My new furniture arrived today! They were even early, which was cool because if they were on time, I was going to be late for work. But it all worked out.

The furniture was delivered by two guys named Richard and Grasshopper. That's right, Grasshopper. I introduced myself to him as Mark, he shook my hand, and said he was named Grasshopper. I was so tempted to respond with "Ah so, Grasshoppah". But I thought he had probably heard that a million times, so I just smiled and said "Nice to meet you."

Anyway, the furniture is nice. Fits well and looks good. I was a little worried before it came that it would overpower the place, but it really matches the living space. Next up? Sheets and bedding for the bed. Until then, Army linen and green wool blankets.

It's been a few days! I haven't gotten anything down on the old web log even though I've been quite busy. That's also probably why I haven't written anything - because I've been quite busy. Let's have a quick recap: Left Georgia, made it to Rochester in 13 hours total (no tickets). Went apartment hunting, found a nice little two bedroom place in Greece, NY. Bought a set of living room furniture (good deal!). Dad and I drove to NJ, spent the night at my brother's place (made it in under 5 1/2 hours - no tickets). Next day we went to Lansdale, got a moving truck, packed up all my belongings in storage, and moved it up to Rochester (made it in 5 1/2 hours, also good time since the moving truck had a governer and wouldn't do more than 70. Oh, and no tickets). The day after that, Dale (brother-in-law) and my nephews helped me move it all in. Let me tell you, those two little guys can move some stuff! That afternoon, bought more furniture. Next day, started work at my new Starbucks store. Today, the furniture arrived. Now you're all caught up, more or less.

Man, moving is busy work, let me tell you. The trip from Lansdale to Rochester actually wasn't too bad. The expense of the moving van killed me. I ended up with a 24 foot moving van because they were out of the size I had originally reserved. Not a problem I thought, until I started putting gas in the thing. I spent close to $130 just driving from Philly to Rochester. It was almost more money to drive the van than to rent it! But everything is here in pretty good shape, so I can't complain.

I've also started working again which is good (moving is expensive too!) It's a nice little Starbucks store down on the corner of Monroe & Oxford. Evidently it's a pretty slow store. They only do about 10k a week in business. A store that slow normally would never get an assistant manager, but they're looking for some stability and have had issues with managers coming and going, so the district manager (nice guy, BTW) put me there to help slow all the turnover. Also the manager is going to be out of the store a lot in the coming months, so I'll be filling in a lot of her duties. I've only been there 3 days but I get a good vibe so far.

For today, the last of my new furniture arrived *woohoo!* The place is starting to come along! I was a little worried that the apartment would be overwhelmed by all the new furniture, but it fits well. I did a good job of furniture shopping if I do say so myself. In this whole process of apartment decorating, I think I have learned more than any man is ever supposed to know. To my eternal shame, I now know what a duvet, sham, and dust ruffle are. And, I know how to use them.

Anyway, just wanted to get something down here while it was still in my mind. A lot has happened in the last two weeks, but I haven't taken the time to write any of it down. Kind of nice to keep a little log of your life to look back at later =) What's coming up? Another trip to New Jersey! I have drill this weekend. Kind of a pain to have to drive all the way down there again, but I do need the money. It'll be nice to get a little break from Starbucks too.

I went and visited my grandparents on Friday. It was nice seeing them, and I gave them both a kiss on the cheek when I left.

Fast forward to Sunday morning, about 7 am. I'm awoken with stomach pains and a generally nauseous feeling. I spent the next 12 hours throwing up and crapping water, interrupted with periods of shivering and achy muscles. I couldn't keep anything down. Orange juice? In the toilet. Applesauce? In the toilet. Water? In the toilet (though sometimes by different orifices). I couldn't even get any medicine in me because I couldn't keep from throwing up long enough to get it into my body. What does this have to do with my grandmother? I found out later Sunday evening she had come down sick with the same thing on Saturday!

Sorry grandma, no more kisses for you. I love you, but not that much! *lol*

Actually, being sick isn't that bad. I almost found myself welcoming the puking. I would feel soooo bad for about fifteen minutes before I actually threw up that I was fantastically relieved to finally have my stomach settle down for a while after throwing up. The worst part of it is the puke going up your nose. Ugh, that is so bad, trying to get puke out of your nose. Dry heaves are no fun either, but I imagine it's a good workout for your abs!

Then, to top it off, I wake up this morning and there's snow on my car =( At least I'm feeling a little better. My large intestine is rumbling and mumbling, but nothing's coming out. I'll make that trade I suppose.

I imagine this is probably more than you ever wanted to know about my gastro-intestinal health.

Another interesting article from Time. The author argues that the Martha Stewarts and Enrons of the world are a necessary evil, if not an outright good thing. The thinking being that market economies are driven in part by greed. Since these economies need effort to grow, it becomes necessary that the members of those ecomonies be working to maximize their potential. However, in this process, there will always be some who go too far. It's just human nature. The fact that some people are caught being "too" greedy rather than just "greedy enough" is a sign that the economy is maximizing its potential for production. Interesting idea.

After five months here at the U.S. Army Signal Center in Augusta, Georgia, it's time to go home. One long trip to Rochester coming up!

It's been a good time down here. I attended the 74B1O course for those who don't know, which is the alpha-numeric code for the Army's Information Systems Operator/Maintainer course. Essentially, I'm now one of the Army's computer nerds. I did pretty well in the course, if I do say so myself. I Graduated as an Honor Graduate with a 97.3% average (ok, I'm done bragging =). I learned a lot, had a lot of fun, played some paintball, and met a lot of nice people. I'm definitely grateful to have had the opportunity to come here.

Alas, all good things must come to an end. It's on to Rochester to start the next chapter in life. Hopefully I'll get to live there for a while. I got out of the active duty Army because I was sick of moving around all the time and not spending more than a couple months at a time in one place. What happens when I get out? I end up living in four different places the first year. *lol* I'm really looking forward to finding a place and making it mine. You know, finding a place, getting settled in, decorating, getting the love pad all set up.

I think I'm most looking forward to being closer to my friends and my family. I would love to be able to be a bigger part of my nephew's lives as well as spend more time hanging out with my sister and parents. After all, they may not be much but they're the best family I've got! Just kidding, I love my family and I'm very excited to be living closer to them.

Well, enough writing for tonight. I'm off to bed to dream the dreams of a just and righteous man *snicker*. Then off for Mark's Big Adventure in the morning. See ya in about fourteen hours!

Apparently a woman claims she couldn't have been driving a car that killed another person because she was giving the driver a blow job at the time of the accident. She claims the fact that the other passenger in the car was found dead with his pants down proves her claim.

I especially like the list of alternative reasons the prosecution gave for why the alleged driver had his pants down. He was feeling ill? I know I always drop my trousers in the car whenever I feel car sick.

A number of people have commented that there's not much working here yet. That's because I've been putting all my web designing energy into a page for a friend of mine at http://www.nriyounglife.org. Once I get that site finished, I should have more time to get the pictures section up and work on transitioning this page to a CSS layout rather than tables (and making all those other changes I need to make).

For now, I guess visitors will just have to content themselves with reading the occasional thoughts I post and the odd article I find interesting enough to link to here.

I appreciate your interest though! Keep coming by - one of these days there'll be something beyond the web log here. I promise, I do have a plan =)