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Christmas wasn’t as great this year as the past few years. People just didn’t have money to buy gifts and I just wasn’t feeling the spirit of the season. What did I get?

• Erykah Badu – New Amerykah Part One (4th World War)
• Calvin Klein cologne and body wash
• a nice shirt
• another gift should be coming

I didn’t realize that people who I thought would be used to animals would react so badly to having a dog around. I guess they like the idea of me having a dog as long as they don’t have to deal with him in person. He had to stay cooped up in 1 room most of the time and he kept whining to get out. This might make going home difficult. It got better, but still. Maybe next year I’ll celebrate in my own home.

Anyway, it’s good to have 2 weeks off from work. I’ve been getting caught up on TV shows that I recorded, movies, and gaming. I’ve still got another week to go.

Man, I’ve been neglecting this blog for a while. Whenever I think about updating, I get distracted by other stuff.

I figured I would update today because it’s my 30th birthday. It’s been a great day. I didn’t even mind that I had to work. Some of my co-workers decorated my cubicle. I was kind of expecting something, but I didn’t know for sure if it would happen. I got a card that everybody signed and even got some chocolate candy. Mostly everyone congratulated me and made jokes about my age. For a while I forgot about all of the stuff I’ve been bitching about on Twitter concerning so-called optional work-related social interactions.

I didn’t do much tonight. I watched the muppets Christmas special, put together some doggie stairs, and put up a coat rack. Very exciting!

This weekend I’m going to Birmingham to see Avenue Q. I don’t know what else we’ll do, but it should be fun.

Thanks to everyone who wished me a Happy Birthday. I really had a great day.

I was so glad to go vote today. I’m ready for all this to be over with. I went to the polling place about 10 minutes before the door opened at 7AM. The place where I was assigned to vote was a retirement home just a little way across town. There was already a long line forming and there wasn’t nearly enough parking. I got one of the last 2 marked spots. I was finished about an hour after I got in line. There was only 1 person checking off names and 1 of the machines was broken, so I guess it could have gone faster. From what I’ve heard there’s been a high turnout all over the city. The polling place down the street from me (not sure why I wasn’t assigned to that one) had so many cars on the side of the road that it was hard for me to get back home to get ready to do to work.

Anyway, I hope everybody votes today and makes the right choices. And if you don’t know what the right choices are, then you’re probably helpless j/k.

Rob was here last week and talked about the possibility of George R.R. Martin not finishing his Ice and Fire series. The other night his office was broken into and a few items were damaged/stolen. He makes it sound like he barely missed an encounter with the thieves. So not only could he have had the manuscript for the next book in the series stolen, he could have been hurt as well. Thankfully, he still has hard drive the book is on and he is okay. Just finish the damn book, please.

I did something that I used to think I would never do. I bought an iPod. I’ve changed my mind on it at least 3 times in the past couple of days, but I finally placed the order today.

I’ve gotten the idea of getting an mp3 player in my mind several times over the past few years, but I always change my mind. I really don’t need one. All the stuff I can do on an iPod I can do on other devices. I can even do it better on other devices. However, the iPod has a convenience factor and a coolness factor. Although I am rarely in situations where I have to use the iPod, I’m sure I will WANT to use it once I have it.

At one point I thought that I would buy a Zune if I bought any mp3 player. I’m kinda anti-Apple lately. I changed my mine on getting a Zune after a friend of mine got an iPod. I’ve already ripped all of my CDs to my hard drive using iTunes. I still don’t understand why people get so excited over iTunes. It is something awful. I’ll have to get used to it I guess. I’ve also started organizing the mp3s I already had. I can see myself obsessing over this for many hours, but it’ll be great to be able to listen to any of my songs whenever I want.

I’m excited about finally making it into the 21st century in this area. It should be here by the end of the week. I think I’m going to buy some accessories today.

A couple of weeks ago I got an email welcoming me to OnStar and congratulating me on the purchase of a new vehicle. Since then I’ve gotten more emails from them like diagnostic reports, order confirmations, etc. The weird thing is that I’m not an OnStar customer and I got my car 3 months ago. The car this guy is driving a 2008 Cadillac GTS (He’s probably old. I’m just saying). Mine is a 2006 Nissan Altima. I love a good case of mistaken identity.

The email address that this is sent to has my first and last name in it. The person that these emails are supposed to be going to has the same first and last name as me, but his middle initial is different than mine. HIS middle initial begins with the same letter as our last name. My theory is that somebody entered the email address incorrectly.

I tried calling OnStar and explaining everything to them, but I couldn’t convince the customer service representative that I wasn’t this person and I don’t own the kind of car mentioned in these reports. Because we have the same first and last name, we had to be the same person, right? People don’t realize how common my name is. Finally, she agreed to take my email address off the account, but a few days later I got another welcome email and diagnostic report. I checked my bank and credit card transactions and I’m not being charged for OnStar, so I won’t worry about it anymore.

What else have I learned from the emails?
• He just purchased more hands-free calling minutes today
• His hands-free calling number is a Florida number (supports the old guy theory)
• He has 86% of his oil life remaining
• He has 1507 miles on his car
• 3 out of his 4 tires have low air pressure, but everything else on the car checks out okay
• He has XM Satellite Radio

I almost wish I had OnStar now.

Update, 09/30/2008
I got another email from OnStar yesterday asking me to complete my online account setup.

Someone from OnStar left a comment here asking me to call her to address this situation. I’m leaving it in moderation so it won’t show up here. She was in a meeting when I called here earlier this morning. I’m still waiting on a return call.

I recently made my way through Headcrash by Bruce Bethke. It was hard with the Olympics and dog stuff and whatever distractions I could come up with. Headcrash is a cyberpunk novel. The author is the person who came up with the term cyberpunk.

The VR elements of this book reminded me of Snow Crash. I liked this one a lot better, but I still wasn’t blown away. I guess cyberpunk just isn’t my thing. It’s a funny book and good satire. I liked how at the end it was making fun of authors like Tom Clancy and Michael Crichton, whose books I do like to read. Enjoyable book, but I’m ready for something else. Next I’ll be reading Watchmen.

• Headcrash, Bruce Bethke
• Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke
• Timeline, Michael Crichton
• Unshapely Things, Mark Del Franco
• Finding Serenity, Jane Espenson
• Serenity Found, Jane Espenson
• On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
• On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
• The Appeal, John Grisham
• Playing for Pizza, John Grisham
• The Taking, Dean Koontz
• Playing for Keeps, Mur Lafferty
• The Night Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Day Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Twilight Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Final Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
• His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
• Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
• Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
• Empire of Ivory, Naomi Novik
• Victory of Eagles, Naomi Novik
• Lyra’s Oxford, Philip Pullman
• Unholy Domain, Dan Ronco
• Elantris, Brandon Sanderson
• Titus Andronicus, William Shakespeare

A week ago today I adopted a puppy that I found through Petfinder.com from the animal shelter in Aberdeen. He’s a mini-dachshund/feist mix. He’s gonna be inside so I didn’t want a huge dog. I was having a lot of trouble coming up with a name, so I called him Puppy for days. A few times I accidentally called him Bailey. I came up with Reese when I was watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Yeah, I know that’s crazy but I like the name.

He gets along well with everybody. He learns quickly and hasn’t been that mischievous yet *knocks on wood*. I wish I could work at home so I could hang out with him all day, but I can’t do that.

For the first week and a half or so of the Olympics I was really into it. Now I’m getting tired of it. I still leave it on in the background, but I’m usually not paying attention to it. Congratulations to all the winners, but I’m ready for you to be off my TV.  I call upon the youth of the world to go home so I can watch Heroes, Chuck, Life, The Office, etc. I’m also ready to get back on a normal sleep schedule.

There was this one commercial for a lawyer in Tupelo that came on almost every commercial break during the first week or so of the Olympics. It’s so bad that it’s funny and if you see it enough it gets stuck in your head.

It turns out that this commercial ripped off another commercial, which I think is done better.

Playing for Keeps: A Superhero Novel was first released in podcast and pdf form on playingforkeepsnovel.com. My first exposure to it was the podcast version, which is read by the author, Mur Lafferty. The paper version was recently released.

PfK is about group of people that are part of the Third Wave of superheroes. The Third Wavers have super powers, but their powers are kind of lame. Their powers are so weak that they’re considered useless in crime fighting. The main character is Keepsie Branson. Her power is that anything that she owns can’t be taken away from her. Third Wavers are looked down on by the powerful superheroes.

The Third Wavers get involved in a battle between the heroes and the villains in the city. As the story goes on, they learn that their powers are stronger than they initially realized. I really enjoyed the book. It makes me think that characters like Dazzler might not be so worthless after all. Next, I’m reading Headcrash.

• Headcrash, Bruce Bethke
• Childhood’s End, Arthur C. Clarke
• Timeline, Michael Crichton
• Unshapely Things, Mark Del Franco
• Finding Serenity, Jane Espenson
• Serenity Found, Jane Espenson
• On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
• On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
• The Appeal, John Grisham
• Playing for Pizza, John Grisham
• The Taking, Dean Koontz
• Playing for Keeps, Mur Lafferty
• The Night Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Day Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Twilight Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• The Final Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko
• Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
• His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
• Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
• Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
• Empire of Ivory, Naomi Novik
• Victory of Eagles, Naomi Novik
• Lyra’s Oxford, Philip Pullman
• Unholy Domain, Dan Ronco
• Elantris, Brandon Sanderson
• Titus Andronicus, William Shakespeare