Whoa, what a week
I think I undertipped the waiter when I was eating apocryphal Chinese food, because I'm living in interesting times.
Wednesday c0nsumer tipped me off that a local Meijer broke the street date for the DS Lite. So echolex and I ran up there and got a DS Lite and some games. I then hopped online to brag about how I got a DS Lite before the street date, which is evidence that I'm a better person than those who didn't but a worse person than those who did but didn't feel the need to rub it in everyone's face.
Thursday part dog, part alien Buddy went in for surgery. He had a face-lift, partly because he's vain as hell and partly because Chinese Shar-Peis suffer from entropion, a malady where the wrinkles cause fur to scrape against the eyeballs and slowly blind the dog. The vet cut out a lot of skin, and he looks like he's had a lobotomy. Now, he's one of those space dogs with the cone around his neck, and he'll get his stitches out on the 15th. We're going to cure the removed skin and use it to make an ironic collar for Buddy. (not really)
Friday echolex's grandfather Bruce died. She knew he wasn't doing well since they removed a brain tumor earlier this year, which is why we spent a week in April on vacation in South Carolina visiting her grandparents. He seemed like a really great guy, and I'm glad I got to meet him. I called Northwest about bereavement rates, and asked if I could use my miles to buy a ticket. I mentioned to the person on the phone that I was a little shy of the 25,000 mile needed but could no doubt get the miles from a family member. My parents both offered up miles to fly Jenny down to SC.
That night we tried to go out to the ArborUpdate birthday party with nerdtech, but by the time we got there everyone had left. We stuck around and had a drink; Bruce was a gin drinker so Jenny had a gin & tonic in his honor.
Saturday Jenny managed to score us tickets to the Canton Ikea friends-and-family preview day from a coworker. For being a ticketed event, it was pretty mobbed. It's Ikea, so you know what to expect if you've been to one before, but the checkout lines were out of control. It literally took us an hour and a half to check out, I checked my phone's clock. Part of the problem was that we wound up in a middle line, the lines on the sides fed into many more registers, the ones in the middle were the suckers lines. Part of the problem was that Ikea's idea of line management was to give out free candy. Part of the problem was that the woman in front of us was shopping for herself, her girlfriend and one of their moms, and using her employee discount. She then spent 20 minutes with the cashier checking out multiple times until her employee discount was applied. It's a good thing the A/C in the store was working or riots would have been inevitable. But now we have cheaply made Swedish crap, so it's all worthwhile.
That evening, we booked her flight. I logged on to NWA.com (which really should include a MIDI version of Bitches Ain't Shit) to find out that my frequent flier miles had gone up by 5,000 since I checked the day before. My theory is that the woman from Northwest that I spoke with took pity and dropped some miles into my account. That or, if you don't believe in the basic goodness of other human beings, angels did it. So we got the ticket for a $5 handling fee instead of the $350 bereavement rate. Jenny's mom drove down on Saturday and so those two will be comforting and helping out Jenny's grandmother this week.
Sunday I helped Jenny get ready for her trip, and then pitched in at my parents digging ditches and fixing computers. I tried to set up encryption on their wireless network, but it's too damn complicated. They have two Macs and three Windows computers, I was able to get the Macs working with every encryption option I tried, but I couldn't find a single encryption option that the two Windows computers would agree on. Not even 40 bit WEP.
Today I got up early and dropped Jenny at the airport and said our goodbyes. I haven't been Jenny-less this long since we moved in together, and likely a lot longer than that. I told her to take the DS Lite with her, which negates a lot of the getting-it-before-street-date bragging rights, but it'll keep her entertained in the down time. For some reason she didn't fight me on that.
I just heard from her; her puddle jumper arrived safely and she was playing Tetris DS waiting for her mom to pick her up at the airport. If you get a moment, let her know you're thinking of her and her grandfather.
Wednesday c0nsumer tipped me off that a local Meijer broke the street date for the DS Lite. So echolex and I ran up there and got a DS Lite and some games. I then hopped online to brag about how I got a DS Lite before the street date, which is evidence that I'm a better person than those who didn't but a worse person than those who did but didn't feel the need to rub it in everyone's face.
Thursday part dog, part alien Buddy went in for surgery. He had a face-lift, partly because he's vain as hell and partly because Chinese Shar-Peis suffer from entropion, a malady where the wrinkles cause fur to scrape against the eyeballs and slowly blind the dog. The vet cut out a lot of skin, and he looks like he's had a lobotomy. Now, he's one of those space dogs with the cone around his neck, and he'll get his stitches out on the 15th. We're going to cure the removed skin and use it to make an ironic collar for Buddy. (not really)
Friday echolex's grandfather Bruce died. She knew he wasn't doing well since they removed a brain tumor earlier this year, which is why we spent a week in April on vacation in South Carolina visiting her grandparents. He seemed like a really great guy, and I'm glad I got to meet him. I called Northwest about bereavement rates, and asked if I could use my miles to buy a ticket. I mentioned to the person on the phone that I was a little shy of the 25,000 mile needed but could no doubt get the miles from a family member. My parents both offered up miles to fly Jenny down to SC.
That night we tried to go out to the ArborUpdate birthday party with nerdtech, but by the time we got there everyone had left. We stuck around and had a drink; Bruce was a gin drinker so Jenny had a gin & tonic in his honor.
Saturday Jenny managed to score us tickets to the Canton Ikea friends-and-family preview day from a coworker. For being a ticketed event, it was pretty mobbed. It's Ikea, so you know what to expect if you've been to one before, but the checkout lines were out of control. It literally took us an hour and a half to check out, I checked my phone's clock. Part of the problem was that we wound up in a middle line, the lines on the sides fed into many more registers, the ones in the middle were the suckers lines. Part of the problem was that Ikea's idea of line management was to give out free candy. Part of the problem was that the woman in front of us was shopping for herself, her girlfriend and one of their moms, and using her employee discount. She then spent 20 minutes with the cashier checking out multiple times until her employee discount was applied. It's a good thing the A/C in the store was working or riots would have been inevitable. But now we have cheaply made Swedish crap, so it's all worthwhile.
That evening, we booked her flight. I logged on to NWA.com (which really should include a MIDI version of Bitches Ain't Shit) to find out that my frequent flier miles had gone up by 5,000 since I checked the day before. My theory is that the woman from Northwest that I spoke with took pity and dropped some miles into my account. That or, if you don't believe in the basic goodness of other human beings, angels did it. So we got the ticket for a $5 handling fee instead of the $350 bereavement rate. Jenny's mom drove down on Saturday and so those two will be comforting and helping out Jenny's grandmother this week.
Sunday I helped Jenny get ready for her trip, and then pitched in at my parents digging ditches and fixing computers. I tried to set up encryption on their wireless network, but it's too damn complicated. They have two Macs and three Windows computers, I was able to get the Macs working with every encryption option I tried, but I couldn't find a single encryption option that the two Windows computers would agree on. Not even 40 bit WEP.
Today I got up early and dropped Jenny at the airport and said our goodbyes. I haven't been Jenny-less this long since we moved in together, and likely a lot longer than that. I told her to take the DS Lite with her, which negates a lot of the getting-it-before-street-date bragging rights, but it'll keep her entertained in the down time. For some reason she didn't fight me on that.
I just heard from her; her puddle jumper arrived safely and she was playing Tetris DS waiting for her mom to pick her up at the airport. If you get a moment, let her know you're thinking of her and her grandfather.