Looks like I am finally going to grow up and commit to a house. I know some will be suprised by this news, as I have not really mentioned houses in quite a while. Lee and I had settled on an apartment, when I made one last attempt to find a place. I forced Lee to go with me, and the very last house we looked at turned out to be the one.

It is a 2 BR, 2 1/2 BA, 1400 sq. ft. townhome. It is really cute, and has a lot of little things that I wanted like a pantry and a laundry room. The owners have done some nice things to it like put in ceramic tile, laminant flooring, and crown molding. The only issue is that the AC needs replaced. It works, but is 20 years old so not very efficient, and no doubt its days are numbered. The owners had it serviced and checked out, and since it works they won't replace it. They are paying most of the closing cost, so this frees up the money for me to replace it if needed. They are also willing to pay for 2 years of a home warrenty. (It is a buyer's market after all...)

I have gone back and forth on this subject, and realized it is not really about the AC, but about rather I really want to grow up. At 35 years old I still live like I am 18. I don't really have any responsibility, nothing holding me in one place. If I buy a house then I have a responsibility and I have to worry about taking care of it, and rather it will increase in value, and I can't just up and move if I wanted to. Still I can't keep renting, and it would be nice to really have my own place. For the last 2 years I have been living with someone, just renting a room. It sucks not being able to decorate the way you want, or not having enough room.

Overall I do think this is the right thing, but it is still a very scary thing.

Tags: house
Current Location: Home in Bed
Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Law and Order: CI

Well I have lead 3 training classes so far and have gotten good feedback. Only 4 more left to lead. Then of course we Go Live, and I will get inundated with calls.

I have to say leading a class all day makes you tired. I know some people think I talk all the time, but I really don't. It is tough doing all the talking for 5 hours, and helping people learn.

Still no word on the job. Tomorrow will be 3 weeks since the interview. I think I will call the HR lady and gently ask about it. Word on the street is my interview went really well.

Tonight I am hanging with my friends Phyllis and BJ. We are watching Buffy on DVD. We have already watched season 1 and begin season 2 tonight. I have to say the show is actually pretty witty and campy. I really like it alot.

What I really need right now is a non-fat, no whipped cafe mocha. Only 3 points, but so yummy.

Current Location: Desk at work
Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Ralph talking on his phone

So I have a new favorite TV show, and it is actually not a Sci Fi show. It is called Life and is on NBC at 10pm EST. It is about a cop, Charlie Crews, who was wrongly convicted of a triple homicide. His lawyer finally gets him out of jail after 12 years, and he gets a $5M settlement, and gets reinstated as a cop.

He is paired with Lt. Dani Reese, who has her own troubles. She is in AA and NA (narcotics anonymous), and hates being stuck with Crews. Crews in very quirky, and has a sort of Zen way of looking at things (or at least that is what he wants you to think.) His real goal in getting reinstated is so that he can research the triple homicide he was convicted of. The homicide was of his best friend/parter in a bar, this guy's wife, and their son.

I am really intrigued by what happened and why. I love that the show is quirky, and has very witty dialogue.

The only other new show I have watched this season is Bionic Women. (Lee and I actually only watched Life because it just happened to come on after Bionic Women and we thought it sounded interesting.) BW was ok. Not great, but not terrible. The second episode was better than the first. Katee Sackoff is in it and plays her character way over the top. Still they got me curious about where the story is going, so I will probably keep watching, if for no other reason than it is on before Life.

Tags: tv
Current Location: Desk at work
Current Mood: lethargic
Current Music: Quiteness

As many of you know I am working on this big project for work. It involves us going to one global system, and I am doing the Quality Management portion. I have to train everyone on site who does some kind of quality imput.

So here is the rant...I am really getting tired of getting emails from people that they can not attend their assigned training. I can't take any vacation for the next 3 months, and I had to cancel a much needed doctor's appointment so I can train these people, and now they don't want to show up. AAAHHHHH!!!!

The best is I managed to schedule a class for 3 people tomorrow, and I wanted to start it at 9:30am. (For those who don't know I am NOT a morning person. I need a job that starts around 11am....). Well they want me to start it at 9am, so it won't go over into lunch. I know it is only 30 minutes, but this means I have to get up 30 minutes early, and considering tonight is karoke night, that is no easy task.

Then on top of that I am having problems with some training materials I am setting up for another trainer, and it is really aggrevating me.

I really want a honeybun right now...

Current Location: Desk at work
Current Mood: cranky
Current Music: forklift backing up

Still no word on the job. They told me it may be a few weeks, and there is a big Buisness Line Water meeting this week, so people are out of the office.

I have to say I am really fed up with people answering their cell phones in my Weight Watcher meetings. The meeting is only 30-45 minutes long. If you are that damn important that you can't go somewhere for 45 minutes without answering the phone then put it on vibrate and leave the room to talk. I can not believe how rude people are. Last night this woman answered her phone, and was talking in a normal volume voice while the leader was talking. Then 10 minutes later another woman did the same things. AAAHHHHH. How can people be so damn rude??? WW is my "me" time and I want to be able to focus on what the leader is saying.

Another WW rant I have is people who show up and want to know how fast they can loose the weight. ("I have a party to attend in 2 weeks, and need to loose 40 pounds.") Give me a frickin' break. It is a live style change. It took you years to grow that fat ass, and it will take months, if not years to get it off.

Sometimes I really, really hate people.

Tags: ww
Current Location: Desk at work
Current Mood: cold
Current Music: Air conditioning

Just wanted to let everyone know the interview went really, really well. They told me it may be a week or longer before I hear anything.

Through the grapevine I have heard that there was only one other candidate besides me. She currently works at a facility that uses our products. She has field experience, but I have knowledge of the products and how they are made. It will really depend on what direction they want the job to go in: marketing or technical.

Even if I don't get the job I am still pleased that all the participants liked me and my interview when so well. I met some new people, so it helps for them to know my name.

Tags: interview
Current Location: My desk at work
Current Mood: good
Current Music: Air conditioning

I have an interview tomorrow for an internal position. Technically it was be a lateral move, but does have a bit more prestige than what I do now. Right now I support production as a Process Chemist. In this job I would be an applications chemist and would work more with customers. It would also be a pay raise, which is always nice. Please wish me luck.

Tags: work
Current Location: My desk at work
Current Mood: hungry
Current Music: Air conditioning

All my training is complete, so no more trips to Delaware. I may have to go to Pennsylvania to train people at another site, but that should only be for a few days. The one good thing about being away is coming home. One of the best feeling in the world is to see Lee after being away for a week. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder.

Dragon Con was as always awesome. We had a fantastic time, and as those who know the story of how we meet it is also our anniversary. (Technically you could say the anniversary of our first date was September 6th, but we decided that it was better to say it is Labor Day.) It was even more people than last year, with attendance around 53,000. They exanded into a thrid hotel, which I think helped alot. It did not seem like as many people as last year because things were better distributed. The Hyatt is still a mess with the elevators, and I was pretty pissed that you could not take photos in the evening. Picture taking is a huge part of the con experience. I think next year I am staying in the Marriot.

I also really enjoyed meeting the gang from West Virginia, especially Jenn and Sam. I think I have for the most part meet all of Lee's friends.

One of the highlights of DC was watching the Star Trek New Voyagers episode "World Enough and Time". It has George Takie, a cameo by Grace Lee Whitney, and was written and directed by some TNG writers. It was outstanding. It was excellent and just as good as any ST episode shown on TV. If you are a Sulu fan you will LOVE it. It was very moving and had the right mix of drama and funny moments that are typicaly in TOS. Many in the audience, including me, cried a bit at the end.

Another highlight was walking in the Brit Track for a panel on "Hot Fuzz" and seeing my baby up there. The lady who runs the Brit Track recognized Lee from his audience participation and drafted him to help out. He did an awesome job, and hopefully will be on more panels next year.

I was a bit dissapointed in Gates McFadden, Jonathan Frakes, and Brent Spiner. I was so excited to see the three of them, and found them all sarcastic, and not very cooperative. They hardly answered any questions fans asked, instead choosing to answer with snappy one liners, or jokes at the expense of the questioneer. In one case the poor guy was clearly mentally challanged and Spiner was an out right dick to him. I think Frakes would have been great alone, but being with Gates and Spiner he followed their lead. I realize they are tired of the same questions, but they have to remember a lot of the people there have never seen them. If you don't want to answer the same old questions, then don't go to Cons. What I think is funny is many of the stars seem to enjoy telliing the same stories over and over.

I will admit I got tired of people asking them if they were going to be the upcoming movie. One poor idiot went so far as to call the moive a "rumor" and clearly did not know about the recent casting news. I can understand them being annoyed a bit about that.

Still over all I wish I had went to fans panels instead of seeing them. I missed some panels on ST Canon, Doctor Who, BSG and dicussions about the ST movie to go to star panels. I did hit some of the author panels, and I enjoyed those. As alwasy I ended DC by going to see Peter David. He is always entertaining and I have to say always has new stories to tell. I would like it next year if they did some panels about each ST series. I know Voyager ended years ago, but I still want to get with fans and bitch about it. I think I will also hit more Brit Trak panels.

I did not like the "Mega" panels with the Stargate guest. You can't have 10 people on a panel and expect to cover many questions. I would have loved to hear more from Corin Nemic. I have seen Chris Judge and Michael Shanks before, but I felt bad for people who have never seen them before. They did not get the full experience of them cutting up and picking on each other.

Oh I almost forgot to mention Nichelle Nicholas. She is really an incredible lady. Very gracious, and you can tell she loves the fans. She was by far the best star panel I attended, and one of the best I have ever seen overall. She is so animated.

Still overall it was awesome and I already can't wait for next year. In terms of "stuff" I did not get much, and actually came home with $160. My main quest these days is collecting old ST comics. I am especially trying to get all of TNG stuff and Voyager. I picked up about 25 comics, a couple of magazines, and a t-shirt. It is a black baby tee, and says I Godzilla Toyko. (Instead of saying Godzillia, it just has his shiloette in red.) I love it.

Tags: dragon con
Current Location: Home in Bed
Current Mood: awake
Current Music: Food Network

I am currently in Delaware on business. It is not so bad, but I do miss Lee alot. The company I work for is transitioning to a new computer system, so I am here training and testing the Quality Part.

I will be here a total of 4 weeks. I am in the middle of my second week. I do get to go home on the weekend, so it is not totally terrible. I will be here next week, go home for a few weeks, and then come back for the 4th week.

The good news is that Lee and I are going to Dragon Con for Labor Day Weekend. I can't wait. It will be our one year anniversary, and DC is always a ton of fun. I am really excited to see Gates McFadden, Johnathan Frakes, Brent Spinder, and Robert Picardo. Nichel Nicholas will also be there.

Current Location: Hampton Inn
Current Mood: sad
Current Music: CNN on TV

Lee and I were out of town last week in Monroe, NC. Lee is part of an internet TV show called The House Between. We went down last week to film the second season. It was an interesting experience, but a bit stressful. It was weird to spend 10 days with Lee, but miss him so much. Typically I would get to see him a few minutes in the mornings, at dinner, and then at night right before going to bed. It was fun driving down and back home. I got Lee an XM radio for his birthday, so we had a lot of fun listening to the various channels. One of the best parts was listening to Casey Kasem's Top 40 from 1982.

To be honest I am not exactly thrilled about the show. Lee's character, Travis, is a jerk. I really don't like seeing my baby being mean. He is such a sweetie pie in real life. I know he is just acting, but I don't like it.

Not much else is going on with me. I still have not found a house. I will be traveling soon for work, so I may have to wait until September to start looking again. I am starting to consider career possibilites. I am really unhappy at work and would like to do something other than be a chemist. I would really like to be a librarian, but there is no local school I can attend that has a Masters in Library Science. Right now I am thinking of accounting or getting my teaching certificate. I figure I have 2-3 years more in my current position before I need to decide something.

Current Location: Home in Bed
Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: Reno 911