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I haven’t had a post in awhile.  With everything going on, I guess you could call this the political edition.

Last week was the DNC, this week, the RNC.  It was pretty good argument for the Democrats last week.  They have a pretty convincing argument.  McCain has voted with Bush 90% of the time.  People tend not to like Bush.  He also doesn’t know how many houses he has and he believes that anyone making less than $5,000,000 per year is middle class.

Also, you can compare 8 years of Clinton vs. 8 years of Bush and look at how the country has changed during each person’s time.  During Clinton’s time, wages increased, jobs were created.  During Bush’s time, wages have lowered and jobs have been lost.  It could be coincidence, it could be cause and effect.  Who knows.

Of course Republicans have their following.  Statistically rich, white guys and the church-going folk.

While I do whole-heartedly believe that abortion is wrong and I believe marriage should be between a man and a woman, at what cost should these be pushed?  People are losing health care, the middle class is getting eliminated–the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer, most countries around the world don’t like America.

It makes you wonder.

On a different note, this year we’re going to have either a woman vice president or a black president.  Both history making accomplishments.

I’ve been pretty into the Olympics this year.  Much more than I have been in the past.

As everybody already knows, Michael Phelps has kicked some serious butt this year winning 8 gold medals–the most anyone has ever won.  He seems like a good guy.  Not cocky like somebody like that could be.

Gymnastics has been pretty cool, too.  I was just thinking how it different Gymnastics is from so many other sports.  They have to rely on the judges’ scores.  They can’t beat each other directly.  They can’t just run faster than someone else to prove they’re better.  They need to score higher–not be better, per se.

I bring this up because the other night I saw Nastia Liukin get the exact SAME score as a Chinese gymnast.  I then saw her get 2nd because of the judging algorithm they use.  This got me riled up for a couple reason.  One, Nastia’s on the American team and I was pulling for the Red, White, and Blue. Two, Nastia’s kind of sexy.  Three, the commentators (and I) thought Nastia did better than the Chinese girl. It just makes me think how the system leaves so much room for error and prejudice for or against someone.

I haven’t watched a stitch of track and field and I might not.

I’ve had a weird few weeks.  I won’t go into too much detail, but I’ve learned more about myself, where I’ve been, and where I want to go.

Somebody told me recently that if you want something in life you need to be willing to go after it.  In some areas of life I excel in that.  In others, not so much.  I tend to have more trouble with it when the consequences of failing are bigger.  While it’s good to measure risk and reward, I’ve come to realize that I do it too much.  I tend to overanalyze.

So, I’ve decided that if I’m lucky enough to know what I want, then I need to be willing to give it whatever it takes to make it happen.  You could apply this to a lot of things in life.

I’ve also come to realize that there are always going to be some things you don’t like a whole lot about yourself.  Some of these things you can change, and some you can’t.  The best you can do is change the things you can and own the things you can’t.  If there’s something you don’t like about yourself and you can’t change it, all you can do is go with it.  Getting down on yourself over something you can’t change will get you nowhere.  You have to own it.

And, you also have to not let the couple things that you’re not fond of cloud the reality of the things you do have going for you.  People come as packages–nobody is perfect.

So, I’m changing my outlook on some things in life.  Hopefully for the better.  If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life, you can’t do the same things and expect different results.  So, you have to try to some different things to get different results.

I can’t really talk about the details, but I’m putting the finishing touches on my latest big idea.  I never really know how stuff is going to do, but I have a good feeling about this.  It could revolutionize the online ecommerce world.

I had a pretty big weekend.

Friday I went to see Boyz II Men with Darren and Lisa at Live off the Levee.  It’s this free concert series that St. Louis had all summer long.  This was the only one I went to, though.  They did a lot of covers, but they did do pretty much all of their big hits.  I was worried that they might not sound very good live, but they did.  The bass player doesn’t perform with them anymore because of back problems.  They haven’t replaced him on tour.  I respect that.  They put on a good show.

Saturday I watched  a couple movies.  Harold and Kumar Guantanamo Bay.  It was pretty good.  Surprisingly graphic, especially the bottomless party.

Today, I played guitar in church.  And, we had band practice after church. Then I cut grass, took a nap, and did some important upgrading on Prime Modeling billing.

I was thinking how to take advantage of new API functionality on my billing stuff, and I piece together a way to fully automate the billing.  For awhile, I was thinking that at it grows, it would be hard to keep track of memberships and that everyone gets billed properly.  But, though some sweet integration ideas, I figured out a sweet way to do it that will scale effortlessly.  Every once in awhile, I amaze myself with my programming and ideas.  Pretty amazing.

Not to mention, I’ve had my latest big idea.  I think with what I know now, it could be as big or bigger than Prime Modeling, and less work.  I’m not going to get into details about it now, but I might later on.

I’m not in the mood to post right now, but I haven’t in awhile so I need to.

Long story short, I’ve been going out a lot more the last few weeks than I normally do.  We’re talking 2 to 3 times a week. Compared to 0 to 1 time a week, that’s a lot.

I’ve been hanging more with an expanded group of friends.  Amy, Shenaira, and various friends of theirs (plug Darren, Lisa, etc).

I’ve started going to Zapatas in Collinsville more often.  We’re thinking we’re going to make it more of a normal thing.  Go there on Fridays.  They have karaoke, dancing, $2 Coronas, etc.  I like the atmosphere, not true bar, but you could dance if you want to.

I also think I might start going to Wild Country again on Thursdays.  Anyone who knows me knows I used to go all of the time.  Then I stopped going for awhile.  Then, I started going sometimes.  Now, I go from time to time.  But I think I’m going to start going every week.  I’m starting to make a new group of friends there.  My old WC friends don’t go anymore.  So I need to make friends with the current regulars.  Last week was a lot of fun, so I think I’m going to make more of a habit of it.

And then I’ll make a habit of Zapatas on Friday nights.

No, I wasn’t born on the 4th of July.  But given that this past weekend was the 4th, it seemed a fitting title nonetheless.

I haven’t posted in awhile, so there are a couple odds and ends to catch up on.

I’ve still been running.  I find I lose about 2 pounds the days after I run gain 1 pound the days that I don’t run.  So I guess it’s a simple numbers game.

I’ve also been playing more guitar lately.  I’m trying to play an hour a day.  To help make time, I switched my Netflix plan to 2 at a time instead of 3.  It saves a couple bucks, but more importantly allows me to do other things, like practice.

Last week was pretty busy for me.  I’m having a sizeable get together on July 26.  Because of this, I needed to get done a few things that I had been putting off for just such an incentive.  On Monday and Tuesday night, I painted the breezeway.  I did it all white, which is what it used to be, but the new bright white makes a big difference.

Wednesday we grilled out at Darren’s.

Thursday Darren, Lisa, and I went Roboskis.  Amy and Theresa met us there after the game.  I had never been there before.  It gets pretty crazy after the games.  I myself got crazy after the game, a little too crazy if you know what I mean.  I crashed and Darren and Lisa’s.

Friday (the 4th), Amy had a thing at her house.  I carpooled with Shenaira how is a friend of hers who lives pretty close.  I didn’t have too much on Friday because I overdid it a bit the night before so I wasn’t exactly in the mood.  After grilling and stuff, a few of us went to the Jury Room in Eville to hang out.  We ended up staying pretty late.  I got back like 2:30.

Saturday, bright and early, my parents came over and helped me paint the staircase–which is something else I wanted to get done before the 26th.  It went fine, but took a little longer than expected.  While we were painting, a tree trimmer was going door to door to stir up some business.  I needed to get my trees trimmed anyway, so it seemed as good of time as any.  They trimmed the crap out of 3 of my trees.  Right now, all of it is piled in my front yard.  It looks pretty trashy.  The trimmer said that there’s one tree I should take out soon because it could fall on the house.  It is in pretty bad shape, but I think I’ll give it a little while.  I think it has some time left in it.  After all that on Saturday, I just hung out.  I was pretty beat from the week.

Today, we played my arrangement of America the Beautiful during the offering.  I think it went pretty well.  I had my doubts because it’s a little envelope pushing for Lutherans (it uses distortion on the guitars).  And, the sound is always jacked up and you can never hear anything right.  But, it went pretty well.  I only missed a couple of notes on the solo and they were some of the less important ones. It seems as if you could hear everyone ok, so all in all I was pleased.

After that and lunch, I came back and laid around and watched TV all day.  After all last week being so busy, I was really looking forward to a day when I would  be able to do just that.

Going into this week, it’s pretty much back to normal.

I have this patch of dirt in my front yard that doesn’t have any grass.  I think this is because this piece never sees any sunlight.  So, I trimmed back this bush/tree that keeps it in the shade.  Now, it gets sunlight.  So, I decided to plant some grass seed there.  Sure enough I did, and now there is grass growing there.  I’m still working on getting it all filled in.  This is a hard time of year to grow new grass.  You have to water at least twice a day.  But, it’s still growing.  There are a couple other areas of my yard I might try putting some new grass in, too.

Thursday night we got together to play poker.  The best men (Darren, Nick, Brian, and me).  We grilled at my house and then played poker.  Darren went out first after buying in twice.  Then I went out, then Nick, leaving Brian as the winner.

Friday night I didn’t do a whole lot.

Saturday was the belated Father’s day celebration.  In the morning, we went to Alex’s Tball game.  It was really fun.  He had some of the best hits.  After that we went to Steph and Joel’s to play some Wii and eat some brats.  We then went to the Botanical gardens.  Besides for a small quick shower, it was good over there.  I haven’t been there in a long time.  After that we went to Hodack’s for dinner.  Great food, good value.

That night, I went to Amy’s.  She a friend of mine who is more a friend of Darren and Lisa.  She had a pool party type thing.  I got there late, but it was fun.  Met some new people.

Sunday I didn’t do anything all day.  Just watched TV and movies.  Fast times at Ridgemont High, ok.  I am starting Star Trek Enterprise.   I had never seen even a single episode before.  It’s been probably at least 10 years since I’ve seen an episode of a Star Trek series I’ve never seen before.  Kind of weird.  I see potential.  It might take me a little while to get into it.

Last night, I watched Legends of the Fall.  I had never seen it and really didn’t know anything about it.  It was one of the best movies I’ve seen in a long time.

Well, the last week hasn’t been very eventful.  And, it hasn’t been weird like that my last post.

More of the same, really.  Work, running, work, house stuff, Netflix, TV.  I did decide to downgrade my Netflix plan to the 2 at a time plan.  Now, with the more cable and with running and yardwork and stuff, my Netflix DVDs pile up more.  I always feel a pressure to get my money’s worth. So, I decided to downgrade it to allow myself more time for other things.

I did watch National Treasure 2, it was ok.  I watched the Other Boleyn Girl.  It was pretty good.  It wouldn’t have been as good, but I tend to like most things with Natalie Portman.  I think I may be in love with Natalie Portman.

Saturday there was a party type thing at Dawn’s house for the band stuff.  It was alright.  I always feel a little out of place there.  The next youngest person besides me is like 40.

Sunday, we had Father’s Day plans, but my Dad’s back got all jacked up, so we just ended up hanging out and grilling at my parent’s house.

The last 24 hours have been extremely odd for me.  Kind of confusing.  It’s kind of like when you eat something and it leaves a weird taste in your mouth.  It’s like that–but in your brain.

Yesterday, I got home from work and was going to mow the lawn.  About half an hour into it, my mower stopped running.  Less than a year old new mower.  Weird.

I decided then to go to Wild Country.  That part was pretty normal.  On the way back, I was on 255 South coming up to the 64 exit.  There is a spot there that never has any cops and I always think it would be a good place for a cop.  So there was.  I get pulled over.  I haven’t gotten pulled over in like 5 years.  I was clocked going 74 in a 65.  Pretty tame.  He only gave me a warning–pretty awesome.  The odd part is that I normally am going at least 80 there.  Sometimes a lot more.  Sometimes I have not been entirely sober there.  The time that I get pulled over is the time that I least deserve to get a ticket.  Weird.

Then I come home and go to bed.  About halfway through the night, I start dreaming about this girl from Degrassi the Next Generation.  Her name is Shenae Grimes in real life–Darcy on the show.  Sure I think she’s pretty, but there are other girls I think about a lot more.  Ones from real life.  That wouldn’t be so weird on its own.  Guys dream about girls all the time.  The weird part is that I start waking up like every half an hour.  Every time that I fall asleep, I keep dreaming about her.  In a continuous story line type manner.  It was a continuous dream with waking up inserted.  I’ve never in my life kept dreaming about the same thing over and over again after waking up.  Stranger yet, today as I think back and try to remember the dreams they seem like a fuzzy memory.  Not like a dream.  I would put how I classify these dreams in the same category as how I remember a random event from preschool.  Very foggy–but very real.  I remember it in a very linear fashion.  Like they were experiences.  Weird.

So of course, tonight I decided to watch another DVD of Degrassi the Next Generation.  Weird.