Is it supposed to be like that?

Wife and I are back from our trip to sunny San Diego and man o man what a sweet ass town that place is. Loved it as much as I did back in the day. I could honestly find myself sliding into a sweet little position in one of the swanky hotels there and living on the beach. I’d eat dirt at this point to live on the beach.

Anyhow I’ve got a ton of stories and a few pictures to get out but for now I’ve also got to dig out from the pile of work on my desk. It’s funny how I went there for work, and yet am even more buried by work now that I’m back. Weird!

I can’t help myself

I have to make a comment on the latest election headline. I REALLY don’t want to but I can’t seem to stop myself because I am SO FUCKIN outraged by the current election. God help me!

Obama: Grandmother may not see Election Day

Can someone tell me why this is news? Facing all the other issues about to come crashing down on the American public, her illness and imminent demise is making headlines. This is complete and utter BULL SHIT.

Why is no one calling Obama to the mat on using this as the PR stunt that it is. How about for once we have an unbiased media that is willing to report the real news rather than trying to sway public opinion to fit their personal beliefs.

Where is the media coverage for the thousands of sick and dying homeless in this country? There’s no headlines for them…There are bigger issues at hand here but we’re too blinded by the candidates rose colored glasses that no one seems to care.

It’s a shame that we don’t have the option for a “None of the Above” vote in this election because neither candidate has the chops, experience or direction to lead this country. For the first time in my life I am ashamed of our government. Our current leaders and of their potential replacements have become so corrupt over money and power that there is no way they will be able to lead us out of the status quo and back into prosperity.

I don’t know about the rest of you but I am sick and tired of a system that promotes the choice of a lessor of two evils mentality when it comes to the choice of our next leader and I’m sick of the media using total BULL SHIT headlines like this one in an effort to sway our votes.

Don’t get me wrong on this one. I have nothing but complete and utter sympathies for him and his family. On a number of news comment sites many people are questioning the ability of a broken hip to cause a death. This is how my own grandmother passed a number of years back. If they say she’s near deaths door do to this condition then I believe them. However, I don’t believe this to be actual news that is worthy of the American public’s attention during such a critical time. I have no doubt that this is nothing more than an attempt by the liberal media outlets in an effort to gain a sympathy vote movement for Obama and that is despicable and they should be ashamed!

Drivers Ed…

I can’t seem to wrap my head around the thought processes many of the drivers on the road seem to go through every day. It’s like driving through a grand theft auto mission everyday on my way to and from work. People running red lights left and right. Making illegal turns and my most favorite of all, the left hand turn from the lane of travel. Come on people…there’s a center lane, sometimes known as the “turn lane” for a reason. Pull your winkled old ass into that lane and then make your left turn. This whole slow down to 2mph in the traffic lane, begin the turn and then remember to turn on your signal is getting a tad FRUSTRATING.

Oh no, don’t think that I’m only singling out the older population on this one…no no…you little bastards out there aren’t getting off that easy. Life isn’t a fucking video game where you can drive as you please while talking to your dumb-ass boyfriend and texting your best friend about the hand job you gave him last night (unless you’re in Utah then it’s that dry humping session but I digress), oh no it’s not. How about we put the cell phone down and focus on the road and traffic around you, oh and yeah…the center lane is where you should be initiating your left turn from, not the traffic lanes.

I swear, as life speeds up and technology takes over we all seem to forget the rules of the road. What would be refreshing on one of my commutes is to not get cut off, have to slam on the brakes for some dumb ass making a left turn right in front of me instead of from the turn lane, nearly get rear ended by some jackass texting on their phone or run the risk of getting broadsided because that yellow light doesn’t mean slow down and stop anymore, no no, it means hit the gas because the first 10-15 seconds of a red light don’t really count…didn’t you get that memo?

So to all of you out there…PUT DOWN THE FUCKING PHONE & DRIVE OR GET OFF THE ROAD!

Yes I’ve noticed

That there is a HUGE amount of political ads on my site and they all seem to be for Obama. DO NOT think this is any sort of endorsement on my part for him or for the current and future political status quo. Unfortunately I don’t have any say in the advertisements on the site other than they are pulled from the tags given to each post and am seriously considering pulling all political oriented tags until after the election.

None Of The Above

A classic from “Brewsters Millions”. Now if only we could accomplish the same in this election. Vote None of the Above!

You’re Joking

A few months ago Wife and I went and saw “WALL-E” which was pretty poignant and kind of direct in addressing where humanity is going to end up if things don’t begin to change. I’ve done a decent job at repressing that information since leaving the theater, that was until I read this,  “India launches moon mission in Asian space race”.

Now I am in no means what so ever a tree hugging, liberal, humanitarian, green peace weenie. Not even close, but I can’t seem to contain the outrage boiling in my gut over this headline. A country where the majority of its population lives below the poverty line is spending billions upon billions to keep up with the Jones family next door. What complete and utter horse shit! Who can blame them though, look around the world and they’re not doing anything less than anyone else. Look at us…we’re more focused on what other countries think of us than how we treat our own citizens. We’re so focused on keeping our police strangle hold on the world that we refuse to take a step back and look at ourselves. Maybe it’s time that we began taking care of the problems at home before looking to solve the problems of the rest of the world. How can we set an example for someone else when we can’t do it ourselves?

But still, a 3rd world country sending a satellite to the moon to map its surface is more important than dealing with the poverty issues facing its population. And yet I act surprised by this. This in a country where men are slapped on the wrist for throwing acid in the face of their mothers, daughters, sisters and wives, setting them on fire or just plain murdering them and dumping them in an irrigation ditch all in the name of “honor”. Horse shit, absolute horse shit. Way to go India, keep turning that blind eye and one day you’ll be just like us, hope you’re happy.

Californication

We’re a few days away to leaving for California so that I can attend a hospitality conference and so that Wife can wile her days away on the beach while I work. I think I’m getting the short end of the stick here. We’re going to be spending our time in San Diego which should be a lovely 70 to 75 degrees the entire time we’re there. We’re heading in a bit early so that we can have some time to play on Saturday before the conference starts that night. I’ve also arranged for us to stay an extra night so that we can play on Wednesday before coming home on Thursday afternoon.

I have to admit that I am feeling a little guilty about the whole thing. The conference falls smack dab over our 7th anniversary so I basically stiff armed Wife into tagging along so that we could get some sort of a vacation out of the deal, no matter how small it may be at this point. Either way I know she’ll love it. It’s been a few years since I was last there, but from what I remember it was absolutely gorgeous. I can see why so many people flock to the area.

I think we’re just going to play it by ear and make our plans on the fly. I know that she really wants to see Sea World and where it’s like a mile away from our hotel that’s pretty much a given. I also remember a pretty sweet swap meet happening at the sports arena (I think that’s where it was) that we may also try to hit on Saturday. I’m pretty sure that it was at the San Diego Sports Arena and if that’s the case it’s all of another mile or two down the road. I like things that are close…no worry…no hassle.
Either way this should be a relaxing trip (at least for one of us).

Souped up golf cart eludes police

Only in Utah

Voting: what’s the point

I’ve been informed that I’ll be leaving work early this afternoon so that I can spend more of my precious time  worrying about which candidate truly gives a fuck about me and my problems by registering to vote at the 11th hour. Whoooopeeeeeeeeeee

It’s not that I don’t care, because I really do. There have only been a few critical elections in the past and I firmly believe that we’re faced with one of the more important elections of our countries history. Yet the outcome is not going to lead us towards a stronger and brighter future…no no…neither candidate is capable of delivering that promise no matter how much they’d like you to believe, nor how much their fanatical supporters would have you believe. That’s right I called them fanatics because that’s what they are. I’ve seen them, they act like a bunch of pubescent teenage girls at a beetles concert. I have no doubt that there’s been more than a few pair of under ware or depends (take your choice) thrown on stage during these rallies because they’re just another concert, nothing more nothing less. Each one as important as the next Wiggles appearance.

In the past I’ve always looked at elections as which one is the lessor of two evils and who won’t screw it up too badly. Lets face it, it doesn’t matter who’s in power, they’ll screw it up one way or another, it’s just a matter of how badly. Only on this round I think we’re all in for one hell of a ride down the cluster fuck highway. Do I believe that in 4 years we’ll be any better off with either Obama or McCain at the helm? Not in the least. I have no doubt that we’ll still be ignoring our internal social issues and wrongs. There will still be old and young without proper housing, food or medical attention and we’ll still be shuttling our young off to fight a bunch of asshole religious extremists all in the name of freedom. Freedom, what a crock…how can we claim to be the home of the free when the majority of the population lives paycheck to paycheck and regularly has to decide between which bill to pay and which hits the trash can so that they put gas in the car and food on the table. Yet we can shovel money into foreign affairs that aren’t getting better with our assistance and ultimately would probably be better off if we washed our hands of them and instead chose to address one of the wrongs in our own country for a change.

Wife is freaked that I might vote for a total psycho that’s running for Utah’s gov. Why not? the old regimes and old boys clubs that are currently in power all over the country sure can’t seem to get it done, so why the hell not. Who knows, he may surprise us all and do a hell of a job. Yeah he’s a little crazy and has had some issues, but you can’t tell me that he’s not more of a regular guy than the other old rich assholes in the race. I have no doubt that he’s looking at it as how can he make things better where the others are looking at it as how quickly can this catapult them into an even higher ranking government position. Either way we’re screwed, at least with this guy we have a little fun along the way.

If I had my choice I’d be campaigning for “NONE OF THE ABOVE” and calling for another round of candidates. But we all know that won’t happen because we have the movie star and the old guy…Instead of voting who’s president and vice president we should be voting which candidate becomes president and which becomes vice president. At least that way we might have some balance in the office rather than another lackey licking the boots of the president. Isn’t that how all other elections are handled? I mean really, I can’t think of another position that is a twoffer like that. Don’t we usually have to vote for a president AND a vice president? Am I wrong to question why this election means we have to get two assholes for the one vote? What are we the Costco of nations and have to get the best bargain even in our elections?

Screw it…I’m flipping a quarter on all my votes, we’re all screwed anyway. That way I can point the finger at someone else…just like they do in Washington!

Crap

A few months ago I set a goal to get back into the gym on a regular basis and drop a certain amount of weight before today. Well…I didn’t do it, and when I mean I didn’t do it, I don’t mean that I missed the goal weight by a few pounds here or there, I mean I DIDN’T DO IT, as in, at all. Yeah I suck!

Wife and I were doing great for the first 2-3 weeks. Getting up early and heading to the local Gold’s Gym (all of 3 blocks away) and were seeing some great results. She was far less crazy and I was feeling better, looking better and losing the weight. Then I don’t know what happened. We got lazy and one morning sleeping in turned into 2, then 3, then 4 and then before I knew what happened the entire week was gone and the vicious cycle would begin again. We really were doing great. We even began keeping tabs on just what we were eating and the amount of mindless junk, sugar and fat that we had been shoveling in took a huge nose dive.

The drive for this change came when I found out that I would be speaking twice at the hospitality convention that I’m attending at the end of this week. I thought, my God, I have to stand in front of a group of other industry professionals and convince them that I know what I’m talking about and I have to do that while being a big fatty, not good, not good at all. The worst fear was the fact that I have a genitic disposition to sweat buckets from my forehead when I’m nervous and the weight exacerbates the problem 100 fold. I’m sure that it won’t be an issue and no there is really going to care one way or another, the problem is that I care and repeatedly choose not to do anything about it.

I’ve been toying with this idea in my head of posting real time results and workouts on a daily basis on the site. I haven’t quite decided the best way to do it, but it’s something that I’m seriously considering. Maybe in that way I can kill two birds with one stone, regularly update the site and get my butt to the gym. This probably won’t be starting until the first of Nov, but who knows, I may start it tonight with the amount of guilt that I’m feeling. Sucks!

Part of the other issue that has brought this to light is that Wife and I went shopping over the weekend for a few things I need to fill in the closet, the goal was to be doing this with smaller sizes, not more of the same but that’s just what happened. The worst is that the rest of town is made up with large asses like mine so finding things in my size proves a little difficult. This is then compounded by the fact that we live in a town that is trying hard to grow, but when you really don’t have any competition what’s the point to carry a well stocked selection of items. This all resulted in a lot of frustration and turning to the online store to order something that I should have easily been able to find on the shelf. Oh well, no one’s fault but my own. Guess I should do something to change that.

Found

I was cruising through one of my favorite little websites  today and happened upon one that was all too familiar.

Ex-Mountain Biker!

You know, my shoulder still hurts…I wonder how that tree is doing…My favorite is when it decides to dislocate in the middle of the night just to say hi. That was an epic trail though, totally worth it!

I highly suggest that you spend some time at the site, because it kicks ass. The best tactic isn’t to go through them in order by date, no no no…go to the archives and hit the tag cloud, absolutely priceless I tell you, PRICELESS! I think my favorite has got to be “prom” or maybe it’s “oops” but then “cheese” is kinda good too…so many choices.

Ta Da part II

Well it seems I’ve had a slight change of heart. The original version of this theme was too cluttered for my liking with the two side bars on the right and lets face it, I really didn’t like having one on either side of the blog posts. So this is as good as it’s going to get. I am however going to widen the body to better space the posts and see if I can draw the bottom of the site up a few pixels. I’ve also dumped a few wiggy plug ins and installed better versions. The coolest of which has got to be the text cloud.

I’d love to say that I came up with it on my own but no, it is a plug in that I found on the WordPress site. It’s by Roy Tanck who did an amazing job. I mean really, it’s a piece of art.

So aside from these recent changes I’m basically done. I’m going to add a p
cture gallery, or flickr widget or something in the coming days, but for now tis is good enough for me.

Up next is the business site and Wife's blog. She’s been at this a little longer than I have and her site really is in need of an updating. I’m pretty sure that we’re going to run with Thematic on her site as well where it has really proven to have everything I’m looking for at this point. There are a few items I wish I could tweak but we’ll see what the newest version does in the coming weeks and cross the bridge when it gets here. If the newest version doesn’t have what I’m looking for (from the themeshaper forums it sounds as if it will) I’ll have to change the main design elements and keep restoring them when a new version of Thematic comes out.

Twoffer

Something about this son

“Something about you” by Leroy
I donno what it is but I really like his sound.

um, Yeah!

I had to sneak away from the office a little early this afternoon to take care of a few items and get a much needed haircut before I head out to a hospitality conference next week. Before all of this however I had been working through next years budget numbers, which resulted in some sort of weird time warp and my not realizing what time it was. What does this mean? Well it means that I didn’t really eat lunch. Blamo, too late to do anything about it I had to hit the road. So when I got home later this afternoon I was starving…craving that something special. I scan the kitchen for that something and low what do I spy?

Oh ho ho, a brand spanking new bag of Cheetos puffs…but these aren’t any run of the mill puffs, oh no these are ginormous. I mean I can barely fit one whole in my mouth, and trust me when I say this…I, have a big mouth…

I have a slight problem when it comes to cheetos…especially puffs. If there were an AA program from cheetos I would totally have been ordered to participate via this or that courts mandate, and then promptly flunked out. I’m certain that one day Wife is going to come home from work one day and find me in a coma with lovely cheese encrusted fingers.

MMMmmmmm what a day that will be…

A very cool site

I found this site off of the MSN home page this morning. It’s an upstart that’s only a few days old where the main content is pictures of upsidedown dogs. Now you tell me how that could get any better?

One of Those days

I couldn’t say it better myself…

 

 Dilbert

 

It’s that time of year when just about every company I have ever worked for hunkers down with the trolls in accounting and produces the magic numbers for the next year. Dilbert and I are on the same wave length today.

Ta Da

So here it is. The latest and greatest styling. This one should be good for more than a few days I hope. There are a few items that I need to tweak but it’s basically all there.
It’s a child theme based off of the thematic frame work, which proved to be a life saver while trying to come up with something that I liked. Due to thematic I will be able to update and change things very easily without much if any down time. Between Thematic and Wordpress things went fairly smoothly, even for a hacker like me. It definitely proved that if I can adapt and change the site that anyone out there can do it to.
So there you go…I hope you like it.

Stay Tuned

Recently I made a pack with myself to make sure that I would post something daily if at all possible. Well not even two weeks in and I’m falling behind.
I won’t make excuses other than I’ve been busy working on a new layout, style and direction for the site the past week or so. The latest version just isn’t cutting it for me. It’s too 1998 and really has a basic html look to it that I’m not super excited about. So please stay tuned and I hope that you’re surprised with the new changes.

Spooky

You’re witnessing the latest and greatest version of whatthefetch.com exciting don’t you think? As I mentioned before I had been toying with the idea of swapping out my old theme for something new and this is what I’ve come up with. It’s based off of the “Vrooom!” theme by Rajaie AlKorani.  It caught my eye with the larger right sideblog and the overall format. I have made a large number of changes, in reality making it my own theme at this point with the basic css and xhtml coding left in place. I pulled a large number of colors, images and formatting from my previous theme over to give it that extra bit that the original theme was lacking.
I’m still not supper excited about it…something is still just missing. It’s also a little too Halloweenie for me. But being October I suppose it’s ok for now.
I’m also fighting the clutter it would seem. I have a feeling that for me to really do away with a lot of the clutter I’m going to have to come up with my own formatting. That however is light ages down the road. In the mean time I’m going to be keeping my eye out for a theme that I can manipulate into something more my liking. Hell, I may even dump back into my original if I can’t get the current version or something new more to my liking.

Latest Revisions

I went on a tear yesterday and decided to make an attempt at updating to the latest version of WordPress 2.6.2 from our currently installed version 2.2. Wife and I had talked about updating our systems off and on for the past few months, each time returning to that what if everything crashes and we lose our sites and can’t get anything back. Well, coming from a background of starting out on an old IBM XT back in the day I can totally see her point. I remember going through high school having to use Mac’s in our computer lab because our district  was to snotty to use simple PC’s, THOSE machines are for laborers and people who schlep for a living…not my son or daughter, no they need to create and to make sure that they aren’t physically able to get sucked into a lifeless job in front of a computer we’ll make sure they don’t know how to use them.

Sorry, the crazy seemed to jump in there. Where was I?

Oh yeah, so we were pretty certain that the upgrade would cause some sort of doomsday reaction and that it would not only dump all of our blogging history but blow up the Western Hemisphere in the process. I decided that enough was enough and that if the Western Hemisphere was blown off the face of the planet because of it, well then we’d all be that much better off anyhow.

Our sites are hosted through liquid-web and they offer the use of fantastico to help the blogger challenged (much like myself) to keep on top of our updates and software upgrades. After making every physical back up to our sites that I could come across I crossed my fingers and clicked update. It took all of 20 seconds and was done. I couldn’t believe how easy it was. I happily clicked on the “view site” link and was immediately taken to my page that was not proudly showing a large bold “NOT FOUND” error message.
Well I thought, thank God I didn’t update Wife’s site because she would have a stroke and I’d be found guilty for murder and rot the rest of my life away known as Erica to my closer friends in prison. So I began digging around and with Wife’s help realized that everything was still there, our categories etc worked as they should. Once you clicked through, everything loaded and it was if nothing was wrong. It was then that I realized that we had an external problem and that this issue had to be based in WordPress. After some frantic searching across Google and the WordPress forums I stumbled across a one line response that someone had given to someone else in a similar position. “Did you deactivate your plug-ins?” Ahhhh hell could it be that simple I thought. So I went back into the admin side and did just that. That’s when everything came back like magic and I thought I was in the pink again. With everything working I then re-activated all the plug-ins and found that I was back to square one. After some further trial and error I discovered that my Katesgasis Side Blog plug-in was causing all the trouble.  So after some frustration in trying to remember what our FTP address, user and passwords were I was able to auto update it and a few others.

For those independent WordPress users I highly recommend staying current in the newest software releases. I know that if we hadn’t gone from version 2.2 to 2.6.2 directly I would have saved some heartache.  Oh well, knowledge is power and now I know so next time won’t be quite so frightening.

Political Low Point

I’ve been fighting with myself over whether to post anything on this site concerning the current state of politics in this country. Unfortunately I don’t think I can remain quiet any longer. I’m tired of reading through this blog or that blog and just wanting to bang my head on the desk in frustration. Everyone seems to have an answer or a reason as to why we’re currently in the state that we’re in. They all seem to point the finger at President Bush and his less then shining record of action.

WAKE UP PEOPLE

President Bush isn’t the Antichrist that every liberal news media outlet out there would have you believe. If you want to begin pointing fingers you need to point them at yourselves. YOU elected the real people in power and have no idea what you have really done. Everyone is sooooo tied up with the president’s position when they really need to be taking a look at those men and women that are currently representing your voice in the Senate and Congress. It’s these people that really make the country move in a certain direction, not the president. Yes the president has the power to create and veto laws, bills and various programs, but he or she in no way has the power to turn the tide of a country one way or another like that of the Senate or Congress.
Last night I refused to watch the debate because there is absolutely no point. Why have a debate when it’s not a debate? Where is the accountability? Where is the structure and demand to answer a direct question with a direct answer. This is how I will fix the problem, 1, 2, 3. We as a country have become so blinded by our own sense of superiority that we refuse to open our eyes and our minds to new ideas and demand that those we have elected be held accountable and actually represent US for once.

I’m not going to give you my stance on the current presidential candidates other than they both scare the hell out of me.

On one side we have Barrack Obama, a man who clearly doesn’t understand basic economic principles and is proposing tax cuts for the middle and lower incomes while raising taxes for higher incomes. WAKE UP…budy, the only thing that this is going to accomplish is to drive the final nail into many American businesses and force the middle and lower incomes out of a job. What happens when the higher incomes are now taxed more? They have less disposable income, which in turn means they now purchase fewer and fewer of the luxury items that the middle and lower incomes produce. In other words this translates into even less cars being purchased, less boats, less homes, less electronics etc. Who makes those items? YOU AND I do, so now that they’re not being bought by the higher incomes due to a tax hike what happens to you and I? We’re out of a job, tell me how that is a good thing. Everyone thinks that taxing the rich is the answer to our problems when in reality it will only add to them. The rich have the money and will always have the money. Raising their taxes just means that they hold onto it tighter and spend less of it on those items you and I produce on a daily basis.  If you don’t believe me I suggest you take 15 minutes out of your time and do some basic economic principle research. Hit the library or better yet hit the local college and find an economics professor…they’ll tell you the same damn thing.

He’s also touting change change change. How can you change when your running mate is a senator that has been in office for what seems like a life time? How is a long time senator who ultimately is the real problem with politics in our country change? How are they going to give us something different and begin pushing the country back to the level it had once been?

On the other side we have John McCain, a man who is afraid of rocking the boat. He’s touting change and that he knows how to fix the problem, but really hasn’t put out anything new. The most interesting bit would be his pick of a woman as his running mate. Does she have what it takes to cut the mustard or is she a gimmick? Hell if I know. The only thing I can see that he has running for him is his experience in the military. And lets face it, every country out there pretty much hates us and we may need someone who’s been there and experienced that. Other than that I don’t see much in him either. He’s kind of like that toad stool on the stump in your back yard. It’s always there, not really doing anything, but not really hurting anything either. Not really the type of person we need as a president when we’re currently in the financial and military fiasco’s that we’re currently in.

The one that will get my vote is the one that can prove in the next 20 some odd days that he has the know how and the drive to extricate ourselves from the rest of the world and to begin fixing the issues we’re facing here at home. Will it be one of the two mentioned above? probably not. I think this year may be a year for “none of the above”. I think the real question is does Obama or McCain have what it takes to fix our broken country? Unfortunately I believe the answer to be no on both sides.

On a lighter side I was pleasantly surprised to find that Wife had packed me a some yogurt and homemade granola this morning. I know that it wasn’t the success that she had been looking for, but it still turned out good which is more than I can say about our looming presidential election.

The Finish Line

This morning found us back in southern Utah, with two pickup trucks and our Budget Rental truck full of the remains of our lives in northern Utah. Yesterday was a little depressing, I know that Wife will never admit how tough it was for her to pull the door closed to her home, knowing that it was now someone else's home, but she did it and I love her that much more for it.

We may no longer be home owners but at least we’ve got some great memories of the place and our life together there.

The last thing we did before we pulled the door closed was to dig out Saint Joseph and clean him up. He’s earned his place in our home, wherever that may be. With the way the markets are right now, the sale of our home is an absolute miracle. I don’t know any other way to describe it, it’s a miracle.

Fresh out of the ground 

So it’s now official. We’ve moved to Southern Utah and there’s no turning back. Leaving our lives there has been tough, but it’s for the best. Part of me is sad to see it go, especially this time of year. Fall in that area was absolutely perfect. The days were warm and the nights were cool. The changing of the leaves
and the smell of winter coming was just to die for. Southern Utah will be nice though. We experience all of those things, just not in the usual timing, they’ll be more like November and December experiences now.

Here are a few more pictures from the move…

Soooo Bored

I don't know why, but this shot makes me think of daisy as a nun

So that’s that…I guess the next step is getting out of debt and finding a new house to make our own.

File Not Found (your brain is being shut down to prevent further system failure)

Friday afternoon found Wife and I packing away our lives into the back of a Budget Rental moving truck. It was a little sad and a little exciting at the same time. We decided to empty the storage shed first. I can’t tell you how glad I am to be rid of that shed. We got it when we first moved to northern Utah 3+ years ago and have reworked it I don’t know how many times. Filling it to capacity, cleaning it out and donating the items we no longer needed or used, only to refill it again a few weeks later. Hopefully with our new lives we’ll be able to afford a house that has enough space and storage that we can keep all our crap in one location. Everyone tells you to simplify and to do without those items and to never get a storage shed. I remember reading somewhere something about how if you have to store it then you don’t need it. This is probably true, but doesn’t change the fact that unlike the person who said that, the items I’m storing are those that are usually stuffed into an attic or basement. Where our house had neither we were left without much choice.  It was still liberating to clean that damn shed out and pull the door shut for one last time.

This morning proved a much harder task…

How do I surmise the past few years of my life with Wife into something tangible for the rest of the world to understand? I don’t think there is a word to describe that feeling. I’ve tried, and have rewritten this paragraph a hundred times attempting to describe that feeling. I don’t think anyone fully understands it until they pull the door shut on their first home for the very last time, knowing that the truck now full of their belongings wasn’t going to a new and exciting home to start over again, but back into another storage shed. I think the only people out there that would know that feeling would be those that have lost their homes due to the upheaval in the credit and mortgage industry. Thankfully I have an upside and that is knowing that in a few months Wife and I will be out of credit card debt and will emerge from this whole financial mess facing the country and world a step ahead of hundreds of thousands of others. Thankfully my move is not a forced one but one made by choice. Thankfully we were able to find a buyer for our home and still make a profit, a small profit but at least I’m still ahead of the game.

Tomorrow IS the day

I know that my last post claimed that it was the day, but in all respects, tomorrow really is the day. It’s the day that our move to Southern Utah becomes final and an actual reality. It’s going to be a good step for us financially and will I’m sure prove to be one of our better decisions.

Tonight however also proved a few chinks in our plans as we had a celebratory dinner of sorts with some good friends. It served as a reminder of even though we’re leaving winter and some huge debt, we’re also leaving some great people. It proved that we’re going to have to actually put forth some effort now and be good friends back.So Gfunk & Kgirl, here’s to you and thanks for a great night out. Sorry we couldn’t continue on with you to the side car, but we’ll see you next weekend in Vegas!

(this post was written & published on iPhone)