I Suck At Hanging Out With Marc And Kelley

last night was reunion night. and by reunion night, i mean karen's high school reunion night. it has been 15 years since karen graduated from high school. her class decided to organize a reunion for the 15 year mark because they had apparently missed the 10 year mark. and by organize... i mean the class spread the news via word of mouth and via the social networking platform known as "facebook". so needless to say, the reunion was not going to be a true reunion because right off the bat... people who do not know the organizers would be excluded (and apparently, i was correct because karen later told me that there were no asian people at the reunion. for anyone curious, there is a large asian population in quincy... how do you miss inviting the huge asian population? i have no idea... i guess they just weren't popular enough.) but i guess you have to give the organizers some credit for even trying.

so while karen was at her reunion, i hung out with my friends (marc and kelley). too bad i suck at hanging out with marc and kelley. marc and kelley came over because karen had the car.

as always, it was good to hang out with marc and kelley. it's especially a great time to hang out with kelley when she has been drinking. sadly, kelley did not imbibe too much at my place. she nursed her ginger ale/whiskey drink for most of the night. she did, however, have two martinis beforehand at blue-22... in addition to about 30 wings from what i was told.

anyway, the three of us grabbed a quick bite to eat at panera in hanover and then just hung out watching movies. we started the movie night off with "get smart". i actually thought it was pretty good... for a movie remake of a tv show. most tv shows that have been made into movies lately have not been too good. but get smart was entertaining. in addition to having "the rock", the movie also had another professional wrestler who goes by the name of "khali" in it. it was interesting. (for the record, the rock rules!)

(the video below is the trailer for get smart.)


the movie ended pretty early so we still had some time to kill. after fiddling around with my playstation 2, which sadly does not seem to be working properly, we decided to watch another movie and make it a double feature movie night. (yes, i am very saddened about my playstation 2. perhaps now, this could be my reason to get a new gaming console.)

we ended up watching resident evil 3: extinction. i have never seen the other two resident evil movies, but marc and kelley had. i absolutely loved the resident evil video game series. in fact, resident evil 4 is one of my favorite games of all time. so needless to say, i had no problems with watching the resident evil 3 movie.

(the video below is the trailer for resident evil 3: extinction.)


marc, however, was actually somewhat tired. so he took a little nap during the movie. so kelley and i watched the movie. i must say, the movie was entertaining. i will now have to go back and watch the other two movies. i can't wait.

thinking about the whole resident evil video game series brings back such great memories. i remember my favorite sister-in-law (janine) telling me about how she used to also play the games in the dark and how it would freak her out. survival horror at its finest. love it!

anyway, i had a great time hanging out with marc and kelley. i hope they likewise enjoyed it. i know a lot of people probably don't get too excited over watching movies. but it was nice to simply hang out and have fun.

I Still Suck At Casting

on wednesday, my bff (kerry) told me that she actually came up with an asian actress to play my friend (aimee) in the movie about all of us. kerry obviously read about my choice from my blog. i am guessing that she thinks i still suck at casting because she offered another actress to play aimee.

kerry's choice to play aimee is keiko agena of gilmore girls fame. since i have never seen gilmore girls, i never knew the actress even existed. keiko agena plays "lane kim" in the show.

(pictured below is keiko agena as aimee... according to kerry.)


anyway, at the the black friday dinner, i mentined to everyone kerry's choice to play aimee. i had mentioned it only because my friend (marc) had told me that he liked my casting choice for aimee. the general consensus is that keiko agena would also be a nice choice in addition to siu ta.

i just thought i would throw that tidbit of information out there. in the span of less than a week, i went from zero asian actresses to two to play aimee in the movie about all of us. that's pretty good. although, now that i am thinking about it... we could have one of the actresses play aimee and the other actress play her sister (angela). i don't know. that's just silly talk.

I Suck At Black Friday

yesterday was the infamous day known as black friday. black friday is supposed to be one of the busiest retail shopping days of the year... but that is not why i consider it a day of infamy. black friday is the day i potentially could have died. thus, i suck at black friday.

for a few years now, my friends (cass and ellen) have been having all of us over on the day after thanksgiving. the premise is simple: everyone brings their leftovers from thanksgiving and then all of us partake in those thanksgiving leftovers. i guess you could say it is sort of like a potluck of thanksgiving leftovers. cass and ellen began the tradition because they generally host thanksgiving at their place for all of cass's and ellen's family. so, in an effort to get rid of the leftovers, they came up with the idea of the black friday dinner.

it was on one of those fateful black friday dinners where my eyes were definitely larger than my stomach. i used to have a nasty habit of devouring food. (who am i kidding... i still do.) needless to say, i met my match when a dish containing strips of steak appeared. thinking nothing of it, i simply placed an entire strip of steak in my mouth. i figured that i could chew the steak apart with my molars of steel. unfortunately, the steak proved to be a little more resilient. the steak would not break apart in my mouth.

i don't remember what caused my attempt to swallow the piece of steak. i actually think that one of my friends made some sort of joke and i... naturally... giggled. i think when i giggled, the swallowing action was triggered and the piece of steak attempted to go down my throat. that was not good, considering the strip of steak had not been broken down in the slightest.

so unfortunately, i started to choke. when i realized that the piece of steak was lodged in my throat, i calmly tapped karen on the shoulder so as to not make a scene. karen was busy talking about something and initially ignored me. so, i tapped her on the shoulder again. this time, karen realized what was going on and quickly had me get up so that she could perform abdominal thrusts on me. truth be told, i would have perfomed abdominal thrusts on myself had i remembered what the procedure was when doing it to oneself. (as you can tell, like most things... i forgot my cpr training.)

luckily, the piece of steak came out. i actually wanted to take a picture of it as an old keepsake, but karen quickly disposed of the evidence. my friends joked that karen's face turned whiter than mine when i was choking. looking back, i can laugh at the whole incident.

for my friends (garv and leeann), it was probably an interesting night for them. leeann had only dated garv for a brief time during that black friday dinner. so as it was, she barely knew any of us. she had to leave early that night to meet her friends. so when she got up to leave... that was when the choking incident happened. when it turned out that i was okay, she must have thought all of us were crazy because we were all laughing and joking again as though the whole choking thing was commonplace. thankfully, she ended up marrying garv.

anyway, that was awhile ago. yesterday i did not have any life threatening moments. my favorite brother-in-law (pj) and i had lunch together at the 99 restaurant in rockland. (i believe it is considered in rockland. the restaurant is off of 228 on the hingham/norwell/rockwell line.) pj loves the 99, in part because his friend (dee) works there. lunch was good.

afterwards, karen and i went to the black friday dinner. in addition to the usual cast of characters this year (cass, ellen, marc, kelley, karen and i), my friends (meredith and doug, and hugh and jenny with their two children) came to partake in the festivities.

it was nice to meredith again. meredith always seems to be happy, especially now that she is planning her wedding for july 4th of next year. and doug... he's a riot. he's a great guy.

likewise, i have not seen jenny and hugh (or their children) in quite some time. it was good to see them as well.

anyway, there were no choking incidents this year. i made sure to cut up my food into really tiny pieces. as usual, i had a good time seeing everyone again. for this holiday, i probably should hang out with my friends more. it will probably provide a good distraction during the holiday season.

I Still Suck At Thanksgiving

yesterday was thanksgiving. happy thanksgiving!

unfortunately, i still suck at thanksgiving. the day the pilgrims and native americans sat down for dinner is supposed to be a joyous day to give thanks. lately, however, i really haven't had much to give thanks to... outside of my family and friends. i mean... really... what can i say? thanks for taking my son (braden michael) away? thanks for replacing my security alarm? thanks for replacing my septic control panel? thanks for replacing the rear brakes in my car? thanks for [insert broken item needing to be replaced here]? thanks for all these headaches since braden passed away?

i know i must sound like a miserable person. right now, i feel pretty miserable. as insane as this sounds, i sometimes think going on a downward spiral would do wonders for me. it's like homer simpson's quote about alcohol: "the cause of-and solution to-all of life's problems". luckily, karen keeps me pretty grounded.

lately, it has just been hard to focus of the positives since braden passed away. i suppose i should be thankful that i was able to even see braden for the one week that he lived. i'm obviously thankful that i have a great family... and great friends who have supported both karen and i throughout these times. aside from that, i feel like i keep waiting and waiting for something "good" to happen. it has definitely been some trying times.

anyway, karen and i started off our thanksgiving... running about three miles to my favorite sister-in-law's (janine) for breakfast. apparently, the story goes that janine was supposed to send karen a recipe for pumpkin waffles. janine kept forgetting to send the recipe. so instead, she invited us over for breakfast to have the pumpkin waffles. (for the record, the waffles... very delicious... and filling. cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound.) and well, in our efforts to do some sort of exercise, karen and i decided to have our own turkey trot road race and run to her place from our house.

when breakfast was over, karen and i then went back home and prepared for thanksgiving dinner at karen's parents' place. it's funny. it seems like the entire day is planned around getting ready for meals. karen's parents had invited my parents over as well for thanksgiving dinner. thus, both my parents and karen's parents would be at the same place this thanksgiving. having both sets of parents in one location is so convenient and less stressful. before, karen and i would have to visit karen's parents in the day... and then leave there to go to my parents in the evening. it was just too complicated... and often a waste of food because inevitably we would be too full to eat later in the day.

regardless, thanksgiving dinner was very good. i think my parents enjoyed it as well. heading down to quincy, karen and i noticed that our car was making a rattling sound... yet another thing to be "thankful" for, i guess.

i think the most memorable part of the day came after thanksgiving dinner. after driving my parents back to their place, karen's parents, karen and i went to visit karen's grandmother (nana) who is currently living at a nursing home (marian manor) in boston. we brought nana a turkey dinner and called karen's other relatives via our cell phone. nana spoke to all of her children to wish them happy thanksgiving. when she spoke to her son (richie... karen's uncle), she said the funniest thing to him... "it's about time you did something." karen's uncle richie has not exactly visited nana that often since she's been in the nursing home. granted, he lives in tennessee. it was just comical that nana replied with that statement when richie told her he was coming up on christmas to see her. i think richie got a chuckle out of it too.

but, i guess it just goes to show that all along nana knew what was going on... or not going on i suppose. she just could not communicate her thoughts for awhile due to the accident. i sometimes think people automatically assume the elderly do not know or comprehend things... which is a shame. the incident last night simply made me laugh.

anyway, that was pretty much my thanksgiving. hopefully, next year i will be in better spirits for thanksgiving. i guess we'll see...

I Suck At Pre-Thanksgiving

yesterday, my friend's (andrea) grandmother passed away. it is never fun to lose a loved one. i should know... i lost my son (braden michael) after he was only a week old in september. and it definitely is not fun to lose a loved one before the holiday season.

it seems to me that when people pass away, there exists a lot of awkwardness in terms of communication or verbalizing thoughts to those whom the deceased left behind. in reality, there are no words that people can say to help with the grieving. in my opinion, the best thing that can probably be done is to acknowledge the loss and offer condolences.

so andrea, i'm sorry for your loss. obviously, if you need help with anything, please let me know. karen and i (and i am sure many of your other friends) are here for you. i hope things will get better for you soon.

the news yesterday morning of andrea's grandmother's passing probably set my mood for the rest of the day. my mind has a tendency to follow a bizarre train of thought. with the passing of andrea's grandmother, however, i simply thought about the passing of my own son, braden, for a good portion of the day.

thus, my solemn mood may have followed me when i went to my friends' (jen and bill) for a little pre-thanksgiving celebration. so unfortunately, i suck at pre-thanksgiving.

jen and bill planned a martini and movie night yesterday. in particular, they had planned to watch a christmas movie... which one?... i'm not sure. nonetheless, it was a good time. my bff (kerry), my favorite sister-in-law (janine), and my friends (carlos, hot amy, and bruce) were all there in addition to karen and i.

it has been quite some time since i've seen all of them. so it was nice. what started out as a trip down memory lane in terms of looking at old pictures and whatnot... turned out to be simply kerry and i talking about our high school days. apparently, everyone else went to watch television... and interestingly enough... they did not watch any christmas movie whatsoever. they watched the show, "three sheets"... which is a show whereby the host simply gets all liquored up in other countries. it's an interesting job to have, that is for sure.

anyway, hopefully i won't get sick. kerry was a little under the weather as was hot amy. although i do not think hot amy got me sick this time around, i actually think she may have poisoned me. she made some bacon dip for chips. don't get me wrong, the dip was very good. i consumed a lot of the dip. unfortunately, my stomach has not been agreeing with the dip today. it is either that or the mass quantities of pizza, which carlos brought over, that i inhaled. who knows?

but all in all, it was a good time at jen and bill's. it was definitely good to see all of them again.

I Still Suck At Casting

i had a quick conversation with my friend (aimee) yesterday about this whole casting thing about who would play you in the movie. sadly, i still suck at casting... but at least i'm still smart enough to not cast rosie o'donnell as any of my friends.

anyway, one of the problems i have had with casting certain actors or actresses for my friends happens to be the fact that there are just not that many asian actors or actresses in the american movie industry. normally, that would not be a problem... except that i have a number of asian friends. (if you can name a handful of asian actors off the top of your head who are not past their prime then i would be quite impressed.)

i have always tried to think of someone to cast for aimee, who seems to be one of the few commenting contributors to this blog. unfortunately, i could never think of an asian actress that would make a good choice to play her.

a while ago, it was first proposed to me that the actress in the movie, harold and kumar go to white castle, should play aimee. which actress you may ask? well, if you have seen the movie, the character is "cindy kim". in the movie, cindy is the princeton student who tries to get harold to attend asian-american student meetings because she thinks he is a "twinkie". (for the record, harold and kumar... great movie.)

naturally, i thought the original proposition was a result of our silliness. it was not until yesterday, however, that i decided to actually explore the idea. might i add, finding a picture of siu ta... very difficult.

as i started to look over the pictures of siu ta, i started to think... siu ta actually would not be a bad selection for aimee.

(pictured below is siu ta as aimee.)


so, for my casting call, i think i will go with siu ta to play aimee. of course, if siu ta were selected to play aimee, she would have to learn capoeira now too.

I Suck At The YMCA

last night, karen and i attended a staff meeting at the south shore ymca in quincy. the meeting was in regards to the upcoming workout classes offered by the ymca. every session that a workout program is offered, there is a general meeting to review things like the program protocol and whatnot.

as staff members, karen and i are required to attend. obviously, with our son's (braden michael) birth and passing a little over two months ago, karen and i have been away from the ymca for some time. so, the meeting last night marked our return to the ymca as staff members. too bad i suck at the ymca.

should karen and i be blessed again to conceive another child, this could very well be our last session at the ymca. the doctors have already told us that karen would probably not be able to do many things should she be pregnant again to prevent the possibility of another early birth. among those things would include standing on a hard cement floor in the ymca research area for three hours straight.

but i guess we'll see. in some ways, i would be relieved to leave the ymca. in other ways, i would feel saddened to leave. for anyone curious, i work part-time at the ymca as a research instructor. the core duties of a research instructor are to train the participants of the research program the proper techniques in strength training, make sure they incorporate cardiovascular exercise, and make sure they follow a sensible nutrition plan.

when i started working at the ymca well over five years ago, i always felt that the work was about the participants and making a difference in their lives. i got to meet a lot of interesting people. at the same time, it was quite rewarding to help the participants achieve their personal fitness goals... whatever those goals may have been.

as time went on, however, i felt that things at the ymca became less about the participants and more about the ymca itself. it was just how i felt and as more time progressed, i slowly found myself working less and less at the ymca. it should be noted though, that my feelings were in no way a result of my boss (rita) or any of the other staff members. rita and the staff are great. unfortunately, they have own marching orders.

looking back, i had a great time being a research instructor. if you have seen the show, the biggest loser, you would know the trainers bob and jillian. the trainers are sort of like good trainer/bad trainer respectively. similarly at the ymca, there were always two research instructors for each program. inevitably, i would always end up as jillian... just without the yelling.

anyway, the meeting went well. it was nice to see everyone at the ymca again... well... see everyone that i knew like my friends (rita, ally and tom). there were also a lot of new faces at the meeting that i did not recognize.

i actually almost started to tear when rita made an announcement about our return to the ymca staff. that probably would not have been good, considering there were many new faces at the meeting who have never met me before. they probably would have thought i was a nut. maybe it was thoughts about not having braden around during the holidays or whatever... but when rita welcomed karen and i back at the meeting, she almost alluded to the reason for our hiatus and i just started to think more about braden. naturally, that got me somewhat choked up.

the rest of the meeting went okay. as an added bonus, we did get free t-shirts... not just karen and i... all of the staff members. free t-shirts are always good. in fact, i would say the free t-shirts made the meeting.

after the meeting, karen had a nutrition counseling appointment. so while she did that, i decided to try to clear my thoughts and go running at the ymca. usually, i just put my ipod on and run. for anyone curious, the last time i ran... i ran to the new kids on the block... to their latest album. yes... strange i know, but it has good beats to run to. yesterday i ran to angels and airwaves... love them.

needless to say, i just ran to clear my thoughts. i ended up running three miles... which is not bad... but unfortunately, when all was said and done, i still thought about how braden was not around to enjoy the holidays with us. i definitely think it will be a tough holiday season this year... not having our little braden with us.

I Still Suck At Casting

one of the topics that inadvertently came up in conversation last night was the "who would play you in the movie about you" topic.

while watching heroes at my friends (marc and kelley), the commercial for rosie o'donnell's new variety show came on. personally, i don't know who thought it would be a good idea to give rosie o'donnell a variety show... but someone did. i personally don't find rosie that funny, but that's just me. (i'd probably watch the nick lachey and jessica simpson variety show again over the rosie variety show.)

anyway, the reason why i bring up rosie o'donnell was because at one time, rosie was selected to play kelley in the movie about kelley. for the record, the casting was not by me. i still suck at casting... but i don't suck that badly. my choice to play kelley is rose mcgowan of charmed fame... and the first scream movie... and former girlfriend of that nut, marilyn manson.

(pictured below is rose mcgowan as kelley.)


in an effort to spark another possible spy vs. spy incident, marc jokingly referred to kelley as rosie. needless to say, kelley was not too happy. but of course, the whole thing got me thinking again about who would play who in the movie.

so, for my choice (and probably for my physical well-being should kelley start inflicting bodily harm on anyone who thinks rosie should play her)... i'm sticking with my original choice of rose mcgowan.

I Still Suck At Buffy The Vampire Slayer

last night, karen and i hung out with our friends (marc and kelley). as this was going to be a busy week (with thanksgiving and all), we decided to get together on monday.

as usual it was a fun time. for dinner, we ordered takeout from the fowler house located in quincy. among other things, i truly suck at the fowler house. i generally use the "yum-o" phrase as coined by rachael ray whenever i refer to great tasting food. unfortunately, for some reason, i have never liked the food at the fowler house. the food always seemed greasy to me... and last night was no different. but, marc had a craving for the fowler house so all of us ordered food from there. as luck would have it, i was starving... so i would have eaten anything.

the only staple of the fowler house that cracks me up is seeing an old middle school teacher who seems to be regularly there. now, i don't go into the fowler house often... but whenever i am there... i can always count on seeing mr. henderson. it's very odd... and funny at the same time to see an old middle school teacher there because when you grow up, you look at your teachers as... teachers... and not regular everyday people... at least i do.

anyway, one would think that mr. henderson owns the fowler house for always being there... he doesn't... it is just pure coincidence that he is there whenever i am there... or maybe he is quite the regular... a la "norm" from cheers.

needless to say, all of us had dinner and watched some more episodes of the greatest show ever: buffy the vampire slayer. now i still suck at buffy the vampire slayer. we were able to squeeze in three more episodes before watching the latest episode of heroes. (heroes, by the way, is definitely not as good as it used to be this season.)

the episodes from season 2 of buffy that we were able to watch included the episode about ted (starring the former john ritter), mind-controlling eggs, and buffy's 17th birthday surprise. all of them, of course, were great episodes. in fact, buffy's 17th birthday surprise sets up the rest of the season 2. love it!

knowing what happens, i am even more excited to watch the remainder of season two again with everyone... too bad i have to wait another week...

I Suck At Thanksgiving

last night, karen and i had thanksgiving dinner at my parents. yes, i know... thanksgiving is not even here yet. luckily, i suck at thanksgiving.

this year, karen and i are celebrating thanksgiving day at karen's parents' place. my parents were also invited and will be attending as well. this thursday will actually be the first time that both my family and karen's family will be together for a holiday. it definitely makes things easier for karen and i because we won't have to scramble around going from place to place to visit our family, eat turkey... and then eat more turkey... and all that.

because we are celebrating thanksgiving day with karen's family, my parents wanted to have everyone over for dinner beforehand. i suppose you can call it a pre-thanksgiving day dinner. so in addition to karen and myself, my parents invited karen's parents over for the pre-thanksgiving dinner, along with my cousin (betty) and her son (marvin) and my mom's friend (jan).

dinner was very nice. as usual, my parents made way too much food for the nine of us. there was roast beef, turkey, pasta, corn, sweet potatoes, homemade cranberry sauce, canned cranberry sauce, rice... etc. there were even a ton of desserts afterwards too like cherry pie, frozen yogurt pie, cranberry/blueberry bread... and apple pie. karen's father made a homemade apple pie... it's very good. i think he makes the best apple pies.

with all the food, it's no wonder why i was an overweight kid growing up. it's weird. i guess i took my parents' cooking for granted when i was growing up. as i look back now... i didn't realize how tasteful their dishes really were. i really should learn how to cook from them before it's too late. i guess it's never too late to learn.

anyway, i had a good time at the pre-thanksgiving day dinner. hopefully everyone else did as well. but it was a nice way to kick off the holiday season. i generally get all sappy and lame during the holidays. in fact, i'm usually a pile of mush by now. sadly, this year has been a little harder to get into the holiday spirit. so we'll see how the rest of the season goes.

I Suck At Visiting The Cemetery

on friday, my son (braden) had some unexpected company.

my mother came down for a visit on friday. she was required to take an online training course for her work. the only problem... my mother does not have access to the internet. (well, technically she does. she still has a dial up connection on her home computer, but she rarely goes on the internet.)

because the online training course had streaming video, my mother could not exactly take the course at her house. thus, i asked my mom if she wanted to come over and use my computer. and so, she came over after work on friday.

before she started the training course, however, my mom and i went to visit braden at the cemetery. now i suck at visiting the cemetery. all right... perhaps i don't really. in the mornings, i say "hello and good morning" to my son as i pass by the cemetery on my way to work (or on my way to drop off karen at work). i also try to go inside the cemetery as often as i can. i'm hoping some day things will get easier when i visit braden because i still miss him a lot.

but i suppose i should consider myself somewhat lucky. some people don't even get the chance to even meet their son, if only for a week. i think the holidays are definitely going to be hard this year.

anyway, the unexpected visitors at braden's grave site were not my mom or i... the unexpected visitors were wild turkeys (and i don't mean a bunch of drunk guys at the bar). nope, i mean... wild... with feathers and a throat wattle... turkeys.

(pictured below is one of the turkeys at braden's site.)


my mom counted at least six of them. it was wild... literally. i was actually hesitant to get out of the car at first because i was not sure if wild turkeys attacked or not. after all, i didn't want to star in the next "when turkeys attack" video or something like that. my mom, on the other hand, had no problem. she was all smiles and in awe... and she hopped right out of the car.

when we approached braden's site, the turkeys calmly walked away. it was nice that the turkeys came to visit my son. i almost felt like they were there to wish him a happy thanksgiving. of course, i could just be crazy. but seeing the turkeys there was very nice. the sight made me think that turkeys wanted to kick off the holidays with my son. so maybe this holiday season won't be so bad. i don't know.

as an added bonus, the family headstone was installed on the plot. i realize it seems very odd to get excited over a headstone. i'm just glad the headstone was installed before the winter season... and the snow... and all that. the company that installed the headstone (quincy memorials) wanted to have the headstone in place for us before thanksgiving. i thought that was very nice of them. quincy memorials, however, did not have enough time to finish braden's marker yet. so, we're still waiting on that. but i must say, braden's site is starting to come around.

I Still Suck At Buffy The Vampire Slayer

last night, karen and i got to see our friends (marc and kelley). marc and kelley were in washington dc for a good portion of the week, so we could not meet up on our regularly schedule wednesday. so instead, we met up yesterday.

for anyone curious, kelley was attending a conference in washington dc for work. both kelley and marc seemed to have a good time. i did not hear of any spy vs. spy episode where marc tried to kill kelley or vice versa this time around, so i'm guessing things were pretty good.

i've only been to washington dc once thus far and it was quite memorable. aside from seeing the zoo, the museums, the famous landmarks and monuments, the white house, and ben's chili bowl, i got to tell the police that my eyes were blue in washington dc. (for anyone curious, my eyes are not blue.)

after visiting arlington national cemetery, karen and i (and a few other tourists) actually witnessed a woman jumping off a bridge. it was quite memorable to say the least. this woman was sitting on the bridge with her feet dangling off of the side of the bridge. the next thing you know, she pushes herself off... plummeting into the water.

luckily, the woman was okay. the police came to take statements from everyone. one of the police officers asked what color my eyes were... and naturally i said blue. in my defense, i have been conditioned to say "blue" for eye color now thanks to karen and the whole incident whereby my friends asked me what color karen's eyes were after i made the claim that i was an "eye-guy". (my answer then was "hazel", which i have been told is nowhere near blue.) nonetheless, i told the police officer my eyes were blue... to which he told me not to speak again. oh well.

anyway, kelley prepared a nice chicken dinner with rolls, couscous and aparagus. it was very good. (cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound.) kelley is quite the cook these days.

the four of us hung out and watched another episode of heroes... to which marc seems to be losing interest in this season. (and i'll admit, the storylines have been a little convoluted of late.)

luckily, we watched some more episodes of buffy the vampire slayer afterwards. yep, i still suck at buffy the vampire slayer. the episodes we watched ("what's my line, part 1 and 2) introduced kendra, the other slayer. the storyline had to deal with buffy and her bleak future outside of being a vampire slayer during "career week". it was also the first time xander and cordelia first smooch.

it's amazing how much i forget when i haven't seen the episodes in a while. it's such a good show. watching buffy again has definitely been a nice escape from reality... if even for a couple of hours.

I Suck At Cell Phones

since my son (braden) passed away, things have seemed to break or needed repair for both karen and i. adding to the snowballing list of expenses now... our cell phones.

both karen and i have had the same cell phone for quite some time... at least 4 years. karen had a cell phone prior to then. she actually upgraded to a new phone when i got mine over four years ago. at the time, i actually did not even want a cell phone because i knew i would hardly use it. to this day, i still hardly use my cell phone. nonetheless, i suppose the cell phone is good to have in case of emergencies or whatnot. (i almost sound like an old fogey for saying stuff like that.)

anyway, lately our cell phones have been losing its battery life very quickly. we would charge the battery and then the phone would "die" a couple of days afterwards. anyone who knows me, knows that i only recharge batteries when the entire battery has been drained. i don't charge batteries otherwise. so with the recent battery problem, karen and i decided to get new cell phones. too bad i suck at cell phones.

karen and i ended up going to the at&t store located on the hingham/norwell line. we had gotten there just as the store was closing. the sales associate (joseph), however, was kind enough to stay later to help us out. (it turns out, the sales associate gets commission for sales... so it's not like he helped us out of the kindness of his heart. there were ulterior motives for his wanting to help us after hours.)

we told the sales associate what we wanted... which wasn't much because all karen and i really do is use the phone to call people. we don't generally text. we don't use the camera. we don't use a lot of the features that come on most cell phones now. so the sales associate went to the back and brought out a bunch of phones for us to look at. karen and i decided on a phone (a nokia 6650).

as we went to pay for the phones, the sales associate told us that the phones come with a car charger. naturally, we thought... great! only problem... when we looked at the receipt, we saw that the car chargers were charged to the credit card.

of course, we questioned this fact with the sales associate. in what seemed like a convoluted story, he told us that the price of the phone was discounted from its original price so as to make the receipt appear like the car chargers were charged.

when it smells like feces, it probably is. anyway, karen and i have since gone to the at&t website to view the price of the phone. sure enough, the price of the phone is the same price that we were charged for. so, it appears like either a) the price of the phone is incorrect or b) the car charger was incorrectly charged. either way, the entire thing seems shady.

to be honest, with the passing of our son (braden), i don't think karen or i have time to deal with asinine things like this. we can better spend our energy elsewhere. but unfortunately, we have to go back to the store and question... yet again... the charges to our credit card.

I Suck At Working On The House

last night, karen and i completed another project off of our "to-do" list in terms of home improvement projects.

we have a long running list of projects that need to be done when we work on the house. unfortunately, i suck at working on the house. with the recent string of helping my friends and family with their home improvement projects, however, i may have been bitten by the home improvement bug again. so hopefully, karen and i can cross off more items from our "to-do" list.

the latest project to be completed: the corner cabinet.

when my brother moved, he gave karen and i a corner cabinet that was at his place. after all, my brother was not going to lug the corner cabinet all the way to texas, which is where he currently lives. so karen and i ended up with the piece of furniture.

my brother had gotten the piece of furniture from one of those unfinished furniture places. the cabinet has remained unfinished for quite some time. karen and i always meant to eventually stain the cabinet... we just never got around to it... until now.

(pictured below is the corner cabinet.)


when karen and i re-painted the living room, the process gave us a reason to revisit the cabinet project. after all, we wanted to "finish" the room off so that the room would actually look like a room instead of the construction mess that it has been for some time.

needless to say, karen and i ended up staining the cabinet. (we used the same stain that was used for the shelving unit in our kitchen.) and as usual, we did the coats of polyurethane and the wax.

i was going to switch out the hinges and use a more sleeker design... and by sleeker i mean hiding of the actual hinge itself. unfortunately, the cabinet door is not wide enough for those types of hinges. so, i had to leave the existing hinges on the cabinet. oh well.

i did, however, switch out the cabinet knob. the knob was an old wooden pull. the knob is now a nickel pull that resembles the pull knobs in our master bathroom... because we had an extra pull knob when we had the cabinets in our bathroom installed.

all in all, i'm happy with the way the cabinet came out. karen seems to like it as well. so that's good.

I Suck At Home Improvement

yesterday, i worked on a few home improvement projects. naturally, one would think that i was closer to getting my house finished and complete. unfortunately, the home improvement projects i worked on yesterday were not for my house... they were for karen's grandparents. so i guess you could say, i suck at home improvement.

sunday morning, i met my favorite brother-in-law (pj) at karen's grandparents' house which is located in hanover. generally speaking, whenever someone in the family has a home improvement project, pj is usually contacted. that is pj's thing. after all, it's what he does every day. just kidding.

i'm usually the one contacted for computer or other electronic issues. occasionally, i get called in to help with pj depending on the scope of the home improvement project. yesterday was no different as the main home improvement project was to install a counter top shelf. (there were a handful of other smaller projects as well.)

anyway, karen's grandfather, pj, and i then went to the local home improvement store (home depot) to gather supplies and whatnot for all of the projects. as i had just found out about the project the other day, i did not even know what the projects actually were.

needless to say, it took us a while to get everything at home depot. when he got back to karen's grandparents' house, we started all the projects. we actually completed quite a few... or i should say... pj completed quite a few. my main project was to install something in the shower to hold the shower head. yay!

the list of projects finished included:

installing the counter top shelf;
removing the casters from the existing cabinets;
drilling holes in the counter top for running wires;
installing the grommets (which apparently are what those things are called that get inserted into those counter top holes for wires... who knew?);
setting up the sewing machine;
setting up the computer (which runs windows 3.1... very sad);
installing the shower head holder;
installing two door pulls by the front entrance for karen's grandmother to grab hold of and use;
attaching a bracket to hold the planter pole upright;
and creating a small railing by the walkway for karen's grandmother.

i would say that the highlight of the day... aside from installing the counter top in the sauna of a room that it was going to be used in... was definitely the installation of the small railing by the walkway for karen's grandmother.

while installing the railing, pj somehow got his drill covered in... what can only be described as... stench. not only did he get this stuff on his drill, he got it on his sweatshirt... his hands... it was awful. the smell is indescribable. even when pj washed his hands numerous times, he could still smell it on him.

naturally, i had quite a chuckle watching him gag over the smell that he was covered in. yes, i'm a great brother-in-law. it was just humorous to watch him make faces.

pj even had the smell on him when we went out to eat afterwards. we went to uno's in hanover. lunch was very good. it was fun. i had a great time hanging out with pj... just sitting back, relaxing, watching the football game. i'm lucky to have a great brother-in-law.

I Suck At Getting An Oil Change

i think i have come to the realization that i am cursed. my friend (aimee) thinks that i am usually lucky. if only she knew how terribly mistaken she really is...

saturday was not exactly a great day. during the week, i remembered that it was time to bring our car in for an oil change. the car had definitely exceeded the customary 3000 mile mark from its last oil change. yes, i suck at getting an oil change.

so saturday morning, i brought the car in for an oil change. i generally bring the car in bright and early in the morning to the local firestone because i will have time afterwards to go about my normal day and do other things.

unfortunately, it just wasn't meant to be on saturday. in what has become a common trend of late, the car needed a repair... not just any repair... a new timing belt and a rear brakes.

since my son (braden) passed away over two months ago, it seems like things have continued to be... well... rather disappointing: our oil tank had to be serviced because the furnace was not receiving the oil properly; the septic system control panel to our house malfunctioned and needed repair; our alarm system needed to be repaired to properly send signals to their monitoring center; and now... the car.

it probably would not be so bad if these repairs were not all within a two month span. after all, it makes things like planning for a headstone for braden, planning for the remembrance jewelry for braden, and planning a vacation during braden's original due date a little more difficult.

needless to say, saturday was not fun. in addition to the annoyance of having to repair the car, both karen and i would actually have to be without the car for a good portion of the day while the brakes get fixed. so unfortunately, karen and i could not go anywhere. it's amazing how not having a car can limit things.

anyway, it was very frustrating day.

I Suck At The Sunnyside Bowladrome

this past friday, i did something that i have not done since starting my job in marblehead: i hung out with my coworkers after hours.

it's not that i dislike my coworkers or anything like that. i like my coworkers a lot. they are a great bunch of people to hang out with. it's just that with my long commute home, it occasionally makes after hours events a little more difficult.

friday, however, i got to hang out with my coworkers at the sunnyside bowladrome in danvers after work. i definitely suck at the sunnyside bowladrome. after all, i have never been to the bowladrome... or anywhere in danvers. my boss had planned this outing a while ago after a bunch of us had a group luncheon in marblehead. (the luncheon was quite fun, especially since all of us got to learn about the "triple deuces" offered by a local bar in town.)

needless to say, all of us had fun bowling. it seems like all bowling alleys look the same to me... and the sunnyside bowladrome is no different. inside is usually... old... with a musty smell... although the bowladrome did have an electronic scoring system (which reminded me a lot of atari with its old-school graphics).

i am extremely terrible at bowling... although i could probably still beat my friend (hot amy). and as added proof that i am definitely getting old, the left cheek of my derriere started getting sore, as did my shoulder. who knew bowling could be such a workout?

afterwards, a bunch of my coworkers walked on over to the onion town grill, which is a restaurant directly across the street from the bowladrome. i must say, i love that name "onion town". for anyone curious, danvers is apparently famous for onions... or more importantly... the danvers onion.

anyway, my coworkers and i had a great time on friday. when my coworkers left, i was then lucky enough to hang out with karen and my friends (kerry and jen)... who were also at onion town.

while i was out an about bowling up a storm at the sunnyside bowladrome, karen and jen took the commuter rail train up to salem to meet up and hang out with kerry. i think it's been a while since the three of them just hung out together. so it was nice that they were able to hang out together... at least, i hope it was.

i don't know what they did prior to onion town... if they did do anything prior to onion town... but i was lucky enough to meet up with them at onion town.

the four of us ended up going back to salem to a pub called o'neills. in case anyone is curious, o'neills is an an irish pub and restaurant. o'neills was rather interesting. not only did they have a pub and restaurant area, they have a dance area. while we were there, the place quickly filled with people on the dance floor... although i am not sure if they were actually dancing.

needless to say, i had a great time on friday.

kerry has since offered to make pancakes for us if we stay over her place the next time we are in salem instead of heading home. yummy... pancakes!

I Suck At Terms Of Endearment

in the latest installment of spy vs spy, my friend (marc) tried to take out my other friend (kelley) with a furnace. after all, tonight is wednesday... and wednesdays are what i call "marc and kelley" night. every week, i always look forward to "marc and kelley" night because i can always count on having a great time... laughing... and just hanging out with people who i admire and consider great friends. the weekly hang out provides a constant in what has become a rollercoaster ride following the death of my son (braden) over two months ago.

anyway, tonight marc tried to get rid of kelley via a furnace. i had picked up dinner for everyone from the falafel king located in quincy. (cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound... the falafel king is so good!) when i got to marc and kelley's place, there apparently was some sort of technical problem with the thermostat.

as luck would have it, i have been installing thermostats... a lot... within the past week. marc explained that the landlords already had someone come to look at the furnace that day. that person did not find anything wrong with the furnace. yet, for some reason, marc and kelley's thermostat was not working. kelley thought the pilot light was simply out.

anyway, karen and i thought that perhaps they should just hit the reset button on the furnace to see if that would restart things. so kelley got ready to go down to the basement to hit the reset button. before she went down, marc adamantly suggested that i accompany her. thinking nothing of it, i agreed.

both kelley and i ventured down to the basement. i was expecting a somewhat modern furnace. to my surprise, the furnace looked... ancient. i would consider the furnace "old school"... quite possibly an antique even. there was a metal lid, that reminded me of the hood of an old car, that had to be removed in order to get to the reset button. anyway, kelley pushed the reset button.

in what was quite possibly a scary... yet comical moment, flames shot out from the furnace for a brief second right in front of kelley. kelley's groin was considerably close to the flames... in fact, had the flames ignited kelley's groin, she could have possibly been like lindsay lohan... a "fire crotch". (that's a pop culture reference.)

needless to say, kelley was fine. and the heat started right up! so naturally, we had a good laugh over it. we have since used our creative licensing to change the story to make it seem like marc was trying to eliminate kelley again, using me as a pawn in his master plan. it sounds better at least.

after the incident, all four of us watched the latest episode of heroes. we were even able to catch another episode of the greatest show ever... buffy the vampire slayer. (the episode was about giles... the librarian/watcher... and his seedy past.)

as the episode was nearing its end, my friend (scott) was actually up and stopped on over. scott lives in new york. he occasionally has to come up to massachusetts for work, which he thankfully still has. his company recently had some layoffs. layoffs are never fun, especially in our current economy. i should know, i've been laid off twice in my short professional career (during the "dot-bomb" years).

anyway, it's always good to see scott. he is a great guy. while he was at marc and kelley's, he got a call from his wife (ofelia). not that we were eavesdropping or anything, but scott had used some terms of endearment when referring to ofelia.

naturally, karen asked me how come we don't use any terms of endearment. i didn't want to say... "because i suck at terms of endearment"... because i do. karen and i have never used any terms of endearment for one another since we have been together. no "honey", "hun", "sweetie", "schnookums"... nothing. we just never had the opportunity to use any terms. i guess you can say we are a strange couple that way.

this is not the first time this topic has come up in conversation. awhile ago, we discussed creating terms for each other. she couldn't come up with one for me. i, however, came up with "kiwi" for her. no, karen is not australian... and to my knowledge has no ties to australia. i chose "kiwi" because of the fruit with the same name.

karen is a registered dietitian, so i figured... fruit equals good! plus, the kiwi fruit is just such a cute looking fruit. and as it turns out, according to my friend wikipedia:

"The kiwifruit (or kiwi) is the edible berry of a cultivar group of the woody vine Actinidia deliciosa and hybrids between this and other species in the genus Actinidia. The Actinidia is native to Shaanxi, China."

the kiwi was apparently originally called the chinese gooseberry and was actually declared the "national fruit" of the people's republic of china. so i guess the term "kiwi" has more meaning than i thought.

the more that i think about it, the more i like... kiwi.

I Suck At Ireland

it's interesting. this just occured to me. one year ago today, i was in the motherland: ireland. i suck at ireland.

last year, my friends (jen, bill, hot amy, and andrea), karen and i decided to go to ireland together. needless to say, the trip was a fantastic time. i would go back to in a heartbeat. everything is just beautifully scenic in ireland... except the urinals. the urinals there were quite interesting to say the least.

(pictured below are all of us at the guinness factory.)


a while ago, my friend (bill) had originally proposed the idea of getting everyone together again and watching the videos that i had created from our trip. i had created a slide show from everyone's pictures and set them to irish music. each day had its own pictures and music. i included other videos i had taken while on the trip. the entire thing filled up 3 dvds. i think the finished product came out nice. i even made copies for everyone for the holidays last year.

ah, the good times of ireland. it's amazing how fast a year goes by. for karen and i, we had the birth of our son (braden)... and we also had his unfortunate passing within that one year. i bet braden would have loved the motherland. i can picture him now... except instead of the neonatal intensive care unit knit hat... he'd be wearing a scally cap...

anyway, ireland was an amazing trip. things (and i guess i mean more like... my life) were simpler back then. although i will probably never regain my fairytale outlook on things again, i can always look back at ireland and reminisce about the good ol' times.

so i don't know. maybe i will actually watch the videos again and think about braden with a scally cap. we'll see...

I Still Suck At Installing A Thermostat

i seem to be on a little handyman tour... a home improvement tour of installing thermostats. too bad i suck at installing a thermostat.

this past friday, i helped install a thermostat at my friend's (jen and bill) new apartment. today, i helped my bff (kerry) install her new thermostat.

with it being veterans day today, i assumed there would not be much traffic heading home from scenic marblehead. as karen was having a dietitians dinner with my friends (hot amy and dolores)... all of whom are both registered dietitians... my parents invited me over for a home-cooked dinner. (my mom gets all excited when i come over for dinner. you'd think that she never sees me or something.)

anyway, with the little traffic, i thought i would have a lot of time to kill until dinner with my parents. so, i decided to stop by kerry's place in neighboring salem. luckily, she was home. it was nice hanging out with kerry. she is still enjoying the north shore and is quite excited for her holiday party this year.

needless to say, kerry asked me to install her new thermostat while i was there. i should probably clarify... the thermostat is not exactly new. it's new to kerry. the thermostat was actually one of three thermostats that karen and i have in our house. during the whole second floor addition to our house, we had the contractors consolidate everything into one furnace which resulted in two unused existing thermostats. yep, it's complicated.

anyway, karen and i gave one of those thermostats to kerry so that she could program and control her heating system. naturally, since i enjoy doing home improvement projects (just not on my own home), i started to install the new digital thermostat.

i started removing the old mercury thermostat, only to discover that the wires behind old thermostat were of different lengths. one wire (the white one) was considerably shorter than the other (the red one). the white wire was so much shorter that it would not reach the terminals of the new thermostat.

as i did not have my tools with me, that obviously became a problem. i needed a wire to create a pigtail so that it could reach the terminals. (i have no idea why the electrical term is called a pigtail because it does not look like any pig's tail that i have ever seen.)

naturally, i figured i would just reattach the existing mercury thermostat and install the digital one at a later date. so i reattached the red wire... and then attempted to attach the shorter white wire... and kept trying... and trying. there was simply no way i could reattach the white wire to the old mercury thermostat. it was just too short. (that is usually where i inject "that's what she said".)

unfortunately, i had to leave to have dinner with my parents. i felt pretty awful because i did not want to leave kerry without any heat in her place. kerry, however, told me not to worry because she would go get the wire and attach the old mercury thermostat herself. so after giving her a quick tutorial on how to create a pigtail, i left and hoped that i did not mess things up too badly for her. hopefully, she would get the heat back on.

as luck would have it... kerry is quite the handyman... or woman. calling from the local home improvement store (home depot), kerry asked me what type of wire was needed. she got the wire and everything. when i checked in with her during dinner with my parents, she had successfully reattached the old mercury thermostat and had the heat back on. yay kerry!

and interestingly enough, kerry just called me again. apparently... the heat is down again at her place... i do not believe the cause to be a result of the thermostat incident. coincidentally, her heat is down due to a broken boiler plate. what luck...

at least it was a good effort. plus, now kerry knows how to install a thermostat. so she can also suck at installing a thermostat too... like me.

I Suck At Veteran's Day

today is veteran's day. happy veteran's day!

to any and all of those who have served our country with honor, thank you. the dedication of this country's armed forces are very much appreciated. after all, this country would not be where it is today without its veterans.

outside of karen's father, both grandfathers and some of her other relatives, i do not think i know too many veterans. i guess you can say that i suck at veteran's day.

for anyone curious, i actually had an opportunity to serve my country long awhile ago. that is also one of those lesser known facts about me. had i actually enlisted into the armed forces... i possibly could have been a veteran by now.

coming out of high school, i did not know what i wanted to do with my life. many of my friends all knew that they wanted to go to a certain college or do certain things. not me. i really had no direction in life. i may have had a little too much fun in high school as well because i was on a "dartmouth or bust" kick at the time.... dartmouth being my dream school of choice.

if i had taken things a little more seriously, i probably would have applied to more colleges than just dartmouth. well, i never got into dartmouth. i blame my guidance counselor who provided absolutely no guidance whatsoever. i do, however, remember how my guidance counselor took all of my essay questions that i had printed out... cut them into small blocks of text... and pasted them onto the application... creating a frankenstein-ish application. i thought that was the oddest thing at the time. again needless to say, i did not get into my dream school. oh well.

having busted on my original dream school, i considered joining the armed forces. growing up, i enjoyed watching military movies. the movies made serving the country seem so glorified and so patriotic. my brother also had considered it as an option once. i was told by him, however, that he was denied because he did not pass the physical examination. he apparently had a heart murmur. so naturally, i too thought the military was a viable option after high school.

although i really wanted to join the marines... because they are generally considered the best of the best... (semper fi!) i ended up being recruited by the army. the first thing the army recruiters had me do was take a test.

when i was done, the recruiters graded the test. apparently, i scored pretty high on the test because the recruiters seemed pretty impressed. they started their schpiel about how i would be perfect for military intelligence. (even if i had been in military intelligence... i'm sure i still could not find weapons of mass destruction in iraq.)

at the time, i wanted to be a grunt. i wanted to hang out with my fellow soldiers in the trenches like in the movies. and... whether it was due to my exposure to video games or not, i wanted to serve my country with glory and pride... and shoot the enemy... also like in the movies. (perhaps i may have watched too much television growing up and played too many video games.)

needless to say, the recruiters tried to show me the error of my ways. they really wanted me in military intelligence. they even showed me their pay stubs as demonstration about how much i could be making while in the military. truth be told, the salary would not have mattered to me because any salary would have seemed like a lot at the time.

unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it), i never took the recruiters up on their offer because i really wanted to be a grunt (like in the movies). had i enlisted, my life would obviously be so different now: my circle of friends would probably be smaller; i'd probably have an army wife instead of karen; i wouldn't have such great in-laws; quite possibly... i could even be deceased (although if i were in military intelligence, the chances of seeing fieldwork are probably very slim).

not that i have anything against the military, but i am happy with my decision to remain a civilian. i have a great wife, great family, and great friends. what else can one ask for? so, i enjoy serving my country in other ways... like voting. but that is beside the point.

today we honor all of those who have served our great country with glory and pride. thanks again!

I Suck At Going To The Patriots Game

today is sunday... and as any typical sports fan can tell you... it's the day of football... and massachusetts is home to the new england patriots. too bad i suck at going to the patriots game.

the last professional football game i went to was a preseason game last year. that game was against the new york giants... the eventual winners of the superbowl last year. (stupid giants!)

anyway, as luck would have it, my friend (ron) contacted me about going to the football game. ron splits season tickets with one of his other friends. it so happens that the tickets he had were for today's game. interestingly enough, he was having trouble finding two people to go to the game. he could only find one: his brother-in-law.

naturally, i agreed to go. karen, however, wanted me to go without her and have fun with ron. with all the recent events like my son's (braden) passing, she thought it would be nice if i had time away from her. with the other ticket still open, i asked ron if my friend (carlos) could go. my original thought was asking my bff (kerry) to go because she also has never been to a professional football game. as kerry was just down yesterday, i did not want to ask her to travel down again at the spur of the moment. sorry kerry.

needless to say, the four of us had a great time tailgating... watching the game... and tailgating some more.

(the video below is of the patriots game.)


making the day even better... the patriots won the game.

i'm lucky to have ron as friend... not just because he invited me to the patriots game... or had the whole tailgating setup ready within his truck... or likes to drink himself silly playing "flip cup" with a bunch of college kids who looked like they were teenagers. he genuinely cares and wants people to have fun.

i admire that about him. i know i keep saying i should hang out with ron more... i really should.

I Suck At Celebrating My Father-In-Law's Birthday

last night, was my father-in-law's birthday. happy birthday! incidentally, it also happens to be my in-laws' wedding anniversary. happy 38th wedding anniversary! as i have been told, my father-in-law... in an attempt to never forget his wedding anniversary... got married on his birthday.

to celebrate my father-in-law's birthday, my favorite sister-in-law (janine) had everyone over for dinner. as usual, dinner at janine's was very good. after my niece and nephew went to bed, however, the fun started.

as long as i have been a part of the family, i cannot remember my in-laws hanging out with janine and karen and dispensing the family history into the late hours of night. it was actually quite comical. i got to learn some things about the family i married into. and i must say, my family history... very boring... so hearing about someone else's... way more fun.

i think the part of the night that is most memorable to me, is the look of shock and awe on karen and janine's face when they heard some of the family history. the look can probably be best described as the "i don't even know you anymore" type of look... except that it was about other family members. and it was not just my father-in-law who was having fun telling the stories. my mother-in-law got all giddy with excitement... whispering into my father-in-law's ear about some other story... which then led to more family history.

the night was definitely interesting to say the least. what have i married into? just kidding.

I Suck At Working On The House

yesterday, my bff (kerry) came over for a visit.

kerry lives in salem. she offered to help work on our house this weekend as she was coming down to have dinner with her father. i'm happy kerry came over because i suck at working on the house. her coming down only motivated me to actually... well... work on the house.

i have a long laundry list of home improvement projects... still... even though the second floor addition was completed over a year ago. obviously, i couldn't ask kerry to do the more labor intensive items like running my table saw or anything like that... not that she couldn't of course. i would just feel more comfortable if i used the table saw and lost my fingers as opposed to her using the table saw and her losing her fingers. all right, so maybe i would not feel too comfortable losing fingers either way. but in general, i would probably feel worse if my friend got injured helping me.

so, karen and i had kerry do some touching up of the walls with paint. you can't lose a finger painting. if you do, then you're doing something wrong. not only did kerry paint, she helped karen hang pictures. hanging pictures is a relatively safe project as well. the only possible risk of injury is a hammer to the finger, which in the grand scheme of things is much better than a table saw to the finger.

for karen, it was particularly useful to hang pictures with kerry. karen has always been afraid to hang pictures by herself. after hanging a few pictures with kerry, karen realized how easy the process was. (granted, both karen and kerry had a slight problem with a frame that had two hangers attached to it, but i took care of that one for them.)

needless to say, karen enjoyed hanging pictures with kerry and she actually feels more at ease at hanging them up now on her own. in fact, she has started hanging other pictures on her own... with an excited smile and a bounce to her step. thanks kerry!

when we were done, the three of us had lunch at a local deli in norwell (called "on rye deli"... yum!), hung around and had some fun. we also had some cupcakes from a place called "the gingerbread construction company". the gingerbread construction company is located somewhere on the north shore by kerry. and i must say... the cupcakes... very good as well (cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound).

oh yes, we also watched a few episodes of veronica mars. kerry and i are trying to get karen into the show. kerry and i started watching the show a while ago when karen was in bon jovi's home state of new jersey visiting my friend (pam). as kerry and i did not get too far into the first season, we basically started watching the show again from the beginning to get karen all caught up. (kerry may have dozed off during one of the episodes.) but, i think it worked. karen now likes the show. yay!

I Suck At Installing A Thermostat

today has been a very frustrating day... as evident by the fact that i'm still awake in the wee hours of a friday night doing work.

i suppose i don't really have to be working into the wee hours of night. so i guess it is technically by choice that i hammer away at the keyboard and pulling my hair out in frustration. there has been a project at work that has been driving me nuts.

it was a simple project... in theory. all i had to do was edit some lines of code. it was easy. i tested the code and it worked. the person requesting the changes also approved the changes, so i moved the edited files to our live production environment. that is when the problem started.

apparently, the person who approved the changes discovered what we developers like to call "a bug" with something related to the changes i made. in a state of panic, the person went to all the senior management and started to yell that the sky is falling. okay, so maybe those weren't the exact words... but it was close.

needless to say, the incident makes me look bad because i moved the code to our live production environment... even though this person approved of the changes. truth be told... the "bug" is not even of my own doing. this bug existed for at least two months prior to my touching this project. it just so happens that it was discovered when i moved the files to our live production environment. so, that's even more annoying...

anyway, since i take pride in the things i do... i'm working into the wee hours of night trying to rectify the problem... and hopefully people won't think i'm that bad at what i do.

so now that my venting is done, i suck at installing a thermostat. actually, the installation of the thermostat was very easy. the easy installation is probably the highlight of today for me. (curse you, work!)

my friends (bill and jen) recently moved into a new apartment. so as to not confuse anyone, bill and jen are siblings... not significant others as some people in ireland believed.

bill got a new programmable digital thermostat to replace the old mercury dial thermostat that came with the apartment. as he was hesitant to install the thermostat on his own, he asked for my help. of course, i obliged because i like doing home improvement projects... just not the ones that pertain to my own home. for some reason, doing other people's home improvement projects are much easier and more enjoyable.

anyway, it surprisingly took me very little time to install the new thermostat. for some reason, i was expecting wires galore because bill said there were a lot of wires coming from the wall. there were only two. having only two wires made things easier, that's for sure. well, i hope bill and jen like the new thermostat. (and for anyone curious, we did test to make sure it worked.)

afterwards, i got to hang out with jen and bill for a little while, which was nice. we ended up watching a show called "three sheets". it's basically a show where the host (zane lamprey) goes to a foreign location to imbibe alcohol with the locals. it must be a tough job... to get intoxicated for work. but the show was interesting to say the least.

from jen and bill's, i went to the south shore ymca in quincy... which is probably the other highlight of my day because it was the first time i set foot in the south shore ymca since my son (braden) passed away two months ago. likewise, it was the first time for karen. as it had been quite a while, karen and i planned on meeting at the ymca to visit a few people and say hello.

karen had to do a nutritional consultation with someone that night anyway, so i just worked out before meeting up with her... that is... if you can call it working out. i must have looked awful running 2 miles with my ipod on. it was the first time in a long while (again, at least since braden passed away) that i did any type of cardiovascular exercise. i also did some free weight training, so we'll see how sore i am tomorrow. but i must say... gotta love those endorphins!

anyway, seeing everyone at the ymca was good. my friends (ally and michelle) were there. and as karen pointed out, one of the members in the class sounded like alan alda of mash fame. so it was an interesting time.

I Suck At Buffy The Vampire Slayer

although some people may call wednesdays "prince spaghetti night"... i usually refer to wednesdays as "marc and kelley night". after all, karen and i usually get together with my good friends (marc and kelley), grab a bite to eat with them, hang out, and have fun. yesterday was no different.

last night, kelley made dinner for all of us while marc was on his way home from a lecture whose guest speaker directly studied nicaraguan sign language. when kelley is not getting egg splattered in her eye, she is a good cook. (kelley is also famous for her chocolate chip cookies... cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound.)

interestingly enough, kelley tried to kill all of us last night by burning a wood cutting board. she accidentally left the cutting board on the stove... with the burner on. the place started to smell of smoke, which was how we found out about the cutting board. we think kelley was trying to get back at marc who was supposedly trying to kill her a few weeks before.

a few weeks before, marc had an errand to run after karen and i left. kelley went to take a shower. apparently, he told kelley to relax... take some time in the shower... light a few candles when she was done, etc. while he was out. as it turned out, marc accidentally left the gas on.

needless to say, the past few weeks have almost become a spy vs spy moment. it has been quite comical.

but anyway, last night we watched more of season 2 of buffy the vampire slayer. yep, i suck at buffy the vampire slayer... and this time i actually do. we were discussing vampires and which character sired which character and all that. the question soon became who sired the vampire known as drusilia. sadly, i forgot which charactere sired her. (the answer is angel.) i forgot the whole backstory about him purposely driving her insanely crazy and then turning her into a vampire. damn my selective memory.

luckily, the answer to the question was part of the episodes that we watched last night. we saw the college fraternity episode ("reptile boy"), the halloween episode, and the vampire revelers episode ("lie to me") which starred jason behr of "roswell" fame... well, if you can call "roswell" famous.

it has definitely been fun watching all the episodes again. yay buffy!

I Suck At Surround Sound

the media is saying that yesterday was a historic day. i guess that's true. after all, the country was either going to have the first african american president or the first female vice president. americans overwhelmingly chose the former.

so in celebration of the historical event yesterday, i worked on installing surround sound in our living room... to hear the campaign speeches of course. too bad i suck at surround sound.

a long while back (close to when we first purchased our house), karen and i thought about having surround sound in our living room. at the time, neither of us wanted huge speakers or any other thing that was an eyesore in the room. we eventually found a set of speakers on ebay. (my only stipulation of course was that the speakers had to be sony... i'm a sony guy... i should probably buy stock in sony because i own so many products by sony.)

unfortunately, when we received the speakers, we did not have anything to mount the speakers to the walls with. so, we basically connected the speakers to our receiver and simply placed the speakers around the television.

the set of speakers sat that way, for quite some time... even when i did finally get brackets to mount the speakers to the walls over a year ago. (the brackets... also by sony.) one of the reasons, aside from sheer laziness, as to why i did not install the brackets was because karen and i had talked about adding a second floor, straightening the living room ceiling (as the living room was slanted midway through the room), and repainting the entire room. i thought it would be best to wait until all of those items were done before installing the brackets and the speakers... and thus finally getting surround sound.

as luck would have it, everything came together. after a quick trip to the store for supplies, i worked on connecting the wires from the speakers to the faceplate, and then connecting the wires from the faceplate to the receiver. i am so thankful that i ran the wires before the second floor addition was done. installing the surround sound was so much easier.

anyway, i tested the surround sound to make sure the speakers are functioning properly... and they are... so that is always a good sign. now if i can only convince karen that we need a new television for the living room...

I Suck At Casting

today is election day. happy election day!

regardless of which candidate you support for the presidential election (or any of your other political decisions impacting your state), please perform your civic duty and vote today. and afterwards, go get a free ice cream. i hear ben and jerry's is giving a free scoop of ice cream today from 5pm to 8pm. if only there were a ben and jerry's located near me... (ah, the good ol' days when i worked in town... i could have gotten one then.)

anyway, karen and i went to perform our civic duty this morning. there was a line at the polling place, but it moved very quickly. we were done casting our ballots in no time.

speaking of casting... i suck at casting.

my friends (marc and kelley) brought up the topic of my other friend (carlos) today. one of the silly things that my friends and i do is come up with actors or actresses to play us in the movie about our lives (as if our lives were even that interesting to make a movie out of.)

as we were talking about carlos, here is who i came up with to play carlos in the movie... about carlos: jon favreau.

(pictured below is jon favreau as carlos.)


carlos is so money! (that was a reference to the movie "swingers" to which jon favreau starred in with vince vaughn.)

I Suck At Getting Into Shape

today, i decided to get into some shape... or at least attempt to. after all, when i send a picture of me in a speedo to everyone this year for the holidays, i have to make sure i look damn good. just kidding.

seriously though, i do have to get into some shape. the amorphous blob shape that i currently am can only go on for so long before i say enough is enough. too bad i suck at getting into shape. since the birth, life, and passing of my son (braden) two months ago, i have not exactly taken good physical care of myself.

i have put on ten pounds. i have not exactly eaten well (or i suppose if you look at it from a glass is half full perspective... i have eaten extremely well... mass quantity consumption well). i have not done any physical activity, whether it's weight-bearing or not. i have simply been a couch potato. of course, it doesn't help that my job, by its very nature, is sedentary. (for anyone curious, i do... computer stuff.) as well, i'm sure my sitting in front of this computer right now and blogging does not help things either.

so today, i decided that enough is enough. i'm going to get into shape. unfortunately, i don't exactly have a concrete plan yet as to what i'm going to start doing to get back into shape. i am thinking... step 1: nutrition. nutrition is always the hardest part of a healthy lifestyle. i'm sure karen and my friend (hot amy) would agree with me on that statement since they are both registered dietitians. nutrition is probably the most overlooked part of being healthy... whether it's not eating enough, eating too much, eating the wrong proportion of things, etc.

i need to start eating better again. since braden passed, i have not had any interest in preparing foods for meals, preferring instead to eat out a majority of the time. i'm obviously going to have to change that. right now, there is nothing in my refrigerator. (karen also has not had any interest in preparing meals since braden's passing.) i may have to go grocery shopping today.

from there, i think i will need to begin my cardiovascular and strength training. i'm currently toying with the idea of the high intensity interval training again mixed with bosu workouts... i'm not sure yet. whatever i decide, i need to focus on nutrition first. after all, i'll need the energy to even begin any sort of training. we'll see how it goes.

I Suck At Painting

yesterday, karen and i did something we have not done in quite some time... we worked on our house. in particular, we painted our living room.

(pictured below is our newly painted living room.)


too bad i suck at painting. it's not that i hate the act of painting... well... okay, maybe i do. i think it's just that on my list of home improvement projects, painting is always near the bottom. i would rather build something or install something as opposed to paint something.

in this case, the living room definitely needed to be painted. our contractors finished adding the second floor addition to our house over a year ago. part of the renovation process was fixing the living room beneath the second floor.

prior to the second floor, our living room had a sloped roof midway through the room. the room looked awful. i believe the sloped part of the room was originally a porch that got added to the existing adjacent room. when our contractors added the second floor, they had to make up the sloped difference... and they did with extra wood and drywall and all that.

unfortunately, our living room went unfinished... until now. karen and i spent the entire day painting the room. i think it came out okay.

it's weird. looking back, i used to incessantly work on the house every weekend. i'd be cutting drywall, running wires, doing plumbing, etc. i'd sometimes work so much that i rarely saw my friends. i remember one time, i was in the attic and my friend (pam) stopped by. as i was a mess, covered in attic insulation, i could only say hello to pam from within the attic.

as time went on, i've gotten away from working on the house. there is still a laundry list of to-do's for the house and i've simply let the list get longer and longer. even when i was preparing the room for my son (braden), i worked only on his room. i didn't worry about the other projects.

after painting, i actually felt invigorated to tackle the long list of to-do's again. i'm not sure if that is a good thing or not. part of me is excited because i want to finish all the other projects and actually have a livable house. the other part of me is not that excited because i'm afraid that if i throw myself into all these projects, that i will not be able to spend time with everyone and simply enjoy life.

I Suck At The British Beer Company

saturday, karen and i had dinner at the british beer company located in pembroke. too bad i suck at the british beer company. hmm... i seem to go to the british beer company a lot... perhaps i don't suck at it.

anyway, karen's cousin (karlene) and her husband (tommy) were down visiting. karlene and tommy live in lowell. they may tell you that "there is a lot to love about lowell"... don't be fooled by them. just kidding.

karlene is the godmother of my niece (kaleigh). as disney's "high school musical 3" was recently released in the theaters, karlene and tommy thought it would be nice to bring kaleigh to see the movie. if you ask me, i think tommy just wanted to see the movie and kaleigh was a pawn in his master plan to go watch the movie. i'm just kidding... although karlene and tommy are big fans of the high school musical series.

as they were down this way, they decided to see if karen and i would be interested in grabbing dinner. interestingly enough, neither karlene nor tommy have ever been to the british beer company. there apparently is no british beer company located by them... proof that there is not a lot to love about lowell.

anyway, i think karlene and tommy enjoyed the food at the british beer company. (i know i enjoy the food. cue rachael ray's "yum-o" sound.) it was good to see both of them. karen and i haven't really seen them in quite some time... aside from my son's (braden) service of course. it was good to catch up with them.

apparently, karlene watches that dreadful 90210 show... the new 90210. interestingly enough, her brother (matthew) also watches the show. yikes.

I Suck At Halloween

tonight, karen and i celebrated halloween at my friend's (garv) restaurant... blue 22. too bad i suck at halloween.

it's been a surprising halloween thus far. i was expecting a lot of children to go trick-or-treating this year because halloween was on a friday. plus, the temperature was nice and warm. i figured all of that would produce a lot of trick-or-treaters this year. sadly, i was mistaken.

we ended the night with very few trick-or-treaters. after the children in our neighborhood finished their trick-or-treating, karen and i went to garv's restaurant, blue 22, to celebrate the night. karen went as a mushroom. it was a very neat costume. karen took a sombrero and added fabric and padding to it to create a mushroom cap. the cap did not look that big until she placed it on her head. apparently, she had gotten the idea from my friend (jen) who saw the costume on television.

as for me, i did not have a costume. i really am not into gettting dressed up. stretching for ideas, i decided to go as a computer virus. i went to my friend's (marc) place and printed out the source code for the melissa virus. i thought it was fitting because my ex-girlfriend was named melissa. i like to refer to her as the "scourge of evil" at times. i mean it in the best possible way of course.

anyway, karen and i picked up marc (who dressed up as the dude from the movie "the big lebowski") and headed to blue 22. it was totally fun. blue 22 offered free food consisting of pasta salad, chicken fingers, chicken wings, and french fries.

my friends (jen, hot amy, kerry and bill) met us at the restaurant. also at the restaurant was garv and his wife (leeann) and my friend's (cass) brother (bj). it was a fun time. bill actually won a prize for his costume. he went as captain hook.

(pictured below is bill as captain hook.)


i think next year, i'll try to get into the halloween spirit and get all dressed up. like i keep telling myself, i just need time to plan a costume. now that i have a year, that should be plenty of time... or at least that is what i tell myself.

growing up, i always thought it would be cool to get dressed up as a knight for halloween... complete with plates of armor and chainmail. i imagine it would be tough to use the bathroom wearing all of that attire, but i thought it would be cool nonetheless.

for anyone curious, that is how i decided to use the handle "cavalier". not only does the definition of the word mean knight, the word "cavalier" also means "marked by or given to offhand and often disdainful dismissal of important matters" according to the merriam webster online dictionary, which i would say describes my instigating attitude fairly well. apparently, the definition also means debonair too. so all in all, i thought "cavalier" would be a good name to use for me.

anyway, as much as i liked the idea of dressing up in a suit of armor, i probably will never do it. i'm afraid that once i don the armor, that the whole costume thing becomes borderline LARPing... not that there is anything wrong with that of course. i just don't want to perpetuate my geekiness any further. that's all.