I Suck At Philanthropy

today was philanthropy day for me. too bad i suck at philanthropy.

my feelings of good will began... interestingly enough... at my current place of employment. since resigning from the company a week ago, i had all of my projects transitioned to my other team members. as well, i have not been given any new projects because of the short remaining time frame that i will be at the company. so, i have been basically in limbo at work... and it feels great. truth be told, i have been spending most of my time lately surfing the web... on instant messenger... doing anything but work. (so for any of you who are reading this... contact me so i can pass the time away.)

you would think that having all this free time would be awesome. well, after awhile it gets a little boring waiting for the time to pass. needless to say, i decided to help one of my coworkers (tim) today with a project that he is working on. after all, i can't always be like those government workers and fleece the taxpayers. just kidding.

tim has been under the gun with an unrealistic deadline, which is typical at my company. so, i helped him out so that he could possibly reach that deadline. (as of right now, he seems to be on target for that deadline. so that is good.) that was philanthropy act #1.

philanthropy act #2 occurred after work. i had the pleasure today of taking the subway train home with my friends (hot amy and carlos). as always, i had a great time taking the train home with my friends. they definitely are the best part of my day. anyway, the sheeley shuttle was in service today. so, i got a ride to my parents' house. granted, it was a nice day out and i could have walked... but how could i pass up a free ride... especially with hot amy? and, it was a good thing i did take the sheeley shuttle. as it turns out, the sheeley shuttle was a little short on cash and would therefore not have been able to get out of the parking garage of the subway station. hence, philanthropy act #2.

when i'm no longer in town, i wonder what will happen the next time hot amy doesn't have enough money to get out of the parking garage. she accidentally left her purse at work the first time... now this... perhaps she will have to flirt with the old man (who appeared single by the way) by the parking garage gates as i had suggested.

from there, i went to visit karen's grandmother (nana) for philanthropy act #3. awhile ago, when karen and i took nana out to the villa rosa, we had discovered that her overhead reading light was broken. in addition, we came to learn a couple of days ago that her security alarm had to be reset. so, as the good grandson-in-law, i went over to work my mikey magic (or mikey mojo... or whatever you want to call it) while karen was working late at her regular full time job.

resetting the security alarm was no problem. replacing the overhead reading light took a little bit longer as the entire the switch had to be replaced. needless to say, the light now works. nana is too cute. she offered to pay for the replacement switch. as much as like taking money from the elderly, i told her i'd settle for food instead. so, she fed me chicken salad sandwiches. granted, it would have been better had nana had ice cream sandwiches like she normally does... but chicken salad will do. karen's mom had also stopped by during her walk to see how things were. all in all, it was fun hanging with nana.

anyway, today was a day to do good deeds... and it was quite rewarding. i should do it more often.

I Still Suck At Not Your Average Joes

today is my usual day to hang out with my friends (marc and kelley). normally, we hang out at their place and just have fun. tonight, however, we went out to celebrate my new job as suggested by marc. interestingly enough, marc and kelley seem more excited about my new job than i do. i think they are just happy for me because they know how disheartened i have been with my current company.

needless to say, marc and kelley are great friends. we decided to go to (of all places) not your average joe's located in norwell. now, i still suck at not your average joes. it sure does seem like i go there a lot, huh? what can i say... the food is good. (pictured below is karen, kelley, and marc in the bar area of the restaurant.)



anyway, my other friend (cass) also showed up later for the celebrations. we had a good time talking about the upcoming wedding for my friend (garv), returning to high school, the library, and some other random topics of conversations like the "slammin'" movie known as "save the last dance". karen was even able to fix cass's cell phone with a shake of her hand. it was funny.

it was good to see cass again. i haven't seen him since his wife (ellen)'s uncle's wake. it turns out that cass was asked to go to our alma mater of north quincy high school and present a scholarship. in high school, we had a friend named greg whose mother was (and still is) a teacher at north quincy high school. greg passed away on valentine's day a several years ago and his mom started a scholarship in his name. anyway, as she was busy that night, she had asked cass to present the award. apparently a lot has changed since our days in high school... so much so that all of us at the table felt old.

anyway, i think everyone had a good time. i'm glad a few of my friends were able to make the celebration. as much as i joke about how much i exude awesomeness (and it's true... i do exude awesomeness), i have never been into "me". even things like my birthday, i get more excited for the chance to hang out and have fun with my friends as opposed to actually celebrating my being. so tonight, it was nice to celebrate something as trivial as a new job.

I Suck At Alumni Pizza

after the fire at downtown crossing incident, my friends and i decided to go to the alumni pizza in quincy for dinner. now i suck at alumni pizza.

while my friends (hot amy and jen) and i were at a bar at south station waiting for the commuter rail, hot amy and jen asked if i would be interested in having dinner. apparently, they both were craving alumni pizza. like minds must think alike...

anyway, i had explained that karen was at her parents (who had just returned home from their trip to alaska). her parents were going to show her their vacation pictures. my friend (bill) had showed up there later to also view the pictures. how funny. so, all of us ended up at the alumni pizza for dinner after our train ride home. (pictured below are all of us at alumni pizza. the first picture is bill and hot amy; the second is carlos and bill; and the last is karen and jen.)







anyway, it was a fun dinner. i got to say hello to my former high school substitute teacher (mr. doyle) who was bartending. (i'm sure my bff, kerry, is quite jealous that i got to see him. for some reason, all the girls... i am guessing kerry too... in high school loved mr. doyle. he's dreamy... or so i hear. i must learn this special power some day.) the pizza was actually filling as well (and good). we even got to chat with the waitress about dating. let this be a lesson for all of you single women... love will find you... just don't be so quick to rule people out.

and to end the night, i got to put my pilfering skills to the test. i swiped a glass at the request of hot amy. the glass mentioned ben and jerry and a foursome. ben and jerry happen to be the names of hot amy's weiner dogs... the foursome... well... with my mind currently in the gutter, i won't touch that... i'll just say hot amy's fetishes are her own business. (it might explain the blood splatter in her car though.)

anyway, i'm starting to get pretty good at pilfering. first, it was the shamrock bass glass for my bff, kerry... and now this ben and jerry glass for hot amy. what can i say? i'm a sucker for pretty faces. i didn't have anything to hide the glass in tonight. so, i stuck the glass in my pants when i walked out... hellooooo ladies. i can't wait for my next pilfering task.

I Still Suck At Riding The MBTA

it's always an interesting ride home on the mbta. today was no different. apparently, there was an electrical fire at the downtown crossing station today during the commute home. i met my friend (hot amy) at the platform of park street station. the platform was absolutely full of smoke. this was going to be one of those days where i suck at riding the mbta.

anyway, as we were supposed to meet my other friend (jen), we decided to walk to south station. we figured with the fire and all, the trains would most definitely be delayed. (pictured below is hot amy in front of one of the fire trucks outside downtown crossing.)



well, we met up with jen. with the train delays, however, we decided to have a couple of drinks at clarke's located in south station. yum... apple martinis. the drinks were like shots... they were still good nonetheless. as well, we decided to call my other friend (carlos) who was also just getting out of work. (pictured below is jen as we waited for carlos to arrive at south station.)



anyway, after drinks... we were lucky enough to take the mbta commuter rail (even though the mbta people were not exactly the most friendliest people to deal with). i have never taken the commuter rail, so this was my first time. it was very exciting, especially to be there with my friends. (pictured below is carlos and hot amy.)



for the record... the commuter rail... love it in comparison to the regular subway. the commuter rail is much faster. too bad it was my first and probably last commuter rail ride ever. we arrived at quincy center station in no time... and thanks to hot amy, i got chauffeur service to my car.

needless to say, for what normally would have been an awful train ride home, i had a great time with my friends. i love my friends.

I Suck At Brownies

today has been quite the interesting day.

my boss (anthony) finally got around to telling my team that i had resigned this morning. granted, i actually resigned thursday of last week. anthony was hoping the company would still do what is correct and make a counter offer (which never happened) on thursday; and on friday we had a little snafu with a website release... so the news had to wait until today. it was a little sad because all of my coworkers had told me that they were sad and that they would miss me... they also told me they understood my situation. some of them were even outraged by the company's lack of effort that they wanted to leave as well. it's refreshing to know that so many people at work actually care about me. it's unfortunate that none of those people who actually care about me are part of the executive team.

one of the executives (the president of the company named rony) even scheduled a meeting with me to discuss my departure. needless to say, he was quite late to his own meeting that he called, so we didn't do much discussion. in fact, we didn't discuss much at all. rony basically said thank you for your service and that it is "good for you" to move on. his apathy was somewhat surprising to me... then again, after all that is said and done, i'm not really too surprised.

with all that said, however, i actually had a good day. one of my coworkers (natasha) who works at our satellite office on federal street in boston had heard that i was leaving last week. natasha is pretty funny. i will miss her. we chat about the 80s all the time... and some other silly things. right now, we are having discussions about who we would prefer. (for example... al pacino or robert deniro... both her and i chose deniro)

anyway, natasha made brownies today for my team. now i suck at brownies. these brownies that natasha made, however, were delicious. natasha is a former cook... so i am guessing the food she makes is pretty good. yum! well, she had made the brownies over the long weekend and brought them in for my team today because we had recently helped her with a certain project. the only problem was... she was at the other office location... and consequently, the brownies were at the other location... and she had no means to bring the brownies over to our location.

now, i didn't realize that she had brownies until after my lunch break. needless to say (because i have nothing to lose now by taking an extended lunch break), i went to get the brownies. my friend (tim) and i had gone out for lunch earlier. we went to herrera's for burritos. (sure, i could have called this blog "i suck at herrera's", but i didn't.) after going to herrera's, we ate the burritos in the common and watched as a couple of bums fought. it was an interesting fight. there was a female bum in a wheelchair just yelling at some guy. she was dropping the f bomb like there was no tomorrow. the all of a sudden, her "bum enforcer" as tim liked to call him, just started wailing on the guy. the guy fell to the ground and tried to kick back. it was amusing. shortly afterwards, another bum started getting into an altercation with the female bum in the wheelchair. as she started dropping the f bomb again, her bum enforcer walked over to the other guy. the other guy walked away... it was quite amusing. according to tim, this happens all the time during his lunch break. he said i'd miss this when i left.

anyway, i went to get the brownies from natasha. after hanging out for a little while with natasha, i brought the brownies back to our office. the brownies were contained in a naturalizer.com shoe box. the shoe box was nicely wrapped and decorated with a note thanking my team. it was a very nice presentation. when i actually got back to our office with the brownies, some of the women at the front desk of the other company that shares our building had thought i went shoe shopping because the box said "naturalizer.com". i think natasha did that on purpose. damn her.

needless to say, i felt funny telling them it wasn't women's shoes... but brownies... and good brownies they were. my team devoured the brownies in a matter of minutes.

I Suck At Gath Greenery

yesterday, karen and i went up to visit her cousins (karlene and tommy) in lowell. apparently, it is a tradition to go to lowell on memorial day weekend because the past few years we have gone to lowell to go to gath greenery.

i suck at gath greenery. gath greenery (also known as gath's) is located in dunstable. the place is family owned and they seem to have the best plants. yes, wild and crazy weekend of plant shopping... i know. (pictured below are some plants from gath's.)



in addition to having the best plants for the price, they are very helpful at gath greenery. they seem to be quite knowledgeable about all things green.

karen's aunt (denise) first learned of gath's and spread the word to karlene. from there, karlene and tommy brought karen and i there (on memorial day weekend)... and the rest apparently has become tradition.

needless to say, karen picked up some plants and a green flower box. she's been on a kick lately to make the outside of our house look pretty. this should be interesting...

I Still Suck At Not Your Average Joes

after having lunch at the scarlet oak tavern today, i did what any normal person would do to celebrate a wedding anniversary... mow the lawn. yes, very romantic...

in my defense, karen suggested that i mow the lawn. our lawn has been so overgrown that it has been a complete eyesore. regardless, it may have been the food coma speaking when karen suggested i mow the lawn.

when the lawn was finally mowed, karen and i watched a movie (the devil wears prada). we thought it would be a cute movie and i'll admit... it was good. as we were still full from lunch after the lawn mowing and the movie, we decided to watch yet another movie (save the last dance). for anyone curious, we had gotten those two movies specifically for today. you can probably tell which one i chose.

there's a story behind "save the last dance". it looked so awful when it first came out in the theaters... with it's "slammin'" commercial... that my friends (marc and kelley) used to make fun of it all the time whenever we were there. in fact, we started using the term "slammin'" after that movie. naturally, i had to watch it, and what better time to watch it than on my wedding anniversary? well, even though the movie critics gave it two thumbs up... i thought it was bad. i suppose i should not expect much from a movie about a white girl trying to dance. i probably would have had a more enjoyable time watching my rhythmatically challenged friend (hot amy) bust a move instead.

needless to say, we started getting hungry after both movies. we decided to continue our anniversary celebration at not your average joes. i still suck at not your average joes. there was actually some rationale as to why we decided to go to not your average joes... that rationale being we went to not your average joes last year when we celebrated our four year anniversary at the cape.

as usual, the food at not your average joes is awesome. i had a cranberry glazed chicken dish with butternut squash and asparagus. it was very delicious. in fact, i can't wait till the next time i see my bff (kerry) so that we can go there again. (we'll probably go either there or the halfway cafe.)

I Suck At The Scarlet Oak Tavern

today is my fifth year wedding anniversary. it's amazing how quickly time flies.

anyway, karen and i usually try to exchange traditional anniversary themed presents. (for example, the first anniversary is paper so i got her a gift certificate to a spa; the second anniversary is cotton; the third anniversary is leather; etc. leather... hee hee.)

well, the fifth anniversary is wood. (snicker snicker... okay, i'll get my mind out of the gutter.) as this anniversary snuck up on us so quickly, we decided not to exchange presents this year and consider the second floor addition as our present to one another. the rationale being that the second floor was constructed from wood. my coworker (tim) thought we should have celebrated our anniversary with fireworks (that's beside the point).

in addition to not exchanging presents, we decided to stay local this year. as we were staying local, we went to the scarlet oak tavern located in hingham for lunch. now, i suck at the scarlet oak tavern.

the place is much different from the restaurant that used to be there. the bar area has been enlarged. the area looked nice and clean. my first thought was that my brother in law (pj) and i should have brought my friends (hot amy and jen) there when we were pimping them out. after all, there would probably have been well dressed snooty hingham-ites there. karen, however, disagreed because she thought that the men at the bar would have been all married.

regardless, the food there is delicious. i had trout almondine. i had debated between that and a scallops and bacon pizza. the plate was delicious. even the corn bread they gave us was good... nice and moist. yum. of course, we also had to celebrate with dessert too. i had pecan pie; karen had a lemon mousse.

needless to say, we were both stuffed after lunch. (i think i'm doing a pretty darn good job of putting back all that weight i lost from the high intensity interval training.) i'd definitely go back.

I Suck At The Villa Rosa Restaurant

tonight, karen and i took nana out for dinner.

last christmas, karen and i gave nana a homemade voucher saying that we would take her out for dinner... any time... to any where. well, nana never decided on a time or a place after christmas, so karen decided for her. (it was actually quite cute because nana still had the homemade voucher that was created. she thought it was an actual coupon that we'd need.)

thus, tonight we brought nana to the villa rosa which is located in quincy. (she was really craving italian food and the villa rosa was one of the few italian places we could think of in quincy.) now, i suck at the villa rosa restaurant. whenever i go to the villa rosa, i generally end up getting the same thing... eggplant pizza. yum... eggplant... if only hot amy would wager again.

well, tonight was no different. karen and i ended up getting an eggplant pizza. nana had chicken parmigiana (which was also very good).

(pictured below is nana at the villa rosa with her chicken parmigiana.)



needless to say, the food was good. i hope nana equally enjoyed the dinner (and the possible lunch with the leftovers she didn't finish). afterwards, we went back to nana's house for some ice cream. there's always room for ice cream. we also ended up fixing her answering machine (by turning the answering machine on).

anyway, nana is too cute. unfortunately, i have never known my grandparents. to my knowledge, all of my grandparents have long since passed away. i did meet my step-grandmother (my father's step-mother) once when i was very young and my mom took me to hong kong. my step-grandmother did not speak english, so it was hard to communicate with her. that was well over 20 years ago and she was the only remaining grandparent then. i never saw or heard from her since then.

thus, nana is the closest person to a grandparent that i have... and i couldn't have asked for a better one. i'm lucky to have her.

I Suck At Buying Flowers

today, my company closed early for the long weekend. naturally, i was ecstatic to hear that news. as is typical with my company, my team received a request from the owner to push some new functionality to our live server a couple of hours before the scheduled early closing time.

one of the golden rules of development is to never push code on fridays because in the event there is something wrong during the weekend, the problem will be harder to correct... because people are out and about on the weekend. one of the other golden rules of development is to also provide a realistic time frame when releasing code. two hours... is never enough time because code has to be tested... repeatedly. one would think that my company would learn these golden rules by now. sadly, it is not the case.

needless to say, i was delayed in leaving early today. in addition to the code push, my boss (anthony) accidentally made a mistake on our live server. while testing, he sent test messages to live users. thousands of users. oops! that is never good. thus, we had to enter damage control mode. when all was said and done, i ended up leaving an hour past the scheduled early closing time. (this is just another reason why i need to leave my company.)

anyway, the silver lining from my company's fiasco was that i got to meet up with my friend (hot amy). as tomorrow is my wedding anniversary of five years, i wanted to buy flowers for karen, who was going to pick me up at the wollaston train station. i figured i'd surprise karen with the flowers.

thus, i googled florists around my work. i figured i'd remember the location because on the map, it looked like it was right next to the statehouse. unfortunately, my selective memory must have kicked in because i forgot the name of the florist and the street it was on. needless to say, i wandered around the statehouse looking for the place... to no avail. yes, i suck at buying flowers.

when i met up with hot amy and told her about my dilemma, she mentioned the vendor outside park street station who had nice gerber daisies. what luck! not only was there a vendor for flowers, but the vendor sold gerber daisies... which karen loves.

anyway, we (or i should more appropriately say hot amy... because i suck at buying flowers, remember?) picked an array of different colored gerbers. flowers all look the same to me... they all look pretty... so it was easier to just have hot amy choose them. (pictured below is hot amy with a gerber that she chose.)



from there, we took the train home together. it was without a doubt a very fun ride home. the train car that we first went into was stifling hot. so we decided to move to another train car at the next stop. so when the next stop came up, we exited the train... walked further down the platform... and entered the train car before the doors closed... the only problem was... we ended up moving to the other end of the same train car that we had initially entered. we learned our lesson after that... but it was comical.

i simply had a blast. it is silly things like that which i will miss.

I Suck At Resigning

today, after 5+ (almost 6) years, i resigned from my company. i suck at resigning. the entire morning, i was a bundle of nerves because i knew my boss (anthony) sincerely wanted me to stay. when i gave my resignation, he totally understood my reasons as we had discussed things earlier.

the reasons were simple. last year, i was offered a position with a new company and i had accepted it. as the company was going through some transitions, the company countered the offer. as karen did not want to sway my decisions on whether to stay or leave, i decided to ask my brother-in-law (pj) and my friend (hot amy) for their opinions. needless to say, i agreed to stay with the company.

well, it has been two-thirds of a year since then and needless to say, none of the promises that were made back then have come to fruition. i had repeatedly inquired about those promises during that long stretch of time. unfortunately, every time i inquired, i was rescheduled for a later date.

it has been frustrating. the last few months, in particular, i have absolutely dreaded going to work. the only things i looked forward to during those times were my high intensity interval training workout and my friends. (i love my friends... thank you everyone.) i've never woke up and dreaded going to work before. it was definitely a rough stretch.

anyway, my boss (anthony) shortly joined the company and i had the opportunity to discuss things with him. anthony is a great guy. when the company interviewed him, he told me that i was the one person he definitely wanted to be on his team. it was nice to hear that. he did, however, totally understand my predicament. in fact, he has done everything he could to convince the company to make good on its original promise and retain me (for which i am grateful for). unfortunately, he can only do so much.

in all honesty, i was not even actively looking for a new job. this new opportunity came up out of the blue and i explored the option. i even told my current company about this new opportunity in hopes that they would actually do the right thing and make good on its word. needless to say, the new opportunity turned into a reality as they offered my a position. i still gave my current company an opportunity to make things right. unfortunately, it was just not in the cards.

it's unfortunate. as much as i like to have fun, i take my job seriously and i think i'm actually a very good worker (in comparison to some of the other engineers i know). i have even been told that i was one of the most respected employees at the company. it simply frustrates me that a company would not want to retain good workers. but, it is not up to me to make company decisions. a part of me had wished (and probably still wishes) that the company would simply do the right thing. it's a small company, so there should not be much red tape in getting things done. i love my coworkers (well, the ones on my team), i love working in town, and i love being able to see my good friends in town.

i feel like i've given my company every opportunity to make things right. and at this point, even if they made things right now... it's probably too little too late. luckily, i don't have to worry about that "what if" scenario as the company did not even counter the offer. i'm definitely sad to leave my friends and my team. hence, i've been reminiscing a lot about the good times lately, much like as if it were christmas time where i historically get all sappy... or much like when i'm inebriated.

but... with every ending, there is a beginning. so hopefully this will be the start of something new... like instead of having fun hanging out with hot amy, i can probably now have fun hanging out with my bff (kerry). who knows? we'll see how it goes.

I Still Suck At Scramble

well, it was inevitable.

today, my rein of terror in the scramble world came to an end. so unfortunately, i still suck at scramble. my friend (aimee) beat me in a head to head competition by a score of 236-235. so close, yet so far away.

congratulations aimee!

as promised by my challenge, i'm looking forward to lunch soon (before my inevitable departure).

I Suck At Emmet's

for the third straight day, i went out for lunch. for all the weight that i've lost doing the high intensity interval training, i'm sure making a good run at putting it all back on in a span of three days.

anyway, today i went to lunch with my friend (carlos). due to meetings and conference calls, we went out for a late lunch (around 3pm). as we were both starving after our meetings, we decided to go to emmet's.

now, i suck at emmet's. i must have devoured my mushroom swiss burger and fries in a couple of minutes. it's a good thing that the food was delicious. needless to say, i had a good time hanging out with carlos. i haven't really hung out with carlos during lunch in quite some time due to our conflicting schedules. it was nice.

we even got to watch part of the soccer game between manchester united and chelsea that was being played in moscow. chelsea had tied up the game while we were there. (by the way, it seemed like there were more chelsea fans than manchester united fans.) as it turns out, carlos's dad loves soccer. so, i got the scoop as to what this whole soccer game was all about from carlos.

as well, we talked about my friend (hot amy)... non-stop. i'm just kidding. i was just instigating. we mainly talked about work stuff. i divulged the information that i had interviewed with another company and that things were looking pretty promising. carlos was disappointed that i would be leaving, but he understood the situation i was in where my current company had failed to deliver on certain promises it made a while back. i think carlos was very disappointed in the company because he treated me to lunch. carlos also told me how the company would not be the same if i (the "doctor" as he calls me) left.

(pictured below is carlos at emmet's. interestingly enough, he was drinking water and not the usual bud light today.)



anyway, i know i've said it a lot recently, but i will miss my friends in town.

I Suck At Bertucci's

today, i had plans to meet my friend (aimee) for lunch. aimee had suggested meeting at the government center mbta subway station before heading toward our destination of bertucci's brick oven ristorante. unfortunately, i suck at bertucci's. in fact, i was actually late meeting aimee at the station because of work. (plus, i didn't think aimee would be on time anyway due to her history of tardiness... come to think of it, it must the name because hot amy is also generally tardy.)

anyway, from the government center mbta subway station, we walked to the bertuccis located in faneuil hall. needless to say, i had a great time at bertucci's. (in addition to the delicious rolls, i had a spinach/zucchini/eggplant calzone with no ricotta cheese... cue rachael ray's "yum-o".)

(pictured below is aimee at bertucci's.)



it was nice to just hang out with aimee. i even got to chat with her about scramble... which she will never beat me at... yet... just kidding. speaking of scramble and the lunch challenge, aimee treated me for lunch today. she actually said lunch was on her because she did not have the chance to treat me for lunch when it was my birthday.

that was very nice of aimee. it is moments like that which make me think of how blessed i am to have such great friends. i will truly miss my friends in town when i leave my current job. yeah, i know... sap... you'd think that it was either the christmas holiday season now or that i have been drinking heavily since noon with my behavior of late.

anyway, i had a very enjoyable time today.

I Still Suck At Riding The MBTA

considering today was my first day back to work after my vacation, i must say that i have had a pretty good day. i got to have lunch with my friend (hot amy). and i got to take the mbta subway train home with hot amy and my friends (aimee and carlos).

now, i still suck at riding the mbta. today, when i arrived at the subway platform at park street station, i noticed hot amy and aimee talking to each other. in fact, i almost walked into hot amy from behind before i realized it was her (damn those sunglasses. perhaps i really should consider not wearing them down on the subway platform. for anyone curious, i wear my sunglasses at night... so i can... so i can...)

anyway, even though i almost walked into hot amy, neither her nor aimee noticed that it was me. naturally, i concocted a plan. had i been younger, i would have tickled hot amy or aimee from behind (just below their rib cage). (i used to do this when i was younger and my fellow victim would squirm, laugh, and scream.) well, seeing as how we were on a crowded subway platform, i figured tickling would not be the best course of action.

so, i did the next best thing... i walked until i was a couple of feet behind both hot amy and aimee, pulled out my cell phone, and called them. i attempted calling hot amy first, but she did not answer her phone. so, i called aimee instead. when aimee answered her phone, she had asked where i was... to which i laughed and replied that i was two feet behind her. i don't know if they found my plan as humorous as i did, but i sure got a kick out of it.

needless to say, we got to ride the subway train home together. carlos actually joined us as well. i did not notice him (because of my sunglasses apparently) but he got on our subway car just in time before the doors closed. he was apparently chatting with some mysterious blonde who also made the car with us. (perhaps he was trying to make a certain someone jealous. just kidding. it wouldn't work anyway because she was old and not too hot... i've seen hotter.) there was actually something familiar with that mysterious blonde. i'm not sure where i have seen her before, but i have a feeling she works in the same building as my current company.

anyway, it was a fun train ride home. we got to hang out, laugh, and be silly. i even got to play the role of the weird guy on the train who sings as i sang a few lines of a tune that could be heard through someone's headphones. it's the silly things that make my day.

(pictured below is aimee and hot amy on the train. aimee is the one with the hand in front of her face.)





after the train ride home, i even got chauffeuring service to my parents' house... and all i had to do was carry a projector... no lint cleaning. what a bargain! anyway, i had a good day today. if only all my days at work could be like that.

I Suck At Silvertone Bar & Grill

today, i had the pleasure of having lunch with my friend (hot amy).

as hot amy had a craving for mac 'n cheese, we ended up at silvertone bar and grill. now, i suck at silvertone bar and grill. i haven't been to silvertone in quite some time. apparently, neither had hot amy, which is why we ended up going there. (our other option for mac 'n cheese was scollay square, but i think she was there recently.)

anyway, silvertone is known to have a delicious a mac 'n cheese dish. coincidentally, my bff (kerry) was there at silvertone not too long ago when she met her friend for grilled cheese sandwiches. apparently, the grilled cheese meal is also delicious. who knew?

well, i would say the mac 'n cheese at scollay square was better than silvertone. (i actually did not order mac 'n cheese. i had the tuna melt... and a good portion of hot amy's mac 'n cheese.) the mac 'n cheese at silvertone was not bad... it was pretty good (just that i like scollay's better). the cheese just seemed more stringier and the bowl of macaroni seemed never ending. (the macaroni by the way looked like it was steroids... they were huge.)

regardless, i had an enjoyable time with hot amy. it was fun to just hang out, laugh, and not have to think of work. if and when i leave my current job, i will definitely miss having lunches with her.

I Still Suck At Scramble

a couple of nights ago, i woke up in a cold sweat. okay, perhaps there was no sweat... or coldness for that matter... but it was a nightmare nonetheless. i had a dream involving my friend (andrea). in the dream, she defeated me in the game of scramble. excited with the thrill of victory, andrea jumped for joy... inflated her own ego with some talk about how awesome she was... did some trash talking with me... and even did a little jig. (luckily, i knew it was just a dream because andrea does not dance.)

perhaps the dream was a sign of things to come. a couple of days later, i played my friend (aimee) in a game of scramble. she actually had me on the ropes in the early rounds. (she had outscored me in the first two rounds by a score of 102-89.) not one to panic, i actually ended up winning the game 254-225. naturally, that got me thinking... i still suck at scramble. granted, i have not lost yet to any of my close friends. i have actually lost to my coworker (sean) three times, which currently are my only three defeats. (sean and i are 3-3 in head to head competition.)

anyway, aimee is determined to defeat me. she said it was her "mission" to defeat me and win the free lunch challenge that i issued. (i still think that in all fairness, any of my friends who lose to me in scramble should at least do something like inflate my ego and post something on myspace or facebook saying i exude awesomeness...)

i'm actually surprised aimee has not defeated me already. aimee has an uncanny ability to beat me. perhaps my friend (hot amy) should hang out with aimee and hope that the winning rubs off onto her. when we were younger, aimee absolutely kicked my butt in a fighting video game at my friend's (garv) parents' place. it was quite amusing.

needless to say, with the bullseye on my back, i think my days of beating all of my friends in scramble may be soon coming to an end. but we'll see. i'm still waiting to see the posts of my exuding awesomeness...

I Suck At Massages

tonight was an interesting night.

my brother-in-law (pj) mentioned the other day that he never goes out any more. so, tonight, i went out with pj... and my friends (hot amy and jen).

hot amy and jen were going to hit the bars and be on the prowl for men. (i believe the correct term for them is... cougars) the plan was for pj and myself to accompany them and have a competition whereby we would funnel/introduce men to hot amy and jen. in a way, you could say that pj and i were going to have a pimping competition. the plan, when all of us thought of it, sounded awesome in theory. it may have been the sun stroke from playing tennis earlier.

well, needless to say... pj kicked my butt in the competition... in all facets of the competition. it's very sad. i have discovered that i suck at massages. (in my defense, i have not given a massage in years. and when i have, the person i was giving massages to was lying down.) in fact, i'm not too good at pimping either. (this is probably why pj is the favorite son-in-law too.)

we started our competition a little late. while waiting for hot amy and jen to arrive, i downed four mixed drinks of rum and cranberry juice. (i was determined to drink the night away as it would make me more "touchy" in my pimping duties.) from there, we decided to eat at the abington alehouse located in abington. the food was good. (i had a burger.) the drinks were good. keno was good as pj won some stuff. the male population, however, was not too good at the bar.

so, we left and headed for the british beer company located in pembroke. there was an oldies cover band performing that night. they were good... just that the music was... old. well, pj started his pimping. he knew one of the workers (dave) there who was in charge of checking ids. thus, dave tried to funnel men toward hot amy and jen. there were a couple of men also at the bar which i tried to work my pimping magic. (their names were mike and jared.) well, the two guys left... damn them!

anyway, as there were no other viable men for hot amy and jen, we decided to go to bella's in rockland. likewise... no men... so eventually, we ended up at t k o'sheas which is also located in rockland. it was karaoke night that night. (we didn't sing any songs... although i think it would have been awesome if all four of us did.)

sadly, that is where the night ended. i have come to the conclusion that it sucks to be a single woman in her 30s... at least when it comes to going to bars. (personally, i think meeting people at bars is not a good idea... but that's just me.) there just is not enough men at bars, and the ones that are at the bars apparently do not meet the standards of certain "cougars".

so, you may ask... how does this relate to massages? well, what happens in the jetta stays in the jetta... much like the blood splatter stains of hot amy's former fiance. but yeah, i suck at massages in comparison to pj. it's very disheartening, i know... i will have to work on that.

I Suck At Hanging Out With Hugh

last night, i went out with my friend (hugh). now, i suck at hanging out with hugh.

i can't remember the last time i went out with just hugh. apparently, he has been feeling a little out of touch with his friends, so he contacted me to go out and catch up on a few things. (incidentally, hugh was my best man at my wedding.)

needless to say, it was an interesting night. i arrived at his place to pick him up. i actually had to wait around for my friend (jen, his wife) to return from target. the reason jen was at target was because their son got rid of his binky and they had promised him that he would get a toy when he got rid of his binky. thus, they were at target shopping for toys.

well, an hour or two later, jen returned and we were finally able to go out. from the look of things, it wasn't going to be a good night. we had started off going to a bar called warren's in weymouth which is located not too far from hugh and jen. unfortunately, the bar was packed (the place is rather tiny). so, we decided to go to a place in rockland called the players club. the players club, which is relatively new, was likewise packed... more so than warren's as there was no place to park.

thus... plan c... which was the main street grille (also in weymouth). this wasn't going to be our night as that place was likewise packed. three strikes! well, we finally ended up at a place called the cellar tavern in abington.

the cellar tavern is a tiny place. there is an old baseball scoreboard decoration above the bar area and a few t-shirts displayed saying "i ate the worm at the cellar tavern" or something like that. from what i was told, if you actually had a tequila shot and ate the worm, you would get the t-shirt. i was all gung-ho and ready to eat the worm. hugh, however, was not so much... so we did not attempt the tequila shot with the worm. too bad.

anyway, it was a fun night. hugh and i got to catch up on a few things. he talked mostly about his job and his passion for unions. i, on the other hand, just mentioned things about my job, my home improvement projects, and all that. plus, we got to watch the awful celtics perfomance in between.

it was good catching up with old friends. i should probably do it more often.

I Suck At Photoshop

today, i was finally able to work on a photoshop project for my friend (andrea).

last week, andrea had asked if i could air brush a picture of her from when she went to the kentucky derby. her intent was to use the air brushed picture of her for her profile picture on myspace or facebook or both. naturally, i agreed. ecstatic, andrea sent me the image file via email... which basically sat and sat in my inbox until today. (in my defense, i have been a little preoccupied with my landscaping project from hell in which i worked from the wee hours of the morning till the wee hours of night.)

anyway, today i was finally able to work on air brushing the picture of andrea (because the weather forecast called for rain today which meant i could not really work on that landscaping project from hell). i think my photoshop skills are a bit rusty because i suck at photoshop. it has been quite some time since i had to play around with the application. i think the last time i played around with photoshop was when i created a banner for hot amy's community website... which was a while ago.

needless to say, here is the air brushed picture of andrea:



if andrea does use the image for her profile picture, i hope all of her friends realize that she went to the kentucky derby. taken out of context, one might wonder why she is wearing a ginormous hat on her head... at least, that is what i would be thinking if i saw the picture and did not know andrea.

anyway, i hope she likes the picture.

I Still Suck At Having A Dog

last night was a sad night for hingham.

after working on our landscaping from hell project, karen and i decided to visit my favorite sister-in-law (janine). in particular, karen wanted to visit and play with the new puppy (clover). (truth be told, i wanted to play with clover too.)

unfortunately, we discovered some bad news. it turns out that my favorite niece (kaleigh) has not been feeling well since clover joined the family a week ago. janine thinks that kaleigh may be allergic to clover. very sad.

consequently, janine is now trying to find a new home for clover. (i hear there were plenty of tears involved yesterday.) anyway, because i still suck at having a dog, i obviously could not take or care for clover (even though janine said she'd come over during the day to walk her and such).

janine contacted the breeder yesterday about her situation and as of last night, had not heard back from the breeder. it's too bad about clover. janine spent a lot of time and energy looking for the right breeder. hopefully things will work out.

I Still Suck At High Intensity Interval Training

yesterday, i saw my friends (marc and kelley). marc was feeling a little under the weather, so we decided to order out for some food (the little duck in quincy). needless to say, all of us just hung out... ate dinner... watched "lost" and watched some of the celtics game.

as i customarily use marc and kelley's bathroom scale, i decided to weigh myself one last time in the name of high intensity interval training (hiit). i still suck at high intensity interval training. my workout ended last week but i forgot to record any data. anyway, the magic number last night was 181.6 pounds.

granted, i've been a little preoccupied this week with my landscaping from hell project in which i've been sod-busting and dirt transferring and all that fun stuff... so the numbers may be a little askew. when i first weighed myself after beginning the high intensity interval training, i weighed in at 191.8 pounds. for those eight weeks of the workout, i only performed the hiit. i did not do any other cardiovascular workout in conjunction. i did not even strength train (which i currently am missing because i feel like such a "girlie" man right now after shoveling all that dirt around... stupid landscaping project).

thus, based on the quasi-data that i do have, it does seem to appear that the high intensity interval training actually works. i have lost approximately 10 pounds during the timeframe of the workout... which is not bad.

i have even been thinking about restarting the workout again in a couple of weeks, so please let me know if any of you are interested... (for the record, training by yourself... not fun.) i may even look for a different type of hiit workout. so we'll see how it goes... or maybe, i'll work on organizing my bosu army... we'll see.

I Suck At The Halfway Cafe

tuesday, my bff (kerry) spent the night. she apparently had some work related thing down at otis air force base early wednesday morning. so, even military bases need emergency management.

anyway, like most times when kerry sleeps over, we go out for dinner (and possibly for some ice cream depending on the time). tuesday was no exception. in case you were curious, we did not go to the usual hot spot of "not your average joe's". kerry wanted to try something different, so we ended up at the halfway cafe in marshfield.

kerry loves the halfway cafe. apparently, her friend dave (who lives in texas) does as well. unfortunately, i suck at the halfway cafe. the halfway cafe in marshfield is fairly new (it opened a couple of months ago) and is quite tiny in comparison to the halfway cafe that i have been to in holbrook. apparently, the place used to be a sandwich place with a drive through. and like the other halfway cafe that i've been to, this place was decorated with sports memorabilia.

anyway, the food was delicious. (kerry had steak tips, karen had american chop suey, and i had a chicken panini; the latter two were part of the seven for $7 menu that the halfway cafe updates every month.) our waittress was great too. kerry had asked if she could purchase one of the glasses that our soda came in because it had the halfway cafe branding on it (which is a new thing as their glasses never had their brand on glasses before) so that she could send it down to dave in texas. (hence, that is how i found out dave loves the halfway cafe.) well, our waittress asked the manager and the manager gave her the glass for free. it's always good when you can get glasses for free without having to pilfer them.

needless to say, all of us were loving the halfway cafe. we had good food, good wait staff, good times... and kerry had a free glass. what could possibly top that? well, as it turns out, tuesday was trivia night at the halfway cafe.

i actually suck at trivia (which i could have titled this post), but i like to partake in the fun known as trivia night... especially when there are drinks involved. a company called "stump!" actually comes into the restaurant and runs the entire trivia night program. i've been to a few trivia nights before, but tuesday was kerry's first time (virgin trivia night-er... i'm glad i could be there for her first time... just kidding.)

well, let's just say, karen, kerry, and i did not do that well at trivia night. considering there was a 70s theme feel to trivia night, we didn't do awful either. we came in 5th out of 11 teams with a whopping 59 points. personally, i think some of the top 4 teams cheated, but that's just my opinion (and no, i'm not saying that because i'm a sore loser.) and the funny thing is, after prizes were awarded for trivia night, stump! held a raffle for some other parting gifts... and guess what our team won... another free glass!

so dave now has two glasses shipping his way. all in all, it was a very fun night at the halfway cafe.

I Suck At Sleepy's

today, i went to my parents' house to pick up a pick. my father has a pick and said it would be good to use for my sod-busting/trench digging project from hell (primarily the trench digging part). my dad wanted to bring me the pick today, but couldn't because he was waiting for the delivery of new mattresses and box springs. as i was going to be in the neighborhood anyway, i didn't mind stopping by.

needless to say, shortly after i stopped by, my dad gave me the pick. i asked him how the mattresses were and all that. he showed the mattresses to me and told me how the delivery guys could not get one of the box springs up the stairs through the hallway, so he canceled the purchase of that box spring.

well, my mom came home shortly thereafter and my dad recounted the same story he had just mentioned to me. my mom wanted to verify that she wouldn't be charged for the canceled box spring purchase, so she called the place where she had bought the mattresses and box springs. (she got them at sleepy's, located in braintree.) unfortunately, that is when the trouble began.

my mom was okay at first when she spoke with the salesperson who sold her the mattresses and box spring. when the salesperson passed the phone on to the manager, that is when my mom got a little perturbed. my mom got frustrated and annoyed with the manager of sleepy's because he persistently asked why she wanted to cancel the order and then told her to call the 1-800 number.

needless to say, that did not sit well with my mom. so, as the good son, i got to accompany her and my dad as they marched to sleepy's in braintree to talk to the manager. (my parents generally have me do things like that because they think their english is terrible. it's really not, but i think they just think that.)

anyway, i suck at sleepy's. i don't know anything about sleepy's other than the annoying radio commercial i hear. i didn't even know it was in braintree. when we arrived, my mom spoke with the manager and the salesperson and she let the manager have it. (it's quite cute watching my mom get all angry.) even though i was brought in for my amazing english skills, i didn't even get to speak a word. i simply just watched (and probably smiled).

as it turns out, there was a miscommunication between the manager and my mom (obviously). the manager thought my mom wanted to cancel the entire order, not just the box spring item. and in an effort to make my mom happy, the manager (dean) gave her two black bags with the sleepy's logo on them. the bags are supposed to be used for groceries (since this is the age of recycling now).

although my mom was happy that things were cleared up, she wasn't too impressed with the black bags. in fact, she gave the bags to me as soon as we walked out (along with another bag she received once for buying a crate of noodles... don't ask). it was an interesting outing.

I Suck At Mother's Day

yesterday, karen and i celebrated mother's day by having her parents, her grandmother, and my parents over for lunch. as with most things involving my family, i get a little stressed. don't get me wrong, i love my parents. they are great parents. i think sometimes i just get stressed because they are my parents.

anyway, i suck at mother's day. while karen was preparing the vegetables, the couscous and the potatoes in the kitchen, i was grilling the pork outside. my mom even cooked some scallion pancakes... which she shouldn't have because it was mother's day and i wanted her to take a break and relax. sad to say, she likes to cook for people and consequently wanted to cook scallion pancakes for karen's parents, particularly karen's father. (my mom always likes to be doing something... preferably cooking for people. her dream job, if she could have one, would probably be to open a take out chinese restaurant and cook all day for people.)

similarly, my dad likes to be constantly doing something. shortly after lunch he started digging up the lawn to help with the sod-busting project. he was not dressed at all to work on the house, let alone the dirt of our front lawn. i know my parents want to do things and help. sometimes, i wish they could relax and simply let me do things for them once. after all, they have done so much for me already. it's things like that which stress me out. i probably shouldn't complain about the fact that my parents like to be busy and do things for me. i suppose it could be worse.

anyway, i hope everyone enjoyed mother's day. (pictured below is my mom opening her present. she seemed quite ecstatic with the box. and no, it was not a big box of nothing...)



while my dad did some sod-busting, my mom went shopping after lunch to a.c. moore with karen, karen's mother, and karen's grandmother. (my mom bought a box.) so, at least my mom did get to do something nice for herself on mother's day (albeit it was to buy a box).

anyway, happy mother's day mom. i love you.

I Suck At Pot Luck

saturday night, my bff (kerry) had a bunch of us over for a pot luck party. yes, i suck at pot luck. the theme for the pot luck was... grilled cheese.

for those of you who are curious, kerry is a finicky eater. a grilled cheese, however, is one of the few items kerry absolutely loves. so, the grilled cheese theme made sense. plus, the pot luck gave us a reason to visit the mean streets of medford where kerry lives. i like to have fun with kerry and say how medford is so far away. (medford really is not that far away. and for anyone interested, the medford high cheerleading squad apparently won the national championships in cheerleading... who knew?)

anyway, the rest of us (karen, jen and myself) brought a potato product (tater tots), fritos, and drinks to go with the grilled cheese theme. needless to say, i had a great time. all of us hung around her kitchen, eating, laughing, drinking. it was fun. (pictured below is kerry with her tongue sticking out trying to open something.)



plus, the grilled cheese was quite delicious. i don't think i've ever seen kerry cook before. after saturday, i would say kerry makes very good grilled cheese sandwiches (which may be why the food is one of her favorites). her secret may be the potato bread used for the slices of bread.

anyway, i had fun... and that was even before the many bottles of vodka were brought out. (it turns out kerry has many types of vodka at her place. i don't know why, but she does... and each one... tastes so good going down. granted, some tasted better than others going down...) i even learned a tidbit of information that jen has flat feet. i never knew.

so all in all, it was fun. we also got to test her cake dessert afterwards (which was also good). perhaps i'll have to visit the mean streets of medford more often.

I Suck At Buying Furniture

since the new addition of the second floor to our house, karen and i have not gotten any furniture. thus, the second floor has been mainly devoid of anything for quite some time... that is... until saturday.

on saturday, karen and i finally got some new furniture for the addition. in general, we always have a hard time deciding on things like furniture. the only time we seem to agree on furniture is when the piece of furniture is ridiculously expensive. (i guess we both have expensive tastes.) anyway, the practical side in us can't justify paying for expensive furniture. thus, we generally have a hard time deciding on things like furniture. so i guess you could say... i suck at buying furniture.

anyway, a while ago we had decided to go to bernie and phyl's located in braintree. as luck would have it, we agreed on some items of furniture in the store. (karen had done some earlier browsing of the inventory online. plus, she found an online coupon to use at the store which also made her very excited.)

needless to say, we purchased the items that day. we had to wait, however, until saturday to actually pick the items up. (pictured below are the pieces of furniture sitting in the room.)



so, these new pieces of furniture are going to sit in the workout/office area. the original intent is to have these items face the television in that room. unfortunately, there is currently no television in that room. so, the chairs and table are facing a blank wall right now. sure, it may seem odd right now... but when that television is there, it'll probably make more sense.

I Suck At Having A Dog

friday night, i got to see my favorite sister-in-law (janine).

janine has been looking for a dog for some time. she has visited many dog breeders in her quest for a labrador retriever. luckily, she finally settled on one. on friday, she was able to take home the labrador retriever from the breeder.

as the labrador retriever was born on st. patrick's day, janine decided to call her "clover". clover is very cute. (pictured below is clover sitting on janine's lap.)



clover did not do much when karen and i were there except sleep. i guess puppies sleep a lot when they are newborn. my niece (kaleigh) was pretty funny around clover. she wanted clover to fetch a toy and so threw the toy and told clover to fetch it. well, clover just slept. when clover seemed to wake from his slumber, kaleigh would get excited because she thought clover was going to fetch the toy... only problem was... clover went back to sleep. it was cute.

needless to say, i love dogs. the only problem is... i suck at having a dog. i think if i actually had a dog, the dog would die because i'm not home enough. lucky for me, i can just visit janine and play with clover at any time. hopefully, clover will be as good as ben and jerry, which belong to my friend (hot amy). ben and jerry are my benchmark as far as dogs go. they (ben and jerry) are very well behaved and equally adorable. so we'll see how clover ranks up.

I Suck At The Falafel King

today, i had the opportunity to go out for lunch during work. of course, i chose the best day to of the week to go out for lunch (with the dark and dreary sky and the drizzling rain and all). and naturally, i did not have an umbrella today. i actually didn't even have a jacket on when i went out for lunch. you'd think i'd learn my lesson by now.

anyway, i decided to go to the falafel king. now i suck at the falafel king. the falafel king is a tiny take out place located on winter street on the way to downtown crossing in boston. while you wait in line to place your order, the "king" gives you a falafel to eat. he's such a nice guy. i usually order the falafel sandwich. in fact, i have only ever ordered a falafel sandwich every time i have been there... which is a testament to how good the falafel sandwich is. (the place is not called "the falafel king" for nothing.)

i was first introduced to the falafel king by my former boss (brian). he had always raved about the place during lunch time. in fact, i never even knew what a falafel was when i first heard of the place. when i first heard the word "falafel", i thought it was a waffle-like item of food... for no reason other than the fact that the words sounded similar. i have come to find out in my wise years that a falafel is a fried patty of chickpeas.

according to my friend wikipedia, the word falafel is the plural of the arabic word meaning pepper.

"Falafel is generally served in pita bread, either inside the pita, which acts as a pocket, or wrapped in a flat pita. In many countries, falafel is a popular street food or fast food. The falafel balls, whole or crushed, may be topped with salads, pickled vegetables and hot sauce, and drizzled with tehina (tahini). Falafel balls may also be eaten alone as a snack or served as part of a mezze. During Ramadan, they are sometimes eaten as part of an iftar, the meal which breaks the daily fast after sunset.

Falafel has been part of the diet of Arabs and Mizrahi Jews for centuries. It is also considered a national food in Israel where it has become a common part of the Israeli diet. Now a popular street food in many countries around the world, it is sometimes offered as a vegetarian alternative to Doner kebab."

speaking of jews, the falafel king is also the first place i had ever had lunch in town with my friend (hot amy). we were running an errand for my other friend (andrea) by taking pictures of cows. (for anyone curious, hot amy is not jewish... but she is apparently revered by the jewish community.)

anyway, i had a good lunch today by myself. going to the falafel king allowed me to get out of the office and enjoy the dreary drizzly day. i got to be all pensive and stuff... which is sometimes trouble as i like to reminisce.

I Suck At Scramble

yay! it's friday!

as i arrived to work early today, i decided to check my facebook account. i had a quick chuckle because on my profile page, there was a mini-feed that said i had just "dominated" a scramble board. for anyone curious, i had just finished a game with my friend (andrea).

needless to say, the mini-feed made me chuckle because i suck at scramble. okay, maybe i don't really suck at scramble. chalk up another item to add to my list of things that make me "exude awesomeness". first, i'm mr. walsh's favorite (second to ed of course)... and now scramble... just kidding.

anyway, for anyone who does not know, scramble is a facebook application that is pretty much the game of boggle. and for those who do not know what boggle is, boggle is game where you make words of at least three letters or more from a random board of letters within a given time frame.

i used to play boggle a lot growing up. boggle was one of the few games that my family had. i remember playing boggle a lot with my brother (back when my brother and i were pretty close). i remember how we had to shake the board with its hard plastic cover on top... the clanking noise of the cubes with the letters on them as they fell into the board... tapping the sides of the plastic cover to get all the cubes to fall neatly into the board. ah... the memories.

needless to say, playing scramble on facebook reminded me a lot of playing boggle when i was growing up. sadly, i'm still addicted to the game. i started playing when my coworker (sean) challenged me to a game. (yes, we were at work. it made the time go by much quicker.) it was the first game of scramble i had ever played and i lost handedly to him.

since that first and only defeat, i have gone on a rampage... leaving unsuspecting scramblers in a trail of word making dust. just kidding. i haven't lost since that first game. i was even tempted to issue an open challenge to my close friends and family... such that if anyone of them could beat me in a game of scramble, i'd get them lunch or something. i might even make lunch... that's how confident i am in my scramble abilities.

i'm really not that confident in my scramble abilities, but i was thinking the challenge could be fun for my friends and family by giving them some extra motivation or something. (because i know if i could score a free meal, i'd be all over that.) anyway, we'll see how it goes...

I Suck At Sod-Busting

i hate gardening projects. i would rather do carpentry work, electrical work, or plumbing work. i'd even do masonry work if given the option instead of working on a gardening project.

you'd think that working on a gardening project would be fun. gardening is outside. the weather can be sunny. the project itself can relaxing. unfortunately, this project that i'm currently working on is known as sod-busting. i suck at sod-busting.

sod-busting is the removal of turf (or in my case, the existing front lawn).

according to the diy network, you can use a flat square shovel.

"Begin by digging down to a depth of 2" to 4" to get all the grass roots. Push and pull the shovel horizontally, keeping the blade as level with the ground as possible. Work in small sections: soil and sod are very heavy."

sounds simple enough, right? well, needless to say... i hate it. in the span of about two hours after i got home, i only managed to bust a strip of sod approximately 6 inches by 35 feet. at this pace, i will probably finish sod-busting the front lawn by the time my vacation ends next week.

what makes it worse is the fact that the delivery of loam (soil) is happening tomorrow in the pouring rain. if i didn't know any better, i would say that this is a sign that i should not work on any gardening projects... ever.

i wonder if hot amy would be willing to make a wager with me whereby she'll do the sod-busting if i win some challenge. right now, i am hoping the answer is yes.

I Suck At Emma's Pub & Pizza

last night, i hung out with my friends (marc and kelley).

after watching last week's episode of "lost" on their tivo (might i add... love the show!), we decided to go out for dinner. marc had suggested going to this place called "emma's pub and pizza". too bad i suck at emma's pub and pizza.

anyway, marc had seen commercials for the place on the phantom gourmet food show. marc, being a connoisseur of food, was naturally interested in trying the place out. so, marc, kelley, karen and i took a little trip to emma's pub and pizza, which is located off of route 24 (exit 15) in bridgewater. it was a fun ride because kelley almost plowed into a police car when she was pulling into the parking lot of emma's pub and pizza. (the cop car was exiting the parking lot.) that would have been interesting to explain. luckily, she didn't hit the car.

needless to say, the place was an interesting place to eat. there was supposed to be a magician last night... but we didn't see him. apparently, the magician is very good at doing his disappearing trick. (there was also supposed to be 99 cent cheese pizzas, but we didn't have any.) the place itself reminds me of those old diners (except this place was fairly big). there were two claw vending machines in the waiting area, a huge picture of some chef on wall, and other pictures of their menu items on the walls.

despite the decor, the food was very good. i had the "maverick" burger, which was a one pound hamburger (that's a lot of beef). in addition, i had an oatmeal cookie martini... which was very delicious (in the immortal words of rachael ray... yum-o.)

all in all, it was actually a pretty good experience. (for anyone curious, their lobster roll was rated by the phantom gourmet.) i'd go back again... and hopefully the next time i can see the magician.

I Suck At Hanging Out With Meredith

last night, i ran into my friend (meredith).

meredith and i go way back. i've known meredith since middle school. we used to chat on the phone all the time. we used to laugh, joke, and just be silly. in fact, i pretty much still laugh, joke and be silly... so it's good to know i haven't changed that much.

anyway, the last time i saw meredith was at her then-new house in weymouth for a fourth of july celebration a few years ago. so, it was nice to see her again albeit the circumstances surrounding my seeing of her again were not the greatest. we were attending a wake for the uncle of my friend (ellen). ellen happens to be married to my other friend (cass). it's somewhat odd how most of my friends have met their significant others while in high school. i guess my high school graduating class was very tight-knit. but, that's beside the point.

needless to say, i got to talk to meredith while at the wake. when we left, it naturally got me thinking how i suck at hanging out with meredith. meredith is one of the nicest people i have known and have ever met. she has recently lost some weight too and looks good. she recounted a story about how when she first moved to her grandmother's house in quincy, my other friend (hugh), who incidentally was the best man at my wedding, had rode his bike all the way down to the house and gave her a stuffed animal. he had given it to her because she was concerned that she didn't know anyone in the neighborhood. thus, with the stuffed animal, she would at least know one person. i don't really do the story justice (meredith did a much better retelling of the story). she laughed and thought it was funny how that was one of the things she remembered about the past.

anyway, i'm glad i saw meredith again. seeing childhood friends always cheer me up. some might even say it makes me all sappy, which is why come christmas time... i get a little thankful for all of my friends. regardless, i hope to see meredith again in the upcoming months.

I Still Suck At Personal Training

apparently after watching iron man in the theaters, my personal training duties were not completely finished yesterday.

my friend (hot amy) came over to finalize the grades for the class that her and karen were teaching. after grading, karen and hot amy went shopping to celebrate. i had arrived back from the movie just in time to celebrate the dinner aspect. shortly afterwards, we did a quick workout... we ran.

for any of you who are wondering, this running with hot amy yesterday did not come completely out of the blue. she had actually asked me about running some time ago. believe me, i was surprised when she had first asked because it was well known that hot amy does not like to sweat. naturally, i agreed to show her how to run.

i had envisioned hot amy to run like phoebe in that friends episode where phoebe and rachel begin running together in the park. thus, i pictured hot amy to run with her arms flailing. i was quite surprised to find out that she's not bad at running... apparently because she used to do quincy track club way back when. she even had some ribbons from races. who knew?

anyway, i think one of the reasons why hot amy wants to learn how to run is not necessarily the getting in shape aspect of it, but more of the competitiveness of it. awhile ago, i thought it would be interesting to see hot amy race against her bff (andrea) who also never ran before. thus, i had imagined two women sprinting down a race track with their arms flailing around. soon, that got the gears in my head turning and thinking about the possibility of having a race between karen, kerry, jen, hot amy, andrea, janine, terri, etc.

and with the olympics coming this year, i immediately thought of the 100 meter dash (because i associate that event with the olympics... which is also one of the reasons why i even began running track and field in high school. yes, i had such aspirations growing up.) anyway, as 100 meters would be too long for non-runners, i decided to shorten the possible race to 50 meters. thus, i proposed the idea to some friends and for the most part, all of them were on board.

so needless to say, i think hot amy is more concerned about winning this 50 meter race than actually running per se. (i was actually tempted to add a video clip of her running to this blog post to show how hot amy was actually a decent runner, but thought against doing so because i didn't want other competitors to get an edge... you know... level playing field.)

anyway, i hope hot amy enjoyed the quick running lesson. perhaps this will spark her interest to run more, in which case she can join the friday night running club (which has been on hiatus for a little while). just kidding. that may be too much to ask...

I Suck At Iron Man

yesterday after running my favorite sister-in-law through another bosu workout, i met up with my friends (marc and kelley). the geeks that we are, we went to see the movie "iron man" at randolph.

now, i suck at iron man. growing up, i always thought he was an okay superhero as far as comic books go. according to my friend wikipedia

"Iron Man (Anthony Edward "Tony" Stark) is a fictional character, a comic book superhero appearing in publications from Marvel Comics. Created by writer-editor Stan Lee, scripter Larry Lieber, and artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby, Iron Man first appeared in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963). Tony Stark, after being gravely injured and forced to build a devastating weapon, instead created a suit of power armor to save his life and help protect the world as Iron Man. He is a wealthy industrialist and genius inventor whose metal suit is laden with technological devices that enable him to fight crime."

for anyone curious, my favorite comic book superhero growing up was "hawkeye". hawkeye had no special powers, but he had a bow... and a funny sense of humor.

needless to say, the movie of iron man was done very well. i even liked it more than the spiderman movies. robert downey jr makes an awesome tony stark. and surprisingly enough, gwenyth paltrow was good in the supporting role of pepper potts.

anyway, the geek that i am... i loved the movie. it reminded me of my childhood where superheroes kicked butt.

I Still Suck At Personal Training

yesterday, my favorite sister-in-law (janine) came over to do a workout.

since she started the "mad dash" (which is the ymca's version of the biggest loser) she has lost some considerable weight. her weight loss and muscle gain is quite noticeable. i'm very happy that she has been able to see the results of all of her hard work.

apparently, janine told karen and i a story about how there were a pair of clothes she had bought prior to the mad dash that she wore the other day. as it turns out, the clothes were now huge on her, so she looked silly wearing the outfit that night. i wish she could have taken a picture of it, just so i could see it.

anyway, janine wanted to do yet another bosu workout. because i still suck at personal training, i obliged and ran her through the bosu workout. (pictured below is janine doing a workout. although not pictured, she is actually standing on the bosu ball.)



janine did an awesome job on the workout. the awful brother-in-law that i am, i worked her until she could not do any more pushups. (yes, i do derive some pleasure in making people workout until their muscles totally fail.) but, she did it, which is an accomplishment that should not go unnoticed. in fact, it even looked like she was not even challenged during some of the exercises... so i'll have to make things a little harder for next time. (perhaps i'll have her flip tires like in the biggest loser... now that i know where there are some...)

anyway, i'm quite proud of janine. she is doing a fabulous job... now if only she'd listen to me and change her strength training regimen and forget the ymca's "standard training" protocol in favor a more intense strength training workout... but that can come later. she's doing amazing regardless.

I Suck At Celebrating Terri's Birthday

saturday, a bunch of friends and i celebrated a birthday. the birthday plans were first proposed by my friends (bill and jen). from there, my other friend (hot amy) flushed out the details for the rest of the plan.

anyway, the person's birthday that we were celebrating is hot amy's sister (terri). naturally, i suck at celebrating terri's birthday. the plans were as thus: to have dinner at blue-22, which is a restaurant located in quincy by the quincy center mbta subway train station. the restaurant is partly owned by my friend (garv), who incidentally is considered an intellectual genius by hot amy. blue-22 was supposedly chosen for dinner because terri likes blue drinks, and blue-22 features a blue martini. (sure that was the reason...) (pictured below are terri and hot amy.)



i had visions of this dinner celebration going all awry because it was a hodge podge of different people (terri, her husband dave, bill, hot amy, jen, carlos, kerry, karen and i) and usually with large groups, it's always tough to please everyone. plus, we were seated at a rectangular table... and for anyone who knows me... i hate eating at rectangular tables when there are large parties. the reason i dislike them so much (curse you rectangular tables!) is that people will get segregated by where they sit such that one end of the table will be having a separate conversation as opposed to the other end of the table... and the people in the middle have the option of floating between both. thus, i prefer circular tables because the design makes it such that everyone is involved.

needless to say, i got to sit at the end or the rectangular table. it was actually quite fun because it gave me the opportunity to chat with garv (who was working that night) and his brother (kevin) who i have not seen in ages. it was fun and it made the night fun. plus, i got to chat with my bff (kerry) and karen who were also by my end of the table.

of course, it could have been the alcohol talking. prior to the dinner celebration, karen and i went to jen and bill's place. jen and bill had found this drink called absente, absinthe refined, which apparently according to their website:

"Absinthe was the trademark drink during the heady days of 19th century Paris. Famous artists, writers and poets like Picasso, Baudelaire, Hemingway, Degas, Manet, Toulouse-Lautrec and Oscar Wilde all heavily indulged in it. Maybe it was the mystical allure of "The Green Fairy," or maybe it helped inspire their creativity.

Whatever the reason, experience Absente, Absinthe Refined, and recall the glamour of nineteenth century Paris.

We know what you're thinking. Absinthe has been banned in the United States since 1915 because people were hallucinating and having way too much fun, how did you bring Absinthe back?

Absente, Absinthe Refined, is a modern version of the original Absinthe recipe. It's still the same aromatic, dazzling emerald green liqueur made from a combination of exotic botanicals.

The only difference is we replaced Wormwood, the botanical that caused the initial ban, with a less bitter cousin called Southern-Wormwood, also known as "Petite Absinthe," which allows us to offer Absente in the United States.

Absente, Absinthe Refined , is best defined as a modern Absinthe."

the drink is 55% alcohol by volume... very nice. jen, bill and i indulged in drinking it. it was very nice.

anyway after blue-22, a few of us ended up at bad abbots, which is a pub also in quincy. that was an interesting experience to say the least. there were two married men who were trying to pick up women (karen and hot amy being two of them). apparently, hot amy's eyes melted one of them. (and you sometimes wonder how hot amy got the "moniker" of hot.) but the good news from bad abbots is that kerry now has a glass from the place. she wanted a particular glass that had a shamrock on it. being a bff, i could not disappoint her.

regardless, the birthday celebration was a good time. happy birthday terri!

I Suck At Cleaning Cars

today has been a hectic and frustrating day at work. so it goes without saying that once it was time to leave work for the day, i was actually looking forward to taking the mbta subway home. (you know it's a bad day at work when i look forward to an mbta subway train ride home.)

anyway, one reason i was looking forward to the mbta train ride home was the fact that karen was going to be there to meet me. as it turned out, my friends (hot amy and carlos) were also available to take the train. well, it was an interesting ride home to say the least.

as there was a little drizzle coming down, i managed to twist hot amy's arm to give all of us a ride home. (i suspect that i really didn't have to twist her arm too much considering the company that was present.) the only condition for getting chauffeur service, however, was that i had to clean the inside of her car.

now, i have no problem cleaning cars. unfortunately, i suck at cleaning cars. apparently, the inside of hot amy's car is full of lint. aside from the blood splatter stains on the passenger side of car, there is lint all over the fabric of the seats in the front of the car, on the back of the front seats, and that arm rest separating the two front seats. hot amy claims that the lint is a result of her black sweater. personally, i am curious as to what she is doing with this sweater. i have this vision in my head that she is swinging her sweater around like it were a rally towel because there is just lint everywhere. i cannot imagine how else she would be able to get lint everywhere in that car. (well, i suppose i can imagine other ways she would be getting lint everywhere in her car... but that may be too risque to write and it's something i don't want to think about my friends doing.)

anyway, hot amy's niece usually picks the lint off the seats for her. due to child labor laws and the agreed conditions to receive a ride home, i had to remove the lint from the seats with the provided lint brush (which just so happened to be in the car). and again, i didn't mind doing it. i figured it was the only way hot amy would ever get me to clean her car because lord knows... she'll never beat me in any challenge or wager to even warrant a car cleaning. (pictured below is carlos with the lint brush. yes, he's in the back seat behind hot amy... also lint cleaning. i guess you could say he's been in the back seat of hot amy's car... hello... just kidding.)



needless to say, it was an interesting ride to my parents' house. i think karen, carlos, and i managed to clean up most of the lint in the car.

I Still Suck At Hanging Out With Coworkers

tonight, my coworkers and i went out after work. my new boss (anthony) wanted to get the entire team together and hang out. the last time the team went out, one of the members (sean) was in china. so tonight, the entire team was present. apparently, anthony likes to have outings to bring the team together and boost morale and all that.

i'd say it's a good method to build teamwork because booze and food are involved. unfortunately, i still suck at hanging out with coworkers. we ended up going to the elephant and castle pub and restaurant (like last time).

it's funny because i have been to plenty of company outings during my six year tenure at work... and each time i have always dreaded going out with coworkers. and again, it's not that i dislike my coworkers. i like my coworkers. i think it's more of the fact that these company outings are like "forced" get togethers.

needless to say, the food was delicious at the restaurant. (i had grilled salmon... and naturally a few pints of guinness.) i'll have to admit, it was actually a good time. maybe i shouldn't dread these company outings so much because i have had a pretty good time the last times out. then again, it could be the beer talking. but yeah, we hung out, told stories, laughed. it was fun.

anyway, i got to ride the subway train home with anthony afterwards (he lives in braintree which happens to be the destination of the same train i take home.) as he would normally have walked from the station to his house, i offered him a ride because it was quite late... and dark out. so lucky for anthony, he got to meet my parents while i picked up the car.

incidentally, my parents were quite impressed that he knew chinese better than i did. (he's a "white devil" with "yellow fever" as he is married to a chinese woman. plus, he has lived in hong kong.) so needless to say, i got to spend some quality time with the new boss. it was actually quite nice. i got to learn more about my new boss. he seems like he really cares about the team... it's a nice feeling... hopefully, he'll stick around because i sure would like him to... but we'll see.

I Suck At The Kentucky Derby

my friend (andrea) contacted me this morning. as we are both currently addicted to the application known as "scramble" in facebook, we played a few rounds together. for those of you who are curious, scramble is basically boggle... only on the internet (or more accurately, on facebook).

andrea and i have played a few games together now and each time i have outscored her. apparently, being hot amy's bff has not been too good for her. hot amy's aversion to victory has rubbed off on andrea because she can't seem to win a game against me. not one to give up, andrea is determined to beat me. she is apparently a glutton for punishment. hopefully i can use this to my advantage to challenge her and possibly get her to wash my car... or something.

anyway, andrea had to cut one of her rounds short because her dad came to pick her up. i had almost forgotten that she was going on vacation today. andrea was going to be visting the state of kentucky. now normally, i would not want to go to kentucky... ever... because kentucky conjures images of the movie "deliverance" only in kentucky and not atlanta. plus, i would probably stick out a little if i were in kentucky. that said, andrea was going to attend the kentucky derby.

naturally, that got me thinking. i suck at the kentucky derby. i would actually like to attend it at some time. according to my friend wikipedia:

"The Kentucky Derby is a Grade I stakes race for three-year-old thoroughbred horses, held annually in Louisville, Kentucky, on the first Saturday in May, capping the two-week-long Kentucky Derby Festival. The race is one and a quarter miles (2 km) at Churchill Downs. Colts and geldings carry 126 pounds (57.2 kg) and fillies 121 pounds (54.9 kg). The race is known in the United States as "The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports" for its approximate duration, and is also called "The Run for the Roses" for the blanket of roses draped over the winner. It is the first leg of the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing in the US and typically draws around 155,000 fans.

Kentucky has been a major center of horse breeding and racing since the late 18th century. From the time the region was settled, the fields of the Bluegrass region were noted for producing superior race horses. In 1872, Col. Meriwether Lewis Clark, Jr., grandson of William Clark of the Lewis and Clark expedition, traveled to England, visiting the Epsom Derby, a famous race that had been running annually since 1780. From there, Clark went on to Paris, France, where in 1863, a group of racing enthusiasts had formed the French Jockey Club and had organized the Grand Prix de Paris, which at the time was the greatest race in France.

Returning home to Kentucky, Clark organized the Louisville Jockey Club for the purpose of raising money to build quality racing facilities just outside of the city. The track would soon become known as Churchill Downs, named for Meriwether Lewis Clark Jr.'s relatives, John and Henry Churchill, who had provided the land for the racetrack. Officially, the racetrack was incorporated as Churchill Downs in 1937."

now, i'm not big into gambling or any of that. but i'd still love to attend the kentucky derby... if only to see the horses. (growing up, i used to love horses because they seemed so majestic. in fact, i still find them very majestic.) i'd also love to see what the whole atmosphere is like during the kentucky derby.

i hear there is a mint julip concoction that is the official drink of the derby. (a mint julip is an iced drink consisting of bourbon, mint and sugar syrup. yes, sounds very appetizing.) i'd love to try it just to see what it tastes like. i'd also love to try the burgoo, which is a traditional thick stew of beef, chicken, pork and vegetables.

maybe some day...

well, hopefully andrea will have a good time...