People enjoyed my tiramisu tonight! I haven't really had a piece of it yet; I thought the small test piece I ate was a bit watery since I couldn't add irish creme liqueur. But a couple of aunties want my recipe, so hey, yay. I'll have a piece tomorrow.
I just wish I had my dessert-making partner around. The results would have been better.
I had entirely too much to eat Thursday and Friday (the latter due to a last-minute guest for dinner and my mom whipping up a lot of things in a short timeframe). My stomach ached both times and I felt gross afterwards, though somewhat satisfied.
Thanksgiving, as it's been for the last nine years, was ‘celebrated’ at Imran's house. Perhaps the most striking thing that I can remember about this year is that no Bengali food was served with the Americanish food.
Also, there didn't seem to be as many people this time around. My mom says it's because the little kids have grown up and aren't as loud as they used to be. Maybe.
We watched Harold and Kumar go to Whitecastle and started Napolean Dynamite before we had to leave. But what started off the night was watching two gag gifts Asma and I got for my brother: Lil Jon's Crunk Juice and Ying Yang Twin's My Brother and Me (with bonus DVD).
Ying Yang Twins are by far the most retarded famous people I've ever seen, and that's how Thanksgiving 2004 will be remembered. Video clip detailing their stupidity will be uploaded within a week. (And they really aren't rich enough to be on MTV Cribs, but maybe they like living modestly overall.)
(The Ying Yang Twins are real brothers, nicknamed Kaine and D-Roc. What say you, d-rok?)
My brother and me went to Best Buy early in the morning (we woke up at 4). The line getting in was insane, as always, because people started camping out in the cold at midnight. We got what we wanted getting there way after 100+ people (including a 160 GB hard drive for $30), except that Hasan didn't get the digital camera he was hoping for. He opted for a slightly more expensive one.
And so we were ready to checkout, basket in hand. The line to the 12 cash registers weaved in and out of the aisles all the way to the back of the store.
We got in at the end and steadily progressed towards the front. Roughly 45 minutes later, we were around 70% through when an employee came by asking if anyone had a digital camera – if so, we could go to the camera section to checkout. The line was shorter there, supposedly.
Hasan went while I kept our spot, and if it was short enough, he'd call me and I'd take everything to the camera section. Sure enough, the line was short, and I left my spot.
Big mistake.
First, there was only one cash register. Just imagine what would happen if someone was having trouble getting his or her credit card to go through or if there was some hold-up.
Second – and maybe this was the real problem – each customer took roughly 20 minutes to process because the cash register was going slow. We were told that since all the Best Buy stores were on a single network, this was to be expected.
Well, we got sick of waiting, so after an hour I told Hasan to go back into the old line, which meant going all the way back to the end. The main line was moving, so we figured that whoever got close to the register first would call the other.
Sure enough, Hasan got near the registers (near meaning that he was behind 50 people); I still had three people ahead of me. I left my spot and went to be behind 50 people. And we still got out faster.
So, I'd like to punch the employee who told us it'd be faster to switch lines and the employees who said that all the registers were slow, regardless of whether they were idiots or liars.
Eh.
Someone should coach me in being more social and communicative.
I should learn to be more aggressive and organized and take on freelance work. People with less skills seem to be able to be more in control of what they do and how much they make. Which makes me think I'm not cut out for being terribly independent.
But really, I'm just lazy and easygoing.
Why isn't Central Illinois near DC?
I got into Springfield yesterday after a 3 hour delay. And after some bad turbulence (which really didn't bother me, because I was in the bathroom taking a poop and so was a little distracted from dwelling on crashing), I started to get a little paranoid about the idea of flying.
There's a monstrous piece of metal in the sky. It has a chance of falling. Falling is scary.
Home is good. It feels like I've just plopped back into place here, not having ever really left. I dunno. I'm happy to see my family. I just hope my dad doesn't bring up old and oft repeated subjects much.
It is significantly colder here – 22° vs 58° in DC right now. Um.
My room has always been cold, but I'm going to put insulating tape on the window tomorrow and hope that it makes a difference. It's like the time where I realized I didn't want a queen size bed in my room because it took up nearly all the free space. And it took me 7 years for that to sink in. This particular idea verges on 8.5.
I should've brought coffee and tea. I miss Asma. My stomach is gonna explode tonight, though. And I feel like making tiramisu now. Maybe I will.
giddyup999: link dont work!
Auto response from express kaiser: www.gaystreetfighting.com
Aura Weapon 99: that link doesnt work
Auto response from express kaiser: www.gaystreetfighting.com
Don't steal it.
Am I the only muslim to not mention Eid or Ramadan in any sort of way?
Eid was last Sunday or Monday, depending on if your local mosque follows a scientific or outmoded method, or if they simply do it when the Arabs do (lame). You could just do it based on your method of choice, but if you're not gonna celebrate with the community you're missing out on an important aspect of it.
Here's looking at Eid [al-Fitr] Mubarak 2005!
These pants are tight enough that I could go for the fourth notch on my belt; I've recently gotten a bit plumpier to make three notches a bit snug. Hmm.
Tapas.
Shirin has had a bit of hardship ever since coming to DC with me, and it boils down to three things: a cage smaller than what she was used to, non-consistent playtime outside of cage, and a wire bottom on the cage.
The wire bottom especially bothered me, because I love to see her lie down and sleep – that, to me, was the ultimate sign that she was comfortable. I rarely saw that in the last two months.
We bought her a tray for her dust baths and I'd hoped that she would sleep there, since it was the only flat, non-wired surface. For the first few days she took an occasional nap, but otherwise, she consistently huddled up in the corner under the tray and slept.
So finally, after collecting a few paychecks, Asma and I were able to order a new cage from Quality Cage Co. A mansion, really – at 3'×4'×2', it's roughly six times bigger than what we kept her in.
After a week of anxiously waiting for the delivery, the cage came in (minus the rolling stand) yesterday. We assembled it and happily watched as Shirin was able to run and jump in her new home.
And the best part is, she's lying down on the platform and tray to sleep. Yay!
That makes me happy.
Work, not so much.
I think one of the secretaries was given a link to some Flash movie or video clip, so I've been hearing the same bit of music repeatedly while she laughs and says, ‘That is soooo cute!’
Props to Ryan, though.
And his whole national debt nonsense about being $8.18 trillion, and how it was so much more than during Reagan's time – if my memory serves me, Reagan was the first president to break the $1 trillion limit and set America on a course of heavy borrowing. This isn't to defend Bush; rather, I'm just pointing out that it's Reagan's fault, and so no comparison should be made to him about how big the debt is now.
From the front page of The Washington Post a few minutes ago:
Red-Light Camera Bill Dies
Action by Va. House committee may halt use of technology after July 2005.
For a few seconds, I thought Red-Light Camera Bill was a guy and was wondering what that had to do with state government. But nicknames are obviously in quotes, and I felt silly that this was a bill, and not Bill.
I hope the circumstances surrounding Mohamed Alanssi get more coverage if the FBI did in fact screw him over. Assholes.
Good morning. I leave for Springfield in eight days.
After almost nearly two years, I saw Mojgan Katzhausen, and it was cool. Asma and I met up with her at Ikea, then had dinner at Chipotle and watched Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason or something like that (which was cute).
But yeah, saw a friend after a long while. She's still zany.
And then I came home and saw this:
jeffreywegesin: i had a dream last night that you were in
Auto response from express kaiser: eid mubarak, my noggas
jeffreywegesin: you and i were in a large carrot field
jeffreywegesin: the carrots were halfway out of the ground and about twice the size as one of us
jeffreywegesin: we tried uprooting them but instead we started knocking them over
jeffreywegesin: we started some kind of landslide and ended up dying
jeffreywegesin: death by carrot
I know your last name isn't German.
It might be one of the best anniversary gifts ever.
This assignment I'm working on right now has me feeling annoyed and restless. It involves editing around 170 records in a database. I spent many hours in Excel which records I need to edit. And then I realized that I didn't sort by date about halfway through, so I wrote some PHP to take the original, sorted data, match it with my data (which has a lot of fields missing since I didn't think I needed them), and then creating a new list.
I want to go home. Shoot me. Or not.
Scott Peterson is guilty, yay. So they'll finally shut up about the case in a week?
Yasser Arafat is dead, boo. Ariel Sharon should die first, from choking on a matzah ball and simultaneously having a heart attack.
Two months late on loan payments. Will fix that next week.
Here's the gist of my grievances caused by The Bivings Group:
July 4th. Flew out to DC for an interview. Was told in email and in person that I would be reimbursed.
July 18th. Emailed Isabelle (vice president) my ticket receipt and stubs, since she had told me to send reimbursement items to her.
July 26th. Followed up with Isabelle, since she hadn't responded to my email. Also asked about if a decision was made on the job position.
(I now know that, except for one company, no one wants to ever let you know that you didn't get it.)
August 3rd. Emailed Anupam, the guy who I'd had most of the correspondence with, and my interviewer. He said he'd look into it.
August 17th. Followed up with Anupam, since he hadn't responded to my email. Tried calling Isabelle and Anupam directly after that, but always got their voicemail. Left a message.
August 20th. Sent another email showcasing my annoyance with how they were handling things. Also re-sent receipt.
October 4th. Sent yet another pissy email, after more unreturned phone calls. Told them I'd stop by the office sometime to pick up my reimbursement check.
October ?th. Made an in-person appearance (I think it was on or after Columbus Day). Met with Anupam; was a bit nervous, but wanted to yell at him. He seemed geniunely surprised that I had't gotten my check yet. Should've gotten on his case about why he was too much of an asshole to not respond to me; took some pity instead. Left a local address and yet another copy of the receipt.
Made a few more phone call attempts. Always voicemail. Fuckers.
November 4th. One more phonecall to Isabelle, asking her what was up and to call me. Bitch.
November 9th. Went with Asma to her house to drop off her parents' car. She looked through the mail and handed me an envelope. From Bivings. With a check. Was happy. Asma misplaced envelope a few minutes later. Her mom later found it on top of the refrigerator.
Cute.
PS – I messed up yet again at Antharia, except this time I left a live site (with lots of visitors, apparently) in disarray. Except that I thought it didn't get much traffic and that it would be all right as it was until I could spend many more hours this weekend to fix things up.
I felt shitty when I heard what had happened (loss of potential clients, making them look bad), and still feel pretty stupid about it all.
Bah. I hate myself sometimes. I don't see why they didn't fire me.
I decided to bring my laptop to AARP today so that, if nothing else, I could play around with Zope and other miscellaneous things if I didn't have internet access. (I was told that I couldn't plug in my laptop to the network because it's the IT department's policy). I didn't want to disable my desktop in the process, since that would be in poor judgement, disconnecting my official work computer and all.
Well, in the process of plugging the power adapter in, I found two ethernet ports under the desk. With my handy retractable 6 ft ethernet cord, I connected Mason-Dixon II to the free port.
That didn't work. Blah. My supervisor said she might not be in today, so I thought that I'd just disconnect the desktop – just for today – and plug Mason into that port. Hopefully I wouldn't need all their network login crap to get this going.
Initially, it still acted like it wasn't working and I lost hope. But then Eudora downloaded mail and I was surprised and happy.
And the best part is, I connected the desktop to the other port and that works as well. So I can check my AARP email and not miss anything from my supervisor.
A lot of that was extranneous info, wasn't it?
All posts are going to be in Eastern time from now on. Begin the second year.
Roughly 364 days (365 days, actually, since it was a leap year) and 12 hours ago, I kissed a girl during a lunar eclipse.
A year later, we're still kissing. And talking about having mansions and babies, for Shirin. It's very serious.
For real, though, I don't how to best put it, so I'll put it simply:
I love u, Asma. U make me happee. MooOioosh?
Four more years!
Kiss.
I bought an external hard drive bay from CompUSA today. My 120 gig hard drive is powered up for the first time in nearly two months, and I now remember that I have 14 gigs of unorganized MP3s in my Soulseek directory.
Um.
My laptop either has a weird Firewire port, or it doesn't have one at all, and that's a bit upsetting, considering that I always thought it did, and that I wanted to hook up the external bay with Firewire.
I don't understand why there's a craigslist site for Tulsa and not Springfield. I don't remember Tulsa having anything.
Shirin is getting a mansion soon. I hope she enjoys it.
Lots of work to do.
Nearly finished a 5.5 oz bag of Utz Sour Cream & Cheddar chips; feel disgusting and fat.
Why can't they decide to announce a clear winner by the end of the week? It's not so logical to have almost every eligible voter vote on the same day and then expect to count all the results in less than 24 hours. Especially when much of the ballots are paper.
Kerry shouldn't have conceeded just yet. If by some miracle he wins Ohio after this…meh.
But I didn't vote! So who cares. We the nation don't work on the most common of senses.
Begin 12-hour unsupervised playtime.
Hello:
As of Tuesday, October 26, 2004, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) records indicated that you have not completed registration for Fall 2004, and that you currently do not have any other affiliation with UIUC.
Currently, you can no longer access CITES network services such as UIUC Dialup or CITES Instructional Computing Labs.
And on or shortly after Tuesday, November 2, 2004, CITES will terminate your access to CITES Express Email and CITES NetFiles.
More information is provided below.
Five years and kaput. I thought it'd be forever. Sigh…
All email is being forward to gmail now, as it shall be for one year before forwarding gets disabled.
Now, my vote versus The System:
(source)
Democracy needs a facelift.
With all the craziness surrounding elections (voter intimidation, planting votes, conservative thievery, baby killing), I'm anxious to see if riots are going to spark.
Will my commute home after the polls close be filled with danger? Will the metro teem with angry citizens bumrushing the train until it falls to its side? How many conservatives will be out looking for anyone that looks suspiciously non-oriental asian? Are conversatives going to gang rape me because I look suspiciously moslem with my brown skin and non-Oriental, non-Mexican looks?
In the six years I've been eligible to vote, I'm missing my second presidential election. It wasn't so much apathy this time as it was the lateness in sending my absentee ballot application (which I applied to receive the day before it was due).
Next time.
I have a sad story, the details of which will be posted tonight.
Also, I did some work for my part-time job at my full-time. And since I can't install the programs I like to make my life easier, I had to write and upload code using Notepad and the command-line ftp program. Ugh.
IT departments suck.