Sleepin' at work. What's new?

I was in a meeting today and had no idea what people were talking about.  The topic of the meeting was supposed to be for a project I am on, but I do not understand any of it.  We brought a new person into the project this week - a new hire.  He still didn't have his laptop set up yet so I shared my screen with him at the table.  We were discussing all of the issues another coworker found during his testing on an excel file.

I had no idea what he was rambling about and ended up falling asleep.  But, the thing was that I fell asleep with my hand on the keyboard.  On the left arrow key to be specific.  By the time I woke up, the excel file was on column HV.  Content wise, the document only went up to column G.  It was a very awkward moment when I realized the new guy was just watching me sleep, scrolling through empty cells in the excel file.  If it were any other place, I am sure I would have been laughing out loud at myself.

The funny thing is there were only four of us in the room.  No one said anything.  Oh well.  I guess I will just keep sleeping at work...

-Thundalips

Summer slump

Been feeling a little out of it lately... Weekends do not come soon enough and when they do, they just seem... Unfulfilling and unsatisfying.  Being 25, I feel like I am falling behind.  I thought my life would be more stable by now with more direction, but everything seems so uncertain.  I have no idea why I am still going to school or why I am working at a job I absolutely hate.

Being in this situation makes me realize how valuable happiness really is.  Am I becoming a hippie?  Is happiness really more important than money?  I guess it depends on how much happiness and how much money... Yea... I guess I have not changed...

For the most part, I have always been able to control my emotions rather well.  I could always suppress anger.  I could always bypass shame.  Subvert optimism, tolerate annoyances, etc.  But one thing that I could never control was depression which makes feeling like this so much harder to deal with.  I know it is normal to feel lost and blah blah blah, but this feels like so much more than that.  It goes beyond the normal realm of sadness and disappointment. 

Iamalostsheep...

-Thundalips

Fun, Fun, Fun, Fun

Big ups to the birthday boy.

First things first.  The Sharks were eliminated last week in a devastating fashion.  Another year, another disappointment.  Here are some of the upsides:

• "There's always next year..." -Sharks motto
• Most of the core players are locked up beyond the next season
• No shame in losing to a superior team
• Facing adversity will help the team grow - nothing came easy this season

Downside?

• No parade
• Longer wait for start of next season
• Guch up as restricted free agent
• More ammo for critics to call them chokers

Since school has ended, things have been fun again.  But fun means bad things for my body.  I can already see the extra calories from the alcohol affecting my body.  And my brain.  I feel slower...  But at least I am enjoying myself.  Need to start exercising a bit more to balance out the heavy drinking.  I think I drank almost everyday in the past two weeks.  And I have exercised twice.  Not good.

A lot of things have happened, but it's past midnight so I will continue this later.  I have missed you blog.  See you soon.

-Thundalips

Crappy story

I usually take two dumps at work per day.  Once at 9AM and another at 4PM.  Typically 10-15 minutes each time.  So today during my 4PM run, I approached my second favorite stall since my favorite was occupied.  Technically, the one next to my favorite was occupied but only morons use stalls next to ones already occupied (if you follow).  There are six stalls and I was not about to sit next to someone else and smell their crap.  I hate it when people do not space out in bathrooms...

Anyways.  When I walked into my second favorite stall, it looked clogged.  I flushed the toilet to check and the water rose to the brim.  It almost overflowed and the clog would not clear.  So, I just went into the stall next to it.  A few minutes later, another person walks into the bathroom and tries to use the stall next to me  The one that is already clogged.  He did the same thing I did.  /Flush

All of a sudden, I see water spilling over into my stall.  I had to finish my number two with my feet in the air so my feet would not get wet.  What do you do in that situation?  If you are the flusher, do you apologize?  A bit awkward.  Even more awkward finishing with two legs in the air.  Try it sometime.  Not exactly a good feeling...

-Thundalips

Take it to the max

Epic song.  Makes me feel like I should do something dramatic.  If I were to create a soundtrack to my life (new project?!), this song would be somewhere in the mix.  This guy's actual name?  Alexander Max Band.  Seriously.  The only thing that would make his name any cooler is if Max was short for Maximus or Maximillion.  His name is second only to my ex-landlord: Vince Stryker.  Effin' great album.  If you think you recognize his voice, it's probably because you do.  He's the former lead vocalist of The Calling.  If you forgot who they were, they sang Wherever you will go.  If you liked that song, here's another one.

In BUS210, I'm learning about organizational culture.  The topics that I have gone through include organizational behavior, organizational culture, creativity, and leadership to name a few.  After learning more about how an organization works, I look at my job from an entirely different perspective now.  It makes me want to shoot myself in the face everyday.  More than before.  I just don't want to be there anymore.  This week I probably worked a total of two to three hours in four days.

Our entire group consists of about 50 members, but only about 15 or so are actual full time employees.  Everyone else, including me, is a contractor.  Company policy decided about a year ago to prohibit any parties or extra curricular for non-employees.  Yesterday, the employees had a paid day off.  They all had lunch in San Francisco and then went to the Asian Art museum while the contractors were left behind in the office to slave away.  It's definitely created a rift between employees and contractors.  Our boss doesn't like it but he's tied down by the system.  Morale is at an all time low.  All the perks that we saw before (company lunches for end of release, retirement, etc.) are exclusive to employees only.  The contractors are just as important as the employees and more than half of them have worked as contractors for over five years.  Revolt!

So this is my car situation as of now.  Last weekend I went to test drive the 2dr Golf TDI (I stalled six times in a row, embarrassing I know...)  and had to walk away from the dealership empty handed.  Their opening offer was $33,000.  RIDICULOUS! I countered with $5.  Not really but I talked it down to $26,250 out the door with 0% APR after almost an hour and a half.  They wouldn't go lower so I walked.  After learning about how expensive it would be, I called up Bui to see what kind of deal he could get me.  After calling people he offered me same price.  I decided to give up on purchasing the Golf.

After that happened, I went back to my first choice.  The Audi A4.  And even better, the 2011 is out.  The difference between the two is $8,000.  I have been going back and forth between the two cars and whether or not to finance or just to lease.  I wanted to lease the A4 but after thinking about it a lot, I might just lease a cheaper car since I won't keep it anyways.  It'll keep my monthly payments super low and I could save up for a purchase at the end of the lease.  Hopefully I could find a car I can lease for around $200 a month.  At this point, I don't really care what that car is but it would be nice if I could get an estimate on how much a lease is on the Golf is since it's in my top two picks.  I know this car will go through a lot of abuse in the next two years.  I won't have time to properly maintain it.  Probably will look up a lease price at work tomorrow.  Any suggestions?

Until next time,

Short sentences that use all letters of the alphabet (called pangrams and great for beginning typists):

1. The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog (33 characters)
2. Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs (32 characters)
3. Quick, jab my fading pink zit, evil sex whore! (35 characters)

-Alex Thunderlips

Without distraction

My online class started on Monday.  So now I am taking Bus 210 "Managing and Developing People" and RA106 "Regulatory Affairs".  The combination of the two is destroying me.  My mind is being blown by all the information thrown at me.  I have probably read more in the last month than I have in the last two years.  This is definitely one of the hardest things I have ever done.  There's so much work that I am taking Monday off from work to catch up.

To help me concentrate on school work, I have eliminated two of the most time-consuming activities: TV and Facebook.  Andy and Kevin came over today and helped me move the TV in my room to my sister's room.  I can't remember the last time my room didn't have a TV... I still remember when I had three TVs in my room.  I could watch TV, listen to sports on another, and play game on the third.  It got so bad to the point where my room looked like this...

This is how my room actually looked in high school.  And it was not intentionally set up this way.  It took weeks of abuse and neglect to get it this messy.  Those were simpler times... 

When I study, I usually have music in the background since I'm sedatephobic (fear of silence).  Since I can't concentrate when listening to music with words, I turn to Pandora for generated playlists.  My studying playlist is a combination of Yiruma, Escala, and Bond.  Almost everything they play is pretty good with that lineup.  That's where I found the song above.  Pretty nice music to listen to.  I've listened to Pandora so much that I've already hit the maximum hours allowed.  I've already played 40 hours of music this month on the site and if I want to continue using it, I'll have to pay.  Did you know there was a friggin' limit?!  I think I'll just wait until October...

Without Facebook, there isn't much left to do on the web.  I check the sports pages and the news every half hour or so, but there's nothing really left after that. 

On the plus side, now that the TV is in my sister's room, I have a new place to work out (if I ever have time).  Her room has windows and gets plenty of air so it'll be perfect. 

I'm also thinking about getting an iPad for my mom.  If she likes it, she can keep it.  But I have a feeling she would be too frustrated with learning how to use it and give up.  In that case, I'd take it.  So it's really a gift for me.  I've been debating about which iPad I want.  I definitely only plan on getting the 16GB (smallest one) but I'm not sure if I want to go with the 3G or just the Wi-Fi.  With the 3G, I have the option of using internet where ever there's a 3G hotspot but it costs a whopping $130 for that feature.  In addition to that, you also have to go through AT&T to get the data plan which is 250MB/month for $15 or 2GB/month for $25.  The good thing about the plan is that you don't have to pay for it unless you use it since it's month to month.  So I think I will buy the 3G iPad but hold off on getting the service until I need it.  It would be a great asset if I ever go on that road trip around the U.S. that I've been working on...

Until next time,

Some interesting facts I learned from my readings:

• 54% of Americans are using prescription medication; 35% use 1-3 and 19% use four or more
• Only 2 of 10 marketed drugs return revenues that match or exceed R&D costs
• Since new medicines were approved in 1995, the AIDS death rate has dropped more than 70%
• The death rate for cardiovascular disease fell 26.4% between 1999 and 2005. This includes a 29.7% decrease in stroke death rates an a 34.3% drop in death rates for coronary heart disease. Nearly half of the decline is attributable to medical treatments, including increased use of prescription medicines such as cholesterol drugs and blood thinners.
• In a study, a $1.00 increase in prescription drug spending saved $2.06 in hospital spending
• Generic medications account for 74% of prescriptions filled - up from 49% in 2000

There's a lot more interesting stats and things but I don't want to number you to death... Interesting though ain't it?

-Alex Thunderlips

Mo' Monae, Mo' bloggin'

Listen to it.  Now.  It will blow your mind.  Turns out the album I downloaded a few weeks ago wasn't the actual album released.  About half of the tracks were "fake".  Even so, I enjoyed the album very much.  After hearing the real version, I'm only more impressed.  This is a great album from a very talented artist.  Much love for Monae and her awesome afro/pompadour (she calls it "The Monae").

As you may have noticed, I haven't been blogging.  Why?  Superstition.  The Sharks were doing well and I didn't want anything to change.  They still lost.  My playoff beard is no more and holds a record of 6-5.  Next year I'll start it from the get-go.  And of course, they'll make it to the playoffs.

Last night I got take out from Americana.  I ordered a rib eye steak since they were out of the T-bone and a large pizza cheese steak with fries for lunch today.  I brought the sandwich in my usual Tupperware and put it in my usual spot in the refrigerator.  Even at 1:30 I wasn't very hungry so I decided to just eat half.  I left half of my sandwich and fries in my Tupperware and wrapped it in a plastic bag and put it back in the refrigerator. 

When I came back at 5, my Tupperware was missing from the refrigerator.  I looked around the area and found it sitting on top of the refrigerator.  It was empty.  Someone ate my sandwich.  Or threw it away.  Equally unacceptable.  That half sandwich was worth almost $6.  That's almost as much as a whole sandwich at most places!  I'm going to write a letter to building security about securing my godamn sandwiches.  Someone owes me $6 and I'm willing to take them to small claims court.  Don't think I won't do it!




My sandwich?! MY SANDWICH?! MY SANDWICH?!  I hate work people. 

Quick update on everything in my life:

Work has been work.  I thought I was going to get fired a few weeks ago since my boss had repeatedly been on me about my effort.  She ended up giving me more assignments which, of course, means I can't get fired yet.  Good news for me.  I need the money.  Today I also found out that I have been approved for the use of Microsoft Communicator and Live Meeting.  I think with these two programs I'll be able to go on AIM again. 

If you haven't heard, the bird is the word.  Also, I got into graduate school so hooray for me I guess.  Even though I got accepted, I'm not sure this is what I want to do.  But, I figure I'll get the degree regardless and see if I can grow into it.  Worst case scenario, I graduate (actually not graduating and failing out of the program would be worst case scenario) and work a few years in a manager's position making close to or above $100,000.  The degree will pay for itself in a year or two.


Classes meet twice a week and the program was intended for those who are employed full time.  This means I'll get to continue to work (if they renew my contract after December) and go to school.  But it also means most of my time will be taken up.  If they let me go after December, I'm going to take more classes and just enjoy being a student again.  Debate club/team, beginning ice hockey classes, and who knows what else.  It will be magical. If my contract does get extended, it will be less magical but mo' money. 

So, in a nutshell, that's been my life lately.  How have you been?

Until next time,

A jiffy is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second.

-Alex Thunderlips

BUILDING KICK!

Terry Crews is a character.  Someone with such a serious demeanor with childlike sense of humor.

Well, this week was another week.  What can I say.  Work has slowed down and my daily naps have been extended.  I probably slept a total of eight hours at work this week.  The best was Thursday when I had about a three hour nap.  Friday however, was a special nap.  I was working on my excel sheet and I started to nod off.  My hand was still on the mouse and I began to drift off.  Then, out of no where, I wake up and jump.  It was one of those ones where you just wake up startled from something you were probably "dreaming" about.  And as a reflex as I jumped, I whipped my mouse at my monitor.  It was the most ridiculous thing ever.  It made a loud crash and I couldn't help but giggle a little.  Surprisingly, no one looked up from their desks.

That would have been very difficult to explain to my boss if my monitor was damaged.  What could I say?  I fell asleep and threw my mouse at my monitor?  It was definitely the highlight of the week.

I don't feel like typing anymore.  Forget this!

Until next time,

Eat lightning and crap thunder!

-Alex Thunderlips

Back to blogging

That guy is ugly.

I finally finished my applications for graduate school!  That means more time for blogging, COD, and just general merriment.  But technically I'm not done completely.  I still have to actually apply.  That doesn't make sense to you yet but let me explain.  I have already sent in my application for the program that I am most interested in, but I am still waiting to apply to two other programs.  Both websites don't have open applications for the semester I am applying for and both schools are currently on spring break.  What does that mean?  I have to wait until Monday to call both admission offices to get help.  And the kicker is: I've already asked my professors to send in their letters of recommendation so the schools might get it before my applications.  I already have all my information ready to be thrown onto a form but I still need access to the site. 

In the mean time, I have loaded up on hours of COD and lounging.  After a few more days of this, I'll probably start cleaning my room again.  Something that is long overdue.

Last night I was talking to Andy about my birthday plans this year.  I have none.  Ever since graduating college my birthday's just haven't been as good as the college years (to be honest nothing has been better than those college years).  This is by no means a cry for a surprise party or anything of that nature so keep that in mind.  I really have no energy to do the things that I used to do.  We discussed possibilities to celebrate the occasion but nothing really tickled my fancy.  Maybe I really am just getting too old.

Lately work has been great.  I'm seriously starting to hone my ass-kissing skills, and they're coming along quite nicely.  I find myself in my manager's office at least once a day just chatting.  She gives me advice on life and tells me things from her personal life.  It's a pretty nice situation.  She even made me "assistant manager" a few weeks ago.  This was an unofficial title and had no benefits except having power over my other coworkers.  I had the opportunity to create the assignments for everyone and take charge of the project for a week or so.  It was a great learning experience.  What did I learn?  I'm glad you asked.  I learned that I love the power of being a manager.  I can seriously see myself as a power-hungry tool in the future.  I'm sure you can see it too.

Ah, and last but not least, my romantic life.  Or lack thereof.  My dad mentioned a few times in the past week that I should start looking for a nice Chinese girl to settle down with.  This was very unsettling.  You know that you've been single too long when your parents start telling you these things.  The only thing that could have made it worse is if he tried to set me up with someone.  It would be nice to settle down soon though. 

Recently my dad has been exhibiting symptoms of Alzheimer's.  The other day he showed me an old $100 he had (the one with the small heads like the $1).  He complained that the casino had cheated him out of $100 and gave him fake money.  Apparently he forgot that that's how they used to look.  I spent the next few minutes explaining to him that these were the old printed hundred dollar bills and that they had changed the design to curb counterfeiting.  He honestly forgot, which was scary.  He just had no recollection of a hundred dollar note ever looking like that.  A lot of little things like that are starting to add up and it's very obvious now that there may not be a lot of time left before he becomes completely senile.  It would be nice to bring a girl home to make him happy (and myself too). 

Until next time,

-Alex Thunderlips

Home-body

I really should be finishing up my personal statements but seeing as I haven't updated in a while, I'll just leave a quick blurb.

I've been working the last couple of Sundays which has completely changed my weekend outings.  This past weekend specifically, was immensely uneventful.  Other than the Sharks game, I did absolutely nothing.  I can't remember the last time I didn't go out for at least one day out of the weekend.  And by out, I mean out drinking.

Looking back at it, it's surprisingly refreshing to have some of that pressure gone.  Every weekend I have high hopes of something fun happening and I'm rarely disappointed.  But now that I've had time to digest the nothingness that was the weekend, I realized how much calmer my life had been.  I'm not sure if that makes sense, but I think I may begin looking for more non-nightlife things to do around The City.  I'm not exactly sure what else there is to do since I hate a lot of things like watching movies in theaters.  If anyone knows of any social gatherings that frequently occur please let me know.  If I had my scooter, I could attend local scoot-abouts.  I'm not sure that's what they're called but that's definitely a cool name for it. 

I'd really like to meet more people...and actually possibly remember them.  Alcohol is deteriorating my mind.  I feel like I'm getting stupider with every drink.  Will I(t) ever stop?  I don't know.  Turn off the lights and I'll glow.  To the extreme I rock a mic like a vandal.  Light up a stage and wax a chump like a candle.  Dance.  Hellz yeah, bitch.  See what I mean?  I'm also finding more money in my pockets.  I didn't even need to go to the ATM for the past two weeks.

To all you fellow bloggers, your comments for your posts will be arriving shortly.  I'll get to it :]

Until next time,

Cheers.

-Alex Thunderlips

"She was da bomb?"

Yesterday I accomplished something I thought was near impossible.  I was able to run all the way to 47th avenue and back.  A total of 50 blocks or 3.5 miles.  It was amazing because I've been running the same route and I never made it past 41st avenue (on the way back).  The amazing thing was that I wasn't as fatigued as I thought.  I probably could have ran a little further but I was already home.  Even more surprisingly, I am not sore.  My self esteem is at an all time high and I have started working out again.  But enough about that.

Two days ago I posted about something at work that was absolutely hilarious.  And I'm about to show you.  To give you a refresher on the background of these photos, building security provided a binder of emergency procedures and such.  Inside, I found this.

Take a closer look. 

What the eff?!  "Did you place the bomb?"  I couldn't stop laughing when I saw this page.  My coworkers had no idea why I was laughing.  This form was so strange I had to take a picture to capture the memories.

Yesterday I was talking to my mom and she said something that I knew was a lie.  I called her out on it and said she was a big fat liar.  She looked at me and said, "DO YOU SEE MY PANTS ON FIRE?!"  If there was a show called "Moms Say the Darndest Things", she would totally be on it. 

Until next time,

EXPLOSION!

-Alex Thunderlips

Losing my marbles.

Today was my official first day working in San Leandro.  While I am about to bitch and moan about the East Bay life, I must first admit for some reason the place feels very home-y.  For no reason at all, it was just comfortable to be there.

My schedule hasn't been set in stone per se but I have a general idea of when I need to get things done.  The commute wasn't as bad as I thought but still took about an hour and fifteen minutes from door to door.  Hopefully it won't ever take longer than that.  I was surprised at how little people were on the 31AX at 7:20.  The last time I took the 31AX it was shoulder to shoulder, wall to wall full of passengers.  Today there were only six people standing in the entire bus. 

When I got to work, I did the usual routine of booting up my PC and checking my email in Outlook.  Then I tried to log into meebo and yahoo mail.  Denied.  The new website security the building has is ridiculously strict.  Most of the yahoo main articles are blocked due to content deemed inappropriate for the workplace.  That includes external email, instant messaging, forums, social networking, and many other filters.  This means no yahoo mail, no meebo, no slickdeals, no blogpsot, no Facebook (which I've never used at work), no nothing!  I began to complain to my coworkers that all the good stuff on the internet is being blocked and everyone had their own complaints.  My cubicle is about half the size of my old one but it's still big enough that I don't feel claustrophobic.

It took me less than an hour and a half to unpack while most people still haven't unpacked half of their belongings.  Breakfast was provided by vendors and there were donuts, muffins, and coffee.  I almost drank the bottle of half and half since they put it in a carafe without a label.  I wanted milk.  I had no assignments and nothing to do so I began to read the binder of information provided by the building.  I went through all the security protocols and such (which I will be talking more about tomorrow).  I eventually got to the most useful page in the binder.  Local restaurants!  The page listed close to 30 places to get food within five miles.  About half was fast food like KFC, Wendy's, Mcdonald's, etc. but the other half was local places.  I had nothing to do so I yelped all of the restaurants (not the fast food ones).  There actually is a lot of places I would like to try on that list.  I have until December. 

Then I found out lunch was provided as well.  Unfortunately the food was bland and was not worth getting seconds.  It was catered Chinese food from some restaurant.  Nothing tasted good and it would have been a better idea to order Panda Express over that place next time.  I couldn't even TASTE the pandas in this food.  Not finger-ling-ling good at all. 

Eventually I volunteered to do some work so I spent two and a half hours creating a spreadsheet of all available ATMs.  I figured since I was the only one doing actual work today, my manager might not be too upset if I take off early.  I finished my spreadsheet at 4:30 and asked for the rest of the day off since I couldn't complete any assignment before leaving at five.  I also told her that I took a shorter lunch so I should be able to leave anyways since I already put in my eight hours.  She was fine with it and I began packing my things.

The only reason I wanted to leave early was to catch the tail end of the Sharks game.  The game started at four which means it would end around 6:30.  If I catch the Bart and bus fast enough I could easily catch the end of it.  When I get to the platform of the Bart station, the train was just arriving.  "Great timing!  I'm off to a good start," I thought.

When I get off the Bart it takes me a few seconds to realize where the bus stop was and in a very uncharacteristic move, the bus skips my stop.  It was not even close to being a full bus.  So I decide to try a new route.  I knew the 21 ran somewhere along Fulton at some point and I didn't see a bus for the next three blocks or so.  I decided to give it a shot.  Never again!  The 21 moves so effin' slow it was ridiculous.  I could've just taken the 38L which was right behind it. 

When I get to 8th Ave or so, I realize I had left my house keys at work.  There's no way I'm going all the way back to get them.  I have no way of getting into my house now and in a panic I start calling people before thinking it through.  I called Andy and Anjuli hoping someone would pick up so I'd have somewhere to go.  After I called, I remembered my aunt has a set of my house keys.  I tend to panic and act irrationally when things go awry.  When I called her she was still on the Bart at Embarcadero.  So I decide to kill time by going to the ATM and Gordo's.  Time well spent I must say.

By the time I got into my house, the game was over and I was only able to catch the post-game live report.  Looks like I missed out on a bunch of stuff because I left work in a rush.  Fail. 

I need a longboard.  Fast.  I don't like to walk. 

-Alex Thunderlips

90210

Definitely my favorite track of the album.  I'm a bit of a sucker when it comes to music with tragic lyrics.  If it tells a story then it's only about a bajillion times better.  I guess it's comforting just hearing that someone out there could be doing worse than me.  It's a great reminder to really cherish what I have. 

Work has been crap as of late.  I got stuck on support which means I have to carry around a cell phone from work 24/7.  Rain or shine, night or day, I have to answer any calls from any of the service people covering 7,000+ machines in production.  So when they have a problem, they call me and I have to determine the cause of the problem and attempt to fix it.  Sounds scary eh?  I got a call today on my way to lunch and had to turn back to take care of the problem.  After half an hour of walking through the problem, I was able to figure out what the person did and fixed it.  As I was walking out for lunch again, I got another call.  My first attempt to eat was at 12:15.  I didn't eat until 2:30. By the way, did you like how the first paragraph talks about being grateful for my life and then I quickly transition to how work sucks?  I'm a flip-flopper.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is ruining my life.  Someone take it away.

Until next time,

-Alex Thunderlips

New year, new problems.

Both good albums.  Nothing great.  Something that surprised me from both albums was how different the sounds were.  Each album was very eclectic in their own way, mixing styles of their classic rhythm and blues with a bit of rock, jazz, contemporary, and others. 

During a meeting at work today, my team took about 15 minutes at the end of the meeting reflect on the year as its coming to an end.  Many had complaints saying it was a terrible year and that they can't wait for it to be over.  Maybe they don't realize the only thing that changes is the calendar.  If your life sucks, it's going to suck until you make it better yourself.  It's hard to imagine that the simple act changing the calendar year will change the future or your "luck".  Blame your life on your own decisions and faults.  I sure do.  Some things are out of your control though.  In those cases, you just have to find the good in the bad and move on.  Easier said than done. Something I'm having trouble with now.

I'm in a bitter mood.  And who do I blame?  Myself of course.  Who else is responsible for my emotions?  No one.  Got confronted for not doing much at work today, got yelled at for listening to my music too loud at home, and might be getting sick.  On the upside, I actually proved to my boss I was working and had gotten a lot done. 

Based on the current itinerary, I am not looking forward to the Vegas trip with my family this Friday.  Supposed to be a four day trip.  Leaving on Christmas morning and should be back Monday morning.  But we're driving, so there goes 20+ hours depending on traffic.  We really have two full days and that's about it.  My family is going to watch the Lion King at  Mandalay Bay, but I chose not to go since I've already seen it so I'll probably be at some table gambling.   Shouldn't complain too much though.  I know my mom really enjoys the time we spend together as a family so I'm going to try and make the best out of it.  It's the least I can do for her.  Doing the Asian thing and going to Aria to look around at the new place and then try out their buffet.  We'll see how it goes...

Until next time,

Reminder to the world (including myself): In the words of Hiep, "Quitcha bitchin'"

-Alex Thunderlips

Broken raptop = less online time.

Super caked on, super shopped, or maybe both but still beautiful. Because I have time, this will be a long read.  Make sure you have relieved your bladder and bowels before reading on.  Grab your favorite drink and snack and enjoy.

So, as of yesterday, my laptop caught the 700m pandemic going around.  The back light is loose or blew out leaving the monitor another desolate screen that once displayed beautiful vibrant images of the young lady pictured above.  I've been reading up on forums and this is quite common amongst 700m owners.  This happened to my brother almost exactly a week ago and somehow my laptop caught the disease.  Since the screws on the bottom panel have been frayed and stripped to being almost unscrewable (<


This weekend I decided to be a hermit and stay in.  Not much is going on anyways.  That I know of.  Plenty of activities that I can do indoors anyways.

This week, I received many packages from various online purchases made on the week of Black Friday and Cyber Monday.  Got my two portable hard drives from Dell a few days ago, my Tekken 6 Fightstick bundles, and my copy of Fearless: Platinum edition.  I spent much of the morning backing up all my files from my laptop and then putting all my music on the new hard drive.  Still en route are my other two external hard drives that I plan on returning, four books from Borders, and my clothes from Urban Outfitters.  Since receiving the fight sticks, I've been catching up on my SF2HD.  Purchase of the game via Xbox Live was made possible by my sister and her 10 friends, Andy, Doug, and Calvin.  Thanks!  Next game purchase will be Ikaruga, which I'm 400 points away from buying.  After playing twice online, I have come to the conclusion that Xbox Live players are much more competitive and unforgiving than their Playstation network counterpart.  

To test out the game after I first downloaded it, I played one game online and destroyed my competition.  This was at 7:45 AM right before I started doing my business to get ready for work.  I shut off the system and went to work.  I came back to a message by the person I played saying "Run scrub run".  I replied "It was 7:45 AM in San Francisco.  I was testing the game before I left for work.  Some of us are actually employed."  No response back.  Then a few days ago I had some time and decided to give it another go online.  I played one on one with some random guy and lost 8-10 (ish) before quitting since dinner was ready.  Minutes later, I received a voice message from him saying "You know why I played you like an ass hole?  Because you were using Zangief.  Playing one on one.  How cheap can you get.  Fuck you suck at this game."  First off, SF2HD is a one on one game.  How else can you play it?  One vs. two?  Ridiculous.  Secondly, if the developers put certain moves in the game, they want you to use it.  It's the same reasoning they add cheats in video games.  Games go through rigorous testing to balance characters and certain characters naturally have different functions otherwise every character would be the same.  I was practicing my Zangief's crouching jab+jab to 360 with LP (Andy you know what I'm talking about).  Basically the combo at 1:48. 



Needless to say, I caught him enough times (almost twice a round) to make him angry.  Probably got two or three perfects too.  So far, that's two for two.  Two ass holes in two sessions of SF2HD.  If I hadn't flashed my Xbox, I would have definitely reported this guy.  I do not want to cause trouble for myself.  Oh, the limitations resulting from illegal mods...

At work yesterday, our group held it's annual end-of-the-year party.  I spent the first two hours of work zoning out and napping while waiting for the company lunch.  The admin came around at 11 and asked me to go with her to pick up the food (our lunch was catered).  I said yes hoping to get to know her better since she was the youngest person in our group.  She's probably around 28.  The next youngest person is probably in their early 40s.  It's an old bunch.  After we picked up around ten trays of food, I called the team from the car to come help bring the food in.  I asked one of my coworkers to bring four or five other people to help unload the food.  After handing out all the trays to them, I realized there was nothing left for me to carry.  One of my coworkers, H a r s h i t (yes, his name is H a r s h i t and I realize it's one letter away from being Hardshit and I'm spacing out the name to avoid google searches), joked around saying that I called all of them to do all the lifting.  During the lunch, our boss, Jimmy, made gave a speech and thanked the admin for organizing the event and ordering the food and then thanked me for "being the muscle."  Harshit immediately pointed at me and smiled knowing that I didn't carry any of the trays.  I interrupted Jimmy and told him that other people helped.  Harshit busted me out saying, "Yea, Alex called all of us to carry all the food!"  Jimmy then congratulated me on my upper management skills in pawning off all the work on other people.  I guess I am management material after all.  This became a running joke throughout the party which I thought was pretty hilarious. 

Okay.  Here comes the inevitable rant of the entry.  After the lunch, the group has a traditional white elephant gift exchange.  The rules are, the gift must be a minimum of $25 and cannot be a recycled gift from the years before.  THAT'S IT!  The rules of the game in this case, was a gift can be stolen up to three times before being locked up.  The gift I bought was a large dream dictionary and Snuggie, which I personally think is a decent gift.  I drew number 20 of 50 (there were 33 people).  First pick by first person, 7" digital photo frame.  Obviously from the boss, Jimmy, and guaranteed to be stolen.  Here's why.  All the other gifts were lame beyond compare.  But before I get to the horrible list of gifts, let me first share with you the sequence of events involving myself since this is my blog.  Now this is where the game takes a horrible turn.  There was nothing I wanted to steal (you'll see why) when it was my turn, so I chose a gift from the pile.  I picked one that was relatively large with a nice heft to it.  Inside was an inflatable twin mattress (with pump).  This was definitely one of the better gifts, but I thought no one would want to steal it.  I was wrong.  A few turns later H  a r s h i t stole it from me and I decided to pick another from the pile.  At this point, after watching several picks, I came to the conclusion that anything that was horribly wrapped came from a male gifter and was almost certainly something tech-y.  I picked the third to the ugliest one because of the shape of the box.  Inside was a very good gift compared to the rest.  A clock radio with side speakers and a dock for Ipods. 

 

Something like that but not as nice of a model.  Definitely will get stolen.  A few turns pass and Serena, another coworker, steals my gift.  This was fairly upsetting because we were getting down to the wire on unopened gifts and I did not see anything worth stealing.  I took another gamble and picked another poorly wrapped gift.  This is what I got stuck with:

What...the...fuck...  Seriously?  A fucking DTV converter box?  A gift that was probably free from a government rebate?  At this point the entire room started laughing because they knew I picked gift that was almost certainly unwanted by everyone in the group.  This group of people have no fucking respect for the people who actually play the game with decency.  Now, for the list of the worst gifts:

• A T-shirt.  Obviously NOT worth $25
• A small twist-chopper thing and a bowl
• A pen set
• USED billiard balls.  Obviously repackaged poorly with loads of tape.  The cue ball had scuff marks on it.  Who would give this as a gift at white elephant?  What percent of people actually own a personal table and can use this?!
• Cheap wine that was clearly for the budget-conscious
• A teddy bear with candy.  There's always seems to be one jackass who does this (no offense to Dillon or David whoever brought that stuffed animal last time)
• A fucking step ladder.  A STEP LADDER!!! WHAT KIND OF PEOPLE DO THAT!? The best part about this gift was the wrapping.  Black garbage back.  With a step ladder in it.  Of course it was the last gift picked
• A tea kettle.  A fucking tea kettle.  And not just any tea kettle.  A tea kettle that clearly was a few years old.  The box was faded and scuffed up horribly and looked like someone bought it at Ross.  Don't get me wrong.  I love Ross.  But this clearly was the worst gift and there is no way it could have been worth more than $10.  The person who picked this had it stolen from Jimmy.  Every year, Jimmy bails out the person with the crappiest gift when it's his turn to pick.  That way the person with the crapiest gift (at the time) gets another choice.  Jimmy was sixth to draw meaning that the people who picked the crappier gifts could not be bailed out.  Like me.
  
• And of course the DTV converter box

Why?  Why do people do these things?  No respect for the game or their coworkers.  Some people at least have the decency to play the game with honor.  Highlights of "good" gifts:

• 7" digital photo frame
• 8GB flash drive (two people gifted them.  One Sandisk and one generic brand which any tech-y can tell you is not $25 but at least people want these)
• Safeway giftcard
• Clock with Ipod/dock
• Set of four great looking tumblers
• An emergency road-side kit.  Probably one of the most useful gifts.  Included jumper cables, gloves, flares, other tools, an orange cone, and other miscellaneous items.  

Jesus fucking Christ.  At least if I'm there next year I know I can get away with bringing crap gifts like a DTV converter box.  My god...  Work people are ridiculous.   If I had written this yesterday, you can bet that I would have used more profanities but I have cooled down a bit since then.  Worst white elephant in the history of white elephants.  While the gifts obviously sucked, it was pretty funny to see people making fun of everyone else for their poor gifts.  Overall, it was a fun experience even though I walked away with one of the worst gifts of all time.  People were even joking that the reason why someone gifted it was because they lost their rebate form and such.  I was a little sad that everyone didn't really like the gift that I brought either.  My manager actually picked my gift and tried desperately to give it away.  My gift ended up being stolen once and traded at the end of the game so at least a few people liked it.  There was actually another gifter who bought a Snuggie and combined it with a pair of Slipper Genies

To clean your floors while you walk around the house.  At the end of the game, I told Serena that my friend just got a pool table recently and that if she didn't want the billiard balls that she picked then I would be happy to take them.  She said that she didn't want to just give it away and didn't want to trade me for my DTV converter which is completely understandable.  But then another coworker said, "Just give it to Alex.  You have no reason to keep it."  She replied, "Oh, it's ok.  I'll just throw it around or something."  Bitch.  Huge bitch.  Let me tell you some of the things she's done.  My coworker Gary set up a slide show presentation of his trip to Europe with his girlfriend.  One of the pictures showed them in front of a very expensive store.  I forget if it was Gucci, Prada, or something like that but when that picture came up Serena blurted out "Oh that store is expensive.  You guys probably didn't buy anything from there cause you can't afford it huh?"  Everything she says is me, me, me.  "Oh look at what I've done.  I'm better than you at everything.  Everything I do is great and everything you do is wrong.  I'm right.  And everything that's yours is cheap stuff."  Clearly not true.  Before I moved my mattress back from San Jose, I was telling her that I had some back problems because of my mattress.  Her immediate response was "Oh you probably have a cheap mattress.  I have a very expensive mattress and it's very good."  Bitch I've been using the same mattress since I grew out of a crib.  What a fucking bitch.  And another time she was walking around holding a CD and asked me "Can I use your T-shirt to wipe off the gunk on the CD?" Uhh... No.  "Why are you being so stingy? Just let me wipe it with your shirt."  Ok.  One.  My mama bought me this shirt and it was one of my favorite shirts and I'm not letting some bitch use it to wipe shit off a CD.  Two.  Just because it's a T-shirt doesn't mean it's cheap.  It was an expensive T-shirt.  Three.  You have a fucking shirt.  Use yours.  "But my shirt is expensive and it's not made of cotton."  Shut up.  I dress the way I dress because it's comfortable and I don't have to try and impress you fuckbags at work who mean less than nothing to me.  Want to fire me for the way I dress? Fine with me.  What a fucking bitch.  Learn some manners.  How are you married? -End rant.

This week I moved my Xbox up to my room which finally allowed me to plug my USB somewhere and catch up on my shows.  I am up to date with HIMYM, BBT, Community, 30 Rock, and finally got a chance to watch the episode of SNL where Taylor Swift was hosting.  Next up is Modern Family, FlashForward,  White Collar.  I have all of Heroes for this season but will probably delete them before I watch it.  I quit Heroes.  Community is one of the funniest new shows on television.  It will definitely be renewed for at least another season and hopefully longer.  On the other end of the spectrum, Monk aired it's final episode of the series last night.  I'm about six or seven episodes behind and have not yet downloaded any episodes.  From what I've been hearing, the ending is going to be awesome.  I will definitely miss this show.  Upcoming shows to look forward to include 24 and Chuck.

Sharks played the Calgary Flames at the Tank tonight but couldn't come out with a win.  The Flames' goalie was phenomenal and made save after save.  McLaren had another fight but took a beating.  I like the way this kid plays.  Sticks up for his team mates and does not take crap from anyone.  I think in the last three games, he was in a fight in each game.  But rather than bore you with statistics that you don't care about, I would like to share an interesting tidbit I heard while watching the last game.  There is a contest of sorts to come up with the best nickname for the first line of the Sharks.  Currently, San Jose's top line is Patrick Marleau, or Patty, Joe Thornton, or Jumbo, and Danny Heatley, or Heater.  The first name that the announcer's said was "Team Canada".  A nickname they said was too generic and overused.  Second nickname was "The Great White" (because they're Sharks duh).   This was kind of interesting.  But the third was definitely the best.  Someone suggested their line be called "The Burger" line.  A Jumbo, Heated Patty.  Genius.  Next game will be at home against the L.A. Kings.  A game that I have tickets to.  Should be a great game considering they are not only division rivals, but it's also a battle of California. 

Big thanks to Gary who gave me his remaining Magic cards.  Haven't had the chance to go through everything but it's a good amount of cards.  From what I have gone through, I didn't see anything of value to my main deck.  Still very nice of him to give me his cards.  Wiltron get ready. 

That's all for now.

Until next time,

Beware of the Red Cyclone.

-Alex Thunderlips

I'm a bitter man.

 

What a fucking slow start to the "holiday" weekend.  Got in trouble at work for losing some cards (which I found out 20 minutes ago that I had taken home on accident) and left work early frustrated and upset.  Boss set a deadline for my project and I might not be able to finish my work.  Going back into work Friday morning on my regular schedule to try and complete my task.  Got a free lunch at Buca.  I still don't see why people like that place.  I wouldn't eat there again if it was free.  Maggiano's is still my go-to place for Italian.  Came home to watch the Sharks game which I thought was going to be a really exciting game.  Lost 7-2 and let Chicago score three consecutive short handed goals and another four straight until Danny Boyle answered back with a goal with about five minutes left in the third.  What a fucking joke.  And it was a home game.  The first loss in regulation of the season.  Hopefully something will change my mood because today was not a good day at all.

Until next time,

Fucking Chicago...

-Alex Thunderlips

Can't hold a candle to me cause all the moths get in the way.

Not much to blog about lately.  The weekends go by as fast as a speeding bullet but the weekdays are as slow as molasses.  I guess time really does fly when you're having fun.  It's been eight hours of staring at a computer screen pretending to work for the past week or so.  Tomorrow should be the same except for about an hour of meetings.  Can't believe they're paying me for this. 

So the progress on the scooter is going slower than expected.  The person I expected to learn from has suddenly fell out of my life.  Sort of... If I don't get a chance to learn from someone, the chances of me getting a scooter will drop dramatically.  I won't even know how to ride it off the lot without some help.   I need to brush up on how to ride.

I feel like I'm losing my science skillz too.  I'm going to throw all of my lectures into my ipod and listen to them at work for the next few days.  Hopefully the sound of my professors voice won't put me to sleep at work.  For a full year (two semesters), I probably fell asleep twice in this class even though it was at 7:30AM every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  The teacher was so intimidating that I didn't want to get yelled at.  This teacher was the best teacher I've ever had.  His method of teaching was through intimidation.  It made me feel so inadequate just listening to him lecture.  He's a professor at SJSU, Santa Clara University, licensed veterinarian, owns his own construction consulting company, and has so many side projects it's ridiculous.  This guy was the shit.  I studied harder than I ever have in my entire life for this class just because I didn't want to look incompetent.  A letter of recommendation from this guy would probably be the best one I could get.  One of his top students is now the head microbiologist for Revlon.  This guy is who I want to be.

-Alex Thunderlips

City of retards.

^^ This is how I feel.  Confused...

 ^^ This is how I want to feel.  Happy and relaxed.



^^ Kellie Pickler will be opening for Taylor Swift in April. 

Right off the bat, I knew it was going to be a bad day.  I woke up 15 minutes early but somehow ended up leaving the house 15 min late.  Got to work 20 minutes late and did my usual half an hour coast.  When I decided to start working I realized all of my test cards and test checks were missing from my ATM work space.  I started looking around and one of my coworkers asked me if I had left my stuff out.  Of course, being an honest guy, I said yes.  She told me security had their nightly walk-through of the test lab and found cash laying out in the open.  Apparently, I had left $55 in $1 bills out in the open.  She told me security was pissed and had filed a report.  I went to the security to retrieve my belongings and got an earful.  I was in such a rush to leave the night before that I forgot to clean up after myself.  Normally I don't leave my cash out, but I always leave my test cards out.  After getting in trouble like that, I always get really flustered.  I couldn't concentrate all morning.  Luckily I had a meeting which went long.  So I had 90 minutes to forget about it.  Fell asleep in the meeting again though.  Today we were talking about some genius in Texas who was cheating the machines using ridiculously smart techniques.  We're working hard and fast to try and come up with a fix to prevent people from doing this.  I'm so close to getting fired. 

Lately I've been feeling an urge to leave the City.  All of these new regulations and laws are getting ridiculous.  The City already gives tenants more power than landlords, they've banned smoking in most places (this one doesn't bother me so much), Styrofoam has been banned, plastic bags have been banned, they have all these gay rights things(which I'm indifferent about), and worst of all, they're giving animals rights.  City government has now put a ban on all declawings of cats.  The reason given is that it is animal cruelty and torture.  THEY'RE FUCKING ANIMALS!  Humans domesticated cats a long time ago.  What does this mean?  They are, for the most part, dependent on us.  Animal rights is the biggest oxymoron invented.  Animal's don't have rights.  They're for our benefit whether it be for food, labor, or entertainment.  We are on top of the food chain.  They have no rights.  We keep giving animals more and more rights.  At what point do we start to value human life?  I don't want to pay more for my steak because some ass hole wants farmers to start regulating their animals better.  It's not cost efficient and that will trickle down to the consumer resulting in an increase in price.  Whatever they've been doing, it's been working.  If it ain't broke don't fix it. 

AND ANOTHER THING! What's with this compost bullshit? If people want to compost, go ahead.  More power to you.  But don't force people to do it and don't fine them for choosing not to do it.  Now my family is forced to use another garbage can for compost.  And we have to buy special compostable bags.  This city is being torn apart by retarded politicians with their stupid agendas.  What a nightmare.  This city is becoming more and more difficult to live in.  I'm not sure about everyone else, but I'm finding it hard to see the purpose of living here if garbage and animals have more priority than me.  The worst part may be that other cities may follow suit.  What ever happened to human rights?

Help control the animal population.  Shoot an animal in the face.

-Alex Thunderlips

Beep beep ribby ribby.

^^Looks so much like an Asian Tara Reid.  Absolutely love her style.

Today was...interesting... Spent the first hour at work doing nothing.  Just sat in my area and spaced out.  Then there was a meeting where the team counted bags of cash.  In the lab we keep 9 bags of cash for testing, each containing $1,064 of assorted notes.  We made some stupid jokes and suggestions and I said someone should bring out a deck of cards and we should spend the day playing poker.  There were some other shenanigans but I'll continue.  We had a team lunch at Sultan Indian Buffet.  I respectfully declined since I had already scheduled a lunch with My.  But, that lunch was rescheduled so I spent much of the morning dodging questions about why I wasn't going to the lunch.  Lies on top of lies on top of lies.  It gets hard to keep track of lies sometimes.

After the lunch I met up with the team to go to the Academy of Sciences.  Boy was that a disapointment.  If you haven't gone, the only thing worth seeing is the planetarium.  The people working there are rude too.  During the planetarium show, one of the employees leads off the show with some banter.  During that time, a little girl behind me started crying.  Probably was no more than 1 year old.  Another employee walked all the way up the stairs to confront the crying baby's parents and word for word said the following: "How old is your child?  Didn't I tell you outside you couldn't watch the show with your child?  You can't have kids crying in here.  Didn't I tell you that outside?  Why did you come in?"  What made me feel worse was when I realized the family behind me barely understood a word of English.  They were forced to leave.  When we first got in we were told that if we wanted to leave early we could sit in the top two rows and leave so we don't disturb the others watching the show.  My group only wanted to leave early to catch the last bug show.  When we got up during the show to leave we were told to sit back down.  We were berated with questions why we wanted to leave and told, not asked, to sit back down.  Ridiculous.  The museum was small.  Definitely would not pay to get back in there.  Not much to see.  Not much to do.

Been watching some hilarious stand up lately.  Don't remember this guy's name but he was a Mexican comedian and his bit was mostly about how he was Mexican but could not speak Spanish.  He was saying that in high school he was embarrassed to be cheating off the Asian kid in Spanish class.  Then he told a joke about how he's constantly asked to translate stuff to English.  He said one time he was in a club and a girl asked him what the song was about.  He answered "That guy is complaining about the price of gasolina."  Hilarious.  Stand up is my renewed drug.

Sharks tomorrow!  Put the biscuit in the basket!

-Alex Thunderlips

Dragula's simple song.

Very interesting day.  Obama is in town and the building where I work was closed off (5th st.).  No one could come in and no one could go out.  Had to wait about 15 min before I could leave the building.  My aunt who normally drives me home couldn't get her car out of the garage because they were blocking traffic so I took the bus home.

During work, about half of my coworkers went out to the lobby or the 5th floor to try and see if they could spot Obama.  One of my coworkers, Gary, came back and said he saw him but could have been joking.  Manny came in a few minutes after and mentioned something about Obama and Gary shouted out "Did you see him?! OBAMA!".  Manny made the most ridiculous sad face and said "...nobama...".  Definitely the funniest thing I heard today.  I wish I could have seen him.  Would've been something cool to say I've done... 

Spent some time yesterday finding a way to get my hands on a radio so I could listen to the Sharks game today.  Asked around and Chadwick had a radio he was willing to let me borrow.  My mom also had one but it was not digital.  It's embarrassing enough to be using a walkman, but using one with a dial makes me look way behind the times.  Unfortunately, Chadman dropped it off at Andy's and I couldn't pick it up until this morning.  Woke up Andy at 8:20 to pick it up.  Turns out that it was pointless since the lab didn't have reception.  Couldn't pick up a damn thing.  Then I spent the first 30-45 minutes at work trying to find a work around to listen to the game.  Lucky for me, there is a way and it goes as follows: Log off default lab account on lab computer, log back into the computer using personal account, remote desktop to personal workstation PC, stream live radio off the site.  I guess I'll be doing this until our office moves.  The game was so exciting and had so much energy.  Listened to the first two periods and the third in the lobby while waiting for the cops to let us out of the building.  By the way, Sharks lost.

Talking to Anjuli makes me want to watch 24 again.  Do I have the time?  Not this week... Maybe after Monday.

-Alex Thunderlips