February 10, 2012

  • I don't know what to name this post...

    So.....I haven't wrote anything in a while. I haven't really had any motivation to write, since nothing significant or major has happened since the New Year started. It's also a combination of (overall) being lazy, taking long naps after work, playing Final Fantasy XIII & beating in time for the Final Fantasy XIII-2 release, and being hooked on the korean drama, "Smile, You". Basically, nothing to write about + no time to write = no blogging.

    Well, today's a bit different. I have the time and I guess I have a few things to write about. I'm back at my favorite worldwide coffee chain in the city of Dublin. I had to take the X5 into the shop to get some work done before the Cabin Trip in 2 weeks. The rear passenger-side window was making a weird sound when you open & close it. About two years ago, the rear driver-side window was making the same sound. I ended up replacing the window regulator myself, to save money on labor fees, but I reinstalled it wrong and the window glass ended up falling through & shattering, and ultimately had to bring it into the stealership to get it fixed. So much for saving money......so this time around, I'm letting the experts handle it. I'm also getting a couple of software updates that'll hopefully the sometimes wonky shifting patterns.

    I wrote about it before, and I'll continue to write it in the future, but I love my shop here. It's totally worth the drive. The people are super cool and their service has never let me down, and I'll continue to give them my service as long as that stays true. But the one thing that absolutely KILLS ME is that they are a shop that primarily works on E36 M3s (like my old M3). I found the shop through an E36 M3 forum. When you pull into their parking lot, there are no less than 3 E36 M3s there. The owners of the shop auto-cross their E36 M3. And they have even let me drive their boston green E36 M3, like my old one, but theirs is a 2-door (I wrote about it here). And anyone who knows me knows that when I see any BMW M series, but especially the same model year as my old one, it gives me instant temporary tourettes. I will forever be bitter & jealous until the day that I once again own & drive an M. I promise, it WILL happen.

    Enough about that. So, what else is new? Nothing much really, so I'll just put stuff in bullet form:

    • Gabe's living with Shann & I in Sac now. Last semester, we offered him to stay with us, but he only had class 2 days a week, so he just commuted. This semester, he has class 5 days a week, so it made more sense to just live with us. For the most part, it's been cool. He's really quiet and sometimes it doesn't seem like he even lives with us. It's kind of exactly how Shann said it would be.
    • As of the end of January, I have been working for the state for 2 years. I received my annual pay increase, or "merit salary adjustment" as the state officially calls it. Yay for raises! But I'm still the last "new hire" in IT in Sac, so there's still the minor threat of getting the axe if it ever comes to that.
    • Cabin Trip's coming up in 2 weeks. Of course, I'm kind of excited for it. I found a big fancy cabin, probably because it hasn't been snowing at all this year. Every year that we've gone, it has snowed, so hopefully that trend will continue. But this year's gonna be a bit different. Last year, we had a ridiculous 28 people, when we normally have 20-22. This year, so far we have only have 14 confirmed and 8 maybes. I kind of assumed it would at least be 20, so I told everyone the price per person accordingly. I don't want to go back on my word, so I may have to eat the rest of the cost. Good thing I'm getting a tax refund this year.
    • Almost 2 years after buying it on it's release day, I finally beat Final Fantasy XIII. I played it a bunch when I first got it, logging about 48 hours of gameplay in 3 months. Then for some reason I lost interest and stopped playing, even though I was really close to the end. It wasn't until the month before it's sequel came out when I started playing it again. Because of the long layoff, I forgot a bulk of the story, but it was still a good, cinematic ending. Since Shann bought the sequel, I'll probably start playing that soon too.
    • As I previously mentioned, I'm currently hooked on the korean drama, "Smile, You". Jaymi recommended it and said she really, really liked it, but I was kind of hesitant because it's a whopping 45 episodes. The longest series I had ever watched was Princess Hours, which was 24 episodes, and a lot of those were filler. Well, I'm currently on episode 35, and while some things took some time to develop, I don't think there has really been any filler episodes. I've really gotten emotionally invested in the story and in the characters (all of them, even the minor ones), which is always an excellent sign to a good drama. I hope it ends well. At least I didn't have it as bad as Shann. We started watching it at the same time, but maybe 2 weeks ago, he jumped ahead of me by watching 10 episodes in a weekend.
    • Sitting at Starbucks, I count 10 people w/ laptops. 8 of them are MacBooks. Out of those 8, I think 3 of them walked in just carrying it their arms like a book and nothing else (no bag, charger, anything). Very interesting.....And according to Google, in the US, 11% of PCs are Macs. What does that say about Mac owners and/or Starbucks patrons? Possibly nothing, possibly everything. Not hatin', just sayin'.......If I'm going to over-pay for a laptop, I'm going to over-pay for more than just the name & logo, like for premium features not found on other laptops. Hence, my sony. Still going strong after 4.5 years. When this one craps out, I'm getting another sony, unless Apple puts a fingerprint scanner & usb 3.0 ports on their MacBooks and start offering different colors, then maybe I'd consider an Apple. I'd just boot camp it to Windows anyways.
    • In November, we figured out how to make okonomiyaki at home, and it tasted hella legit, like the ones they make at real japanese restaurants. In December, we discovered that we didn't need Jay to either make it or make it taste legit. I've made okonomikayi every seek since. And I'm loving it. Now, only if I could make homemade ramen taste like Santa Ramen.
    • My streak of not paying for movies came to end in December. I had a decent run going, I think since July. I either watched free screeners, paid with free passes from my blood donataions, or paid with Costco tickets given as gifts. But in December, I wanted to watch Mission Impossible 4, in IMAX. We watched it at Edwards in Fairfield. I could've used one of my blood donation passes, but I forgot to print it out. Oh well. I'll just have to start the streak again. I have 3 more Costco passes, 2 more blood donation passes, and I'll always be on the lookout for free screeners. I watched The Woman in Black screener w/ Shann & Gabe, and I also got passes to Act of Valor, but no one wanted to see it with me.
    • So the Feds took down Megaupload, my primary source for tv shows. This caused similar file-sharing sites to turn legit, leaving me with torrents as my only option. But in Sac, torrents don't work on my laptop or desktop, where I can't seed anything. If I can't seed, I can't keep my download/upload ratio decent, which means I can't download at all (stupid forum rules). So yeah, I may have to start watching stuff on Netflix or Hulu.
    • I may be looking to buy a house come August. I want to move primarily because of AT&T's crap-ass DSL speed at my current apartment. I briefly browsed Zillow.com for houses near my apartment, and the prices were relatively low. I totally could be paying for a mortage for the same price as my rent. So we'll see. Hopefully Jaymi will be able to find me a nice place for a good price.

    Ok, so this post ended up being way longer than I thought it would. It also took me over 2 hours to write. I guess it makes up for all that downtime.