“The Normal Life”

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I have never been one that could be called “normal.” I know, I know, normality is a very fuzzy concept, but put aside the “everyone is a unique snowFLAKE” circle-jerk for a moment and realize that there IS something called “normal,” and that a lot of people are just that. Normal. That does not make them sub-par human beings, or without talents, or a unique identity that makes them who they are. It’s just that when you add up all those talents and personality traits and actions and thoughts, it comes out to “normal.”

To claim that I am not normal like other people may seem a little egotistical, what with the current fad of “doing your own thing, just like everybody else.” This is by no means how I mean it. I’m talking about the ever-present sense of alienation from one’s peers, of doing things differently despite yourself, of trying to fit in and be like other people even though a part of you inside is screaming out and rebelling against normality as hard as it can.
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On Halo (and Other Things)

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This past weekend I was inundated with Halo. (For those not familiar, Halo is an extremely popular Xbox first-person-shooter made by Bungie, one of my all-time favorite game companies.) Let me explain what I mean. Early last week, I received an evite inviting me to a Halo LAN Party by my friend Robert. Now, I hadn’t played Halo in about 9 months, and hadn’t played it with ANY degree of regularity even then (I’ve logged less than 12 hours of Halo time, even after this HaloFest), so I dug out my xbox and copy of Halo and played an hour or two (long enough to get comfortable with the controller again), and then headed over to the party. Mickey opted to stay home, sending me first to see what it was like (since she doesn’t play video games, if EVERYONE there was a gamer then she’d be pretty bored). She sent me armed with pie, though, so that’s fine.

Suffice it to say, she probably would have had a ball. There was a nice mixture of gamer and non-gamer, and lots of good conversation was had before we sat down and started playing Halo. (They all loved the pie, too. With a Strawberry and Blackberry pie, how can you go wrong?)
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The Long Rant Goodnight

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First off, Mickey finished working on another image recently, and will likely be posting it later tonight, so do check the visual gallery sometime soon. I’ve seen the image in question already, and I think you’ll be well pleased.

Next: sorry for the lack of posting. Hopefully you’ve all noticed that Mickey at least has been posting regularly on her LiveJournal account. I simply haven’t felt up for posting lately, in the midst of getting everything set up and such. That is not to say that I don’t have a lot I want to say, merely once again making it clear that desire [to speak/write] is not always enough of a motivating factor. What finally got me motivated to post? Frustration.

We ended up going with cable modem instead of DSL, because Qwest was dicking around with us and we got fed up… we’ve been pretty satisfied with the results of that decision, which I’ll talk more about in a second. For now, please bear with me. There is one (1) cable connection in the apartment, which is downstairs by the front door. Rather than pay lots of money to get the house rewired (foolish since we don’t know how long we’ll be here, and it’s not THAT big a deal), I’ve moved the cable modem and my airport base station to that location. While this is good in some ways (I can run wire directly from the router/base station to the hub housing the console connections), it means that I’ve had to find a solution in getting my PC connected adequately upstairs in my office.
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The Long Haul

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Okay, so I’m finally getting around to posting about the trip across the country. The delay in posting about it is purely because I’m a lazy slacker who sleeps away the days in a lackadaisical fashion not dissimilar to a coma patient. That, or I’ve been busy unpacking and generally want to go to bed by the time I have a chance to sit and write a blog.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

I don’t have it in front of me right now (and don’t feel like trudging outside to the car to get it), but I kept a logbook of the starting mileage at the start of each day of the trip, plus departure time, date, and location. The starting times would probably be more useful if I also wrote down ending times, but c’est la vie (Emerson Lake and Palmer?). I’ll post it sometime later, for the truly curious (or truly bored… some days, there isn’t much difference). [Worth a passing note but not much more: I also keep a running logbook of date, mileage, gas, and location that I filled up at in my car. It’s not that hard a habit to get into, and being able to look back over the past 50,000 miles of your car is pretty damn cool.]
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Long Day’s Night

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It is currently 11:30 (or so) in the evening and I’m bushed, so I don’t think I’ll be posting my next travel installment today… hopefully tomorrow though.

Just a quick post to say that Mickey said it would be okay to link her livejournal account… so I am. Be sure to give her all sorts of grief… err, I mean, comments. Yeah, that’s it. Comments.

We bought a TV today, and did some swimming, and hung out with Eli and Megan (on their great cross-country sojourn): more on everything later. For now, sleep. Mmmmm, sleep.

Back on the Air

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Before I get into a long ramble about the recent not-so-rambling trip across the country Mickey and I took in order to get to our new home in Bellevue, I’d just like to say: No Dad, the title of this post does not mean I’ve been getting on the radio (KB1EKQ, in case any of you other hams are wondering). :)

That out of the way, on to the rest of the post.

So, when I last posted (August 1st), I was waiting for the movers to arrive, it was pouring, and we were wondering when the power would shut off. Just as I began thinking about posting another entry just that damn bored, the electric company shut off the power (as they said they would, and as we asked them to). Yet another reprieve for you poor folk that I’ve managed to cajol into reading the site.

Since there wasn’t much point in waiting for the movers to pack the electronics (since they could no longer verify that they WORKED), we packed up the stereo and the computers, and waited for a while longer. Finally, the movers arrived (not saying they were late: we just wished they’d gotten there sooner), and in a mere two hours of two guys hauling our stuff down the stairs and into a 53′ tractor trailer, we were on our way.
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Rain Rain, Go Away

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Come again some other day.

So, we woke up this morning around 8, ready for the movers to arrive. As I slipped into consciousness, I realized that it was raining, HARD. Mmm, always fun for when you are moving everything you own onto a truck.

I got up and rummaged around for a little bit not sure what to do (antsy, nervous), and then decided to go deposit the check we got for selling Mickey’s desktop ($650, and we had to fight to get that much). The rain really was something else. I was hydroplaning pretty heavily, and lord knows I wasn’t the only one. Apparently in the time it took me to head north into town, and then head back south (maybe 30 minutes, total), there managed to be a really nasty accident on the northbound lane of I-91… requiring not one but THREE ambulances. I couldn’t see the cars though, so I’m not sure what actually happened. I can only speculate that someone hydroplaned into another car, or off the road. Or both.

I got back to the apartment (can’t really call it home anymore, really), and helped with the little futzing things that we were doing to pass the time (packing the phone up now that service is disconnected, things like that), and lugged the things we’re taking with us in the car to the car.

The rain has started to let up, and now we’re just waiting for the movers to arrive. Somehow (we checked to make sure it was on last night when we plugged it into the charger) Mickey’s phone turned itself off in the night, so we’re not sure if the movers called this morning: whoops. We left them a message, so hopefully they’ll either get back to us or just show up.
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Chapter 2 is Up

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Some general updates real quick before I go eat:

I just finished the draft of chapter 2. I’d appreciate feedback (please leave your comments on this entry), to see if my reasoning is sound. Grammar and continuity issues are already covered by my fantabulous wife.

The movers are arriving tomorrow. Yes, we are happy about this. Yes, we also wish things had actually gone according to schedule. Yes, I know we could have had it a LOT worse.

I’ll be at Squam for the coming week (the 2nd through the 9th of August). If you know me and want to come, email me. If you don’t know my email, you obviously don’t know me well enough to come. Sorry.

Neil Gaiman is doing a new Sandman mini-series. It comes out in September, and I’m eagerly anticipating it.

Both Eli and Uri have been slackers about posting of late. Be sure to go give them shit in their comments section, maybe it’ll goad them into posting. It’ll also show them that I actually have readers other than them. Well, that and also their sites are worth reading, because they are good people and write about life in (sometimes) interesting ways.

That’s all. Hopefully I’ll try to post again tomorrow night (though it may be the last time for a few weeks… sorry! Such is the way of moving :( ).

UPDATE: 9:45pm, 7/31/2003:
Yeah, about an hour after I wrote and posted this blog, my brother posted a new entry. Go check it out.

Eli’s still too busy planning his upcoming roadtrip to post though.

Weird Air

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Things have been really weird lately. I don’t know if it’s the cycle of the moon (new moon was a day or two ago), or what, but things have been just not working right for the past few days.

A few things to ponder: the moving company we are working with was on the ball and professional for the entire time we were working with them… until this week. We were supposed to be moved out either today or tomorrow… and now it’s looking like it won’t be until the 1st. They failed to call us, and we ended up having to call several times in order to finally get any word at all (and it still isn’t confirmed at all).

I tried selling one of our computers over eBay. We got one (1) bid. I sent the invoice within half an hour of when the auction closed. I made it quite clear that this needed to be dealt with as soon as possible, as we were under the gun because we needed to move. We got no response for two days… I emailed again, explained that we only had a day left, he responds… the next day. I send him another email, he doesn’t respond, I finally email him and tell him that I’m out of time and have to rescind the offer. Frustrating!

We were in Everything But Anchovie’s (EBA’s) tonight, and had the slowest service we’ve ever had. The food did not come for fully an hour, which we then scarfed down and ate in 5 minutes. This is pretty damn unacceptable, and not what normally happens there.

It just feels weird right now, like we’ve been told to hurry up and wait, in unacceptable ways. There are other things that are causing this feeling, but I won’t get into that.
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70th Posting

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According to the blogging software, this is my 70th entry in the main blog. It won’t be a large posting, but still some things to note:

First off, Happy Birthday Sabrina! Enjoy the very first anniversary of your birth. I know you’re too young to read (we’ll have you blogging in no time!), but I hope you have a great day anyway.

In other news, the movers arrive in two days. I’m nervous, uneasy, and not very productive at the moment. That said, I really am hard at work on this essay, and will hopefully have more to post by the end of tonight. (FYI: these are draft copies… I haven’t checked them for grammar yet. I know there are a few mix ups.)

I’m sitting in Hanover, sipping iced chai, trying to relax and write, and finally it seems to be working. The past few days have been kind of stressing instead of relaxing… it was Parent’s Weekend, and Hanover was SWARMING with loud, obnoxious yuppies, making it very hard to concentrate on much of anything. One day later, and the place is quiet and back to normal, not TOO much worse for wear. (“But ‘Bil, why not write at home, in the comfort of the giant purple chair or something?” Because my apartment is full of boxes right now, and I can’t seem to concentrate there.)

Ah well, the weather is nice. Feels more like a late August day than a late July day, but whatever. That’s FINE by me.