February 1, 2001

    Another month is in the record books. The weather is warm and it's a teaser for Spring. I know we'll get a cold-snap and then be complaining about the suddenness of Winter. It's human nature, isn't it? Expectations rise and fall according to what happens to you. Happiness is relative. Anyway, enough philosophy, let's talk Psychology. Let's talk Survivor. I totally dig this show. I love the mystery of guessing who is going to get tossed, and hoping that it's people that you don't like, or in general are just people that get on your nerves. There are two princesses on the show that I'd like to see go. Kimmi and Jerri, the women with the i endings. Chances are that one of them will make it to the top 5. I Guarantee that one will help get the other one voted off if they are both around when the tribes merge. I don't think that they would tolerate each other. 

    Kel got the boot tonight. both Debb and Kel have some of the same problems, neither of them really understand how people work. They both made foolish assumptions about what it takes to survive with 7 other strangers. At this stage in the game, it's all about personality. People are choosing people based on whether or not they want to hang out with them. If they pass that test, then it will be about whether or not they are a liability to the tribe. Once you get through those, the tribes will merge, and it will be about who is the biggest threat to each individual. This is Survivor 101 at this stage and we will see some surprises along the way. 

    There are two people that I'd like to see get booted off. The two princesses. Jerri and Kimmi. There is something about the I ending on their names. Jerri is going to be poison for anyone that flits into her scope. Fortunately (for her), she has become the primary cook for her tribe. I think that Jerri and Michael will face off when the tribes merge. Both of them will try to get the necessary votes to eliminate each other. If they don't act fast, they will be the one who is voted off first. Then again, they could use their combined strength to make it to the finals. 

    What  a fascinating exercise. It reminds me of basic training. At least my view of basic training. I remember being happy when someone was washed back. (Washed back is when someone does something bad enough that they get reassigned to another flight which is further back than you are. Being washed back means that you have to repeat 2 or more weeks of Basic Training. No one wants to be in Basic Training any longer then they have to.) I remember thinking to myself. "Good, the sharks have been fed. I'm safe for another couple of days." It was a horrible way of thinking, but I disliked Basic Training. It wasn't physically demanding, but it was mentally draining for me. It was a game, and I didn't like playing it. I still did fine in Basic Training, but I didn't like it. 

    In other news, I received 4 of my tickets for U2 in Albany! I have to go out and reserve my vacation time for that week/ weekend. I also got my year end tax statement from my last employer. Fat tax return, here I come! That's all for the news..

    Time to sign off, I just wanted to kick off February with a diary entry. I'm also going to try to fix the problem I'm having with some of the pictures in the U2 portion. Goodnight all!     

February 7, 2001

    It's tax time again kiddies. I was happy to find out that I could deduct my moving expenses from my federal return. No such luck with New York state. I'll be bringing home a pretty big return this year because I was taxed heavily because of the bonuses I received. I haven't decided what I'm going to do with it yet. Since I'm mailing in them and not doing it electronically, I may have to wait a while to receive it. It's no use spending it before it gets here, so I'll probably get my bank statement a couple of months down the road and say "Cool!" and then pay bills with it. I already take care of my entertainment expenses, so this will just be more money to sock away or for me to finally get rid of one of my cards. The paying off of one of those cards is quite appealing. We'll see how the savings grow in the next two months now that I have a job again. Like most people I worry about the unexpected costs of living. Particularly when I'm preparing for the future. Take my car for example, I've just hit 170,000 miles this year and it won't last forever, when I get a new car, do I get a "New" car, if so, it will be a milestone; I've never had a brand new car before. Although, I do like the safety net that my previous employer granted me. I'd like to keep that intact for as long as possible. When I arrived in Virginia I put a portion of my savings in a 3 month CD so that I would be earning something, it just rolled over into a new 3 month CD so I'm pretty content with that. 

    In non fiscal news: Districts are coming up for Wrestling. I went to a coaches meeting tonight to decide what the seeds will be. Seeds are positions in the tournament. Seeds insure that the two best kids don't wrestle in the first round. You earn your seed by how you wrestled your district opponents earlier in the year. Districts are the moment of reckoning for most of these kids. We have a few seniors who will be trying to make their mark this year. I hope that they do, there is nothing worse than regret and excuses. I have a few of both when it comes to wrestling. I won't bore you with them now, because there is nothing I can do to change it now. In any case, this will be a big weekend for these kids, we're expecting 8 kids to make it out of the district (top 4 place, and there are 8 teams in our district). We're hoping that more will make it out, but it will be hard for them. 

    I finally got my copy of Stuck In A Moment That You Can't Get Of Single by U2 (Actually it's 2 singles). I had to order it because the singles for this album haven't been released in the U.S. I didn't have to order them, but I thought I would receive them quicker this way. It turns out that I was wrong, I probably could have picked them up locally. Tower is good about stocking import singles. Something is wrong with America these days. All of the bands I like are only releasing singles over seas. I can't find singles for any of the good songs here in the states. I don't know why, you used to get a lot here. For U2's last album they released 5 singles here in the U.S. They must not have sold well. It's too bad because I know that a lot of people would have picked up the single for Beautiful Day if it were available. Well, I'm enjoying the new B-Side Big Girls are Best. It's not stellar, but it's new. And yes, I know, CD's don't have B-Sides.

    Well, I need to get moving. I just discovered that I had a mathematical error on my tax return. Fortunately I double checked my return and avoided 5 - 10 years in prison. 

February 13, 2001

    Today is my boyhood friend's birthday. It's also the birthday of an ex of mine. It's also the day before Saint Valentine's day. So what does that all mean. Well I haven't talked to either my boyhood friend or my ex for over 2 years. I don't expect to talk to them either. I don't know where either of them have landed, though I suspect that they aren't far from where I've left them, but you never know. I've moved...on. Tomorrow will arrive and extend my streak of February 14th's without a sweetheart. It's all good though, scientists have unraveled the human genome. I'm ordering myself the perfect woman; she should arrive before my 46th birthday. I think it will be worth the wait.

    I was reading about Lasik the other day. Apparently, about 5% of the patients who have Lasik have worse vision than when they started. This is primarily because of poor planning on the part of the doctor's who are doing the surgery. What most often occurs is that in a small number of cases, the surgery is done correctly, but they didn't foresee that the patient's eyes would react differently than the original diagnosis suggested. Basically, Lasik is still a fairly new procedure and there can still be complications. All surgery has inherent risks, but 5% is a little high for my tastes. Do your own research on it. I just read one side of the story, and would consider the operation when I have more money than I need and right before my beautiful genetic goddess arrives. For now I'll just keep the glasses and contacts handy.

    If I haven't written you lately, don't fear, I'm a little back logged at this time. I write when the mood strikes me, and sometimes it doesn't strike very often. I was feeling a little more verbal tonight, so I've taken advantage and written a few of you. For those who don't receive anything, don't fear, I'm just putting together extra special thoughts for you ;-)

    The moment of truth has arrived for a number of the wrestlers on my team. 7 of them have made it past districts and will be wrestling in the Regional tournament on Friday and Saturday. We're not sure if any of them will place high enough to go to states, but we'll be pulling for them. This past weekend was both triumph and tragedy. Some of the guys wrestled terribly this weekend. It wasn't just that they wrestled terribly, it's that their heart was no longer in it. 

    Two guys won districts at their weight class. One was pretty much expected, but the other one was a complete surprise. He was ranked 4th in the district coming in and he beat the first and second ranked guy to win it. To be honest, I didn't think he would win it, but we were very proud of him. The rest of the team ran down from the stands after the match and hugged him. He was the most unlikely winner, and thus made the largest impact. That was the triumph. It made the tragedy easier to swallow. 

    Well, I must be going, I have a few more letters to key in before retiring for the night. Happy Valentine's Day!

February 20, 2001

        I'm not really in the mood to write tonight. If I were I'd catch up on some letters from some very deserving people. Sorry, you'll get my personal updates soon. Just not feeling that talkative at the moment. 

    So then, why am I writing? I'm writing primarily because I haven't posted for a week and I don't want to lose the few readers that I currently possess. I'm also writing because if I don't recount the mundane details of my life, they will be gone forever. Oh how I love the mundane! Joy! 

    A spy was caught less than 5 miles from where I work. The spy from the FBI lives in Vienna, Virginia which is just around the corner from me in Fairfax, Virginia. They say that he has been selling secrets for 15 years. For his trouble he got paid somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.4 million dollars. I'm thinking he didn't get paid enough. Think about it. This guy could be facing a death penalty and all he got was 1.4 million, which he can't really spend without attracting attention to himself. Alex Rodriguez is going to be paid 252 million over the next 10 years to play shortstop for the Texas Rangers. I'm thinking that espionage doesn't pay like it used to. You couldn't pay me enough to look over my shoulder for the rest of my life. 

    Today's Tuesday, nothing pressing on TV, so I guess I'll finish writing in here. I was sick last Thursday and Friday. My brother was a full 48 hours behind me, he took Monday off. I'm getting over the congestion. I think that I'm just about done with the whole thing now. I took Friday off so that I could go to the Regional Wrestling tournament and support seven of our kids that were trying to make it the state tournament. Unfortunately only one made it to states. Fortunately he's a Freshman. Top four go to states and he came in fourth. It's a pretty big accomplishment, I never had the opportunity to go. He has some pretty lofty goals, but he's been wrestling since he was six, so many of his goals are possible. He wants to win states twice and record 100 wins. He's on is way to both goals. He will probably finish the season with 29 or 30 wins. He has 29 wins now, but his first two matches will be difficult no matter what happens, so he could lose both and be out. Still, he made it to the state tournament which is no small feat. Two other kids had a decent shot at getting there, but it proved too difficult. One got hurt during his second match, the other lost by 2 points. He was a Senior and this was supposed to be his year. I can commiserate, my senior year didn't turn out the way that I would have liked it to either. Needless to say, I was exhausted when we returned home on Saturday evening. I was fighting a cold, and as usual it was emotionally draining. The state tournament starts on Friday, and I'm not sure that I'll be going. If I do, I probably won't get there in time to see our kid wrestle. At the same time, I'd like to see the tournament because watching the best in the state is pretty cool. The best kids find art in the center of it. It isn't all about aggression, it can be a chess match.

    I'm finally moving to my permanent office tomorrow. It will be a relief to finally get to my permanent home. I like to feel at home wherever I am and at least now I can start to personalize my new work area. Well, I've decided to catch up with a few people via e-mail. If I don't catch up with you, I apologize. Like I said before, I'm behind.

    Oh yeah, one last thing. I'm excited by two things that I've discovered about my site. One is the hover feature on pictures. This is where you put your mouse over a picture and a floating note appears. I've added this feature to a number of pictures so far and will be doing this to all of them in the U2 section. I'll be doing it little by little. The other thing that I discovered/remembered was that I can take screen prints of streaming video, so that I can use the stills on my site. I have a few U2 videos on my computer and I'll be taking pictures of those and putting them on pages to spice it up. I'm pretty excited by that angle. Once I invest in a new computer and a DVD player, I'll be in business. Just you wait. Plus, I'd like to do some computer video editing of my own, but that's down the road.