So Friday You may have noticed that I didn’t post. Yeah, so that’s cause I was sick as a dog. Apparently Amy came back with some hybrid strain of Texas style strep throat that just about killed me on Friday. I felt like road kill that had been eaten by a rabid family of West Virginians, then pooped out and eaten by zombie hyenas which were then hit and left for dead (mostly dead) on an Arizona freeway. Really, I felt that bad. I spent most of Friday sleeping.

Of course that meant that Saturday I was awake by like 6am. This ended up being a good thing as I got a lot accomplished on Saturday. I did some gaming, Cleaning up the house (with Amy’s help of course), and we even went for a nice drive. Amy needed to map out where she was having an interview for a new job.

We also went to see Sin City on Saturday night. All I got to say is WOW! That movie was amazing! I Love comic books, and if there was ever a movie that was so blatantly based and designed around a comic book, this is it. When it first started out, I was listening to the dialog and was taken aback a bit because it was kind of campy, but, once I realized the mood they were setting it all made sense and turned out great. The only regret I have about this movie is that I never really read any of the comics for it before the film. What I have seen though holds very close to the movie. Go See this Movie, Now!

Sunday was another lazy day for me, I did manage to sleep in a little and we got out for a little bit of a walk. The weather was absolutely beautiful. So we opened all the windows in the place. Amy and I curled up on the couch and had a Matrix-a-thon. We managed to make it through “The Animatrix: Second Renaissance Parts 1 and 2” “The Matrix” “The Animatrix: Final Flight of the Osiris” “The Animatrix: Kids Story” and “Matrix reloaded.” After that it was getting late and we needed a break. We might try and watch the last movie tonight.

By The way, the reason for the Title of “Fox News Alert.” Apparently on Paul’s blog he made a post that had that in the title and for a while his Post for that thread was like the 3rd most hit site for the search term Fox News Alert on Google. So this is an experiment.

Oh, I also got my I-Pod! Apparently since I spent 11 days Straight in MCSE Hell, they gave me a free I-Pod Mini. It’s got 4 GB of space, of which I have only filled it with 2.7 GB of stuff. I have a lot of Songs, I just don’t want to carry all of them with me all the time.

Well, Back to work for me!

Well, Amy arrived last night. Her flight was originally supposed to land at 9:30pm at BWI Airport, which is about 1 hour away. Sadly, there was a huge hailstorm in Dallas last night which caused a little bit of a delay, about 2 hours worth of a delay. So her flight was then due it at 11:44pm. I left the house at around 10:30 and beat feet to make sure I would be there in time. She looked stunning as always walking out of the arrivals gate. We walked down to wait for her bags at baggage claim 7.

And Waited

And Waited.

I began asking people around us what flight they were waiting for. A few said the same flight as Amy, but the others were for flights that arrived much after hers. So it was off to the baggage counter we went. Turns out that hers was not the only bag this happened to. There was another flight due in that would have the bags on it, but that was at 12:50. So we opted to have them drive the hour to deliver the bags.

Of course, this happened at 7am this morning! Anyways, she is in and happy to be back. She already has a number of plans for the day, I just hope she has enough rest to do them. (She hasn’t been feeling well).

In Other news, the book signing is tomorrow! I sure hope I can fit back into my cummerbund. During that MCSE class I think I put on a few extra pounds due to sitting around way too much and eating crappy food. Looks like it may be time to start hitting the Gym again.

So, in completely different news, I got to attend my first Major League Baseball game yesterday! My friend Paul bought Season Tickets to the DC Nationals. Yesterday was their last spring training game, but the first one that they ever played in the DC area. They were playing, and will be playing, at DC’s RFK Stadium, vs the NY Mets! Apparently the old DC team (called the Senators) Played there last around 34 years ago. So it was very cool to be there for this historical game. Not to mention it was a lot of fun. Now we all know that I am not a huge sports fan, never have been, so it was nice to have Paul on hand in case I didn’t understand something. I really do enjoy watching sports, I just can’t get into it like some people. I guess it would be like asking a sports fan to follow Star Wars.

Anyways, the game was fun. The downsides to the whole day included: Getting up at 9am on a Sunday (I am a big fan of sleeping in on weekends.) It was Bloody Cold!!! The Temp was like 50 deg, but the wind was horrible! It must have dropped to around 35-40 deg where we were sitting. We sat for 5 hours shivering. But seeing the game was great! Last downside was that when we finally got home, I was wiped out. I mean, on the couch and almost dead to the world!

The Good news is that I got a lot of cleaning done this weekend. I managed to scrub down the whole Kitchen and Clean up and vacuum the Bedroom and Living room. (No I didn’t venture into the dreaded den of despair.)

Ah well, Back to work! As per usual, I may blog more later.

Ok, so apparently I got a large number of people with my little prank. First off, let me explain a few things. Amy and I have no plans to get married. The thing is, with both of us being still so fresh from old relationships, it’s a comfort to each other to have the other there for emotional support. We enjoy doing things together, and she is very focused on getting her life back in order. And getting her life in order involves just her and is centered around her and her Children. She knows that having me in her life is only a perk and that she needs to rebuild so that she can handle it on her own.

By the way, She was in on the joke. So you can all take a big sigh of relief and put away your pitchforks and torches.

The Good news is that She did finally get everything taken care of in Texas and will be returning on Tues April 5th. I know she is excited more over to just have everything done. She even got her maiden name back. More on this story as it progresses.

What the hell is wrong with what I am doing with my own life? The past few weeks I have had more than anyone’s share of arguments with friends who claim they are looking out for my best interests. Let me explain….

I am in love with Amy. But Amy is not without faults. She has been through hell and back with her past relationships and is dealing with the repercussions of that now. She is now trying to pursue a life of her own and learn to love herself and others all over again. It’s not an easy path for anyone to take and there have been plenty of bumps in the road that I know have cause more stress in her life than I think anyone is prepared to face. But she faced it and has continued to move forward even when I know that she didn’t want to.

Now I am facing the stress of all of my friends telling me how they believe that Amy is wrong for me and that she is only doing certain things so that I will stay with her. I have heard no other arguments outside of this “Well we think she is manipulating you.”

Ok, First off, I can guarantee that I am not doing anything outside of what I would normally do for anyone that I cared about. And Secondly, You show me any relationship where one member doesn’t do something that could be considered manipulation towards the other member. That’s called being in a relationship, and if anything I am just as guilty of it as her. You think it was easy to get her into a White vinyl miniskirt for the first time?

Why can’t people just accept that I Love her and accept that she is trying her best to fix the problems she has had in the past. Not to mention the fact that you claim to be looking out for my happiness and well being. Did it ever occur to you to ask me if I was happy now? Being with Amy has made me happier than I have been in a long time. I accept her with her faults and Praise her for her accomplishments, Much as she does for me. Have there been times where I have been un-happy? Yeah, but that’s another part of being in a relationship. The Nice part of this one is that the amount of time I have been happy outweighs the un-happiness.

I love my friends dearly, and I do appreciate their input into my life and I value that they have my best interests at heart. But…… Saying that she is Manipulating me doesn’t cut it. If she were cheating on me, If she were stealing from me, forcing me to do harmful things against my will, cutting me off from my friends, any of those, Then I could see justification for being upset with her. Instead you berate me for doing the same thing I would do for each and every one of you if you were in her situation.

Giver her a chance to get over her past and build her new life. Give me a chance to be happy with someone I really love. You know, if you actually take a chance to get to know her, you might see that she is a great person with a good heart. It’s just been a bit bruised up. Give it a chance to heal before you pound on it more.

.

Mid week on my first week back from class and I have already started putting my newfound knowledge to work. It feels good when you tackle a problem and think to yourself “Hey, I know how to do this now!” Defiantly gives me a warm fuzzy.

The Home life is also starting to get back to normal. I still need to clean like I always have. The Den still torments me. I think Charlie is starting to not be as pissed of at me as he was when I was in class. Charlie is my cat BTW. Since I was in class for so long, I would come home and go right to bed. He was feeling very lonely and made a point of letting me know about it. I swear he is one of the most vocal cats I have ever seen! Right when I get home it’s a 5 min speech from him about how he was home all alone and had no one to pet him. Apparently he is a very tortured kitty to not have someone around 24/7 to pay attention to him.

Good News on the Amy front. She comes home next Tues! She arrives at 9:30pm on the 5th of April. We both are very excited that she is coming home and I know she is ready to start working on the rest of her life now. She will make it back just in time for the Upcoming Book signing as well! No, not my book of course, but the Episode III book. The Author will be in Arlington VA doing a signing and we, as the 501st, were invited to Troop the event!

In the mean time I have gotten back to filling my spare time with Gaming, and have even started reading again. While in class I finished the Timothy Zahn book “Heir to the Empire” and am working on the Second book in that series “Dark Force Rising.” Both have been excellent reads so far. I am also back to my problem I had before class, I need to get out more. Money limitations are still upon me, but I need to spend some more time away from home.

I think I have decided that my one and only real vacation this year will be to Celebration III in Indiana. It starts on April 21st and goes through the weekend. I will have probably just enough money to do that as long as I don’t go crazy and buy myself a speeder bike or something. We’ll see how the week plays out.

Well, here we are, two weeks later and my head is full. So full in fact that I spent all of Friday and most of Saturday with a headache that rivals most of my other headaches. And of course I am paying for that now, see, I spent most of Friday laying down in the dark because most anything else would cause searing pain through my frontal lobe. Because of this, my sleep schedule is all screwed up and now my back is killing me because I was laying on it for 2 days straight.

Regardless of how I felt, I still managed to get out for a little while on Saturday night. I met up with Paul and we hit some Irish Pub in Dupont Circle. At least, I hung out until my headache was unbearable again. Thankfully I think I am past it now and am feeling much better.

So I am back at work now, trying to adjust to being here after the long hours of class. It’s even weird to sit down and write again. The class was amazingly tough and fun all at the same time. The long hours really wore on me after a while and I was always just flat out tired. Most nights I would just come home and go straight to bed. I Also met some great people in the class, The Instructor was great and excruciatingly knowledgeable. And most of the nights a lot of the guys would go down to “Baileys Irish pub” just downstairs in the Ballston Commons Mall. Of course they would come right back up after they were done and continue studying. All in all I have to say that I did learn a lot and it feels great to say that I finished all the tests and passed them all on the first try. So now I am Certified!

Now I just need to get back to my normal life (assuming you could call my life normal. Well this was a good start to get back into writing the blog, Hopefully I will have a better update tomorrow.

So here I am on day 4 of the MCSE Bootcamp. I finally got a chance to sit and write. Ok so let me fill you in on the last few days. (and sorry for no pictures in the blog, it’s not as easy to do remotely)

So Monday I left for the class and was feeling great, I had a good night of sleep and was ready to go. That is, I was ready to go until about noonish, and in the middle of the class. That would be the point where my Anxiety kicked into overdrive. I suddenly felt like I completely didn’t belong there. Seriously, I was freaking out. I hope none of you ever have to feel like that. The first lecture was on Windows XP and the test would be on Tuesday. By Tuesday I was a nervous wreak. Almost everyone I talked to was giving me all of the best encouragement in the world, but for some reason I just couldn’t convince myself that I was good enough. I finally broke down and talked with my instructor. He explained to me that he had seen tons of people come through with the same sort of feelings. and based on what he had seen of me and what I know, he was certain that I would pass.

I Took my test and scored 936 out of 1000

Needless to say, I felt better.

The days are very very long. I get up at around 6am and leave the house by 6:30. I usually get to the metro station by around 7am and to the class location by 7:30. From there we study and prep until around 8 or 9pm. By this time I am pretty brain dead and it’s time to go home. Of course I get home and crawl into bed to start the whole process over again.

The Second exam was about 8 times harder than the first one. This was Windows Server 2003 and it was tough, really tough. I finally got myself to the point of believing in myself that I was ready and went in.

Well, lets just say, I passed. Score was not as good as the last score, but a pass is a pass, right?

We finally get a break after that last test to decompress and breath. The next thing we go over is Security. From what I hear it’s a little easier to study for. We start lecture in just a bit.

So that’s been my week so far. No WoW, no Clubbing, no Concerts. For the next 8 1/2 days I am cramming windows propaganda into my skull through a thin funnel.

Don’t forget to send a little extra Mojo my way!

Ok, So I realize that I haven’t posted in about a week. Two things about this, 1: I really haven’t had anything super worth while to post about, and 2: I haven’t been in much of a writing mood. It happens.

Well, I do have a few things to talk about so let’s get into it eh?

Most of you know I am an avid reader of Wil Wheaton’s blog. I have been reading it for quite a long time now and I love the way he writes. I have bought one of his books and have been searching for the other. Recently he was selected to appear on CSI as a homeless guy and a suspect. Wil wrote in great depth the work he poured into his character and all the nuances of his homeless persona. I watched CSI last night and I have to say this……. I really thought he would have more than 5 lines. He was maybe in about 2 scenes where he was speaking. I think he did a great job, just thought he would have a larger role. I can’t really say much, Stephen Baldwin was also a suspect and his role was just as big. None the less, Great job Wil!

Also last night, the New theatrical trailer for Revenge of the Sith, the new Star Wars Movie. This played right after the OC on FOX, so I pretty much just left the TV on FOX and played some WoW until I heard the trailer start. I was getting some serious goose bumps! The trailer was awesome! At least, what I got to see of it….. Turns out that the CSI Episode that I was planning on watching started at 9pm, well Tivo wanted to change the channel from FOX at exactly 9pm. I was hoping that the trailer would be finished by then. It wasn’t. So while I was scrambling with remotes and the bedroom TV, I missed the ending of the trailer. I was bummed. Thankfully, the trailer has been uploaded to about a thousand different sites today so I was able to download it and watch it. The nice thing about a QuickTime version of the trailer is that you can use the arrow keys to actually step through the whole thing almost frame by frame.

On to other things. This weekend is one of my last of freedom. I start my MCSE class on Monday and from what I understand I will be crazy busy with the class. Good chance that I won’t be posting much but we will see. I know Paul is already asking if I am going to go out and I may actually do that this weekend. I need to get out and do Stuff (as I have been saying for the past 3 weeks) so Why not? If I get a chance I will update on Sunday about the weekend, I will probably be too busy on Monday.