Lots of things to talk about...

I've had a bunch of things to post about, just haven't really made the effort lately. I'll start off with the latest and greatest new:

Shelley won a trip for two to Paris!

She's been talking about this for weeks... and I maintained my usual "realistic" (negative) attitude. The same attitude I was using for the recent Powerball craze... which Shelley and her co-workers dumped about $300 (or more) on...

So I'm over at Matt's house watching UFC on PPV, and I get a phone call from Shelley's phone, and it's Darcy yelling that "Shelley won the trip to Paris"... and I was immediately skeptical. "Yeah, sure she did..." Shelley gets on the phone all out of breath and convinced me that she wasn't lying, and that she had to go because they were taking pictures and doing interviews and stuff. Now she has to go to the radio station on Monday for another interview.

So how cool is that?

Another thing I have to report is a warning to all you unsuspecting Internet newbies. This is a true statement in general, but it's even doubly true on the 'net. "If the offer sounds too good, it probably is...".

One day, around May 10th or so, I saw a banner add for a FREE PLAYSTION PORTABLE! I've been resisting buying one of these for a while, because I just couldn't justify the cost. It truly was nothing more than a toy, and all the little gadgets I already have do the tasks that I was trying to convince myself (mostly) that I could use it for: previewing digital images, portable storage... etc. Even I wasn't convinced; how could I convince Shelley?

So I saw this banner advertisement, and figured I'd just check it out. It works like this: You are shown three pages of several different offers. You must choose 2 offers from each page. When you complete the requirements for each of the offers (buy something, sign up for something, etc), you'll be given the green light and will fill out a "form" to have the gift sent to you. However, at the bottom of the form it states:

(company name) reserves the right to: a) substitute any gift item with another of similar functionality
(including a working model that has been used/refurbished) b) substitute any gift item with another of
similar value c) send a member the cash equivalent of the gift item.

I did the math, and with everything I signed up for, the immediate cost is close to $200, and the cost for all the monthly charges that I will incur if I continue to use all the services I signed up for will be over $750. A new PSP costs about $250, and these jerkoffs are already telling me that they "reserve the right" to give me something else if they deem it plausible.

None of the offers that I accepted are things that I wouldn't have bought anyway (Vonage, Netflix), so it's not so much the overall cost that's bugging me. It's the fact that it's already been a month before I "met the requirements", even though 5 of the 6 offers have been reported as completed since the day AFTER I started all this. Only one of them took over three weeks to be "reported"... I'm also extremely bugged by the fact that I may not even get what I was aiming for...

Lesson learned here? Nothing is free...

Well, I had a few more things to report, but I can't think of them right now (too tired), and they probably weren't that interesting anyway... I'll try posting again in a couple days if I remember...

Love to all,

More pictures... and Star Wars Stupidity

I uploaded a few more pictures in the Latest Photos album, including Ryan's first time on a trampoline.



There's also pictures of him meeting the new spotted horse. The plan was to let Ryan name it, but he just kept calling her "kitty".

And a few minutes ago I was channel surfing and watched three self-important idiots debating the whole political agenda of the Star Wars movies. "Clearly Anakin Skywalker following the path of the dark side is George W. Bush", and "The United States is becoming the Evil Empire".

Do you people really have nothing better to do with your lives?

Got pix?

I really couldn't tell you why my last few posts have been titled as questions. Maybe I'm just feeling inquisitive? Maybe I'm being ironic? Maybe my creative well has run dry? That's the best possibility, because it was pretty shallow to start with.

Deal with it.

I finally got some pictures uploaded, and thought I would provide you with some easy links. I've got 200 pictures uploaded so far, and I'm only about halfway done. The majority (not surprisingly) of those are pictures of Ryan and Shelley. The Latest Photos album has a variety of pictures I've taken since I've been home, and the Geoffrey Ryan Grattan album has grown by about 70 pictures as of this post. I'll be adding more as I finish getting the rest uploaded. Here's a direct link to the page with the newest pictures in his album.

Other than that, nothing much to report really. I think my vacation was officially over yesterday, since I spent all of yesterday working on projects around the house, took a test for a job today, and scheduled an interview for next week as well. I'll give better details when I have them, but for now they're just "feelers".

Looks like The Donald (I hate that moniker, by the way. I'm just going to refer to him as TD or DT from now on... I haven't decided which yet), is getting the support he expected. Though a few people say his idea isn't original (... and?), even his detractors are supporting his plan. One quote I saw was "he's an egotistical bastard, and he's 100% correct". Personally, I'm glad he's in the fight. I don't care if he triples his net worth by supporting this thing, the plain truth is that it's much more likely to happen with him involved. That ridiculous "memorial park" plan was an embarassing and belittling answer to the September 11, 2001 attack. I only hope they don't refer to it as "ground zero" after construction starts . Click on the link and you'll see the actual definition, though they reference the WTC there too.

Gotta run, love to all!

What?

I blame Gritty for this:

What Your Dreams Mean...

Your dreams seem to show that you're a bit disturbed... but nothing serious. You may have a problem you're trying to work out in your sleep. Overall, you are very content in your life. You have a very vivid imagination and a rich creative mind. You secretly want to hide your dreams from your waking mind.

What Do Your Dreams Mean?

Anyone else find it vaguely disturbing that it would declare me "overall content" in my life, yet show a picture of someone with a ... worm (?) coming out of their mouth. That is not what I pictured "contentment" looking like.

On a completely unrelated note, I just have to mention something else. Donald Trump is my new hero. I know you people rarely follow the links I give you, so I'll summarize his latest declaration:

"Screw terrorists"

Like I said, that's MY summary. Here's a real one:

Donald Trump is unveiling his own design for a rebuilt 111-story "World Trade Center" at Ground Zero. Trump - who has been outspoken about the current plans for the "Freedom Tower" - told the New York Post he has "a beautiful model, a very big model." "We took the original World Trade Center design ... made it more beautiful than ever before," Trump said. The Trump plan also includes making the tower one story taller and stronger. Source

That's right. Not only does he want to rebuild on the same spot, he wants to build it BIGGER.

I never thought much of "The Donald" before The Apprentice came on TV. And at that point, I only thought less of him. Now the needle has gone the other way... a LONG way. He "anticipates a tremendous outpouring of public support for his new design.". You've got my vote, Mr. Trump. Check out the complete plans.

Ok, I know I still haven't uploaded the pictures, but I really am closer. I finally got my office into a more useable condition, and my main computer back online. I have EVERY INTENTION of getting some pictures uploaded before this weekend. Of course, I had "every intention" of being an accomplished endurance racer, having a winter home in Australia, and being widely known for my culinary prowess by the time I reached my current age... so bear that in mind when you come back on Saturday looking for pictures.

Where to begin?

I've got so many things I want to do, I hardly know where to begin. And when the thing you want to do the most is "Absolutely Nothing" ... how do you start?

Yesterday was Mothers Day, and Ryan and I took Shelley to the Western Colorado Botanical Gardens & Butterfly House and then to lunch at her favorite place... no surprise there, I'm sure.

I got a lot of pictures of both of them, and I'll be putting them up in the next couple of days.

Also, I just have to share with you how very cool my wife is; I know I've always said she was, but I never knew she could be THIS cool. I've been trying very hard not to rant too much about the Serenity screening I went to last week, because I know she's been more tolerant than I deserve about the whole thing. I will be posting my take on the movie soon enough, but wanted to share the things that are more important to me since I've gotten home, and just haven't had the time to do it yet.

I asked Shelley if she had any desire to see the new Star Wars movie that's coming out next week, and she said (and this is what I think is so cool about her) that she'd rather watch them all together. Like back-to-back. So she wants to watch the "first" two on DVD, go see the third one... then come home and watch the next three on DVD. That's like 10 hours of Star Wars that she wants to watch... how many guys are lucky enough to have a wife that's WILLING, let alone WANTS to watch that much Star Wars?

Hmmm... maybe if I made her watch Firefly like that she'd be a little more excited about it... I know, I know... that's my own fault. She's sick of hearing about it...

So that's all I wanted to say for now. I'm trying to get back into a "normal" routine, and my wife is amazingly cool. I'll get some new pics up soon... and Happy Belated Mothers Day to all that qualify!

Love to all!

I'm a big fat liar...

Ok, I'm a complete and total liar... Some of you already knew this, but I came home 5 days early to surprise Shelley. And boy was she surprised. I was waiting in the hotel room when she got there, and she nearly had heart failure. Which was pretty much the plan: mission successful!

So I'm typing this at home (we came home a day early... I'll give the details later), on my favorite big old clunky keyboard (IBM PS/2 RoX!)... and I shouldn't need to tell you how relieved I am to be home. The look on Shelley's face; seeing Ryan look at me with his big blue (uncertain and tired eyes... like he knows he SHOULD know who I am, but is too tired to put it together), getting a smile out of him, looking forward to seeing him in the morning... yeah, all that. And lots more; I'm glad to be home.