After missing the delivery of my replacement wireless card on Friday, I was quite eager to recieve the package today. That would have been great. Well the DHL/airborne man came and delivered a package from Dell. I figured this whole incident was behind me and I wouldn’t have had to sped time on the phone with them. So I open the package, and much to my chagrin, there was no card in the box. All of the weight of the package was the multilingual setup guide and the CD. The package did not have a card in it, The sealed package with the CD and manual, was not in fact sealed there was a slit in the package where something could have been removed. So after another hour and a half on the phone with Tech support trying to get it resolved, by which time the department which would ship out the card was closed. They claim they will call tomorrow to get it confirmed, I don’t understnad what they need to know, they have all of my information. Well they have a whole hell of a lot of information on their records for me wrong. They finally have the right phone number, but for some reason are using an old address I never has this order shipped to, so I don’t know how they even got it. Oh well I will demand some quicker service this time. Until later …..

Well apparently I was up/out late last night and finally passed out this morning around 5:30ish. I was awoken once by a phone call from Jason inviting me to a vegetarian breakfast at 9am. That was not wuite my idea of a good time, if I am going to get up and go out on that little sleep I would definately need some bacon. So I rolled over and back to sleep. I was awoken at around 2:45 by my brother on the 2-way. I guess it was time to get up anyhow, but He inquired what wineries were in the southwestern Michigan area. I looked up the local wine trail, and then they invited me to join them. So after a quick shower and a hour and a half drive, I arrived at the Tabor Hill Winery & Restaurant. We sat and conversed, talked a bit of business, and then got down to the business of dinner. This was the first time in a long time that I was able to have some Bison for dinner. That meat is jsut so tender and savory …… mmmmmmmmm…… Some dinner, some nice wines, and a good desert, a good evening and well worth the drive. It was nice to see the family and play with them. I can’t wait until they decide to make another trip up north for some wine.

I suppose I never wrote about last weekend. It was cold. I went camping, it got downright cold. Too cold, in fact, for the snow to properly pack and the igloo we set out to sleep in was nothing more than a dream. We were unable to sleep in a completed igloo, though why didnt we drape a tarp over the top and sleep in it anyway? I don’t know, partially to prove the failure of making the igloo and partly to test out the winter hammock camping theory. The theory worked out well for me, but was a bit lacking on Tod’s frontier, and he conceeded to the cold and reccommended that we go to the health lodge to warm up. I am not a fool, so I agreed to get in and thaw out a bit. A week later I am still thawing out my feet. After some unforseen circumstance, we had to call the weekend short. A brake job, snow-fall and furnace ignitor later we were back in Allendale correcting the wrongs.

Tonight we finally celebrated Darrin’s birthday. It was a calm evening, and diferent from typical nights out with the gang, but very similar to his last birthday, though without the photo of him not taking a drink to well this year, some emotion is lost. It was definately a fun evening and I feel that some things feel as before with a small gathering of friends, Darrin, Abby, Deanna, Jason and Nicolette were all there and it was a great time. the first drink at the caimbridge house of the year was a good evening, I know that Kahunaville has closed since Darrin’s last suaree, possibly due to his celebration. who will ever know, but this was a good time of enjoying the company of close friends. Apparently, I am having issues uploading the images of tonight, but I am glad to report that Darrin has really appreciated his customized flask. That just tickles me pink. I had quite the conversation with Kelly tonight, and not to get the photos up for the evening.

Alright, after 45 minutes on the phone with Dell and 38 incidences of a dropped wireless connection since the last time we talked, I am going to be recieving a replacement internal wireless card for my laptop. I am quite weary of this whole dropped connection thing.

I made some smoked kielbasa, fresh from the deli. Is there anything better to make a man happy than some good food. After a little talking with my mother, I had that meal ready to eat, and then on to bigger and better things.

I finally got through updating and converting Tod’s website from the horridly static table layout to something a little more fluid and definately picked up some things on how to do all that stuff with CSS. I was also taking a look at another website I may need to redo, and I would need to learn how to do some things before even committing to that.

I guess its about time to go to sleep, I need some beauty sleep. Happy belated B-Day to the German, and the celebration to follow will be great I’m sure.

Apparently my phone has decided to not ring tonight, or give me notice of voicemails. This has caused some anger. First off I have missed dinner. I still do not have food in my apartment, so I was really looking forward to that, and I hate to keep pestering people when they say they will call. I am the one at fault, at least nextel is. Apparently DELL did indeed call back to check if i am still having problems with my wireless connection. I don’t know why they troubles would stop, last night she was just able to verify that she couldnt find the order for the wireless card. What a dumbass. She calls back and says she will email me, that has not happened either. The callback has also come after 9pm, whatever time that is over where-ever-the-hell she is providing some outsourcd support. Now I will go through this grand run around again, and then get find something to do other than go grocery shopping.

I cant figure out doing popout vertical menus either on the web. I am mad.

Vanberge?

I am currently boycotting Hungry Howies. They do not want to accept my money for pizza. I did not realize that they are such a small company that they choose to decline out of state checks. They will not accept a credit card, they will only take a “local check” or cash. Too bad for them. I am still hungry, fuck Hungy Howies. The driver does not even have the decency to tell me that he talke dto the manager and that is their policy. He just drives off, I hope he gets in a damn accident.

So after some communications with the producers of 2 software packages intended for transforming images into engraveable art, we have recieved samples produced from both products. Surprisingly one of these seems to do a much more impressive job for the application that we are seeking, unfortunately it is the more expensive product. It turns out the less expensive product was actually designed for use in sandblasting art with their proprietary masking material. Granted it looks alright, but not the resolution that we had desired. It maxed out at 55 dpi. As compared with the 300dpi sample of this other package. Next thing will be of course marketing and bringing in some money.

At least this is something to be doing with the time between beating on doors for jobs. It keeps my mind going and hopefully by the education and project work, I will am learning something more than just the skills that are obviously changing. Possibly a more deep seated mindset of how to look at things and how to proceed about them. Just maybe all this is for the better?

On a lighter note, Happy Birthday to Marshall. You seemed to have quite the time on your 21st Birthday Celebration. I don’t know how much of it he remembers, but that is just how that birthday celebration should go. I am glad to see that my contribution of Spyritus was accepted and later given in tribute to the porcelain god. I did not get any photos of that occasion, but such is life. The Anchor isn’t all that photogenic a place. Wednesday was a trip to Billy’s for the farewell show of Grasshoppah over at Billy’s at least. It was a nice time, great music and good people. I had not seen a few such as Amy and Megan in quite a while, and they were looking sexy as always. So were the people I see a bit more frequently, Jenn and Deanna. I always find it amusing to run into other people I know randomly at the bars. Seeing Lori was not entirely a surprise but the hug and New Years kiss were a nice part of the evening. Apparently she is doing well as are most people around here. Now I just need to find my way into doing well, or at least being employed to afford doing well. I’m sure you know what I mean.

On a “Musical Note” I am getting quite tired of Boulevard of Broken Dreams. The video and song are way too overplayed on MTV, so is that annoying J-Lo song. I don’t mind the Nelly/Tim McGraw song, I actually kinda like it. Scary isn’t it. Furthermore, it is hard to find music boxes that play old Russian songs, though I have finally found a source for all sorts of music in music boxes.

And now for a little sleep before going out camping and hopefully sleeping in a snowbank. Hopefully, if the camera doesn’t freeze, photos to come.