BeMused

So, day three and no poison ivy…I guess this is a good thing, but now Gail’s going to be more determined than ever to get me out in the garden to pull poison ivy, along with whatever other weeds she wants pulled “As long as you’re already doing it…”

She’s also convinced that I could make a ton of money on weekends, going to various neighbors and pulling ivy. What a weirdo she is.

Other than that, not much going on. This coming Memorial Day weekend is Rolling Thunder, the big ride from the Pentagon, around the National Mall, and ending up at the Vietnam Memorial. My HOG chapter sponsers a ride down to the Pentagon called The Ride of the Patriots. I usually volunteer to work this ride, which means come Sunday morning, I’m up at 3:45 a.m. to be down at the dealership before 5 to start staging bikes. Lots of fun, and usually we have a group of between two and three thousand bikes lining up.

Oh, and my buddy Martin tagged me with a book meme, but as I recently just completed one, I think I’ll point to that one instead. I think it’d be cool to do the same with movies (I’ve seen one for music recently), so maybe I’ll start a movie one.

Then again, maybe not.

My wife loves to garden. While she doesn’t get to play in her garden as often as she likes, when she does manage to find some time she spends hours pulling weeds, planting flowers and other associated plants and generally soaks up the sunshine. About two years ago, while pulling weeds, she tackled some poison ivy and as a result, broke out in a serious rash, complete with blisters. The itching drove her nuts for two straight weeks, if not longer, and nothing seemed to help.

As a result, I am the designated poison ivy picker (or PIP for short ;). She just wasn’t going to be put through that sort of hell again. So now I get to pick it all. Last year, she found a vine that was climbing up into one of the oak trees, and had me come take it down. I pulled and the entire thing dropped down onto me. I didn’t break out in any sort of rash or blisters or itchny-ness however, which made me wonder if I was, in fact, immune to poison ivy. My wife sure thinks so, and now she has no qualms about asking me to pull the poison ivy (if she ever had any to begin with).

Which brings me to Sunday. She was out in her garden and I wandered out to see her. She told me there was some poison ivy that needed pulling, so I grabbed my gloves (better safe than sorry) and she directed me to it. Now, I’ve always wondered about whether I really am immune to poison ivy, so I did the obvious: I grabbed one of the leaves and rubbed it briskly on my arm.

Gail just about went into spastic shivers when she saw that, decrying me for an insane idiot.

So we shall see. I’ve heard it takes about three days for the reaction to occur, and we’re on day two with no results.

Stay tuned!

Today marks the end of my second week here in the new position, and I’m more convinced than ever that I made the right choice. The group of people I work with are all just really cool people, and I actually went to my boss three different times yesterday looking for work. I never used to do that with my old job. I think know I’m gonna love it over here.

One of the side benefits of working here is if I have some downtime (waiting on artwork, or some clarifications and such that seems to happen kind of frequently), I get to work on my personal website(s). I have a new design already in place for this one (I just have to get the comments and everything in place. Hope everyone likes brown!), and new pages for my Harley site completed. And it’s all related to what I do in my current job, so it seems to qualify as practicing my web skills.

My boss even came by my desk yesterday, and saw me working on the Harley site. He said something along the lines of “Whoa…that’s really nice man!” Doesn’t hurt that he rides a Harley as well, so we have something in common.

Yup. I’m gonna like it over here…

Wusabi peanuts are a good thing. Very tasty, with just the right amount of spice.

Unless, of course, you inadvertantly inhale some of that powder up your nose into your sinuses. Then it feels like someone shoved a can of mace up your nose and pulled the trigger.

But that’s not the warning I’m here to give. The warning is this: Wash your hands before rubbing your eyes. It’ll make the wusabi powder up the nose feel like a tickle with a feather compared to wusabi powder in your eye.

So remember kiddies: Wusabi Powder does not go in your eyes!

That is all.

So, naturally, I got a bug up my ass and have started re-designing the site again. I have a layout I want, and the CSS and graphics for that are ready to roll (well, assuming they work on IE and we all know never to make THAT assumption!). So currently I’m futzing around in the control panel of pMachine to figure out what needs to go where and how it’ll look and all.

So…stay tuned!

Sunday nights at our house have become “family night”, and we try to sit down together and socialize over dinner and games. We usually order pizza and then play a board game or something, and each week it’s someone else’s turn to pick the game. It’s a nice way to spend the evening.

We then try to finish up by 7p.m. as America’s Funniest Video’s is on. Both kids love this show, and Gail and I usually get some good laughs as well. At 8, we usually send Sarah to bed, and then Gail, Cody and I stay up and we watch Extreme Home Makeover (or Extreme Makeover, Home Edition, whatever it’s called). I’ve really gotten into watching this show, which is odd, ’cause I’m not a big fan of “reality” TV. This at least shows how people can care for others, rather than trying to stab people in the back for a monetary prize.

One of the side perks of this show: Gail (and I) are always complaining that the house needs work, needs this and that, needs painting, new flooring, etc. Well, after watching that show, we look around and think “We’re not doing too bad. It could be a hell of a lot worse.”

I guess it makes us appreciate what we have…