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snow snow snow snow SNOW!

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Well, the great blizzard of aught-three has come and gone, and boy was it an experience… I don’t think I’ll wish for snow with quite the same enthusiasm ever again.

It had just started flurrying when I left for work – no big deal. Got progressively heavier as I made my 45-minute drive to work, but still nothing to be concerned about. But once I got off the interstate – the roads got slick in a hurry. It happened so fast that within two minutes I was skidding into another car. I wasn’t going fast, and had plenty of time to stop, but my brakes simply refused to work. Dodging two lanes of traffic at a stoplight isn’t my idea of fun. Thankfully the damage to both my car and the guy I tagged was minimal.

I was at work for less than two hours before we were told to go home, but by that time it was too late… I left the office at 10:30AM, and went approximately five miles by 2:00PM, getting stuck once in the process to the point where someone had to give my car a shove to get it up a relatively small hill. I contemplated driving all the way home, but as the interstate came into view, I realized that they were actually moving *slower* than the side road that I was on. Regardless, I wasn’t going to make it home before dark, and I didn’t look forward to the prospect of the streets freezing over again while still stuck in the bumper-to-bumper traffic. So I made a detour and eventually made it to my grandmother’s house where I spent the night.

Not something I’d like to do again anytime soon, but it’ll make a good story to tell the grandkids… at least with some embellishment 🙂

“I remember it like it was yesterday… two and a half feet of snow, and I had to walk FIFTEEN MILES to get to my grandmother’s log cabin in the woods, all the while fending off the bears and coyotes with just some twigs and rocks!”

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2002 Recap

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A friend sent out a end-of-year survey via email not too long ago, which I thought was a nifty way to do the “Christmas letter to friends and family” thing. So, since I am much less creative, I’ll just do the same here! Check back later when I’ve actually answered some of them 🙂

Q&A

  1. What was the best month of the year and why? June… it was the start of summer, I had my new ride, and took a much-needed vacation to Florida.
  2. What was the best joke you heard last year? “A pirate walks into a bar with a a steering wheel hanging out of his pants…”
  3. Which website did you visit the most last year? UMC.org, Gone Gold, ArsTechnica, Online Onslaught
  4. What do you consider to be your best achievement of the past year? Living to see this year.
  5. Which phone number did you dial the most often? My own… in order to check my messages 🙂
  6. How many concerts did you attend last year? About a half-dozen.
  7. What was the best thing that happened at work? My job became significantly more interesting… whereas I used to have to look for stuff to do, now it’s rare that I don’t have several projects to work on at any given time.
  8. What was the worst thing that happened at work? A coworker lost her son in an accident days before Christmas
  9. What was the worst decision you made last year? To sell my notebook computer. It was necessary, but I still hated to do it.
  10. What was the best decision you made last year? To not take a trip out west.

Favorites of 2002

  1. Movie: Tough call… I’m going to have to go with Star Wars: Attack of the Clones, simply because I saw it more times than any other movie this year. The Two Towers and Spider-Man are close runners-up
  2. CD: Def Leppard – X | Bodyjar – The Way Things Work | Superchic[k] – Superchic[k] | Queensryche – Live Evolution | Nickelback- Silver Side Up
  3. Song of the Year: “All the Things She Said” – Tatu | “Four Letter Word” – Def Leppard
  4. New TV show: It’s actually several short shows – Cartoon Networks “Adult Swim”
  5. Book read: The Case for Christ – Lee Strobel
  6. Athlete of the year: Kurt Angle, Olympic Gold Medalist 🙂
  7. Concert: Winger – yeah yeah, thanks to “Stuart” on Beavis and Butthead they’ll forever be a running joke, but they were one of the few 80s metal bands I never had a chance to see live during their popularity, and they did not disappoint… absolutely amazing musicians.
  8. New recipe: Nothing this year
  9. New discovery: QCast Tuner
  10. Holiday memory: A Thanksgiving dinner that consisted of KFC Popcorn Chicken.

Complete the Sentence

  1. My most memorable road trip was… With Randy, hitting Tupelo for a Third Day concert, Tunica for some Blackjack and Memphis for a Wizards basketball game all within a 48 hour period.
  2. The best money I spent this past year was on… A 2000 Toyota Celica GT-S
  3. The magazine I most often flip through is … Some of my old guitar magazines
  4. I laughed so hard I cried when …
  5. I really regret that I didn’t…
  6. It’s so ironic… That the song “Ironic” gives no good examples of irony.
  7. The scariest thing I saw last year was…
  8. This year, I’m most looking forward to… A new second cousin…
  9. My New Year’s resolutions are… To be more friendly and start running again.
  10. Instead of filling out this silly survey, I should be… Leaving work
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…and a Happy New Year

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Well, I suppose I should post something given that two major holidays have passed since my last post…. I had a nice break, but even after being back to work for only two days I can feel the stress starting to work it’s way back in.

Is it just me, or is 2003 just a boring year? For example:

  • 1999 – well, it’s the title of a Prince song – need I say more?
  • 2000 – This year needs no explanation – How many people get to see the calendar “odometer” roll over? And let’s not forget the whole Y2K debacle.
  • 2001 – The “real” start of the new millenium, for all you nitpickers. And the title of a famous movie/book – Interesting how little our world resembles that piece of fiction.
  • 2002 – Um… it looks the same both forward and backward?
  • 2003 – Nothing. There’s absolutely nothing interesting about the year 2003. 🙂

Oh… I saw a riced-out four door Acura Integra while driving to work today. Now, I have nothing against Integras – I owned two over the past 10 years. But ricing out a two door coupe is bad enough… and now a *four door* Integra? It’s a SEDAN! Yeeeesh. Yeah, you’re gonna pick up ALL the chicks now, buddy.

I ran across a very fun website today – Jump The Shark – Chronicling the Moments of When TV Shows Go Downhill. Pick out a show or two you used to watch and read others’ comments… I’ve forgotten how bad some of my favorite shows of yesteryear could be!

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Merry Christmas

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Once upon a time, there was a man who looked upon Christmas as a lot of humbug. He wasn’t a scrooge. He was a very kind and decent person, generous to his family, upright in all his dealings with other men.

But he didn’t believe in all that stuff about an Incarnation which churches proclaim at Christmas. And he was too honest to pretend that he did. “I am truly sorry to distress you,” he told his wife, who was a faithful church-goer. “But I simply cannot understand this claim that God became man. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”

On Christmas Eve, his wife and children went to church for the midnight service. He declined to accompany them. “I’d feel like a hypocrite,” he explained. “I’d much rather stay at home. But I’ll wait up for you.”

Shortly after his family drove away in the car, snow began to fall. He went to the window and watched the flurries getting heavier and heavier. “If we must have Christmas,” he reflected, “it’s nice to have a white one.” He went back to his chair by the fireside and began to read his newspaper.

A few minutes later, he was startled by a thudding sound. It was quickly followed by another, then another. He thought that someone must be throwing snowballs at his living-room window.

When he went to the front door to investigate, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow. They had been caught in the storm, and in a desperate search for shelter had tried to fly through his window.

“I can’t let these poor creatures lie there and freeze,” he thought. “But how can I help them?”

Then he remembered the barn where the children’s pony was stabled. It would provide a warm shelter. He quickly put on his coat and galoshes and tramped through the deepening snow to the barn. He opened the barn doors wide and turned on a light. But the birds didn’t come in. “Food will bring them in,” he thought. So he hurried back to the house for bread crumbs, which he sprinkled on the snow to make a trail into the barn.

To his dismay, the birds ignored the bread crumbs and continued to flop around helplessly in the snow. He tried shooing them into the barn by walking around and waving his arms. They scattered in every direction…except into the warm, lighted barn. “They find me a strange and terrifing creature,” he thought to himself, “and I can’t seem to think of any way to let them know they can trust me. If only I could be a bird myself for a few minutes, perhaps I could lead them to safety.”

Just at that moment, the church bells began to ring. He stood silently for awhile, listening to the bells pealing the glad tidings of Christmas… then he sank to his knees.

“Now I understand,” he whispered. “Now I see why You had to do it.”

–Author Unknown.