejected because they found a few bad links in a table with about 5000 links. Yeah, you heard me right. It's a 30 page table with over 1000 rows and 9 columns. And guess what, every entry in five of those columns contain links to other tables or art in the book. Okay, I admit that these are issues that need to be fixed, but they used this as an excuse to totally stop reviewing the book to make the company I'm writing the books for look bad. This is just silly. They actually went so far as to go to their contracts department and have them write an official letter rejecting the book based on seven comments, all of them simple, isolated incidences. In other words, these are the types of issues that you keep track of and say "hey, book looks good, fix these problems and we're good to go." Not show stopper, missing information, fubared book issues.

The joys of contract work.

Going up to Ocala for the weekend tomorrow. Hopefully I'll make it up in time to go to Amrit Palace for lunch. I wish I would have never eaten at that place...I can't eat at any other Indian restaurant now....

proppat @ 2007-04-03T10:28:00

2007-04-03T17:36:12Z

What kind of world is this where being successful and responsible actually work against you? I'll be as vague as I damn well please, thank you.

At times I feel like I'm using my life to construct the tomb I'm to be buried in one day. It's not very satisfying, to say the least. I wish I wasn't so susceptible to falling into societies traps.

proppat @ 2007-04-02T09:37:00

2007-04-02T13:55:07Z

It's no secret that I'm pretty open about my guilty pleasures. Well, I guess they're not guilty pleasures if you wear them on your sleeve, but still...some of the worst movies ever made rank in my top movies of all time. Movies such as Cabin Boy (Chris Elliot), The Pest (John Leguazamo), and Malibu's Most Wanted (Jamie Kennedy)....

Which brings me to what I discovered yesterday that I totally forgot even existed, Jamie Kennedy's Blowin' Up. I missed this show when it originally aired on MTV (I just don't watch much tv) but found it used for $6 yesterday. Oh man, sooo frickin' good. It even prominantly featured one of my heroes, Bob Saget.

This also led me to the realization that Jamie Kennedy's Kickin' It Old Skool hits theaters on April 27th, the day before my birthday. This has the promise to be the best birthday ever. Kickin' It Old Skool and whatever shenanagans follow.

ALSO, two goals were met this weekend:
1) I purchased a bedframe. Finally, after wanted a platform bed for about 10 years, I finally have one. It actually matches my existing bedroom furniture pretty well, too....and all for $100 off of Craigslist.
2) Thanks to Joe and his dad, my frickin' above the stove microwave is FINALLY installed. I'm pretty handy with things like this and small home repairs, but for some reason this one just turned into a nightmare. At least it's over with.

Next home repair: The reclining toilet. No, I'm not pimpin' out my toilet by making it recline...one of my toilets actually leans back when you sit on it.

ALSO - Anyone have tips on getting rid of carpenter bees? Apparently the little fuckers have set up a colony in my house. The joys of home ownership. I'm thinking that I'm going to have to look into ripping all of the wood off of the side of my house and replacing it with something besides ceder. Ugh...

FYI

2007-03-17T15:45:45Z

If anyone knows anybody who's still on the hunt for a Nintendo Wii, the Costco on University had 30-40 of them this morning. The bundle was $339 and comes with Wii Sports (of course), Zelda (woohoo!), and Excite Truck (meh).

This is all

Periodic Update

2007-03-13T17:02:24Z

Life Lesson Learned
I feel the need to warn everyone, if you ever buy a ceiling fan look long and hard on the box for the term "LED bulb included." If it doesn't say this, you're in the clear. If it say this, run the other direction. I bought a nice new snazzy ceiling fan from Home Depot this weekend, installed it, didn't realize it used an LED bulb...although after seeing that it did use an LED bulb, I got really excited. "Awesome! Affordable, awesome looking fan AND I'll be eco friendly in the process." Boy, there's a reason LED bulbs aren't mainstream. At night, the light from the ceiling fan is equivalent to someone opening their cell phone to use as a flashlight. It's pretty much the same color of light too. Unless I can rig a regular bulb into it, this sucker's gotta go back...

Band of Horses show
Went to this show with my friend Margie (margie!) last night. This show was kinda awesome. The lead dude from Band of Horses was super nice and seemed like the happiest guy alive. It made me feel good to see a band that actually looked like they were happy to be there. I talked to one of the dude's from one of the opening bands called Arizona a bit. He was an A+ dude and seemed thoroughly excited to play down here and get a good responce. That was also kinda nice. I bought their shirt and cd. Note to bands: Act nice, be friendly, talk to the crowd...sell lots of merch! Also helps if you put on a good show. Which the middle band didn't. They kinda sucked. Some chick putting on a fake country accent playing overly generic country music. Bleh.

Work
2 books down, 1 to go. #3 is due on Friday, yet I still have no info for it. Hmm. Yeah right.

Food
I'm currently planning on taking up the elusive art of thermos cookery. More or less, as I'm cooking dinner at night I can also prep food to cook overnight in a thermos for breakfast and lunch. Wake up, open up a thermos of piping hot breakfast. Go to work, open up a thermos of piping hot lunch. Sounds good to me. Stews, soups, grains, veggies, legumes, etc. are gonna be a way of life for a while. A major positive to this is that it means that the only opportunity I'll have to eat processed foods and/or prepackaged foods will be at dinner, and I usually cook dinner anyway...

Random
Wish me luck. I go on my quest to become a level 15 fire chicken tonight! Also, I'm listening to way too much Joe Jackson lately...

They love me! (or rather can't live without me)

2007-03-09T20:12:25Z

So, I took a half day at work today. I figured I was comming in this weekend anyway and, after working 60 hours last week, deserved a break. I also took a half day yesterday.

What did I do today? Ate at La Granja (mmm), laid out in the shade and soaked in some beautiful weather, played some Wii Sports....and went back to work. Rather, I'm GOING back to work. They just can't live without me for a day, I swear. No one else in the office apparently (cause my backup took the day off) knows the procedure for shipping discs to our customer. For these and other reasons expressed this week (I'll update this later), at least I know I'm financially sound as long as I decide to work here. I'm a fully integrated part of the system...and that's just how I like it.

proppat @ 2007-03-02T09:04:00

2007-03-02T14:16:08Z

My new favorite website: www.conservapedia.com.

Unfortunately, this website wasn't started as a joke. Fortunately, this website has pretty much turned into a joke. I love browsing random articles for subtle jokes and conservative stereotypes that are entered, probably by some Colbert fan out there somewhere.

.....

3 more days to write yet another book. This deadline is just stupid. Instead of updating the old version of the book to be consistant and correct, instead they decided to trash it and start from scratch with the new data which gave me 7 days (including the weekend) to pull a book out of my ass. Surprisingly enough, I've made good progress (no rendering / xml errors ftw!) but it's still going to be tight. Now I'm getting new engineering specs I'm supposed to put in. Problem is, the artist is out of town until after the deadline....what the heck were they thinking?

.....

There's a Guitar Hero tournament on Tuesday. Unfortunately, this tournament is scored not just on ability but also on appearance and stage antics....which pretty much rules me out. But damn it, I'd walk out with a trophy if it was a straight tournament!

....

Only 2 more days of the work week left! woohoo!

proppat @ 2007-02-19T06:47:00

2007-02-19T14:49:09Z

I give myself about 2 hours before I'm as cracked out as a crack head on crack. I'm so frickin' cold today and I can't get warm, so I'm chugging coffee as quickly as I can trying to warm myself from the inside out. Unfortunately, that doesn't help the fact that I can't move my toes right now.

Yeah yeah, so what if it's colder practically everywhere else in the US now. I'm not acclimated to this crap...I've lived in Florida 27 years now...

proppat @ 2007-02-16T10:14:00

2007-02-16T18:16:47Z

I've actually grown to take pride in the fact that they've started calling me "The Sweater Pimp" at work. I like that. I'm bringing wholesome back.

proppat @ 2007-02-16T07:55:00

2007-02-16T15:55:51Z

Oh man, I still haven't started laughing about this one. I couldn't imagine ever pulling one of these out of my lunch box.....

http://www.bananabunker.com/

The link is safe for work, but your thoughts won't be....

It's no secret that...

2007-02-15T22:37:20Z

I HATE Carlos Mencia. Not only is he an unfunny bastard, he blatently steals other comics jokes. I've noticed him recycling old jokes that I've heard before, but I never had anything concrete I could say "Mencia stole this from xxxx" or "this from yyyy." They were just jokes I've heard before. Well, Joe Rogan had the balls to call the man out on this. The video's a little long and not the most entertaining thing ever, but it's worth it to hear a bunch of comedians call him out on his shit.

http://www.redban.com/blogy/?p=80

My question is: if you're going to steal jokes, why don't you steal funny ones? Is it your delivery that ruins jokes? Do you purposely pick bad jokes and try to doctor them because you don't think anyone will take the effort to call you out on stealing a bad joke? I don't understand. I hope people get a clue and your show gets canned. You don't deserve your success.

Who all uses last.fm?

2007-02-13T15:02:22Z

Seriously, if you use www.last.fm, add me to your friends: http://www.last.fm/user/proppat/

I just recently started using it again. I didn't realize all of the features it had before, due the fact that it's one of the worst organized sites ever. Still, good stuff.

To: Laz (and anyone else who likes good music)

2007-02-12T14:41:52Z

I didn't forget! Here's the XTC: Upsy Daisy Assortment rip I promised you.

It's Tetris Attack all over again...

2007-02-07T15:30:55Z

So, I woke up at 3:30 this morning and it felt like someone stabbed me in the head with a knife. I was struck by a near crippling headache which is still going strong, despite the excedrin and coffee (which has only made me nauscious).

The cause: Guitar Hero.

Everybody knows someone who's had the "tetris" dream. The dream that you can't control, that you can't make go away. The dream where there's constant tetris blocks falling down in your head. You dream about them, you see them in your head and you can't make them go away. Back in high school I had this "syndrome" with Tetris Attack. Now I'm having it with Guitar Hero.

Let's just say that I had Sweet Child of Mine and Hanger 18 blasting in my head all night long with multicolored buttons scrolling vertically in my head.

Please, just make it stop. please....

In other Guitar Hero related news, I've found out that I'm kind of a local legend and I didn't even know it. People actually talk about me when they talk about Guitar Hero. I've always wanted to be a "local legend"....by why does it have to be from playing a damn video game?