Update Dec 27, 2009

I've been ignoring this blog a lot recently. I have no real excuse. Lack of inspiration at the time of writing is the problem. I'll be at work and a cool idea will pop into my head, but leaves shortly when there is no way to write it down.

For an update, at the moment, I am attempting another new mix. No set theme at the moment. It might just be stuff I started to listen to this year. Last year, I made a New Year mix, and even burn a bunch of copies for people, but never gave them out to anyone. This year, i will with hold the burning in favor of just enjoying a mix for me. Personal things and all.

It may even be a double CD mix, but I will probably tri it down to just one whenever I settle on a theme. So far, there is stuff all over the place with many song being things that I like from the radio.

I am also supposedly writing a script for a friend of mine. He's looking for portfolio pieces in comci sequential art. It's only to be about 6 pages, so I am trying to wrap my head around an idea that condense. You have to figure it's a standard 6 panel grid, so it's 36 panels to work with, but that doesn't include expansive panel layouts and cheesecake shots. I'll think of something. I just need an idea with minimal characters and simple story taht could be told with little or no dialog.

Christmas was fine. Had most of my family over for dinner and such. Nowhere to hide. I got some gift cards, a video game, lots of clothes and a GPS unit.

New Years Eve should be interesting to say the least. I have a love hate relationship with the end of the year. I look forward to new prospects, but hate the hype of the end of the year party. Too many expectations.

Sound of Silence

See, the weird thing is that I had plenty of time and topics to write abut over the last week. I just didn't have a functioning computer with internet access to actually compose my thoughts. It's kind of sad that I resort my self to technology as a crutch to write.

In any case, I guess it's time for an update.

It is solidly in the Christmas season at work. Hours officially changed with Black Friday, but now are staring to effect me. See, for the first few weeks, only weekends were really effected, with opening early and staying open late. Now, this week, the whole week has early openings and late closings. My Wednesday is going to suck, since it is then that I both open and close. In fact I have to go in before open to get work done then. I'm going to need some Red Bulls or something.

My Thanksgiving was all right. It was vastly different than past years. Instead of my home playing host to my immediate family, I joined my mom in center city Philadelphia for an extended family Thanksgiving. My brother was married on the next day, so with his wife's family in from another state, they had Thanksgiving dinner at the hotel were the wedding was to be held. It's strange having such a classic meal with menu options. Don't worry, I had the turkey choice. It was good, but nothing like a home cooked meal. I am also surprised how many people actually go out to eat for Thanksgiving. There was over 100 reservations for the hotel restaurant. Granted our party was most of it, but it still seems like a lot.

My brother, Chris, was married on Black Friday. This was significant because it gave me the greatest excuse (aside from a death) to not have to be at work. An added bonus was the extended days off, my first 4 day weekend/vacation since I was sick in January 2008. It was a good ceremony. It seemed non-denominational. They aren't actively practicing anything that I know of. Still, it was good to see all of my family. It is an extremely rare occasion when even my immediate family is all in one place. I talked with cousins, and generally had a good time. I drank and danced and tried my best to ignore my coming sickness. It never fails that I get sick to some degree whenever I am away from work for extended time.

Saturday started day one of house sitting. Since my brother was recently married and heading to a honeymoon in Belize, I was drafted to house sit and watch his cat, Blue. To describe it in a word, I would use "lonely". I didn't have a computer to connect with he outside world, so I settled for ondemand television and seasons of old TV on DVD. I finished up Generation Kill, Fear Itself and The Adventures of Brisco County Junior. I also brought my Xbox 360 to hook up to the HD television... Well, I hoped to at least.

The cords I had were for standard definition. I thought they may work in some capacity anyway. even if I didn't have the ful HD experience, I could at least connect it to the the internet and play some Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 online. Hell, with the new Xbox updates, I could even check my twitter and Facebook accounts. I held out for a day and headed to Gamestop the following afternoon. There I broke down and bought the HDMI cables needed for full High def experience. That was a good $50 right there. Then I headed to RadioShack and grabbed a 3ft ethernet cord for $10. I was in a good mood. I was going to waste away the rest of my solitude filled nights with mass killing of virtual people. I opend the packaging for the HDMI cable and set to connect it to the TV. Were the cable now connected to the TV, it didn't connect to the Xbox. Apparently, I have an early model that didn't support HDMI. Well, there's wasted money. Instead of getting too annoyed, I opted to attach the Xbox to the TV that was in the bedroom I was staying in. It didn' have internet access, but at least I could get some use out of it. I resorted to played a couple nights of Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.

Now, if you read this blog with any frequency, you may have perused the one written about the date I had. It was fun. We went out a couple times over the next few weeks. We talked nearly everyday. Then Thanksgiving came, and there was silence. With attempted phone calls and text messages left unanswered, I am just assuming the worst. I just have no idea what the hell happened. I'm not going to try calling again until I hear something back. There are other things I should be focusing on, like Christmas.