Today marks the day that I've moved from a basic cell phone to a smartphone. At 8,090 minutes with 222MB of data usage and 3,923 calls made on my trusty Sanyo M1, it is now retired and will probably go on eBay for whatever I can get it for.

This whole thing was actually an impulse buy with me one block away from the Sprint store thinking to myself, WTF am I doing? After a slight hesitation I said fuck it and continued as plan. I was tempted by the HTC Hero phone with its Google ties, but with the requirement of a new plan just to use that phone it made it all that much easier to go with a BlackBerry. About an hour or so later I left the store less $270 for the BlackBerry 9630 Tour. It's really a huge step up from my old phone that I can see myself immersed in getting the hang of this phone over the course of the next few weeks.

This was a pretty big change in technology for me, but the other one was the upgrade to Verizon FIOS a couple of weeks back. I was left with little choice when it came to having free TV because ever since the switch to the digital signal I haven't been able to get channels 7 and 11 so I've resulted to watching channel 4 or 5 for my morning wake up "news". Shit just felt broken to me and my choices were to either get some sort of cable provider, deal with what I had or go through the hassle of testing out antennas until I found one that would work for me. Didn't like the idea of the last two choices so I went for a provider. With my hate for Cablevision in mind the choice was easy to go with Verizon, who I also don't like much, but I guess it was the lesser of two evils. FIOS gave me more than enough of the channels I'd ever need and the way I look at it my parents get to enjoy themselves just a little more with the addition of the Chinese channels. The upgrade from copper to fiber optics for the phone didn't really have any noticeable improvements other than free caller ID and a bunch of other shit I don't think many cared for. The upgrade from DSL to fiber optics was an increase in speeds I never thought would be possible at this price as it rivals what one would expect from something you get on campus. Well maybe not as fast as what's available these days on campus, but definitely enough to stream videos while simultaneously uploading in large quantities.

Friday night could have been better as I met up with a bunch of folks to watch the shitty Mets play. Like the last time I was here, the food was a huge disappointment where it was fucking lukewarm at best. One of the main reasons I went was to check out Steve's coworker, but the only contact we made was when I was attempting to get back into my seat and she apologized. Apologized for being witness to her shooting sunflower shells out of her mouth... sexy! Bad food and the Mets winning combined with not much contact with the coworker should have added up to a bad night, but hey at least there was some sort of contact even though minor.

This was the second week of mountain biking and I have to admit that while I fell in love with it after the first week this second week only reinforced how much enjoyment it has brought me to actually ride on off-road terrain. This was one of those things I knew I'd enjoy just from the looks of it, even before I got my bike.

Despite the wet ground from earlier rain on Saturday I met up with Matt and Larry to ride and boy was it a dirty ride. Should have had my rear fender installed because my backpack was soiled with dirt at the end of the day. Really beginning to get bored of riding on the Belt Parkway as it's pretty fucking mindless, as there's really nothing but flat road throughout. Nice view of the ocean gets dull about the second time you ride this thing and the girls around there are scarce. Then again when you're riding, the last thing you want is a head on collision with bikers coming in the opposite direction because you were staring at some girl. At the end of the path I took them both uphill a couple of avenues before turning back. Nice to see them enjoying the bike ride and hopefully they'll get more adventurous sooner than they'll get bored of the Belt.

Seems like there's always some shit going on on the highways as you get into Queens and start heading to Cunningham. Both times traffic piled up both sides while the accidents were on the left side. Why was my side piled up you ask? Because of fucking rubberneckers! I can think of no better time than to own a tank where I'd just crush onlookers if they move too slow or don't move at all. And for what, to see something that's none of your business on the other side? There was actually two accidents about two miles apart where the second one almost fucked me up. I was cruising along when the fucker in front of me braked pretty hard just to look over the divider to see what happened in the accident. Seriously, WTF?!

Since the first time around I've swapped the spring in the fork for the softer one, one that is more suited for my weight and damn did it feel nice going over shit. I have a feeling the fork was in the locked position the whole time for my first ride because this time around the bike was easier to control. This time I made sure the fork was unlocked before riding off into the trails and was able to go through without having any hard falls. There was one fall where my right hand went to hold the bike up but as the weight pushed my hand down a fucking thorn impregnated my index finger. That immediately caused a reflex reaction and my hand jerked away releasing the bike. Nothing I could do until I get home with a pair of tweezers to pluck this fucker out. After riding the off-road trails a few times we rode on the paved bike trails and boy was that a killer and fun at the same time. You have the uphill climbs that begin to chop away at your legs, but you know that once you get to the top it's downhill time so that keeps you motivated. The downhills were really fun as I may have hit my all time high speed on a bike at 25mph! Had to keep focused at that point as the penalty for failure was going to be... pain like that of which I may not have felt yet! After riding back to our starting point the group called it quits and we parted ways.

The day for biking wasn't quite over for me yet as I learned how to bunny hop when I got home! After reassembling the bike and dusting as much of the dirt off as possible I decided to ride a few circles in my front yard. I don't know what got over me but the next thing I know I started to try and get the back wheel off the ground again. Shortly after that the front wheel and then both! I haven't tried it over any obstacles, but with some practice I should be able to get back onto curbs and over small things in no time!

Oh yeah FIOS was installed on Saturday during the day time and while it is indeed awesome I'm not sure if it's worth it yet. I have yet to utilize the fast blazing speeds and it looks like my parents are overwhelmed with all the TV channels especially when all we wanted were the basic channels. I'll have to make a decision before the 15 day trial period is up before locking into a two year contract. While it looks like I may keep it, the price tag is definitely on my mind as it is going to make a monthly dent.

This past Saturday was spent with friendly strangers and I'm glad I took the initiative to head out to dirty ass Queens. Now that I look back at that day I didn't really think much at all other than this was going to be a good time to finally go off-road with other people that had the same interest as I did.

Sucked that it was a late night the night before, but that didn't stop or slow me down to ride through the mountain biking trails of Cunningham. Put in a good four hours or riding and despite the falls and scrapes it was fun as hell! The biggest crash I had was going down this short downhill section where the front wheel slipped and I fell down hard. Not sure if it was either the front wheel slipping on leaves or me instinctively slamming on the front brakes to slow down. Fucked up my left elbow in the crash along with my pride, but I got past it quick to continue riding. This was probably the hardest crash I ever took as I am STILL feeling the effects where my left arm isn't as freely movable as it was before the crash.

So many things learned and still need to be learned that I definitely see myself coming back for more. Looking ahead and planning your line is something I need to work on, as well as keeping the pedals level when riding through sketchy shit. My beautiful red pedals took quite a beating and it shows just after one lap around with all the rocks.

Gotta check the bike over the next time I ride because this time around I may have been riding with the front fork locked! I don't remember any plush cushioning riding over bumps and never bothered to check the lockout the whole day. I might not have even realized it at all if I didn't give my bike a quick wipe down when I got home!

Speaking of the front fork, this piece of shit is gonna squeeze money out of me! Spent $15 to get a softer spring to replace the medium spring the fork comes with and after swapping springs last night I may have stumbled upon another problem. The softer spring is supposed to be for my weight class, which means the spring should essentially compress a certain amount from my weight alone. Pretty sure the swapping of the springs was done correctly as I mimicked what was done on the old spring, however when I sat on the bike the fork only moved about 10mm. It's supposed to hit between the range of 15-25mm! The "another problem" might be related to this and because the fork didn't move at all initially until I moved around on the bike. Posting on the forums have brought up the term stiction, which basically means it's not moving smoothly as it should due to some sort of friction and static. Need to verify this and hopefully I can fix without having to bring it into the shop or replacing the fork itself. We'll see tonight.

Fucking computers... never ceases to fail at the "right" time! Got home a few minutes early last night and it looked like I'd finally get to watch one of the three mountain biking movies people had raved about. As I was taking a break before my second to last set of pushups I headed over to the computer and that's when the monitor flickered followed by a loud pop. Silence fell just outside my room and I knew immediately something had gone wrong with the Linux machine serving as my router/firewall. Smoke was coming out of the power supply and the fan stopped moving so I quickly turned off the power on the machine and fanned the area to dissipate as much of the smell of burned circuit boards. Well rather than going through the trouble of figuring out and fixing this machine I decided it was time to go the way of a dedicated router. Dedicated in the sense that it no longer requires a PC to function and luckily with the wireless router handed to me from Chao I had something to use right then and there. Was using it mainly as an access point to get online for Tetris and the NSD, but those days are far and few and I had been thinking of running this router as a router rather than an access point. Too bad I was forced to do this rather than doing it alongside a working network, because when that Linux machine went down so did my connection to the Internet.

It took a while to set this router up, mainly because I did not know that the DSL modem had to be set as a bridge rather than PPPoE. It took a phone call to Verizon to educate me on this and it was from some girl with an accent. I have to admit that I was not only surprised by this, but also turned on, as she was quite knowledgeable and nice to communicate with. With her help I had the DSL modem configured properly, leaving the Linksys router as the final step. Final step was easy and I had everything running in a few minutes and that's when I should have went to bed...

I believe it was already midnight or not too long after that I decided to go ahead with an upgrade for the router that would ultimately put a version of Linux onto this router. Took some time to figure out how to proceed with the upgrade, but in the end I had it upgraded. Unfortunately I didn't read all the notes carefully and ended up using an older version of the upgrade, which I hope is the reason why I couldn't get that shit working before finally calling it a night at 2am!

Tonight is a possible round two and if it is, hopefully it'll be a quick one with me victorious! Got plans and while this is a high priority I need my rest for tomorrow...

Recently purchased a pair of the green Superfeet insoles from Paragon Sports for a lower price than they advertised for! I love their price matching option, as they're willing to do so if you can find it anywhere else for a lower price... including online! Anyway I only used them for basketball, which interestingly enough hasn't been too often as of late. I figured these would be a cost effective replacement for custom molded orthotics, which would run $400+ without insurance. Based on my own deduction the bones in the feet need a certain degree of raise to form the proper arch and because this degree looks to be fixed these insoles would do the same job as customs. Rather than reuse the green ones in my normal day wear I decided to get the thinner blue ones to do the job, but they've been difficult to find at a good price. Basically anything below retail is a good price! That is until I shopped on eBay for a pair and won a pair of the blue ones. Keep in mind that I e-mailed the fuck selling them to ask if they were new and their response was a quick yes. The shipping time it took to arrive was really fast, which was a nice surprise. What was even nicer was that when I opened up the box to check out the insoles I found out they were used! One of the insoles has a big brown stain while the logo on both insoles looked to be faded. The pamphlet that came with my green ones were missing from these blue ones so that was the last and final sign I used to ask the seller for a replacement or a refund. So far a day has gone by with no reply after their first reply asking me what they could do about this situation.

In the meantime I've been contemplating buying a second pair of these blue ones from a local store, exchanging the used ones as these purchased ones for a new set resulting in two new ones and I almost went through with it today... something however stepped in and right as I headed out of my work building I stepped right back in to not go through with it. I'm going to wait until tomorrow morning when I get into work for this eBay fuck to respond before I throw a negative feedback on his ass and file a claim.

I've been diagnosed with chondromalacia patella on my left knee, which is also described as runner's knee. Not sure if this is the same as jumper's knee, but after playing ball on Monday for a short while outdoors my knee was paining me like a motherfucker! Walking was no longer natural and kneeling down only exacerbated the pain. Not even sure how to describe this pain, but it's similar to this tingling pain where you just want to keep pressing it to get rid of the tingling. Unfortunately the harder you press the more the pain intensifies!

I've been reduced to wearing that knee strap these past few days and have to say that it actually brought on immediate results! Suffice it to say this is only a temporary fix...

From my research it looks like biking and snowboarding can also bring on this, as the foot of most people tend to be angled in such a way that the big toe is higher than the smaller toe. Due to this slight angle, the knees are stressed when pedaling on a bike or strapping into a snowboard because these activities involve flattening the foot. That's when the knees shift to make up for the change in angle of the foot. Supposedly this affects a lot of people, but unfortunate for me I think mine might be a more serious case.

Created a good lengthy playlist that best represents the songs I love from the one and only Michael Jackson... Each song has some sentimental value to me, from something I loved listening to as a kid to something I wanted to perform to at my own wedding, as well as something that represents a piece of me. I miss ya Michael!

I wanted to make the list "random" in the sense that they don't play in the same order by album or alphabetically while doing it easily so it's sorted by the average bitrate and so far it feels like a smooth listing of songs. There's a few more songs I'd like to include still...

She's Out Of My Life
Gone Too Soon
Childhood
Ben (Single)
In the Closet
I Just Can't Stop Loving You
You Are Not Alone
History
Man In The Mirror
The Lady In My Life
P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)
Black or White
Dangerous
It's The Falling In Love
Give in to Me
Thriller
Billie Jean
Rock With You
Dirty Diana
Off The Wall
Got To Be There (Single)
They Don't Care About Us
I Wanna Be Where You Are
People Make The World Go 'Round
Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough
Remember the Time
Scream
Smooth Criminal
Why You Wanna Trip on Me
You Rock My World (with intro)
Get On The Floor
Heal the World
I'll Be There (Jackson 5)
Beat It
Leave Me Alone
Human Nature
Jam
The Way You Make Me Feel
Bad

I'm closing in on my first hundred miles on the bike, which I'm hoping to surpass this coming weekend. I still have not hit any XC trails, with paved roads being my only means of "training" for some XC trails that I plan to check out this summer.

Here are some of the things I've experienced so far that were unpleasant. The ball of my right foot has been in pain since last weekend, which I'm unsure if it's due to wearing sneakers or if it's because I overexerted myself. Doing fifteen miles on top of playing ball on concrete... the former I've done, but the concrete hoops has been a while. Slowly recovering and should be ready to ride by the weekend.

Don't lose focus while riding because it can be dangerous! I was riding to Jamie's place to meet up with Pat when that fucker Pat called and thinking I had the skills to pay the bills I went to reach my phone. As the front wheel started to shake instinct kicked in and I slammed on the front brakes causing me to endo, but because I was unprepared for it I slipped banging myself every which way though I didn't fall.

Endo #2 was again caused by the fucking phone, well partly. On the way to Dyker Park I went on the local road that connects with the path on the Belt Parkway and there's these steps that I didn't see until it was almost too late. As I approached these steps I thought it was just going to be a downhill slope so I didn't bother to slow down. Right when I realized it was steps I braked hard in the front and bam, endo #2. This also caused my chain to pop off the chainring, which I learned that all I had to do was keep pedaling and it would "jump" back on. Learned later that it would have been better to have lifted the chain off the bottom bracket shell before doing this to avoid cutting it up. My first damage to the bike, though I'm told that it's nothing to really worry about. Ended up getting it touched up at Jamie's the next day just for sanity's sake.

Still need practice on getting the bike to hop, as well as dropping off curbs. The latter which I can do, but not as quick as I'd like. The bunny hopping needs a lot of work! I can pop the front of the bike up, but the rear is something I'm a little weary of.

The rear shifting is almost becoming second nature, but the front shifting I have yet to even try yet. I've only recently learned that front shifting requires me to hold down on the shifter when upshifting so that the chainring has enough time to catch the chain off the derailleur. For the longest time I'd just click and expect the chain to catch, almost always ending up with the chain remaining on the lower gear while the shifter was pointing to the next.

So much to learn and try out, but not enough time to do it. I haven't been touching the skateboard since the bike came into my possession, but it's not totally lost on me yet. Once the backyard is completed I'll get back into some ollies and balancing.

What turned out to be a $600 bike has quickly become a $1000+ bike!  Since the purchase of my bike, The Baroness, the running total so far is $507.06 in accessories.  $1107.06 is the grand total!  Holy shit that's fucking crazy!  Well at least I've covered all I'll need to ensure a good riding session, as well as repair the bike on the go during the day and night...

List of bike accessories - updated 8/21/2009


7/15/09 Update:
+24.84 for low discharge NiMH batteries from Thomas Distributing

7/29/09 Update:
+18.95 for ITS Bikefit shoe wedges from Bikefit

8/15/09 Update:
+32.87 for red Wellgo BMX MG-1 pedals from eBay

8/17/09 Update:
+46.98 for Bolle Vigilante Multi-Lens Sunglasses

8/21/09 Update:
+10 for Finish Line Ceramic Grease from Roy's Sheepshead Cycle Shop
running total now is at $665.23

Truly a sad sad day...

6/20/2009 - Edited to reflect the "improv" additions I made during the speech when I blanked out. Nervousness is a bitch!


Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen - I’ve been feeling quite nervous about giving this speech for some time. But I’m pleased to say last night I slept like a baby – I woke up every two hours, crying my eyes out.

We have now reached that pivotal moment in the speech where I am meant – in good taste of course – to put the groom down. However, when the subject of my speech and my obligation to discuss Larry cropped up earlier today, Mee Kyee made me promise that I restrict myself to speaking only of the good things about her husband. Because a ten-second speech would seem ridiculous, I’ve decided to alter course completely and tell you about how we all came to be sitting here today.

Larry and Mee Kyee met three years ago in a very, very romantic location – the Off The Wagon bar on Macdougal and Minetta, but as we all know this place was renowned for being the hangout for loud drunk dudes and dudettes in red stilettos, so it was pure coincidence that they met on that fateful night.

Larry had nearly given up hope of ever finding a girl when he caught a glimpse of Mee Kyee across a crowded mess. She smiled and he shouted hello but the music swallowed his voice before it could reach her. He proceeded by un-tucking his khakis from his orange colored socks and casually strolled over to her as she slid through the crowd to meet him.

He knew he had mere seconds with which to dazzle her, so the legendary silver tongue – legendary in the sense that it only exists in Larry’s imagination – took over: ‘Are you lost, love?’ When the unimpressed Mee Kyee said she certainly was not, our smooth-talking love hero then relied on his many hours of viewing Lord of the Dance videos on Youtube and replied, ‘If you won’t listen to my words, then listen to my dancing feet.’

Unbelievably, Mee Kyee agreed to go out with him. I don’t know where Larry took her on their first date, but he hinted it was an expensive restaurant that he wanted to keep a secret so that the place remains special only to them. All I know is that he wooed Mee Kyee that night with the immortal line, ‘If you were on the menu here, you’d be a McGorgeous in my Happy Meal!’

Their romance seemed to blossom at an alarming rate and it was clear to everyone that they were extremely well suited. Mee Kyee brought to the relationship beauty, integrity, honesty, reliability and intelligence - while Larry brought, er … [pretend to check notes], ah, Larry brought his Nintendo DS and a wrinkled old copy of Maxim.

True love finally caught up with Larry – when Mee Kyee paid for his eight hundred and eighty-eighth dinner – that's when he decided it was time to pop the question. Following the tradition, before they announced their engagement, Larry went to ask Mee Kyee's brothers for her hand in marriage. They said that it was fine by them, provided that Larry wrestle a pig, do 100 push-ups, sew them a pair of pants... and get rid of those crusty sneakers!

Larry and Mee Kyee share the same core values, and I am sure that as husband and wife their relationship will continue to live long and prosper. When apart, their loving co-dependence means that they pine for each other and long to be reunited, particularly when Larry needs a shirt ironed or Mee Kyee wants to use the computer.

[pick up glass to toast]

In all seriousness, I've known Larry for quite some time and could think of no one better to start a family with. You are a true friend who never ceases to amaze me with your kindness and generosity. You have listened to me through many of my crises and to some extent have kept my path true with your level headed thinking. You're a swell guy and a role model of a friend.

Mee Kyee, you're awesome! Not only have you kept Larry in line in such a way that he's turned out to be a better man, a better dressed man at that, but you are a strong and independent woman as well who has no problems letting Larry come out and play with the fellas. You have been there in times of need and I have valued your advice and friendship. Plus with your deadly Bruce Lee like kicks, just ask Chao, he's tasted them... wait, is he here tonight? we all know Larry is well protected.

“My good friends, make it so.”

To the bride and groom!

Too bad I cut off all the lift tickets on my jacket that I had accrued over this past season while at Killington, but I estimate at least ten total trips. Feels like there may have been more, but there's no record... just remember a bunch on my jacket as I used a knife to cut them off.

California

Year started off with a trip to Mammoth, California, something I hesitated because I'd be flying solo. Turns out it wasn't bad at all because I returned for round two this past weekend! The conditions were nice, but it would have been epic if it were not for the poor visibility mixed with the frozen rain. It was difficult to see the terrain even with a lighter lens, but the terrain was rather smooth so no big surprises. On Saturday we headed up this one trail where visibility was so bad that you had no clue where you were going until you fell on your ass. There was this one point where we were all going down as a group trying to stick close to each other, but I started to drift away. I pointed my shit in what I thought was the direction of the group, but the more I tried to go in that direction the more I drifted away. Couldn't figure out what the hell was going on and it was a little scary. Basically the brain was confused for a second in trying to figure out why it was that I kept moving further and further away from the group even though I thought I was going in the right direction. It's not until you sit down that you reclaim some sort of balance and even then the sitting down is a crash because you're actually trying to sit while moving! Despite these conditions I wish we could do it all over again. Lodging and ride was taken care of by James' friend Tinnie, who whipped up some mean pasta on our last night there. We were also accompanied by Manuel, Derek, and Brandon, all who were affiliated with the Arts Center in some way or another. While I was lost with most of the conversations dealing with that shit it was still rather entertaining to hear. Everyone was pretty cool, definitely more so than the bunch I hung out with for the Stowe, Vermont trip. The other nice thing about this trip was that it coincided with the Bulls/Celtics basketball games for the NBA Playoffs, something I wouldn't have been able to have witnessed if I were home. The games were quite pleasing, except for the last game... fuck Rondo and Boston!

I really have no idea why I didn't pack my new jacket, gloves, or pants! After all I was going to use them sooner or later... They probably wouldn't have held up anyway against the deep powder conditions on Saturday because apparently powder gets really wet the more you ride through it. I was fuckin' drenched head to toe on Saturday that my light gray clothing turned dark gray evenly. Still had a dope time riding regardless! Both days were actually pretty forgiving in trying to land jumps, jumps that woulda been painful on the East coast. Still have some fear to get over, mainly the fear I get once I've taken air. I tend to bend my knees so much that I end up sitting on my ass instead of making a successful landing. All in all good wet fun and good company whilst snowboarding... what else can one ask for.

This last trip wasn't just about snowboarding, but also to relax and hang. Got to try out a few things I've never done before like jacuzzi, all you can eat Korean BBQ, and some alcohol that I'd probably never touch again. Food seems to always be a good experience each time I've been to California... Now that I'm back I'm already missing shit, fuck! Given the price I paid for flights I probably would have done it all again as soon as this weekend if things were to happen.


Vermont

Now that I think about it it's kind of funny that I've been to Vermont twice this season, as was the case with California. First time was with a group of strangers that I had met through some meetup group online. It was a different experience and for the most part people there were okay, but they all sort of knew each other except me and this one dude so it was kind of hard to interact. That and the other dude, who was my driver as well, was kind of lame. Dude had characteristics of the Unmentioned one and got annoying real quick. We were all there for three days of riding due to some special Stowe had. It was a coupon in Transworld Snowboarding to ride for three days for only $99. After two days of riding I wanted to ride a third, but my ride was done so we left after that second day of riding. This was all determined that day, which kind of put a damper on things so I had no remorse for the dude when he had me lead. I took him down some blacks and all I saw was a cloud of powder as his ass was tumbling all over the place. Overall I can't say this experience was a bad one. Given that there were some annoyances it turned out okay after all so maybe I'll do it again.

My second Vermont trip was with Mandi and that turned out to be an okay trip as well. It gave me the opportunity to use my new board and bindings and boy was that exciting! The drive was longer than what I had gotten used to with Hunter and Bellearye, but I was able to do it without any problems. Realized Coke works pretty well in keeping me awake on the long drive, so much so that I had trouble sleeping that night. Fucking wired for a good hour when I laid in bed and had difficulty staying asleep throughout the night. The first day of riding was actually pretty icy, more so than what you usually get with Hunter and Bellearye. The second day was pow heaven as it snowed that morning and throughout the day. It got close to white out conditions, but nothing like what I had experienced this past visit to Mammoth. The visibility here was okay, but it could have been better if I had a lighter lens, something I didn't get until recently. Riding powder was so much fun especially on the easier green trails, and I thought Mandi liked them until she wanted to skip them and do the blue trails. Because my board was new the wax coating was still in good shape so I had no trouble gliding on moderately flat terrain. Because her board was deprived of any wax since she probably first got her shit she might as well have rode on a broom. That was why she wanted to skip the fun powder and ride trails with a steeper decline so that she could get momentum from the decline. Wasn't too happy about the shift in trails, but I was glad to be riding so I followed her to the blue trails. Well to get from where we were to the other side of the mountain that had blue trails and was closer to the car we had to take this one lift all the way to the top and then ride across this really long flat path to bring us to the other side. This long flat path I believe was marked green and was the only way to get there and boy was that flat path fun. My shit had no problems flying over that terrain while Mandi struggled for a good ten to fifteen minutes getting over that shit. Hilarity definitely ensued while waiting for her broken ass. Lesson to be learned here... take care of your fuckin' board and it will take care of you!

It kinda felt weird being just me and Mandi and I wished there were more people with us, but it was a good trip nonetheless. Maybe it'll be an annual thing... definitely would like to visit California annually.

As I was on my way to shoot some hoops today I decided to take a different exit off the Belt Parkway because these road construction trucks were taking their sweet ass time in a one lane exit. The detour put me on 2nd Ave in Brooklyn so I drove down to 49th Street before making a right to catch 9th Ave. From like 3rd Ave to 7th Ave it was an uphill drive at what looked to be a thirty or so degree slope and all I was thinking was how dope it would be to fucking shred that shit on a snowy day. Too bad if NYC ever got shitted on with snow I'd be stuck in Coney Island that by the time I got out there the snow would be shoveled. I wonder if Matt C would let me sleep over just so I could ride that shit the next morning!

While driving to basketball I switched up some joints on the iPod and rocked out to The Rocky Story and Eye Of The Tiger had my fingers twitching for whatever that guitar game we played on the Xbox 360 up at Mammoth. Fuckin' James!

Well there goes that idea. I wanted to spray paint on the Jedi Mind Tricks logo onto my black snowboarding helmet, but after painstakingly cutting out the design with an X-acto knife I realize that such a large design would not come out perfect with the materials I used. I had printed out the design and placed it over a layer of artist's tape with the tape over a sheet of transparency. The tape should have peeled right off of the transparency, but for some reason it because a tug match when I went to remove it. All the tugging caused the tape to curl and that basically turned out to be a fucking mess that when placed over the curvature of the helmet would just look wrong. Still want to get some sort of design on this shit and my next idea hit me watching some documentary on the Wu-Tang Clan. Much simpler design yet just as powerful a message as my previous design, but the only problem is dealing with the damn curvature of the helmet.

Wow, I pay a heavy fuckin' price each time...

lift tix.... 50
food........ 40
tolls....... 25
gas......... 30
===============
total.......140

notebook........$6.67

Snowboarding at Hunter on Sunday was probably one of the craziest days I've ever had. The team consisted of Larry, Eleanor and Mandi with a departure time from Queens at about 7am. I was planning on arriving around 9, 930am, but that did not happen.

We stopped at the rest stop right after getting out of NJ for some Dunkin' Donuts and Burger King for breakfast and it had me wishing I had the White Castle breakfast instead. It probably would not have made any difference in stopping what happened to us trying to get onto the I-87 after exiting NJ. Because snow most likely had started falling when we left Queens the road conditions were not suitable for 80mph or even 60mph, which slowed down our travel time a great deal. I'm not sure the exact speed I was at when merging onto the I-87, but that combined with the sharp turn required the car spun out of control. I know at one point the car was perpendicular to the road and with some steering I straightened it out to be parallel. When traction was lost I began breaking and knew at that moment the only thing I could do was to hopefully steer the car to catch some traction and to stop the car. Unfortunately the road was wide enough for only one car, but fortunately for us and the car I was able to steer the car to the right side where the grass was and not the left where the divider was. While it was good the right side had lots of snow to cushion the car to stop, it made it a bitch to get out. I was willing to do the grunt work, but instead I remained behind the wheel while the team pushed and dug out snow. We tried reversing first, but that didn't work so we tried going forward. That worked out quite well after some extra digging and pushing. Looking at this know I'm surprised I remained calm through all of this despite being the one behind the wheel. Knowing that I was with this team probably helped in remaining calm through the whole thing. Gotta say I was lucky to have this team aboard, because less than half an hour later we were able to get the car back on the road and on our way. The only damage we took was a small broken piece off of the license plate holder in the front of the car and some wet socks.

While we arrived at Hunter slightly before 12pm we were able to get in a few good hours on the slopes. Such a beautiful sight when it's snowing and even more so with goggles on going through it all. The conditions on the mountains were almost perfect with soft powdery goodness.

Wish we had some pics of the car on the road after skidding, as well as pics/videos of us on the slopes... It was such a good day that I would have liked to have stayed one more day.

Today it was revealed by Mr. Chao Xuan.

My assumption that Chao was going to intro me to some girl today was right! Can't say that I'm really into meeting girls in situations like this, but I figured I might as well give it a shot so I showed up. Because I showed up about ten minutes past 6:30pm, the time I was told to show up, I wonder what would have been discussed during those ten minutes. When I got there it was just him and I barely got a chance to say "whatsup bitch" before he excused himself to show the "others" where we were.

The "others" comprised of three girls, two sisters of which were twins and a third, which Chao knew out of the bunch. Chao offered to buy everyone drinks, which the three girls all ordered the same shit, Midori Sour. Maybe it's just me, but I felt it to be fucked up how the girls ordered alcoholic drinks that they claimed to be good and didn't bother to finish. Why order an alcoholic drink, repeatedly say I'm not much of a drinker and then not bother to finish something you ordered? Fuckin' order a coke or juice then. Seems like the twins shared similar characteristics besides their looks. While their professions were in different areas, they both were freelancers. The single one was in fashion, while the other was in design. Love reading, yet couldn't name a recent book they read. Spends their free time watching movies with "Twilight" being their latest. Neither seemed to possess any athleticism beyond badminton.

We then had sushi for dinner followed by shooting some pool in Brooklyn. Nothing out of the ordinary during dinner except finding out they love seafood, love spicy shit and the single twin went to Baruch while the other went to SUNY at Oneonta. Discovered they weren't from the States, which attributed to their broken English and while I was willing to overlook that I gave up at the point when they couldn't spell or even pronounce Oneonta... the school they graduated from! Never found billiards to be fun, despite playing with people of my skill level of SUCK so I don't know why I thought it would be any different here. I was on everyone's team throughout the night and we shot pool for about an hour or so before we all called it a night.

While I'm grateful for Chao's kindness, I don't see myself doing this again. As the night went on the only question that kept coming up was why bother? It hurts a lot less to just not care anymore... no more disappointments.

(15:31:13) Chao: yo
(15:31:14) Chao: slut
(15:45:47) dimm0k: sup fag
(15:47:53) Chao: yo
(15:47:57) Chao: are you free on tuesday night?
(15:48:14) Chao: you want to hangout
(15:48:17) dimm0k: should be i think
(15:48:26) Chao: ok...
(15:48:29) dimm0k: hangout?
(15:48:32) Chao: yeah
(15:48:37) Chao: maybe dinna
(15:48:39) Chao: i have no work
(15:48:46) Chao: if you have work, i'll pick u up
(15:48:53) Chao: how's that?
(15:49:02) dimm0k: whoa, you picking me up?!
(15:49:06) Chao: from work
(15:49:16) Chao: ok..i gotta go now..make sure you are free then
(15:49:18) dimm0k: sounds good...
(15:49:24) dimm0k: so it's a date
(15:49:31) Chao: is hangout
(15:49:34) Chao: ok?
(15:49:35) dimm0k: lolz
(15:49:37) Chao: ttyl
(15:49:37) dimm0k: ok
(15:49:41) Chao has signed off.
(15:49:43) dimm0k: l8az


Chao: yo
Auto response from IllestVerbalist: I am away from my computer right now.

IllestVerbalist: sut
IllestVerbalist: slut
IllestVerbalist: sup
Chao: yo
Chao: tomorrow.
Chao: you still on right?
IllestVerbalist: yes miss
Chao: ok..we are going to be hanging around west 4 the usually area
Chao: i won't pick u up..you might have to come down there
IllestVerbalist: wtf
Chao: sorry..is for your own good
Chao: i got everything plan out
IllestVerbalist: hahah wtf?
Chao: hahah
Chao: just think about it
Chao: i meant don't think about it
Chao: just come and chill with me tomorrow
IllestVerbalist: lolz
Chao: we are going to have dinna?
IllestVerbalist: wasnt that what you asked for?
Chao: errr..i don't remember
IllestVerbalist: haha wtf
Chao: just come out tomorrow ok?
Chao: like we'll go to a bar first
Chao: then we'll go to dinna
IllestVerbalist: lolz sure




Here's a funny from Steven!

Steven: one time i paid 50 bucks for one small piece of duck
Steven: i am still steaming
IllestVerbalist: wtf? why the hell did you pay that
Steven: I was dating marsha
Steven: she asked me to go out with her friends
Steven: I was ambushed with that shit
Steven: fucking french garbage
IllestVerbalist: hahahaha
IllestVerbalist: did you have to make reservations?
Steven: no
Steven: i was asked to go to dinner
Steven: i had one piece of duck as an entree
Steven: next thing i know, it was 50 dollars a person
Steven: WTF
Steven: people can be so pretentious
IllestVerbalist: hahaha
IllestVerbalist: didnt they have prices next to them?
Steven: not that i remember
Steven: if it did
Steven: i think i would just have left
Steven: it makes marsha angry when i bring this up
Steven: LOL
IllestVerbalist: hahah why?
Steven: because I always bitch about it
Steven: and its like 10 years ago
Steven: just like I bring up that her friend james min is the biggest dooshey in all the earth
IllestVerbalist: hahahah
Steven: who the hell would go eat a french joint that's goign to cost you an arm and a leg
Steven: the portions were miniscule, and that is suppose to be the charm
Steven: that is just dumb
IllestVerbalist: fancy lasses
Steven: I'm an american man
Steven: I wonder if mickey was there
IllestVerbalist: heheh ask her
Steven: next time i see her
Steven: its always silly when people pretend to be something they're not
IllestVerbalist: what if they "were"
Steven: were what??
IllestVerbalist: rich or whatever you're accusing them of pretending
Steven: maybe they were
Steven: but i doubt it
Steven: and i am sure they're not french
Steven: and i had a party to go to that day
Steven: i brought 90 bucks and i thought i was good to go
Steven: I had to pay my share, and pay for marsha also
Steven: clearly i was fucked
Steven: 90 bucks for a college student, that is rolling phat
IllestVerbalist: rolling phat?
Steven: that's right
IllestVerbalist: wtf does that mean
Steven: it means hotness
IllestVerbalist: if you say soSteven: one time i paid 50 bucks for one small piece of duck
Steven: i am still steaming
IllestVerbalist: wtf? why the hell did you pay that
Steven: I was dating marsha
Steven: she asked me to go out with her friends
Steven: I was ambushed with that shit
Steven: fucking french garbage
IllestVerbalist: hahahaha
IllestVerbalist: did you have to make reservations?
Steven: no
Steven: i was asked to go to dinner
Steven: i had one piece of duck as an entree
Steven: next thing i know, it was 50 dollars a person
Steven: WTF
Steven: people can be so pretentious
IllestVerbalist: hahaha
IllestVerbalist: didnt they have prices next to them?
Steven: not that i remember
Steven: if it did
Steven: i think i would just have left
Steven: it makes marsha angry when i bring this up
Steven: LOL
IllestVerbalist: hahah why?
Steven: because I always bitch about it
Steven: and its like 10 years ago
Steven: just like I bring up that her friend james min is the biggest dooshey in all the earth
IllestVerbalist: hahahah
Steven: who the hell would go eat a french joint that's goign to cost you an arm and a leg
Steven: the portions were miniscule, and that is suppose to be the charm
Steven: that is just dumb
IllestVerbalist: fancy lasses
Steven: I'm an american man
Steven: I wonder if mickey was there
IllestVerbalist: heheh ask her
Steven: next time i see her
Steven: its always silly when people pretend to be something they're not
IllestVerbalist: what if they "were"
Steven: were what??
IllestVerbalist: rich or whatever you're accusing them of pretending
Steven: maybe they were
Steven: but i doubt it
Steven: and i am sure they're not french
Steven: and i had a party to go to that day
Steven: i brought 90 bucks and i thought i was good to go
Steven: I had to pay my share, and pay for marsha also
Steven: clearly i was fucked
Steven: 90 bucks for a college student, that is rolling phat
IllestVerbalist: rolling phat?
Steven: that's right
IllestVerbalist: wtf does that mean
Steven: it means hotness
IllestVerbalist: if you say so

I've always used gmail here and there, but never as my main e-mail service despite liking how it treats each message as a conversation rather than the old traditional lists of messages. That powered by the search engine of google actually makes e-mail so much more easier to deal with. Unfortunately it's not perfect, which is why I will always have my old traditional account alongside my gmail account. Anyway I tried to create a group with my contacts for people who I know may want to go snowboarding and instead of doing that I ended up deleting all my contacts. The fucked up thing was I actually had the idea of exporting my contacts as a backup first, but skipped over that idea and the price I paid was the loss of all my gathered contacts in gmail. For now I'll take that somewhat as a blessing as that gave me the opportunity to clean up my list of contacts with a contacts manager of sorts on my computer. Threw in some phone numbers off the cellphone and updated a bunch of e-mails and addresses, something I've been needing to do for a while now. Funny thing out of all this is the reason why the contacts managed on my computer were outdated in the first place was because I rarely used e-mail as a means of contacting people. E-mailing people only came into play in replying to e-mails sent to me, but rarely as a means of starting something.

Along with that I've transitioned to Firefox as my default browser and KMail as my e-mail client instead of Seamonkey handling both. My handling of e-mails was to download them with my e-mail client using the POP3 protocol, but then to also leave a copy of the e-mail on the server. The drawback to this was that I'd have to do work to maintain both copies and it wasn't until switching to KMail that I've learned there's a new feature called disconnected IMAP that does this maintenance for me, so whatever I do on one side is automatically transitioned to the other end. Now I have access to all my e-mails for this account no matter where I am. Before this certain e-mails would only be on my computer and not on the server once I had moved them to a different folder for grouping purposes.

With the move to Firefox I've also cleaned up a bunch of bookmarks I've accumulated in the past and while there's still tons of bookmarks in my list, I've managed to make it a little trimmer than before.

Hours watching TV have increased greatly as of late. It all started when I was told that I should go ahead and watch all the downloads of this season's episodes for "Heroes" and "Fringe". Not sure if that was a good idea because now I'm all caught up and have been left in the annoying state of waiting for next week's episode. Sucks having to wait a week only to get your fix and then be left with another week of fiending for another episode. What makes matters worse is that while I'm caught up with weekly episodes there's no one to really talk to them with. Only remedy for this seems to be plowing through another set of DVDs worth of episodes for another show and at the moment it's "House". Don't know when my sister became a fan of that show, but like "Everwood" she turned me onto this shit late in the midst of it all and now I'm hooked. Put everything on hold in my Blockbuster queue and right now it's all the seasons for this show that's available. Maybe I should slow down on watching this show because it's one of the few joys that keeps me going.

Didn't think I'd buy anything as a result of Black Friday, but in the end I couldn't resist. I'd need a new external USB case for HDs in the foreseeable future and with the price of the case I wanted cut in half along with leftover money from the biweekly $200 allowance I pulled the trigger. Now I just need a new HD for archival purposes... The way I see it is I need a total of three drives total to complete my storage needs. One drive to work on, second drive to archive shit like photos and music, and a third drive to backup the other two drives. Maybe the first two drives can be combined into one big drive...

Arrived at the hospital in good time today to remove the stitches from my nose, however my stay there was longer than I had hoped. The wait in the first waiting room was quick, but the second waiting room was quite unbearable. Waited there for a bit only to be put back into the waiting room because some bitch before me had been waiting for a claimed hour before me. I was ok with that and would have been ok waiting there had it not been for some annoying dude who showed up when I re-entered the waiting room. I have no claims to be able to read anyone so I don't know if the girl the annoying dude was trying to converse with was in agony or not and I couldn't help but feel bad for her. He did most of the talking and it seemed like she didn't have much to say in return so maybe she was in agony, which is why I suppose I couldn't help but feel bad for her. Anyway the removal of the stitches was more painful than I had hoped and bloody too! Not that it's visible, but due to the location of the laceration I don't think it was possible to stitch a piece of dangling nose closest to the septum, so I've been left damaged even after the scar disappears. Damaged, oh well.

Damn, my right harm feels like someone gave me a hard knuckle punch ever since the injection of of that tetanus shot. Well I'm glad I went with stitches because the nose, at least at the point of laceration, actually gets quite a bit of movement when using your mouth. Found that out last night when I was eating dinner and blood started forming around the stitches. Not sure what I do in my sleep, but apparently I bled some more and it sucks that I can't blow or pick the gunk out so I went to the tool bag and used a smooth metal tool to scrap the cave as best I could.

The other night I caught an episode of Seinfeld where George, the fat bald dude, decides to attend his girlfriend's family funeral as a way to get into her pants and with the added bonus that he would be able to get a discount on the air fare due to a death. Didn't think much of that until the next day when Johnny came with the bad news of his grandma passing and that he was going to have to bail out on the Canada trip. It's unfortunate, however he still plans on going and for now it's been postponed to some time in January. That leaves me with a free first week in December to get ready for my next trip, to California! Actually going to California twice...

The first time around will be to check places out and meet up with James, Kenny, and Kanny. Not exactly sure how things are going to work since I'll be going with Fai and Vivian and I won't be the one renting the car so I'm sort of stuck to whatever is around the hotel and whatever they're planning. Their plans at the moment don't seem bad at all so it's no cause for complaints. Going for almost the whole week, but not quite the entire week.

The second time around will be in January, pretty much the second week where I'll be meeting up with James and Kenny for a snowboarding trip! Not sure of the exact details, but it's still some time away and I'd rather not hype myself or scare myself away. Hoping to get in a trip of snowboarding here on the east coast some time before January, but we'll see.

Much needed time off from all the stuff that's been going on in my life and looking forward to some relaxation and the cold weather.

EDIT: the JMT show is at 10pm with the doors opening at 9! FUCK, not sure if I want to go now...