Super Bowl....

It is Super Bowl sunday time! Naturally, we have to instill in JT that Super Bowl Sunday is a 'mans day' for football watching. We got ready by practicing our football "mean" face:


After that we went to Grandpa and Grandma so we could eat all afternoon and watch Football.

It was even better because we were all rooting for the Colts and they won!! (Even better they won by more than 7 points!)

Titanic blows...

I finally managed to watch Titanic when I was sick. It was sooo OVER-RATED. Can anyone tell me, "Why was Titantic so good?" "Why did soooo many people like watching it?"

Honestly, I thought it was slow. I didn't see the attraction between the two at all. I mean the girl was engaged to someone else, so for her to fall in love after 5 minutes is just stupid. Then the girl leaves the life boat and jumps back ON the Titantic. Now, that is one less person that could have been saved and maybe Leo would have been saved as well, but NOOOOO, he has to give up the floating board and freeze so she can balance on it and be saved. Argh!

During the entire movie I kept thinking about me and Aya. If Aya was the girl, I kept thinking, I would have died 10 times during the movie! No way Aya would have gotten an axe and broken the hand cuffs. Aya would have fallen, gotten tired, taken a water break, forgot...something or all of the above.

In any case, Titantic sucked. Very boring...but at least I can say I finally joined the masses and watched it.

Vegas...

I am back amongst the vertical people! Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday I pretty much laid in bed and rested. In all honesty, I am still sick but without the aches and pains...so just a head cold now. A head cold feels way better than the chills, aches and fever. Sadly, Aya is a little sick now and hopefully JT doesn't get sick. At least Aya and I can take medicine.

How did I get sick? Sorry to dissappoint. It was nothing gay. It had nothing to do with rooming with Sascha like 'some' of you think. I think it was because Vegas was so cold. One night we were outside drinking and didn't realize it was 37 degree's. I think that is how I got sick.

The Vegas conference wasn't that great. I think I liked Miami more. All I did in Vegas was going drinking, clubbing, eating and more drinking. We went to Jet in Mirage, Pure at Ceasars, Tangerines at Treasure Island and Body English at Hard Rock Cafe. I also saw Scottie Pippen as he drank at the table next to me. I missed my chance to see Tito Ortiz and Jenna Jameson. Jenna was at Pure but I didn't see her...and believe me I looked!

The clubs were okay, but it was divided by the 'haves' and 'have nots'. Since I was a customer at the conference all my entry fees were paid for, all food and bar tabs paid for and we always sat in the VIP section. The VIP section is decent. All that seperates the VIP section from the regular folks is velvet rope...and bouncers. The sucky part of the VIP section is everyone is trying to look in or sneak in and if you are a VIP you can't get out...and then getting back in is hard as well. Kinda like a salmon always fighting up stream.

The good thing of the clubs were lots of young hot chicks. Sure there were some ugly, fat ones, but most of the time we were all arguing which girl was a hotter!

Having a kid made clubbing fairly easy. We would go out at 7 pm...eat dinner...go to a club...go to another club, come back to the hotel around 3:30 or 4:00....go to sleep until 8:30 and then make it to the conference at 9:00 am. That gave me 5 hours of solid uninterrupted sleep. I was doing fairly well...until the I got sick.

Vegas was decent. Not the greatest. I didn't even get a chance to gamble. I just may have to make another trip back to sin city!

Sick....

I will write about the Vegas trip later. Right now, all I can say is that I am back at home, alive and NOT well. I got sick in Vegas. Not the boozing kind of sick but the flu/cold kind of sick. I had a fever, chills, aches, sore throat, cough and running nose. I was a billboard for Nyqil!

I made it through most of the conference okay. I got sick towards the end of the conference. I had to miss part of the last night because I was sick. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday I have been in bed trying to get better and not get anyone else sick.

Titanic...

During my week off in between jobs, I had ONE thing that I wanted to do...watch Titanic. Yes, you heard right...Titanic.

When we first got DVR, last march, Titanic was showing on HBO. I am probably one of the handful of people that has NOT seen Titanic. Yes, it is a chick flick. Yes, it is long. Yes it is boring. Yes, I *know* the Titanic sinks in the end. I have heard all that...yet I still want to jump on the band wagon and see it for myself.

Well, I dunno how I got so busy while I was off, but I didn't get a chance to watch Titanic. I watched a bunch of other crappy movies, Cheaper by the Dozen 2, Just Friends, Two for the Money and Dukes of Hazzard. Sadly, Dukes of Hazzard was the best out of those 4 movies and Dukes of Hazzard was pretty bad.

Hopefully tv will go into reruns soon, but my new goal before the end of March is to watch Titanic. No way, can I have it on DVR for a year!

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This picture cracks me up. JT doesn't mind wearing hats, but he can't stand wearing Aunty Dawn's Mickey Mouse hat. He either yanked it off or started to cry. What a goober!

I am off to Vegas and the Wynn hotel for a week...sorry not for fun, but for work.

Just the dudes...

Before JT was born, the best weekends after I got married was when Aya would go to Fullerton for the day or the weekend and I could stay home, eat 2 large pizza's all day and play uninterrupted video games for 20 hours, never changing my clothes, showering or brushing my teeth! It was perfect!

I figure, no time like the present to pass on some fatherly knowledge. Aya went to Japan last week for the third and final funeral for her father. Thus, JT and I have been home alone.

Saturday was a guys day. We actually slept in until 6:45 am, had breakfast, played, snacked, played, lunch and napped. I got to watch most of the UCLA game, snacked again, went for a quick walk (JT is sick, but on Friday I promised I would take him for a ride in his car...but he was napping when the weather was good and the UCLA game was on...stupid promise), so I bundled him up and went for a walk.

When I got ready for the walk, I realized, we have both been in our PJ's all day. We haven't combed our hair. We haven't brushed our teeth. JT actually stayed in his PJ's all day. I had to actually change because I was in shorts and t-shirt and I didn't want to get sick...but I at least put a hoodie on JT before we went out:


Minus, the pizza it was a typical guys weekend! Aya can have guy-girl day, because Aya and I will be like ships passing in the night. When Aya gets back from Japan, I am headed to Vegas for the week.

Last year the conference in Miami was just bonkers. I can't imagine what is going to happen in Vegas!!

Quarters...

Have you ever seen those Dateline shows where valets take your change? I have seen them and it wasn't that I didn't believe the show...I know valets take stuff...but I just assumed it wouldn't happen to me.

I used to exchange my loose change with Sascha. He would take my quarters and give me dollar bills. I dunno what happened but I didn't give him any change for a few months and I noticed my astray in the car was filling up with quarters. I remember thinking, next time I wash my car I am going to clean out my change.

I went out to dinner. Valeted my car. Thought nothing of it. Business as usual. About a week later, I parked on the street and needed change. I looked in my astray and no more quarters! Only nickels and dimes. Huh? Did I take my quarters out??

Nope. Holy crap. Stupid valet parker took all my quarters! I know the valets sit in my car because my radio LCD is HUGE. Most people think the LCD is a touch screen but it isn't. I always clean the screen but whenever I get my car back from the valets I see their little grubby finger prints on my screen.

Now I have no quarters and finger prints. Good thing I don't park by Jenny's house or she might have towed my car away!

Slippers...

For the past few days I noticed 'feathers' around the house. I thought it was odd that feathers were popping up, but I just cleaned the house over the weekend and the vaccum was stuffed so I thought maybe the vaccum overflowed and expelled some of the 'dust bunnies'.

More and more started to appear and today when I got home they were all over! What the heck? I looked all around the house, checked all the vents...I thought maybe a bird died and fell into my heating unit. Stupid birds.

I was going bonkers looking for the source. I stopped and took a close look. Yes, feathers...not dust...definately feathers. These look like the feathers that are stuffed into furniture. Hmm.

I looked down at my feet. Soft...featherly...slippers. I take off my slippers and start inspecting them. First one...is okay. Second one...DAMN...there is hole in the slipper with feathers coming out!! Stupid slippers! I knew these slippers were no good. The feathers would move from one side to the other...never cushioned my feet.

Man, what am I going to do now? I stopped wearing Uggs because I think they gave me athlete's foot. Now I have no more slippers...I guess it is back to wearing slippery socks in the house. At least I found the source of the mysterious feathers.

Socks...

So how many pairs of socks do you wear during the week? Last week I noticed that Aya would change out of her work clothes and get into casual clothes when she gets home. No big deal. Normally Aya wears panty hose to work so she doesn't need regular socks.

While doing the laundry I noticed that a lot of Aya's socks get into the wash, but I kind of brushed it aside. This week, I actually counted. Aya had 6 pairs of socks for the week!! I had 7 pairs of socks...casual and dress socks total! I do the laundry every week, so for Aya to have 6 pairs in outrageous!

Aya said that she wears a pair a day when she gets home...that is all of 2 or 3 hours. In addition, she only wears them around the house...so you could easily re-use the socks...don't you think?
I think because Aya doesn't do laundry she just goes all willy-nilly style and uses socks whenever she wants. Grr.

I was thinking...

Since I had no PC and no internet access, I couldn't really do anything at work. I snuck onto the lot one day. That wasn't that difficult considering they had 'improved' security.

In any case, I thought of two things. If you deliver pizza for a living, does your car always smell like pizza? Can you ever get rid of that smell? What happens when they try to sell it or trade it in and it smells like pizza?

My second thought was bread. Does anyone eat the 'end' pieces of bread? The only person I have ever seen eat those pieces is my mom. I always throw them away and wonder why the bread company can't sell bread without 'end' pieces.

First Week...

The first week of the new job was rather uneventful and kinda sucky. I forgot the process and the slowness of working for a big company. It took them all week to get me a working monitor and a login. To top it off, my working monitor is a big old 16" monitor...no flat screen...and only 1 monitor. I guess I was spoiled having 2 big flat screens at LMB.

Also, the jury is still out and I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but my coworkers are boring. I am back to being the youngest person on the team. None of these people go out to lunch...which is okay...because I am fine eating at my desk so I can leave early. It is just different...basically the opposite of LMB.

The good news is that my hours are working out well. I am in the office by 7:15 and I leave at 3:45. Luckily, the commute has been good so far and I get an extra hour a day with JT now.

Also, on Fridays they premiere new UMG music videos and bring in artists. We had this one teen girl band come in and play 3-4 songs for us in the conference room. There was only like 30 people there. The conference isn't the greatest but the sound in there rocks! Afterwards we got autographs and pictures.

Other than that, it is business as usual. It is interesting to be back in the exact same building. Some of the same people are still there as well. Hopefully week 2 is better...already seems better because I get MLK day off for the first time in quite a few years. Woo-Hoo!

New job...

How is the new job? I can't tell you. I forgot what it was like working for a bigger company. Day 1 was spent doing new hire paperwork and orientation. Once that was done, I sat around and waited for a network login. No login means no access to the PC or internet....which equals boring.

Day 2 looked like it was going to be more of the same but around lunch time I finally got a network login. Unfortunately, the login had no access to any of the servers. I need to see about 6 servers and I had zero. To top that off, I have a 15" old school, big old monitor. 15"!! Who even carries 15" monitors anymore? In addition, the monitor doesn't even work well and is all blurry and fuzzy.

I requested a new monitor this afternoon...but I am not holding my breath. Other than that, it kind of feels like home. Home being that I used to work in the same building and I have seen several old coworkers.

Lets see how things go once I get a PC that works and access to the system. For now, I am just enjoying the free bottled water. Oh yeah, I also get discounts on CD's. $4.50 a CD so if you want some CD's let me know as we get to order 4 times a year and we are about to start the first ordering period.

Rusty...

There have been better days in my basketball playing life. My first meaningful game back since my retirement and I think I should have stayed retired. I shot the ball poorly...airballed a 10 footer....missed the game winning shot with 6 seconds left to play. All in all, I dismal performance.

Granted, I didn't expect to play that well considering the long layoff, but I didn't expect to play so poorly either. In my head I knew what I wanted to do, my body just didn't respond or move the way I wanted. Not only did I have a 9 month layoff from basketball, but I think my body realized I that I am no spring chicken and my body got used to the retirement.

I always said, one of the good things about leaving LMB will be that I can start eating better and maybe work out. Looks like I have to start doing both if I want to get into better shape to play basketball and help the team.

Funny, I don't feel old...but tonight I sure felt old.

Un-Retirement....

Yes, you read right. I am coming out of basketball retirement. I honestly thought my basketball playing days were done. Sure, I subbed a few times since I retired but I hardly played in those games and my role was truly just a sub.

Coach Ron called me up and told me that they needed me to play to make 5. If I play then he would scrounge up 2 other players to round out the team. I suppose Jeff is the GM or the moneyman because as a signing bonus I got Tigers Woods 2007 on PS2.

I figured I owed it to Ron and Jeff to come out and play since they were having trouble fielding a team. For the past two days, I started working out again. Really, how much rust could there be from not playing in 9 months?

Umm, running is a problem. I have zero stamina, zero heart. I am like fat 10 year old, who has been smoking for 40 years. Granted, I hate running so I moved on to touching a basketball.

You know it is not a good sign, when you are walking up a hill, bouncing a ball and then losing control of the ball, causing it to go down a hill...where I have to chase a ball....and then am so tired from that brief sprint that I debated to go home or go back to the court.

I managed to hoof it up to the court where I proceed to air ball my first shot (from 6 feet away). I then try the infamous Tim Duncan bank shot. Um, yeah...ever see a ball not bank towards the basket but richochet in some unknown or unexplainable direction? Yeah, that was shot 4 or 5.

I then try to 'imagine' game situations and shots that I would want to take. It looked like I never shot a ball in my life. To the casual watcher, it may have looked like I was practicing banking in EVERY shot from every angle. It seemed as if I banked everything or airballed everything. In addition, while 'imagining' these game situations, I dribbled the ball off my foot more times than I can count. Any spin move and the ball was lost. I chaulked those up to behind the back pass practices though.

Rust. Age. Not a pretty picture. Next time, just as a suggestion...Ron, you may want to scout out retired players before needing them to play. I got 4 more days to shake off the rest.

Happy New Year!!

For the first time in quite some time, I did not stay up to bring in the new year. Sadly, Aya and I were both sick a few days before New Years. I was planning on staying up but Aya and JT were already sleeping so I figured, "What's the point? JT is going to wake up at 6 am so I might as well go to sleep and be ready for an early wake up call." Sad, but true.

Not a whole lot is different in the New Year. I went to drink my customary Orange Juice and I thought, "Hmm. Interesting. Pulp."

See, I do not like pulp in my orange juice, unless it is freshly squeezed and being served to be while I watch the sun rise over the ocean. So, that means I don't like pulp in my orange juice.

Miles: I have pulp in my OJ.
Aya: Really. I bought the OJ with no pulp.
Miles: Um, no. I don't think you did.
Aya: I got the one that says NO PULP.
Miles: You know I don't like pulp.
Aya: I know. That is why I *GOT* the one with *NO* pulp.
Miles: Okay, lets take a look-sey.


Miles: Hmm. This carton of OJ has labels that clearly say, "LOTS OF PULP"
Aya: HAHAHAHHAHA! I didn't even read the label.

Clearly that was an understatement, as the LOTS OF PULP lable is on both sides of the carton.

I guess Aya and I are another year older and it shows. We went to go and see Casino Royale. When the movie started Aya tells me the volume in the theater is pretty loud. I thought it was average.

When we are leaving the theater, I asked Aya are you hungry? Aya says something to me that I couldn't quite make out and thought was rather strange:

Miles: What? You want me to call you Tito?
Aya: Huh?
Miles: Did you just say, "I want you to call me Tito?"
Aya: NO. I said, "I have to pee though.

Yup, this how Aya and I started off our 2007.