No internet = me not so happy
For the past 4-5 days our internet connection has been virtually non-existent. It would work for about 30 minutes once every couple of hours, but starting Friday, I couldn’t really connect for more than five. We called Time Warner about it, but they said they couldn’t see anything wrong. Oh really? Then why hasn’t it been working?
That’s alright though. To be honest, I was starting to burn out. It just pisses me off that it’s been 4-5 days since it’s been reliable. I mean, we pay a lot of money to Time Warner each month for TV and internet, and 4-5 days seems like a lot of time for it to be down with no other explanation then “We can’t find anything wrong.” I mean, if it’s been going on for this amount of time, you couldn’t send someone out to look? I’m not exactly a guru when it comes to internet connections and such. If I have to, I can set up a wireless network and add some printers and the like. I can do basic diagnostics if I’m having trouble with a connection card, and I can do a whole lot with Google. But if I can’t load Google, that doesn’t help me very much.
Last night, we had been invited to our friend’s, Leah and Derek, house for a Halloween party. I didn’t really want to dress up because, well, I just didn’t. Ness insisted that I did and she put together a costume so that I slightly resembled Duckie from Pretty In Pink. I say slightly, because it really was slightly. Ness was a French maid, she looked pretty hot, but she always does. I pretty much stood on the sidelines because even though I’ve become a bit more social since I’ve been with Ness, I still have a huge fear of large crowds. It made it slightly worse that the huge crowd was all inside in a tiny town house. Regardless, I had fun.
Towards the end of the night, when almost everyone was drunk, Leah decided it would be funny to come and sit on my lap and get in my face and act like she was going to make out with me. She kept whispering “sweet nothings” into my ear, literally, it was “sweet nothings,” and kept asking me if she was making me nervous. I just laughed. It was Ness’ idea. I believe I was one of the only sober ones in the whole place.
I was taking the beer slow because that’s the only thing that can really get me buzzed or drunk, but I had a few jello shots and one or two shots of Malibu Mango. Liquor doesn’t do anything to me, unless I drink it in ridiculous amounts. I haven’t done that though since the first wedding I went to. I stopped drinking about two hours before we left, but I was just getting tired so that’s why I stopped. That and I didn’t really feel like drinking anymore. I got drunk about a month ago, and since then, I haven’t felt the need to drink in excess anymore. I’m kind of over that whole thing.
For awhile, I thought it would be fun to get drunk every so often. But it’s not that I had a bad experience with being drunk, I just realized there was absolutely nothing special about being drunk. I’m too old for that shit. I was trying to make up for the fact that I didn’t really party before, but I don’t need to be drunk to have a good time. Especially when I’m friends with the most unpredictable, in a good way, people. That, and I’m dating Ness who is probably one of the most crazy people I know. She always keeps me on my toes.
Now that my internet seems to be working, I’m going to try not to burn myself out. I’m not really used to working with so much code in such a small time-frame.
We forgot to pay the cable bill…
Well, I know we forgot to pay the cable bill, but we also thought that someone had paid last month’s bill. Mostly because he said he would pay it. Guess he didn’t. Oh well. So I’ve been without the internet for two whole days.
ZOMG! No Internets?!?!?
Yea…it was hard. I read a book, I cleaned out my computer so now it runs faster, I’m getting rid of some stuff on iTunes so I can download more. Mainly albums that I don’t listen to, but still wanted. I also helped Ness with her homework. I’m a good boyfriend like that. I also made her a mixed CD with all the songs that remind me of her. I even took the time to hand draw a cover for it. It looks really ugly, although she insists she doesn’t. But I blame the ugliness on the fact that I had a very limited supply of Sharpy’s.
Well, if one thing, my computer shouldn’t be giving me much shit now that I actually had time to go around and clean the hard drive off and basically do things to it you should do at least once a week. The amount I use it and the fact that it’s a good 6 years old will do that. If anything, I’ve also realized that I’m in need of a really awesome external hard drive. If you have any recommendations on those, let me know. I’m looking for a lot of space and something cheap. Very cheap.
Mandy’s Mixtape
I don’t know if you know this or not, but Mandy and I have known each other for a really long time. I think I was 13 when I met her. It’s so long that I can’t remember. It’s been over a decade at least. We lost touch for about three years. She got busy with her then new boyfriend and college and we both dropped off the face of the earth. Not to say that I didn’t get busy either, because I did.
Our musical tastes have always matched well, except for her obsession with the Backstreet Boys; I was more of an Nsync fan. I’m not afraid to admit that I have weird musical tastes. Like Nsync and musical theater. I have the CD’s to prove it if you don’t believe me. Anyway…Mandy has sent me a total of 3 mixed cd’s since last October. The first two I fell in love with. This next one, I’m in love with too. Here’s the list (and if you haven’t heard any of these, I suggest you do):
1. Black Magic- Jarvis Cocker
2. Walk in Fire- Doves
3. You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb- Spoon
4. Turn on Me- The Shins
5. Hold On- Razorlight
6. Flowers in the Window- Travis
7. Signal Fire- Snow Patrol
8. It’s Not Over Yet- Klaxons
9. Naive- The Kooks
10. Fistful of Sand- The Bravery
11. Middleman- Bright Eyes
12. West Coast- Coconut Records
13. The Weight of the World- Editors
14. Lullaby- Starsailor
15. Paris 2004- Peter Bjorn and John
16. Let Me Take You There- Plain White T’s
17. Lovesong of the Buzzard- Iron and Wine
18. Walters- Pinback
I don’t think a Mandy mixtape would be complete without Bright Eyes and Starsailor. 
Coming up…
I’m on the verge of launching my baby. (Read: A new site.) When I do, I’ll give you all a grand tour of it.
My girlfriend has horrible road rage…
My experiences with road rage have been minimal, to say the least. I grew up with a mom who likes to drop f-bombs at every other driver, along with other words and phrases that are too inappropriate for me to mention. But that’s about it. If someone had cut my mom off she wouldn’t have sped up and ridden their ass. She would just swear at them, and occasionally flip them off.
Growing up in a small town, road rage never really was an issue. It literally takes 15 minutes to get from one side of town to the other, so not many people are in a hurry. Even if they’re running late, it’s not a big deal. Most people are pretty laid back about time. I was, honestly, a bit naive.
Bigger cities have bigger traffic
I’m smart. It’s no secret that I don’t like to drive. If I don’t have to then I won’t. It’s annoying and I’d rather be looking at the scenery than watching the guy in front of me pick his nose, smoke a cigarette, and talk on his cell phone all at the same time. So when I lived at home, great, I didn’t have to drive on most occasions because that’s what my parents were for. My mom doesn’t work so any chance she had of getting out of the house she takes. Running around with me on my ten minute errands were a great way for her to get away from my pain-in-the-ass dad and sisters.
But when I moved away, I found myself having to drive more. This wasn’t good. Even though I had been driving a car by myself since I was 8 (yes, really, and no, not in traffic) I wasn’t prepared for big city driving. I make it no secret that I think more than half the population is dumber than I am. I’m not saying I’m smarter than most people, I’m just saying that I’m smarter than more than half. First, people who have a low IQ shouldn’t even be allowed to have licenses. Second, people that feel the need to multi-task while driving, like talking on your cell phone, picking your nose, and putting on your make-up, shouldn’t be allowed to hold licenses either. The more distracted you are, the more likely you’re going to get into an accident, or cause an accident. So, half the people I know, wouldn’t be allowed to drive. It would make the world that much safer.
There are reasons why there are speed limits. There are reasons why there are stop signs, stop lights, yield signs, cross walks, emergency lights, school speed zones, and turning lanes. Speed limits not only keep traffic going but they also offer a way to make your driving experience 5% safer. (It should be noted that I’m pulling this out of my ass, but you get the point.) You want to speed a little, go ahead. But if you’re going 80 in a 65, or 90 in a 65, don’t you think that’s a little…unsafe…a little…stupid? I have no problem with going 70 in a 65, and on occasion I’ve been known to go 75 in a 65, I’m not a complete square.
But what happens when people speed on streets? The flow of traffic becomes faster, making it necessary for other drivers to speed up a little bit. It also seems, to me at least, that the faster people are going, the more likely they are to get pissed off at the stupid little things involved with driving. Like when someone needs to change lanes, decides to change lanes, etc.
This leads me to…
Defensive driving vs. Aggressive driving
When I first got my license and took a driving course, our “teacher” told us to be defensive drivers. Meaning, don’t fuck around, pay attention, be courteous, and heed the laws of the land, er, roads. Well, a majority of people driving now say “fuck you” to that and have follow aggressive driving like it’s a religion.
The aggressive drivers are the ones who you want to swear at, give them nice hand gestures, or wish that a cop was around doing their job when they should be instead of at Burger King, the gas station, or Dunkin Donuts. To you I say “fuck you” because you’re the reason I hate driving, the reason I almost shit my pants everytime I enter the freeway, and the reason I’m considering wearing diapers whenever I get into a car.
The road is not your own personal speedway. You want to race, drive fast, almost crash into people, start driving the NASCAR circuit, because that kind of driving is not meant for public roads.
Now my girlfriend…
Ness isn’t a bad driver. Not at all. Most of the time I feel very safe while she’s driving. However, when one of those aggressive drivers comes out and starts acting stupid in front of her, she turns into an aggressive driver herself. She has a very short temper for idiotic people with licenses and cars.
The other day we drove to Akron to hang out with Gay Boy Aaron. It’s ok to call him Gay Boy Aaron, that’s what he goes by. No, Ness and I weren’t drunk. We only had a drink and then left. Anyway…onto the story.
Ness has a different version, her version, of the story, but she can tell that because she’s stubborn and wants to think that she’s right in most situations. That’s one of the reasons why I love her, because I used to be like that until I realized that I wasn’t right all the time, although I’m right 95% of the time.
We were coming home, everything was great, until we had to get off the highway and get gas. We get off the highway, the gas station we went to was closed and had to find our way back to the freeway. Due to construction, we had a hard time finding the entrance, but we did manage to find another, open, gas station. Now, to find the entrance to the freeway. We follow the detour signs, Ness is becoming impatient, and so am I. I snap at her and tell her to look at the signs. I calmed down, apologized to her once we found the freeway. I shouldn’t have snapped at her.
Everything is going well for the first few minutes, then some asshole decides he needs to ride our ass because he can. Ness starts getting pissed off. I would too, but how we react to these kinds of situations is completely different.
Ness has to change lanes to switch onto a different freeway, but she doesn’t realize it until you almost can’t switch lanes. Another car is in the right lane, beeps at Ness to say “Hey, watch it, I’m doing my thing in the right lane, hold your pants on.” Ness gets pissed off thinking this was the same guy who was riding her ass all the way down the freeway. It wasn’t. That guy kept going. Well, she decides to ride on his ass. I ask her to not do it, I tell her to not do it, I beg her to not do it. Finally, after I’m almost about to cry from frustration of her not doing the right thing and scaring me to death, she changes lanes and ends up flipping the guy off. It wasn’t even the right guy and she flips him off! I was speechless, and I got mad. I didn’t talk to her the rest of the ride home.
All I ask…
I won’t sit there and tell you that you’re a bad driver. I don’t care how you drive when I’m in the passenger seat, because it’s not my business. All I ask is that you don’t scare the shit out of me and make me feel safe since your hands are the ones driving the two ton piece of steel.
The two day trip that lasted four
The last time we went to Pittsburgh, Ness’ brother’s ex-wife ended up getting a hold of us and asking if we wanted to go to the Hanson concert in Pittsburgh with her. Ness doesn’t turn down Hanson concerts, let alone when someone else is buying the tickets. We made plans to take a quick two day vacation to Pittsburgh to see the concert and spend some time with the family.
We finally get there, now where’s the concert?
We were running late to the concert because we went out to eat when we really should have left. We quickly looked up directions to what we thought was the venue but it turns out, we were wrong and ended up being even more late to the concert. We ended up in Homestead at the Carnegie Mellon Library Music Hall or something like that. The acoustics of the show sucked, but whatever, it was still a good concert until these stupid girls decided to stand in the aisle right next to me and scream and dance. They seemed like they were drunk, which was odd because there wasn’t any alcohol being served at the venue. Maybe they were just dumb in the first place? Not sure. Anyway…
Halo 3 kicks serious ass
Ness’ nephew has Halo 3. The second day we were there, I got sucked into the game and we were playing on Xbox Live. Basically, we just killed each other more than anything and I got to trash talk to some of his 13 year old friends. I kept it PG for the kids. I surprised myself because I didn’t think I could keep trash talk PG.
I now want an Xbox 360 just so I can get Halo 3.
I’m now Uncle Josh
Ness’ niece and nephew decided to start calling me Uncle Josh. I thought that was pretty cool and was pretty stoked when I heard them say it. I’ve never been an Uncle before and I happen to think that I’m a pretty cool Uncle at that.
We had to stay late to meet everyone…
We hadn’t planned on staying too late with her brother’s ex-wife, but she wanted us to meet her new husband and wanted to introduce me to her brother and his wife. We ended up staying three extra hours. That kind of sucked because we wanted to stop by and see her brother on the way back home. We hadn’t planned on staying with her brother because Ness had to work on Saturday. By the time we left, it was already 11PM and we were tired.
Mapquest made us take the back way…
We had to travel from one side of Pittsburgh to another side. When we got directions on Mapquest, we found out we had to take 60 North. No big deal, we had been on it before, or so we thought. We hadn’t been on this part of 60 North. It was scary. It was like a country road, half in the ghetto, half in the country. I like to call it the ghettry. Ness was convinced that I was telling her the wrong directions and I can finally admit that I thought I was giving her the wrong directions as well, but hey, I was following the signs and what Mapquest told me to do.
After about an hour of going through the ghettry and being scared the whole time, we finally realized that we had been going the right way. We stopped and got some beer before we stopped off at her brothers.
Guess we aren’t going anywhere tonight, we’re drunk
We sailed through the twelve pack and ended up having a little extra fun with some other stuff…stuff that should be legal but it isn’t. At least not in the US. Needless to say, we couldn’t drive after drinking and that so we decided to wake up early the next day and head back to Cleveland.
When we woke up, Ness and I were both sick again, super sick, and couldn’t drive anywhere. Ness had a fever and kept passing out. I couldn’t pay attention for the life of me. If we had driven home, we surely would have crashed or something like that. We ended up staying Saturday anyway and got to watch Gabs, Ness’ other neice, play in her soccer game. We then came home, took long naps, and woke up to a phone call from her brother saying he was going to the Pirates game, had two extra tickets, and wanted us to come.
There’s no better cure than beer
Well, not really, but it helps sometimes. We met the family at her brothers’ sister-in-laws house and drank some beer and tailgated in the drive way before the game. We call this pre-gaming. For anyone that doesn’t know, beer is ridiculously expensive at ball games, so drinking before the game is helping your wallet out.
The whole point of going to the game wasn’t because of the Pirates. The Pirates suck. Everyone was going to see the band that was going to play after the show, The Clarks. They were amazing by the way and you should check them out. Think REM, but the Pittsburgh version.
On Saturday, we found out that Ness’ brother and his brother-in-law are literally obsessed with Justin Timberlake. They have his Madison Square Garden concert saved on DVR and kept watching it the whole day. When we got back to her brother’s place, him and I sat down, drank some more beer, did some more stuff, and watched it. I was a bit skeptical, but holy mother of Bob. After watching that show, I know why they are obsessed, even though I wasn’t converted. Not completely anyway.
Strep…um…ok…
Turns out, Ness has strep throat. Not good. Sunday, Ness was too tired to travel, I was feeling a bit better, but since Ness couldn’t work anyway, we decided to stay the rest of the day, let Ness rest a bit since she had a huge fever, and watch the Steelers game.
Ness slept most of the day, I stayed sober and prepared to drive home later that night. After watching Sunday Night Football, we headed out and finally arrived back home.
My Thoughts
The more time I spend in Pittsburgh, the more I grow to love it. The last time I was there, before I met Ness, Pittsburgh sucked major balls, but it’s a growing city and the more time I spend, the more I learn about the city. It’s now become one of the cities we’re thinking of moving too, although it’s not quite at the top.
This trip was huge for Ness and I. We both got to know Chris, her brother, better and Ness felt comfortable enough to tell him our plans for the future. He was really stoked about it and basically gave us his blessing, which was awesome.
I got to learn more about Ness, which is always a great thing. Like how amazing she is with kids. I mean, amazing. I’ve never seen kids drawn to someone so much, but Ness has a way of captivating them. Every kid we had the chance of spending time with was literally attached to Ness at the hip and wouldn’t let her go. I also got to learn more about Ness’ childhood and realized how strong Ness really is and how amazing it is that she went through so much and turned out to be the amazing person that she is today. I respected her before, but now I respect her even more.
You can’t really go wrong with getting to know your girlfriend better, and even though us being sick put a damper on things, spending that time with her made up for it.