Scotto's Wall Scrawls

Let's see... to recap the weekend -

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Friday - Gem show was fairly nifty... I got to fool with a $109,000 aquamarine stone, and ate some tasty dessert with the in-laws and BHK.

Positives : Played with Rocks, Tasty food, Obtained a little knowledge on Lapidary, Got some ideas about what to get BHK as presents, Rock Cutter reminded me of Todd, discovered "sno cone" cut

Negatives: 4-5 hours is too long in a folding chair, Mouthy lady across from me, Had to wear nice clothes, heavy rain, we were tardy, I notice occlusions and stone flaws too easily, BHK low blood sugar, Newt accidentally in the walk-in closet the whole time we were gone.

Final Score: More win than fail. If I had to do it again I wouldn't complain, but would plan for uncomfy chairs a bit.

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Saturday - We were going to spend a little time doing chores and then go to the flyball tourney with Amy and her sisters, but got sidetracked after we were invited to breakfast with Larry and Chris. Post Bob Evans, we got the tickle to pick up our copy of Zombie Fluxx at Aardvark in Solomon's.... That sort of turned in to a family trip to BJ's Wholesale with the in-laws, once they heard we were heading south for a moment. Larry And Chris suffered a little bit from sensory overload at Aardvark's, but we were in and out quickly. Just fast enough to grab our ZF and go. I found out that they don't carry warhammer minis, but instead do war machine. I wonder if Eryx and his crew mix and match figures, or if they're purely WH? Once we got to BJ's, a quick trip for some tires for Larry's car turned into Shop-o-rama 2007. BHK and I picked up a few things that we needed, Halloween candy for the kiddies, and two wonderfully discounted wii games ($20 each) - Rampage and Ninjabread Man. Chris decided to play Santa, and bought our cart of goodies as well as their own!

While grocery Shopping, we found some Theme Chocolate -



Sexual Chocolate I've heard of... Forgiveness? interesting. Tranquil and Renew... what happens if you eat all of these at once?

On our way south, there was a trailer on the side of the road hawking flowers, apples and baked goods. By the style of dress, I thought at first that one of the vendors was Amish, but on evaluation of the trailer, she must've been Mennonite - Horses would've had a tough time pulling the thing, but a truck hitch would be fine. Also went to the post office, and got Danny's Anniversary Present, and a Fluxx card "Zombies Eat Brains" promo... you use it in the standard deck, but has a Zombie theme, to be sure (The player who has Death on the table wins if the Brain is on the table.) The Boxed version of HEY! That's My Fish! I was a cruel and heartless player, and beat BHK 3 out of 3 games. I fear my victories will grow fewer in number as we get more players - I'm much better with 4 penguins than with 2.

We also stopped off at Maerten's to get our wedding rings engraved - inside of mine will be "Wing To Wing" and BHK's will be "Oar To Oar", referencing Robert Frost's The Master Speed - last lines of which are:

Two such as you with such a master speed
Cannot be parted nor be swept away
From one another once you are agreed
That life is only life forevermore
Together wing to wing and oar to oar.

The full poem is on my bio page here.

Positives: Zombie Fluxx obtained (Aardvark sold out and was on it's second order!), Hey! That's My Fish!, Free Candy, Free Wii Games, Free Houshold supplies, Social time with the in-laws, ginger snaps and apples, offer to teach me old school biscuit baking techniques.

Negatives: Delayed visit to Amy for a day, no chores done - will probably have to buckle down next weekend, a little skittish about not having my wedding ring

Final Score: BIG WIN! I really can't find much to complain about getting games, chocolate and a lot of good conversation and giggles out of a Saturday. Tried Ninjabread Man, and the controls are tricky, but not bad once you're used to 'em. I bet Bugah will be quite good at it.

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Sunday (Today) - I slept in until 10:30! I never sleep that late, but it must've been quite needed.

BHK and I hustled out the door to visit with Amy before she headed back for New York - got to give a friendly wave and offer support. We didn't ge tto eat together, but BHK and I took in some gorgeous weather, and went for pizza at 3 brothers - Sicilian with ricotta and garlic, BHK got meatballs on the side. Really, really good. Enough left over for dinner and for me to take to work tomorrow for lunch... and for BHK to have a nibble for lunch, too.

Stopped in Annapolis to look at couches at Jennifer's to replace the pink Torquemada-inspired beasties on the living room wall. Some solid, affordable options there... most light at the end of that tunnel yet. Nothing totally sings, but we have a few ideas about what to do now.

ATW man changed to Spidey for Halloween!

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I dig his boots.

We got home and flopped in front of the TV in the treehouse, caught up with The Office, Earl, and Midnight.... and just enjoyed snuggles with Newt in bed. Chris called to invite us over for Veggie soup, but I was too pooped out to get dressed and head over there. They understood, and BHK worked our way downstairs to catch up with some of the Ugly betty and cake making challenge video we had saved there - got sleepy, and we hit the sack shortly thereafter.

Positives: walkabout, moon pies on the road with diet cranberry splash, super good pizza, maybe a new couch soon, offered Amy a chance to come visit, ATW man, Further along on couch search, lots of nice time with BHK.

Negatives: The day was too short!

Final Score: Solid win. Comfy, Autumnal, lovey day.

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1 year ago - on honeymoon in SC, ripley's, voice posts
many pages of pictures taken that day! 1 2 3 4 5 Hooray for Honeymoon!

2 years ago - wilma update, peanuts meets lovecraft
more hurricane fallout pictures taken that day

3 years ago - adp and ri battle, kamal, punkinheads, clock change, katherine harris run over, willed body lawsuits

4 years ago - hospital trip, mr Charlie

5 years ago - babynamer, Drawbacks of a name, newt-tadpole pics, candy-corn thoughts, cat heroclix sculpts, PBS-SOP

6 years ago - musical coding, Network

7 years ago - Hanging out with buddies.

8 years ago - Newt's eyes begin to turn color

Restless night sleeping, accidentally booted Newt off the bed once, but he stuck with me throughout the night. BHK was restless too, but I didn't leg-sweep her out. Pye visited briefly, but high-tailed it after the barest commotion. I dreamt that BHK and I were hunting animals, tagging them for reference, and re-releasing 'em into the wild. A side effect of geocaching, perhaps?

Bugah & Neil went fishing - to no avail, as the water was too choppy.

Half day tomorrow! North Beach Fireworks are going to be something else!

via jwz - Search for Lonesome George mate is long shot

While scientists search for a mate for "Lonesome George" -- the last known survivor of a species of Galapagos tortoise -- some say the effort to fend off extinction may be in vain. Even if a mate is found, George has not been interested in reproducing in the past and may not know how, former keepers and others who have worked with him said.

"He has problems ... he probably never saw a female and male of his own species reproducing," said Swiss biologist Sveva Grigioni, who worked with George 13 years ago.

Grigioni, now back in Switzerland, said she could normally get tortoises to ejaculate within minutes, but spent months manually stimulating George and never extracted semen from him.

Age is not George's problem. He is estimated at between 60 and 90 years old, and could live to be 200 and still reproduce, scientists say.

The visual differences in tortoises from different islands were among the features of the Galapagos that helped 19th Century British naturalist Charles Darwin formulate his theory of evolution. Since then, the tortoises have been hunted by pirates for their meat and their habitat eaten away by goats introduced onto the islands. George, who weighs 198 pounds, was found on Pinta in 1971.

Reviewing Openads for the company's ad server for the web. it seems pretty reputable and reliable, thus far.

Fire drill this morning was a welcome break in the day - cool outside, everyone seemed laid back and calm - helped move the rest of the time that much more rapidly. the 2pm meeting went well... lots of good information for me to ruminate over the next few projects. I really dig that I'm in an environment that will allow me to use the skills I have! (Last gig wasn't bad, but a lot of repetition. This time, there's a lot of room for creative thought along with brute force.

Day closed with S'mores over a fire pit, some preview fireworks, and then Bugah and I played a bit of "Destroy All Humans". Not a bad thing.

Follow-up meeting at IANA on Tuesday; I think it’ll go pretty darn well. Shortly, I’ll be going to meet the technologists both in and outside of the industry.

I’m looking forward to modifying my linked-in profile to include county work and possibly the guys above, too. I added a few more of them here and there, so we'll see how that service goes.

I’ve already benefited from having my own domain name – one of the interviewers typo-ed the first half of my email address. Fortunately, the bit bucket catches any names on the dot-com account.

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1 year ago - walnut gold-trading babies, house guest plans, bro to court, get crank radio-light, scooby guests,

2 years ago - wep key cracking, chico crime, martial arts and felt, sentences, RR fixit, Sweet Strawberry Jam!, stopped someone from doing something stupid and permanent.

3 years ago - Bro crap (status remains the same), vaseline, singing science, speak & spell, moved to madcow

4 years ago - Skull dream, Scooby-doo fun & book henge in There, Ghetto Fries?

5 years ago - Pam got bell's Palsy that lasted for a bit. Ann and Bob have adisagreement. Beans. Gummi Bears vs. Fingerprint Sensors, Charlie's LJ mentioned

6 years ago - connubial, cadaverine, flamingos pink because they eat shrimp, tension thinking

7 years ago - Journal will be born in 1 day

I'm going to rework this meme a bit.

name 3 things that really irritate you...

#1 - Folks that don't pay attention to where they're going. I'm the size of a house, but some people still barrel into me. I sometimes wonder if it's because I'm *so* large that folks consider me part of the scenery, like a wall. Maybe I just look like the most comfy thing to slam into, like a giant, fuzzy airbag.

#2 - People who don't listen... but instead are caught inside thier own heads,  spitting out noise, but not taking any info to build an informed opinion/knowledge base. Disagreeing with me is fine, but at pretending to listen isn't. When I tell you that the stove is hot and then complain when you've been burned is a good way for me to drop my respect.

hm, so, I guess you could lump those two into "the willfully unaware".

#3 - People who wreck my outdoors. I've wanted to punch smokers who flick butts onto the ground rather than proper disposal. I'm pretty non-confrontational for the most part, but if I see someone wad and toss a piece of paper to the ground, I'll pick it up and flag 'em down. "Excuse me, you dropped this."

name 3 things that really delight you...(I added this, to kill the negative vibe)

#1 - Good Conversation.  Interaction with someone else, especially where both sides learn something or share a special memory is priceless. Sadly, most internet conversation isn't up to that par... D00D! (Close to, but not quite the opposite of #2 above) Sometimes, it'll surprise you. I've had a lot of good fortune with some internet conversations over the years. It's not hard to find wheat rather than chaff.

#2 - Non-human Primates. Man, Monkeys just make me smile. As long as they're not scary monkeys with a straight-razor or something. Then, they make me laugh. Falls almost into the "things that are so ugly that they're beautiful" catagory, except that  baby chimps, orangutans and the like are genuinely cute.  Something about them just touches the gut. People, but not really.

#3 - Walking can be a great joy... taking in the world. There's always something beautiful to see, and it tends to crop up in unusual places. A lizard running on the sidewalk, pretty girl in a bikini,  tile/shadow partterns, who knows... I've always seen something that made the walk worthwhile.

I don't tag anyone specific, but I would like to see the results for those that do take and run with this meme.

Pretty cool... a lot of anonymous activity in last Sunday's entry... folks debating about heading down to Orlando this for the honeymoon. I agree, it might be a good idea to postpone. It's rare that I see anonymous non-spam activity. Hope the entry is helpful!

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I got 17 out of 18 on the arcade sound quiz. (I missed the one about Zelda/FF/Bad Dudes - I was never a good nintendroid.)

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Why is something so destructive, so lovely?

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Danny likes "reality tv".

Amish in the City and the Survivor series, in particular.

I remain a skeptic and suspect behind the scenes scripting.

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Big Kahuna has been very generous to me lately. I think that having a work ethic while other people act like little punks might have something to do with it. I got a new chair, she offered to take some call this weekend, and some other nice fringes. Hopefully that'll mean a raise sometime soon, too.

Heartbreaking case last night... old man with Alzheimer's. He's a habitual wander off, and apparently his caregivers can't give him the attention he needs. He's constantly taking off on his family. The last time he took off, he had a moment of clarity and tried to commit "suicide by cop".

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Now none of my LJ mail is making it to me automatically. Forgive me if I don't reply immediately.

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I've had lovely chats with Sammy, Whims, Phillykat, Jen and K lately... it seems I only rarely get pinged from AIM, ICQ, or MSN anymore, with last night being a pleasant exception.

Speaking of the first two... I'm glad to hear Sammy's back in CoH, and There's having trouble opening up on my system. I think it's something to do with the new update. Reinstalled, and it works fine now. Had a grand time running around and getting reacquainted with folks.

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Duran Duran got back together... Why couldn't it have been The Talking Heads ? (A whole album is streamable from there.)

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Building a cultural bridge through monkey-chanting ( Read more... )

via fuzzybumblebee

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The Missing Children's Day Ceremony scheduled for Monday Sept. 13th 2004 has been postponed due to the effects of Hurricanes Frances and Charley and the anticipated impact of Hurricane Ivan on the State.

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Archive

1 year ago - written missives with bro, newbie likes the doobie, digital clouds, Hurricane Fabian, Stratego, Yoni Yantri, BK snoops, gave frankie the mooch some pasta and a pan.

2 years ago - Great dreams, care-were-bears, Big Bird (IMT) is a thief, Private moon landing. (never took place, sadly.), newtie play,

3 years ago - 9/11 observations.

4 years ago - Tattoo trend, questions memes.. hmm, #4 came true!, Possibility of a Seed donation

Well, my sweetheart hit the sack early, and I had laundry to do. so... I subjected my duds to a sudsy spin downtown.

There, I met a doppelganger, but a kindly one... he was sam shepherd to my grizzly adams. a fellow man-mountain intent on having an outfit clean enough to go to work in tomorrow. We talked for a little while, finding a common bond in that we were the only ones there that were male, over 20, but under 100 years old, and spoke English instead of a loud, shrill Creole or drunken Spanish singing. A rambunctious, cross-cultural, multi-aged cacophony, to be sure.

A little back story, first. This is the same laundry where this happened, nearly a year ago. since then, I've been primarily going to the other one, by the chit-chat lounge, because that's right next to the bakery... and fresh baked goods makes people-watching go by so much more pleasantly. Sadly, since I did my laundry tonight, the bakery was closed, so I opted for the 'mat of Evil. It wasn't so bad, but it was rather loud in there... I remember now why I usually do my duds in the morning, on the weekend... far more machines avvailable, and the crowd is still half asleep, rambling through some kind of thorzine shuffle, instead of beer-fueled migrant worker-men and young mothers with rowdy,runner-kids, squealing.... but it makes for an interesting study in people and society.

Tonight I saw -
4 kids playing a weird verion of calvinball involving an uno deck, matchbox cars and a lot of high speed running and screaming, saying somthing about not me! not me!

More paper bags coverin' beer cans than I have ever seen before. Maybe there's a public ordinance about boozing it up in the 'mat? I felt sort of out of place drinking my tasty, tall arizona orangeade (obtained at the beer dispensing gas station across the street)

A cute little girl who was the epitome of "how to be good" sitting on the bench, coloring nicely... strange to see her there, across from all the rowdy grownups, but the parents were close, keeping an eye, fortunately.

I had a fascinating conversation with this big guy (name of Mike, by the way), and we both agreed that it was louder inside than most concerts...chatted about books, got a few reccomendations that I'll be looking into, and maybe he'll look into house of leaves and enjoy it.

Head count? about 15 assorted kids, 6 drunk men, myself, mike, 12 women. a mob. I swear.. it sounded like 100...I'm glad that just stepping to the back parking lot quieted it considerably.

some folks I talked to fairly frequently last month have kind of all but blown me off. It saddens me, as I'm a nice guy. Folks get caught up in other situations, though, I guess. One's an LJer, two are folks that have moved out of state, and one that left where I work currently.


I'm happy that there are other folks that are around for me to talk to, both on LJ, and in real life. The really irritating thing is, I call and e-mail, and get no reply. that's just rude. If you don't want to talk to me, tell me, don't have me glean it from holding one-sided conversations.

This has been a public service announcement. Treat people with honesty and courtesy.

That's all