The Future is Scary. The Future is Now.

I constantly tell people who aren't necessarily "into" science just how cool the world is at this point in history. I talk about how close we are to things which we were calling fiction just a couple decades back, and ask how awesome some of what we take for granted would be if people from the last century were to see it.

Microwave ovens. Cell phones. Computers. The Internet. Organ transplants. Nuclear power. Cruise missiles. Space rockets! I could go on and on.

I am thrilled with the prospect of seeing where our future takes us.

At the same time, I am terrified of what certain people with loud voices are doing to our nation's culture.

When a state rules that science isn't science, just to appease some vocal fundamentalists, we're in trouble. Here's a nice essay about it, written by someone who is much nicer and smarter than I. We are in trouble, folks. Our shaky science education is only getting weaker with these sorts of decisions.

What's scarier to me is that people who aren't scientifically minded don't see a problem with this decision. They don't think it violates the church/state separation (which many of "us" think it does, as ID is just creationism with a search-replace applied), and they don't think it weakens science. They certainly don't feel it's dangerous, or that it's going to make our nation weaker in the future.

The fact is that it cripples science. We already were doing a half-ass job at telling kids what science really was. We need to overhaul the entire system of teaching kids about science, so they understand the scientific method much earlier in life. What I learned in "History of Science" at WPI should have been taught to me during my freshman year of high school.

HI 1331. INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE.
An introduction to the methods and source material historians use to study science. Topics covered will range from early Greek science to Newton and the Scientific Revolution in the 17th-century. Suggested background: elementary knowledge of science.

And not just to me, but to all the people who never went further than high school. The people who are currently voting to put anti-science candidates on school boards everywhere.

House Appraisal in, Lawyers still panic

First off, we got the appraisal in on the new house, finally. It came in at 6K over our purchase price, which is a very validating thing to find out. I had built up all these nightmare scenarios where we were going to have problems due to a low appraisal, and none of them are there. In fact, we are getting a little bit of a deal, which is nice (and kind of expected, since the sellers discounted from their expected price since we are bypassing the realtor).

On the other hand, I swear that working with lawyers is bad for the soul.

In an abstract way, I understand my lawyer's goal. His office watches out for the money we've already put it into the house, so that if anything goes wrong we pay as little as possible as a result. They make sure we, the sellers, and the lenders are all obeying the law.

What I don't get are the repeated requests for extensions on our contract. Basically as of the 1st we needed to have a commitment letter from our lender -- and we did. But our lawyers asked for a week extension on that so they could review the terms of the letter. Fine.

Now, after a week, they ask for another week, because not all the terms have been satisfied. For example, they have not seen the septic system inspection form. Since our getting the loan hinges on that form, they "seriously advise" that we allow them to hold off on saying the commitment letter portion of the contract is fulfilled until they have a chance to review that inspection document.

Part of this makes sense: if the septic inspection form is bad, and we've signed off on the commitment letter, we lose our deposit (of $500). So they want to make sure the form is good.

What doesn't make sense is not once did they tell us, up until the week extension was about to expire, that they wanted to do this. We could have had the septic inspection form in their hands on October 31st! But they never said they needed it, until it was almost too late.

It's frustrating, because now we look like idiots. Our lawyer has to call their lawyer (the sellers) and request an extension. Their lawyer calls them, passes it along, advises they accept, and of course they do. Then we call our friends and apologize to them, and reassure them that yes, we are buying the house, and our lawyers are paranoid. They agree, we laugh it off, and then we repeat the whole scenario a week later ... over a form we could have already had, if they had just asked for it.

And, for what it's worth, this law office came highly recommended.

On the plus side, it's ramping up to fireplace weather pretty damn quick. I'm looking forward to it. Big time.

Movie & TV Reviews

Instead of talking about important stuff, how about I talk about pure entertainment for a bit?

Some super-brief reviews:

Sin City (Movie)
I finally saw this recently, and I fell in love with it in the first five minutes and never stopped smiling. I had no idea how cool they were going to make this, and it fills a small part of my heart with joy that they pulled it off so well.

I feel like I need to watch it again sometime, or read a plot summary, because I was so busy ooh-aahing that I feel like some of the puzzle pieces of the chronology just didn't mesh in my head. Oh well.

Anyway, it's a damn shame I didn't see this in the theater.

Samurai Jack - Season 2
I just finished watching these yesterday, and they also put a huge stupid smile on my face. I didn't truly appreciate the genius that was Jack until I watched it with my brother-in-law and the kids. The universal smiles and laughter that went with every moment showed me just how brilliantly they had succeeded at targeting this stuff. It helped me enjoy it more, because as I watched I could see the moments that would make a kid laugh, and appreciate it in a new light.

Star Wars Episode III
This was the first DVD I've watched since I upgraded to HDTV that made me wish that I had a bigger screen, "for real." The movie is what it is -- and it's been discussed to death -- but if nothing else it's a showcase of special effects technologies. Of course, it's a showcase that begs to be appreciated by a high-end system. I kept wanting to turn the volume up and make the picture bigger. I'm very glad I saw this in the theater instead of waiting.

HBO's Rome
On the TV front, my new addiction is Rome. HBO turns their TV-making expertise on the story of ancient Rome, retelling the history of Julius Caesar and company in their usual high-end way. It's a consistent joy to watch, excellently written, acted, and produced. It's the new high point of my TV week.

And that's all I've got for now. I'll likely post again later with a house update, but this one is entertainment :).

House Buying Non-News

I don't think the phrase "no news is good news" was coined by a person with a signing date looming on the purchase of their house.

Over the weekend we packed our living room and a good chunk of our kitchen. We actually probably only spent 3-4 hours of real time packing, but it felt like more. It was important, though, because it reminded me that while packing is a pain in the ass, it's not the end of the world. We will be able to pack our house before we move, and we won't have so many boxes we need a convoy of trucks to move them.

We haven't heard anything new about the appraisal, so we're still kind of nervous about that. I faxed our loan rep a new copy of my 401K statement, so that should definitely satisfy that part of the commitment letter requirements. I re-read the letter today and saw that they need the septic system inspection documentation, so I'm asking the sellers for that info and will pass it along as soon as we get it. This is a non-issue as the system passed inspection just a couple weeks ago. It's just more paperwork.

I don't think I mentioned in here that I exercised and sold some stock options to make sure we had the funds to clear closing and moving costs. I was hoping to hold onto those for a little while yet, but I had some options which were actually profitable (though not by much) and decided to pull the trigger. Nice to have that money available.

Funny that at one point in my life I thought my stock options would buy our first house, straight out. Now I'm lucky I can scrounge up some that will pay my closing costs.

Well, funny is an odd word for that, really.

Double Standards

Folks, this is the sort of news you can't make up. People wouldn't believe it.

An excerpt of the linked story?

Two Carolina Panthers cheerleaders who allegedly were having sex with each other in a bathroom stall at a Tampa, Fla., nightclub were arrested and charged early Sunday following a run-in with patrons and police.

As Howard Stern would say, "Hey now!"

Now, out of respect for our male readers, I'll pause a moment to let the visual sink in and fade.

Still with me? Ok.

I'll close with a brief social commentary. Picture the same story, except with the folks involved being Panthers players, and not cheerleaders. Two guys caught in a stall, practicing their snap count, let's say ....

Try and imagine the impact of that story, and compare it to the impact of the one I linked. Equality? Yeah.

Ongoing drama with house

Just an update about the little things that can mess up the process of buying a home.

At this point we're waiting for an appraisal from a third party vendor who will appraise the home and determine its value. Wells Fargo will feed this into their system, compared with my other information, and determine if the loan-to-value ratio is acceptable for my loan.

In other words, it's the last thing that can go wrong. If that number comes in too low, we have some major issues to work out. So we're very nervous about this going well, even though I keep hearing it's no big deal.

The appraisal was done Wednesday. I deliberately sat on my hands yesterday but sent the loan officer a request for information today to find out where we stood. She responded and was kind enough to copy the information she received on my file. I've included it her verbatim because it's just too funny to leave out.

APPRAISAL: NOTE FROM VENDOR: COMMENT: APPOINTMENT DATE: 2005/11/02 17:00:00 - 11/03 EXPECTED DUE DATE CHANGED DUE TO PROBLEM WITH APPRAISERS SOFTWARE. APPRAISER WAITING FOR COMP TECH TO PROVIDE ASSISTANCE., INSPECTION IS SET, 11/02 17:00 THANK YOU, LSI /

There's some sort of karmic payback here, a software developer suffering angst over a software problem. Either that or the appraiser is just using this as an excuse, part of a grand tradition of blaming the software for your problems.

Either way, we're held up for another couple days, which is frustrating. We wanted this off our heads before the weekend, and it won't be.

Free Business Idea

Imagine a company which combines web-based workflow software with a secure data repository, on top of top-of-the-line storage. Now tailor that software to the real estate market.

Basically a ton of information is being passed around between myself, the sellers, our attorneys, the lender, and my insurance company. It all seems so incredibly inefficient.

What if all the information, whenever it was acquired by any entity in the transaction, was uploaded into a central repository. The uploader could associate various entities with the document, giving them read permission on the data. You'd couple this with CAS (Content Addressable Storage) for privacy and security reasons, obviously. You'd also want this on top of hierarchical storage.

Whenever a document is uploaded, all associated entities are notified and allowed to download the document. A project timeline is maintained, showing the time and date when all documents were uploaded and downloaded, and by whom. Parties involved in the transaction may place deadlines for certain documents (and when you upload a document you may assign it to an outstanding deadline) and the system may be configured to send warnings when deadlines are approaching.

You tie it into fax systems, email, web, everything (yeah right, but hey, we're dreaming, right?).

This would be SO MUCH EASIER than the bullshit I had to deal with yesterday. The lawyer says the lenders haven't sent the commitment letter. The lenders say the lawyers haven't sent the P&S agreement. Both of them say they've sent what is required of them but haven't received what they require. And instead of dealing with each other, they both work through me.

What am I paying you people for? Christ. This isn't rocket science, and you certainly don't need me playing referee....

If I die of a heart attack at the tender age of 32, it's because of this shit.

(Worth noting; I work for a company that makes the software and the hardware that could make this work. Funny, that.)

Boo!

Not much to report on Halloween. The home-buying situation is same as it was a couple days ago -- we're waiting for the appraisal on the new house, which has the potential to sink this whole deal if it fails ("but don't worry about it"), and we'll get our rates locked in as soon as the lawyers fax the P&S to the lenders. It should be there already, but if it's not, it'll be today.

Jess went to the house on Saturday with a full SUV-load of stuff to sell at a big tag sale. Our main concern was just not moving this stuff, so even the 60 bucks or so we made was a huge profit in my book. In the process she met all our neighbors, and they all know we're moving in. Works for me!

While she was doing that, I helped my mother move into her new apartment. The folks at the Kingdom Hall showed up in force, with a solid 3 adults, 3 teens, and handful of rugrats to help out. The move itself was insanely quick, and as Witnesses always are they were polite and generous and all that. It was kind of weird being there, because while I'm on the outside now I used to be on the inside. Their little jokes, their inside references -- I catch it all, but I'm not a part of it. Very odd feeling.

Still, I can't thank them enough for helping out. They paid for the U-Haul and turned what could have been a very stressful move into something fairly easy. After they left I helped my mother get situated, which took longer than the move itself. Overall it was about a six-hour "event" but only a couple hours of that was actual hard work.

Call the Waaaaahmbulance

A rock bounced onto my windshield yesterday, chipping it. By the end of the day I had a 9 inch crack. Now I gotta find a reputable place that'll come out to my work, make an appointment, get the insurance company involved, etc.

Just bitching, ignore me.

What use is a blog if you can't just bitch about your life in it? Where's that image of Jesus on the cross saying "I am SO writing about this in my livejournal" when you need it?

House and Writing Progress

Things continue to progress on the home purchase. Yesterday I faxed a small stack of paperwork to Amber at Wells Fargo, took a call from our lawyers office requesting some title search documentation, and had Amber fax that to them. Nothing like playing go-between. I also sat with my insurance agent and found out what information I needed to get about the house (which I got last night and mailed to him this morning). The excitement never ends *yawn*.

On a more personal front, I finally sat down and wrote something to satisfy the next exercise in the fiction-writing book Clint loaned me. I've had mixed results with the exercises but their main purpose (in my mind) is just to get me used to expressing my creativity in a more focused way. This last one was a joy to write, even though I had been dreading it for a couple weeks (I know, you're supposed to do one a day, at least).

The exercise said to take a fight you had been in, whether verbal or physical, and turn it into a scene. The idea here is to explore writing about conflict, but also to help train you to take real life experiences and fictionalize them (i.e. lie about how they happened in order to make them more interesting :) ). My problem here is that I am not a fighter. I have never been in a real physical fight (been beat up plenty of times, ran away from plenty of fights, but that's not the same), and I try to avoid verbal fights as well. I am always trying to calm verbal fights down, get people to detach emotionally and discuss the reasons behind the conflict (perhaps to a fault). That's what I do. It's what I've always done.

But then something Jess said reminded me of something -- I used to have this real problem with arguing online. I was right, damnit, and loved to try and prove it. Looking back now I realize that I was wrong a lot of times, and even when I was right I was a real prick about it. But that's not the point. The point was I could fictionalize an online "fight" and make it a funny scene where I poke fun at my own history of being an online idealist with no real knowledge to back up his furiously defended opinions.

And so I did. It was a ton of fun to write, and looking back at it afterwards it definitely satisfied the conditions of the exercise, even if it's not quite what they had in mind.

Time to move on. I gotta try not to read the next exercise before I do it, because it makes me dread doing them. I should go in blind. But I saw the first sentence of the next exercise, and it has to do with recreating a scene in your memory which was important at the time but which you don't remember well, or something similar. Ought to be challenging, but I guess that's part of the point.

Housing Update

I only write about this because it's the biggest thing in my life right now ... and because I know that somtimes it's cool to read about the day-to-day process of this kind of thing instead of just hearing "Oh, it went fine." So, if this bores you, skip ahead to ... well, it's all rather boring isn't it? :)

The sellers are finally signing the Purchase & Sales Agreement today with their attorneys. Assuming nothing goes wrong with that, they'll be getting that to us and our attorneys quickly. This will enable us to fax it to Wells Fargo and lock in the interest rate. It also gives me enough confirmation that this will go through that I will feel comfortable contacting our landlady and giving our 30-day notice to vacate. I'll make that phone call and then follow up with a written letter.

I also received yesterday Wells Fargo's "Commitment Letter." This is their promise to loan us the money for the house assuming certain things are true. We need our attorneys to have this by Oct 31 in order to satisfy the conditions of the Purcahse & Sales, so it feels good to have it in my hands. I asked them to fax a copy to our attorneys. I'll call them tomorrow and verify that they received it.

An interesting note about how this works -- basically when we applied for the mortgage, we gave them a bunch of numbers about our financial situation. Average bank account balances, salary information, and retirement account balance, specifically. Well, the commitment letter spells out that they need proof of those exact numbers. This was a little shocking -- I expected, for example, for them to require proof that I was over (X) where (X) is some number less than my actual salary. But they evidently need exact proof.

This, of course, caused our first true panic. Our current bank balance is about half of what we claimed as our average throughout the past year. We'll be well over that figure by the time the loan closes, but my last printed statement shows the much smaller number. I called Wells Fargo this morning and spoke to the woman actually handling the loan (Amber ... Dawn handled the application process, Amber the actual loan ... is there something about mortgage reps' names?). She was just as personable as the last one I dealt with and assured me that everything would be fine. I'll fax her the statement showing less than the amount claimed as well as the income and 401K statements and if that isn't satisfactory they'll ask for more.

I keep forgetting the cardinal rule here -- they want to loan me this money. They'll look for excuses to loan me this money. Of course, they may charge me higher rates and bigger fees if I screw this stuff up, but it's highly unlikely I'd screw it up enough to lose the loan.

deep breath

So, yeah. Lots of excitement. Tomorrow the adventures in faxing begin. I'll be sending them:

• 2004 W2
• My last pay stub
• Last month's bank statement (with balance = 1/2 claimed average)
• Online statement printout from 401k (actual printed copy to come from Fidelity within 5 business days)

I also am supposed to talk to someone from Liberty Mutual tomorrow about homeowner's insurance too. This stuff never ends, FYI.

Did too much this weekend

Ok, I really didn't do that much. But Jess was struggling with a cold on Thursday and Friday. I felt a little under-the-weather on Friday but was doing okay. Saturday around noon I was feeling okay, so when we heard from Steve & Brenda that they were going to her cousin's farm store in Barre for some kind of haunted hay ride, it seemed like an okay way to spend some time with the kids.

First off, it was a good time. The kids were thrilled to see us, which is always heart-warming. And it was cold and just a little nasty out, which made the whole "late fall" feel work pretty well. We took a hay ride through their farm land, made scary for the kids by a couple of family members wearing masks and wielding chainsaws, chasing the ride on 4-wheelers. It was actually fairly entertaining, and a few of the kids were really scared. I also bought some locally brewed wine, beer, and miscellaneous food from the store, so that was cool.

But we were done. I could tell I was tapped out after that.

And then they all came over :).

It was a good time; we ate tacos, watched Samurai Jack, and caught up on a few things. So that's cool. But I was dead-on-my-feet beat by the end of it, and woke up Sunday feeling like death warmed over. And then I had to entertain my mother.

Overall, it was an enjoyable weekend, but not the "relax and recover from this cold" weekend I wanted.

It's fall. For real, yo.

So I go outside this morning, start the car, and turn on my wipers to clear away the layer of wet mist on my windshield.

-SCRAPE-

Ok, so it's not so much wet mist as, well, frost.

I'd love to pretend to be upset, as I'm sure many who come in to work today will be, but I'm actually kind of happy inside. Fall in New England is where it's at as far as I'm concerned. And while I'm far from eager for Winter, I can't help but be excited by the evidence that Summer is well and truly gone and Fall is here to stay.

In other news, Jess has as an awful cold which I'm struggling not to catch (I may be failing this effort, grr) and our progress bar on the home purchase hasn't moved in a week (grr).

It's not all bad, though. I won a buck fifty playing poker online last night. See? There is good news!

Home Inspection (Invasion?)

I've been updating as things progress on the house, so I'll keep that up in the interest of completeness :).

Friday afternoon we had our home inspection. We only had a couple days to get it done so we didn't really have time to try and find someone who came well-recommended. We basically picked a reputable big-name place (Tiger) who others had dealt with and had them send somebody. The guy they sent actually turned out to be very thorough and pleasant to work with.

We learned a few important things during the home inspection, but the biggest is that we have no idea what it's like to own a home. Until this guy explained it, I had no idea how a boiler operated to heat your house. It's stupid, but it's true.

Anyway, there weren't any huge surprises during the inspection. The biggest issue we learned about that was new to us was that there were minor structural issues from when the house was put together. If you picture two "chunks" of the house, attached to each other, imagine that the process of adjoining these chunks leaves a small gap which you can look up at from the basement. You're looking up at two big beams, and there's this one-inch gap between them. Now there is material inserted between these gaps to prevent the house from shifting. Ideally, the material completely fills the gap. What happened here is that the builders left some small spaces in the material.

Picture you're filling a one-inch gap with half-inch plywood. Instead of making it so every inch of the gap had two boards in it, they interleaved them, leaving some areas with only one board and some with two.

I tried to do this in MSPaint but I couldn't really pull it off. Here's some ASCII art instead. The dashes are empty space, the X's are the beams, and the pound signs are boards in between. Here's what they did:

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
-----##########-----#########
########----##########---####
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

It's a little detail, but it shows me that this house wasn't put together by people who took their craft perhaps as seriously as they should.

Of course, he shows us this detail with the same sense of gravity with which he pointed out the totally-wrecked gutters (which they're taking care of) and the slight catch on one of the cabinet doors in the kitchen.

That's the surreal part. Every single issue earned his attention, but he did very little in terms of helping me understand the relative seriousness of the issues.

Anyway. After the inspection we sat with the sellers by the fireplace and just chatted about the whole thing. It was a nice way to end a fairly stressful afternoon, and a reminder of how good it will feel to have our own place....

Quick house update

We spent the afternoon yesterday chasing down lenders for final figures. Last chance to get our business :).

Drew Mortgage, a smaller place in Shrewsbury who was recommended by our attorney, was a pleasure to work with but came in high on the rates.
Bank of America was also a pleasure to work with. Our representative was quick to reply and sent me detailed information via email, always a plus. I was ready to sign with them. And then...
Someone from Wells Fargo got back to me. Our rep was in training, but managed to get a co-worker to look over the file and send me an update. They were an eighth of a percentage point below Bank of America, and a quarter point below Drew Mortgage.

Decision made. I'm sick of comparison shopping. Rates change daily but consistently WF has either been tied for the best among its competitors or beating them. I'm going with them. I called today and spoke to our rep over there, and they're moving forwards with a letter of committment.

Now I just need the lawyer's office to fax them a copy of the Purchase and Sales. We can't lock the rates until they have that, and even though we've signed it, the sellers haven't.

It's always something....

Big Busy Day

This morning we went to our Real Estate Attorneys' office and met with one of the lawyers there. She went over the Purchase & Sales agreement, told us what we need to do next, and got our signatures, and collected around 800 bucks (combined deposit on purchase offer + deposit on attorney fees).

Assuming Lee & John sign the forms now, we're committed to the purchase. This is a big step!

Very next priorities:

• home inspection (supposed to be done by 15th, eek). Jess is arranging that today.
• financing (done by 31st). Been on phone with 3 lenders today, figuring out best deal for us.
• insurance - just need to do it soon

Wells Fargo wakes up

Looks like I was unfair to Wells Fargo in my previous posts. I suggested that they were sluggish in getting back to me -- and they were -- but when I went back and read my email to them I can understand why. I wasn't really clear that I wanted the answers right away; it was easy to read into the mail a message of "we're waiting for more details before I get back to you."

So, when I actually emailed them (her, actually -- her name is Dawn, same as the paralegal at the lawyer's office) with 3 concrete questions, they got back to me right away (well, within 8 hours at least).

Rates are going up. A month ago, they quoted us 5.875. Now we're getting 6.125, which is the same rate GMAC is quoting, and the same rate Bank of America is quoting. WF gave us a slightly better rate on the 20% loan, though, once I asked them to recompute it for a 15/fixed or 20/fixed.

Right now, WF is looking good. GMAC's rates are competitive but their closing fees seem higher. Sallie Mae doesn't have any of their information online, and neither does Sherwood -- the two other places I was considering.

The next step? Signing the purchase contract.

Steps after that? Deciding for sure on the lender, faxing the contract to them to lock in the rate, and scheduling a home inspection.

Home Buying Adventures, continued

Looks like some progress is being made in our home-buying adventure. As the cliche says, once you involve lawyers in something, you lose all control.

Lee and John spoke to their lawyer, and accepted our offer, with certain limitations -- he (the lawyer) wanted to change some of the dates, and tie a deposit to the offer. He said he would prepare some documentation and fax it to our attorney, and that's the last we heard of it.

We called our attorney's office today, after finding out that the seller's attorney faxed them the revised documentation LAST THURSDAY. The paralegal at our attorney's office says they'll finish going over the documents today and we'll be able to move forward.

Frustrating, but ... oh well. We move.

As far as financing, we have two lenders we're talking to so far. I need to decide who else I'll involve, and then sit down and hammer it out later this week to determine who will get our business. So far:

Wells Frago: Were very nice on the phone, but have been unresponsive to my emails. I need to be able to do business via email, at least on some level. I can find time to hammer out a quick email, but don't have the time or privacy to handle financial matters on the phone at work. I need to know the revised rates if I were to go with Wells Fargo, and I need to talk to them about switching the 20% loan from a 10-year balloon to a 15- or 20-year fixed.

Bank of America: This is our bank, and the only people we've talked to in person. Again, the person we dealt with was very helpful and friendly. As BoA customers our closing costs would be reduced (bonus!) but this might be offset by extra legal fees if our lawyer doesn't work with BoA (he does work with WF). The rates at BoA seemed higher than WF but it was a whole month later, and the 20% loan was a 15-year fixed and not a 10-year balloon so it's not really an apples-to-apples comparison. The guy at BoA specifically said he does a lot of business via email and could answer my questions that way quickly. They'll also do all the paperwork at our local branch office, which is convenient. Finally, if our credit score is high enough, because we have accounts there they do reduced paperwork loans without any impact on rates. It's just a convenience issue but it does seem nice.

I probably want to talk to a couple more lenders. Sallie Mae, who does my school loan, is offering a reduction on closing costs because of that. GMAC, located in the same building where Jess works, has good word-of-mouth from my manager. Finally, Sherwood Mortgage in Worcester is also being mentioned as a good place by people we trust.

Do I feel like working with 5 lenders to get the best rate? Not especially. But this is serious money, so I probably should. Grr :).

Movie Review: Troy

I finally saw Troy last night, after letting it sit on my end table for over a month. Go netflix!

In brief, I was disappointed.

The movie had no life in it. Something was missing, and it was missing across the board. The scenes felt play-acted; I wasn't seeing Achilles, I was seeing Brad Pitt acting out his lines. The fights were acceptable but most were lacking any real impact. Even the props seemed off to me, and I can't explain why. Sure, some were awesome, but many just seemed like ... props.

I think Jess put it best, fairly early in the movie. "I should be feeling awed by this, but I'm not."

Exactly.

One other nit -- the movie is rated R. You've got naked people everywhere, but all the "naked bits" are hidden by clever shooting. What is the point of that? It's a distracting flag of disbelief, and while it bothers me in PG-13 movies I can at least understand the point. In an R-rated movie it's unforgivable and pointless.

I've seen worse movies, sure. But I was expecting better than this. I would not recommend it -- you've got better ways to spend 2h45m....

You want to tell who about my blog?

So Jess calls me today, and tells me her cousin Tina wants to see pictures of our home-to-be. Jess says, "I was thinking, I could just send her a link to your blog rather than sending her the pictures individually."

That makes all kinds of sense. Save labor, save electrons, all that :).

I just never thought of any of her family reading these pages. I had to sit there a couple minutes and make a quick mental assessment of what filters I have applied when I wrote these things.

To spell out the metaphor, imagine that my raw ideas come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors. Now, imagine I realize that certain of those objects would scare, offend, hurt, or just plain bore-to-tears people if they encountered them. Based on who those ideas were going to hit, I would make sure certain filters were in place to block the offending objects, up to a certain degree. At some point, if you don't like what you see you shouldn't be looking that closely.

To pick an extremely obvious example, I might not want my boss to get exposed to the "I hate this aspect of my work" idea. But there are more tricky ones. Do I want my conservative brother-in-law exposed to the huge rant about the proposed flag burning amendment I wrote earlier this year? He knows how I feel about some things, but I choose not to rub it in his face most of the time. But if he chooses to come here and try and figure out how I feel about issues I choose not to bring up with him, then it's his responsibility to deal with what he learns like an adult.

Basically, up until now, I've just assumed that family wouldn't be reading any of this. I know I have friends who read it at times, including folks online who I don't know very well. But I've never told anyone I work with about it. I've never told family about it. So I haven't really put that filter on what I write. It raises an interesting question. How different is my "friends, Basiners, Ars lurkers, and so forth" filter from my "family" filter?

Who can say? I can only imagine how much tougher this question is for someone, say, who wants to write professionally. Here's this awesome story obviously influenced by the way you were raised. Oh, it got published, and now your mom reads it....

Nothing like that here, I don't think. Well, maybe. A little.

In any case, I sent Jess the link, and she'll send it on its way.

Nothing will probably come of it. But, if you're reading this and you're not who I expect you to be, welcome, I guess :). Feel free to poke around and get offended. It's actually, despite all this navel-gazing, pretty fucking boring. Except for the occasional swear word :).

Offer made

So, yesterday we actually handed over a piece of paper to the current owners of our future home, offering to purchase it from them.

They go to see their lawyer on Tuesday who will review it, suggest changes, and likely start the process of drafting a formal purchase and sales agreement.

Tentative close date: November 30, 2005.

In related news, I decided to "test" my Wells Fargo representative. She sent me a "courtesy email" to see how the process was going so I replied back with an update on the situation and a couple specific questions I wanted answers to. A theoretical person I'd like to deal with would answer those questions for me in email. A person I don't want to deal with would just ignore them. The person I'm afraid I'm dealing with will reply back "call me so we can discuss."

I'll pursue financing in earnest starting October 1 ....

Looks like we're buying

I'm scared to death. It was a weird morning.

I overheard half of the conversation between Jess and her friend Lee this morning, and it sounded like Lee was telling her that she wasn't going to sell. I was very disappointed, which was odd -- I expected to be relieved. I was sitting there going, "ok, now what, do we go shopping around for a different house, or ..." ... and then Jess came upstairs and said, "Lee wants to sell us the house."

Evidently they've decided they need to move to this other town because of the kids' school, and they want to do it sooner rather than later. They're having trouble finding "the perfect house" in their price range but they have found a fixer-upper they think they'll be buying. It's not for sure yet, but now that they've crossed that bridge (into looking at places that need a little TLC) it's only a matter of time before they find something.

So now the ball is back in our court. We've gotta call a lawyer and have a purchase agreement made up. We've got a verbal agreement on a price and what's included in it, but we still need to hash out some details.

It's highly possible I'll be celebrating Christmas and ringing in the New Year in a new house.

I'm scared shitless, as I said :).

Mortgage Preapproval Woes

As I mentioned previously, we secured a mortgage preapproval over the phone recently. We did this using Wells-Fargo, which I've since learned is not the most customer-friendly banker out there.

That's ok -- I don't need friendly yet. I just wanted to know the loan could come if I needed it.

Well, yesterday I finally got something in the mail from them. It was the loan documents for the smaller loan, the "20" in the "80/20". I was disappointed in the amount of information provided, and also confused by the form. I have to look at it closer this evening but it looks like the loan they approved me for, at least for the 20, has a balloon clause -- we pay X/month for ten years and then pay off the remainder of the loan.

There was no verbal indication of this when I spoke to the bank, so I was very surprised to see this. It's one small strike in the "con" column for dealing with this company in the future. Given how competitive the mortgage market is right now, I'm surprised to see this being handled so sloppily.

Second Visit to the House

So, this weekend we went back and had dinner again with Jess's friends Lee and John, and Jess's parents came as well. Since he's a contractor and has tons of experience in related areas, it was useful to have her Dad along.

Seeing the house again after some time away was a good way to sync up the memories we had of the place. It was a little rougher around the edges than I remembered -- a couple areas where the gutters needed repairing, more dirt on the exterior of the house -- and the living room felt smaller while the kids' rooms seemed bigger. I don't know, just how it felt.

This time we also paid more attention. The downstairs, while finished, is not heated. It gets down to 55 or so during the winter, which is really too cold for doing a lot. You'd need a space heater, or something. If we wanted to hang out down there a lot we'd need a more permanent solution -- extend the heating or put in a pellet stove.

Overall, though, we saw nothing to make us want to run away. It's scary, now, because we're moving towards the area where we have to make real decisions. So far it's been "nothing binding," but we're getting closer by the day.

We took some pictures, this time, but it was at dusk so they didn't come out great. Here are some of the more useful ones.

That's the front of the house. It's a raised ranch, so the front door is above the ground. I'm not a big fan of those front steps and mini-porch thing, and Jess agrees. We'd be changing that fairly soon. There are some nice flowers around the base of the house, though, which could look even nicer with a little care.
This is a shot of the back yard, taken from the side of the house. At the left you can see the stairs leading up to the back deck. Immediately in front is the kids' pool which is in the process of being taken down and put away. The property extends back into the woods.
This is a shot of the back of the house, taken from near the swing set in the back. As you can see, plenty of yard. Again, the deck is a little ugly, and if you look close you can see the busted gutters. The gutters are almost nothing to fix, and the deck would be a project but not the end of the world. Under the deck now is a sandbox which would need fixing up too. You can also see the sliding doors into the kitchen and basement from here.

This is a shot of the living room upstairs. It's much bigger than it looks, because you can't even see the bay window in this shot (that you can see in the exterior shot above). Note the fireplace ... yay!
Here's a shot of the kitchen. Jess and her cousin love this picture because it shows how big the area is. There's room for a table behind the spot where Jess took this shot, even. The three of us are all sitting at an island which may or may not stay.

Last of all, here's a shot of the finished basement. It's in total disarray, being used for storage more than anything else. This would be a completely blank slate, really. It's a little intimidating thinking of what we could do down there with a little time and materials. I have visions of basement bars, poker tables, and HDTV projected onto a hanging screen, but we'll see what the bank account can actually handle in a few years.

In any case, we don't know what this actually holds for us. But it did us good to see it again, and to have someone else there to cast an impartial eye. Jess's parents really liked it -- her father was constantly pointing out little things, talking about how easy it would be to change this or that ... very reassuring. Gotta buy while he's young and healthy enough to help out! After all, I'm not going to get stuck doing all this myself....

Home-Buying, Next Steps?

We are moving forward, but we haven't done anything yet which locks us in. We have now gotten pre-approved for a mortgage from Wells Fargo, who I approached out of laziness (my work has some kind of association with them). This is basically the first bridge to cross -- can we do this if we want to? Of course, we wouldn't have taken this step if we didn't think there was a good chance we'd want to continue down the road.

My primary concerns with the property haven't changed -- the commute is long and there's no central A/C. I haven't been thinking of the A/C issue as a deal-breaker, though. Nowhere that I have ever lived has had it, and I've always gotten along fine. In some ways, it's similar to not having a garage -- I always sort of pictured it in a "house" but it's not going to ruin the place.

The commute is a tougher nut to crack. I'm a big baby when it comes to driving, but the fact is that 45 minutes is not an unreasonable drive. I spoke to my boss about the possibility of working from home more often, and she said that given the responsibilities I have and my track record, she would feel comfortable with me having a regular schedule of days where I work from home and days where I come in -- so two days a week at home is no biggie, and three might even be possible. That's actually less time in the car net even if the time spent on any given day is longer. It wouldn't be a spur-of-the-moment thing, it would be a "Dave isn't in the office on Tuesday or Thursday"
or something like that.

In terms of non-work commute, yes, it does put us farther from friends and places we've grown accustomed to. But Jess will still be working in Worcester and I'll still be working in Hopkinton. Not only that, it's not like we're moving 2 hours away -- the distance we're talking about seems like something we could handle and still manage to get together with friends regularly. Trust me, that was a concern.

So, that leaves the more generic concerns. Is this the right time? Can we afford it? And the truth is that we can afford it, but it's not the perfect time. Our credit is perfect, I'm in a stable well-paying job that I've held for ten years and Jess has worked for the same Doctor for seven years and just recently made a big leap in salary potential. We're ideal lenders, except for the savings issue. And the bank didn't even bat an eyelash at that -- they spelled out the terms of the loans, one regular mortgage, one at a slightly higher rate to make up the 20% which would normally be a downpayment. The total amount of the two mortgages is $250 higher than our rent. Once you factor in property taxes and home insurance, yes, it's a jump in housing costs -- but not an unreasonable one, considering A: how much we've been spending on travel and eating out and whatnot which we
could dial back on, and B: how much increased earnings Jess is bringing in.

So we have to decide on the leap of faith -- is this a good enough opportunity that it's worth moving a little faster than we would want? Country setting, walking distance from a big lake, wooded lot, big yard, and a house we feel comfortable in and can see ourselves settling into for a decade ... it seems like a good opportunity.

No matter when we do it, buying a house is expensive and will force substantial lifestyle changes. And we know we want to do it. We can do it now, or you can save for 2 years and do it then. We have to decide what factors play into that decision and make it.

Along the way we have to inspect the house, figure out the exact numbers with the sellers, and do whatever other due dilligence makes sense to do in terms of making sure there aren't nasty surprises waiting for us.

It's a huge deal, and it's overwhelming. But, hell, everybody does it, right? :)

Do Something Cool: Buy a House!

Why have a blog if you don't use it to document in extreme detail something which is exciting to you but boring to everyone else?

I present to you: Dave buys a house. Or at least, Dave thinks about buying a house, sweats everything, and starts down a long road towards financial ruin and/or maturity.

First off, some background. Jessica's friend from school is the current homeowner. She, her husband, and their two kids live there. They love the house but want to move to a different school district (long story -- they were briefly separated and kids went to school elsewhere and they want to keep going there).

So, now they are on the road towards selling their house. Last time Jess visited with her friends, it came up, and Jess expressed mild interest. Last week, we went over there so I could see it. We had dinner, talked, took a walk through the neighborhood, etc.

The dry facts? It's a raised ranch with a finished basement on 0.92 acres in a country setting. Built in 1991. Oil heat, no central air. The "upstairs" has 3 bedrooms, a nice kitchen, a single large bathroom, and a living room with a fireplace. The finished basement has a huge open area with doors opening to back yard, a smaller area that's been made into a guest bedroom, a storage room, a room with a washer/dryer, and the unfinished utility area.

It's close to a large pond and much of the property is wooded, so mosquitos are an issue. It's "lived in" by a family of four, but not broken down. Needs some minor attention, mainly cosmetic. Certainly livable as-is. They're looking to sell it in the mid/high 200s, our price would likely be mid 200s.

There's a lot to like about this place, with the facts out of the way. I am rural at heart, and living on a decent-sized lot near a pond in a wooded rural area is pretty appealing to me. Right now the big things I worry about are:

Money:
I'd be much happier if I had a year to save up for a downpayment before doing this. This is the price range we'd be looking at, but we weren't planning to do this for a year or so, so we could save some, adjust to spending less money, and have Jess adjust to working.

Distance:
Long drive to work (though I can work from home more often), long drive to friends. Long drive from "stuff" (though not that far from necessities -- grocery/etc). If I want rural, though, there are only so many options here, and it's not the end of the world. Not only that, Jess wants to live closer to her family. I always knew we'd be looking at the area near Sturbridge because of that.

House-specifics:
In this price range, you won't get everything you want. Is the set of tradeoffs in this house worth it? Specifically, the lack of central A/C or even realistically the opportunity to add it?

Unknown:
The unknown is the big fear. What if? What if the neighborhood changes? What if something goes wrong? What if <...>? The truth, of course, is that this fear will be present -no matter what-. In this case, at least, we can be reasonably confident the seller is being honest with us. I must conquer this fear, because it'll stop me from buying -any- house.

Basically it comes down to deciding if this opportunity is worth shortcuttng our schedule for. At this point, it's sufficiently attractive to move forward -- figure out the next steps, get pre-approved for a mortgage, find out about a housing inspection, etc. Plenty of places to stop this train between now and the final deal, but we're definitely creeping forward.

New Orleans, I barely knew you

Nothing I write is up to the task of describing how it feels to read the news stories this morning out of New Orleans.

City uninhabitable for one to three months. Looting out of control. A man shot his sister in the face in an argument over a bag of ice. 25,000 people living in a football stadium. 20 oil rigs missing at sea.

Unknown hundreds dead, thousands living in total misery.

Bad times.

My employer is matching employee donations, just as it did 4 years ago in the aftermath of 9/11. Every little bit helps.

I chopped down a tree

This weekend we (my in-laws and myself) threw Jess a surprise 30th birthday party. She was actually surprised, coming two weeks ahead of her actual birthday and on the same day she was expecting to celebrate her father's 52nd birthday. I was thrilled that she was actually surprised, and it turned out really well. People we didn't think were going to make it ended up being there, there was a picture board with images from her childhood, some of her relatives wore custom T-shirts with Jess's picture on them, and so forth.

As the evening wound down, Brenda got a fire started and people began to migrate away from the food tables and towards that area. As we looked around for wood to burn, Brenda pointed out a dead tree in the back yard. We tried to break it with nothing but pushing and pulling on it, but our efforts were doomed to failure. It was just a little too big for that treatment; maybe 20 feet tall and a little bigger around than a 2-liter soda bottle.

So, yeah. I said, "If you had an axe, I'm sure we could chop it down."
Brenda: "I've got an axe."
Me, shrugging: "Ok, then!"

30 seconds later, I'm hacking away at the base of this dead tree. Small dead limbs are falling off the main trunk and scaring spectators away, but I am not deterred.

It was incredibly satisfying, I must say. Thing started creaking and cracking, and I knocked that bitch down and then broke it up and burned it.

Good times.

I was a little sore the next day, but I mean, goddamn, I chopped down a tree.

The Insanity Begins

Yesterday, we received in the mail a single piece of white paper, with text on it printed in two very recognizable colors.

Red. Green.

The Raymond Family Christmas planning has begun. Who's coming, where's it happening, when is it, what should you bring, all that. Suggested spending ranges for Yankee Swap. Rules for the stocking stuffers. Clarification on who qualifies as "kids" ("never been married Raymond descendants," was the term, I believe). New for this year? A yahoo email address set up for handling coordination of gifts for the kids. Lots of other changes.

It's been pretty mild, weather-wise, the past week. I am absolutely ready for Summer to end, for Fall to begin. And with Fall comes the continuous orgy of fun that marks the end of the year.

Football season. Jess's birthday. Clint's birthday. Town Applefest. Mt. Wachusett Applefest. Halloween. Thanksgiving. Christmas. New Years. Superbowl.

You should see the shit-eating grin on my face right now. I love it all.

Happy Birthday

I know I haven't provided anything new here in a bit, but things have been a little crazy at home. Not only that, the stuff I'd want to write about, a lot of it I'd rather not put here for everyone to read. Nothing dark and evil, just have some birthdays coming up which are occupying my time and energy, and while there's fascinating blogworthy stuff going on, I'd rather keep it quiet until after the events pass....

Instead I'll just say that I just turned 32, and it doesn't feel any different from 31. I usually try to take a step back and evaulate my life -- my goals, my progress, and all that -- every birthday. But this year I didn't really do that. I think it's because I've spent so much time in the past few months doing just that, whether it's money stress, talking with Jess about our future now that she's out of school, or looking forward at the next year and trying to figure out how to keep myself sane while taking care of my mother.

In other words, I've done enough introspection to last a couple months. Maybe I'll reevaluate around New Years :).

Las Vegas Trip Report - Day 3 (Saturday)

(Again, some pics mine, borrowed a couple from others, contact me if you want them down)

I woke up Saturday in fine shape, really. A mild headache, a little tired, but nothing I couldn't shake off with minimal effort. It was early again, though -- even trying to sleep in I was up before 7 and out and about well before 8. Still, I had gotten a solid five hours of sleep, a fine achievement for the weekend :).

We had a scheduled brunch with the WoW Guild at 11, so I just headed over to Krispy Kreme for coffee and conversation. Sure enough, I met Russ there and we chatted about video games and life for a bit before others started filtering in. Before long, we had a couple tables full of people waking up and multiple conversations going on (as tends to happen in big groups). Some people ate, but I held out -- I wanted to get my money's worth out of the buffet!

At 11, we got our big raid group together (I cannot tell you how many "raid" jokes went on during this trip) and went from one end of the casino to the other before packing into taxis and cars for the trip to the Rio for their buffet. Unfortunately, instead of seating all 23 of us (I think it was 23) at one table, we got split into 3 that were fairly separated. It worked out okay, though; we were all friends :). I ended up at RH's table so people were constantly coming by to chat with him. Also, with wait staff constantly refilling champagne glasses, the drinking began.
The buffet was actually very good; I was in a huge breakfast mood so I filled up on breakfast stuff, and then realized I had only seen HALF the buffet and there was all this other stuff I wanted to try. I tried to squeeze some in but goddamn was I full. So I snacked a bit here and there and sipped cheap champagne as people complained about the lack of L60 tanks and warlocks, and discussed Onyxia strategy (over my slowly-getting-drunk head). People rotated from table to table and we pretty much just mooched free champagne and talked WoW for a couple hours.

The slightly buzzed trip back to Excalibur led to a relaxed afternoon. We sat by the same old quiet always-abandoned-during-the-day Minstrel's Lounge and people smoked cigarettes and talked about their families and other serious real-life topics. I skipped out instead of boring them with my own sad tales of woe and went shopping instead. I figured I had to buy Jess something. I also won 15 bucks in a slot machine after putting in a dollar (I probably put 3 bucks into random slot machines during the trip as I walked by and they caught my eye -- generally just the progressive ones with huge jackpots), and got depressed at the lack of cool things to buy Jess. Everything was either completely cheesy or wicked expensive -- and I didn't want to go either way. With her birthday and related expenses coming up, it wasn't the time to buy anything costly.

I ended up buying a jigsaw puzzle with a medieval knight/lady theme, which is kind of cool because we always do puzzles when we travel and it sort of keyed into the whole "you aren't with me but I'm thinking of you" vibe :). Also bought her a very nice artsy card.

At 5, we met for a drink (or, you know, four) to our friends who couldn't make it. Not just couldn't make it, but couldn't make it because they are serving overseas. One of them in particular has stayed in touch while he does his tour of duty in Iraq. His squad does all sorts of highly dangerous and visible stuff like giving kids vaccinations and disarming IEDs. They've lost 4 people in the past few months, out of like 50. So the vets and former .mils in the group talked a little about what it means to serve, we read the local newspapers' stories on the 4 people who died in that guy's platoon, and we toasted them all. Ice and Jan sipped from a scotch in his honor. Very somber but solid event, with many people in attendance. Drew a lot of stares from passersby, obviously.
This took much longer than it sounds like it would have, since almost everybody wanted in on this but took time getting there. Add that to "gotta run to get my camera" type delays and we didn't get done until after 6.

After that, some of the people went off to play craps but I just sat and chatted with some people and sipped a couple beers. With less than an hour before our big dinner, I said I was bored and wanted to pass time and suggested just sitting at a nickel slots for a bit. Tara joined me, but nobody else seemed too interested.

Of course, I won 30 bucks right off the bat at that, so we bailed rather than risk any of it. I cashed in the money and we all went our separate ways to get ready for the big party.

Side note: if you think a lot of drinking was going on, you're right. I didn't dip in as heavy as some people did, but I was pretty well buzzed from about noon to midnight, Saturday. I was "smart," though, and kept finding and drinking water the whole time.

At 7 we met in a banquet hall for the big party. Basically this was like the sort of room you'd have a wedding reception in, but sized for only 50 instead of a couple hundred. We had a buffet, a cash bar, and a dance floor. We had our own band (The Bacon Boys ... Bacon being an anagram for ABCon) made up of 3 Basiners (there's actually a fourth in the band who couldn't make it at the last minute, resulting in them renting some kind of drum beat machine, which worked out fine even though we missed Terry).

The food at this event was average, but there was a bar and there was live music, and we had fun. The band members all wore kilts and were funny as hell -- the sort of thing that I guess you'd have to be there and be a part of it to understand. Various guest singers popped up -- TPJ sang his wife a ballad because she puts up with all our (and his) shit, Mouse sang all the female parts of various songs, and Alan (who I play WoW with every Tuesday) guest-guitarred and sang on one song.

After a few songs, the band reminded us that this wasn't a concert, so a few of the ladies started dancing. Most of us hung back, but the girls finally got tired of being the only ones dancing and started pressuring people to go up. Once there was a somewhat mixed crowd I finally let myself get pulled in, and had an amazing time the rest of the night dancing like an idiot. It seemed like my arrival on the dance floor broke some sort of odd balance, because from then on the floor was always full.
At midnight, we capped off the party with a huge line of drunken people kick-dancing to "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life" while singing along at the top of their lungs.
It was no-shit awesome. Everybody was getting along (mostly, heh -- but what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, and that includes the good gossip), we were all pretty buzzed, the music had us in a great mood, and it was just great.
By 12:30, people were finally done taking pictures and were heading off in various directions. I was wired, but I could have fallen asleep. Instead, I got talked into playing poker. I ended up at a 2-6 table with RH and Zofox, and once again made forty bucks before giving up for the night around 2:30. It was much less stressful the second time, but there was one really rough hand where I folded pocket kings after spending 20 bucks to see the flop and not getting any of it (flop was AJ4 -- and the only guy who stayed in with me bet $12 to start [it was a kill pot, stakes doubled]). General consensus the next day was that I had done the right thing, hard as it was to do. Heck, it wasn't that hard to fold -- I was up and wanted to quit that way.

(Summary for those keeping score: 100$ won playing poker, $80 in the casino, $20 in a casual game. I got silly lucky, but the only reason I managed to not get a big head about it is that I know enough to know how little actual skill I was employing, and was in the presence of people who won 5x that amount on the trip against much stiffer competition).

I had stopped drinking when the party ended, and drank water all the time while playing poker. So when I stumbled off to bed I was just exhausted, not drunk. And when I woke up, 3 hours later, I wasn't really hung over as much as just dead with exhaustion and bodily protest. The rest of the day went by way too fast, and I was at the airport by noon. The rest of the story is pretty dull (airport delays, long drives home, etc) so I won't bother with it. Let's leave the story with me winning money at poker, ok? :)

I had a great time and would do it again in a heartbeat. Can't wait till ABCon VI in Chicago!

Las Vegas Trip Report - Day 2 (Friday)

(Most photos mine, one courtesy Icewind)

I woke up around 6, and wasn't able to get back to sleep.

Welcome to Vegas. Here's your complimentary hangover. Holy shit, I was hurting. Much too late the night before, I realized I hadn't been drinking any water. I had tried to solve this problem, but it had been too little too late. Now I was paying for it, big time.

I went looking for coffee, and ended up at Krispy Kreme with a couple donuts and a halfway decent cup of coffee. A couple people showed up, other early risers. I had a chance to talk a bit more with two folks I had met the night before (Russ and Icewind), great people who are still active in just D2. Yes, those people do exist! Anyway, both of them had been around the block a time or two more than I had, and it was great to hear some of their stories.

Various people dropped by and got coffee and chatted, and it was nice even though I was fading fast. My head was pounding and the donuts I had eaten felt like a pair of lead weights in my gut. I went down to the convenience store in the Casino and bought some advil and some fruit juice, but the acid in the juice was not helpful. I kept drinking water, but it was rough.

We ended up in the dark and quiet Minstrel's Lounge. People drifted in and out and I sat back in my chair wishing it would just turn silent, but knowing I wanted to be there anyway. We had plans that night to hit the Star Trek bar that night at the Hilton, but we found out that there was a Trek Convention in town and that the entire Trek area of the Hilton was going to be closed down and dedicated to that starting at 4:30 Friday. So someone had the bright idea of heading over right then -- around 11. I was -starting- to feel human again, so I decided to come along.
I was glad I did -- we had a great time just sitting and chatting it up at the bar, watching the joint fill up with hardcore trekkies. I think about 10 of us went, maybe? Anyway, drinking began again, and while I couldn't stomach the idea of beer I was able to slowly nurse a giant rum drink. We ate appetizer type foods and shot the shit about D2, WoW, GW, the community, and various people's stories. We kept swapping seats and getting to know each other, and those of us who wanted to get a good buzz on, did (I wasn't really looking to, but kind of did anyway). We caught up those who had missed the party on what had happened, we laughed far too loudly at things that were only funny to us, and we basically had a great time for a couple hours.

My hangover was quieting down quite a bit by this time, so I really enjoyed the company and such on the trip back. We took the monorail, wandered through MGM Grand and NYNY on our way back, and somehow I kept hydrated through it all. I knew I would be drinking again on Saturday so I paced myself Friday.
Upon return, I ended up meeting a couple new people who were getting together for a "Casino Clinic" in Zeede's room. We ended up talking craps a little but that was about it as far as casino clinic went. Someone brought out Settlers, but I headed down to the casino floor instead, since I had told Russ I might play craps with him. He was nowhere to be found but Tara/Sisqui and Jim/ReptileHouse talked me into going to play poker with them and Steve/Zofox in the Excalibur poker room. Tara and I each bought a hundred bucks in chips and got sat at the same 1-3 table, Jim and Steve at a 2-6 (both spread limit, unusual in Vegas), and we played for a couple hours. I was feeling mellow and quiet, so poker suited my mood just fine.

What followed was incredible addicting fun. The Excalibur is VERY newbie friendly, so I didn't feel that out of place. And at first it was fine; I was folding, calling, checking, not really doing anything tough. But then I took a hand to a showdown and won it, my first real pot in Vegas. I am not kidding you, my hand was shaking as I stacked my chips afterwards. The incredible fear of thinking you have the table beat but not being sure, questioning every single little thing, trying to act like you've done it a million times ... sheer terror. It was intense.

Most of the time, though, it was quiet and slow. We had a fairly quiet table, not a lot of joking around, and I was starting to feel tired instead of hung over. So a couple hours of quiet poker went by, big stretches of boredom punctuated by short episodes of terror. Insanely fun.

When we quit to have dinner, I was up 40-something bucks. I wasn't playing aggressively -- probably a little too passive-tight. Still, I had a ton of fun and won plenty, and saw a Royal Flush win a guy a small pot (he had a short stack and couldn't capitalize enough).

I think five or six of us went, afterwards, for dinner. We hit one of the semi-fancier restaurants in the casino, and enjoyed a nice meal paid for with our winnings (Jim and Steve had won hundreds already playing poker -- over the course of the trip Jim paid for his flight and hotel in various cash games and tourneys). The food was pretty tasty, and the conversation casual and enjoyable. Not a bad dinner, considering it was in a casino restaurant we had never heard of :).

A little while after dinner we were able to get two different rooms of people playing .25/.50 poker with chips and cards that people brought from home. This was more like my usual casual game, people doing stupid stuff like playing entire hands blind, etc. But every hand was hold-em. We had a weird night, probability-wise, with some amazing flushes and straights, and 3 different hands involving pocket aces. I doubled up -- buying in for twenty and taking back 40 at the end of the night. Not bad (sorry guys)! Didn't drink much since the room with all the booze in it was one floor up and we didn't want to trek back and forth with it. Laziness keeps me sober!
Once the game fell apart, I ended up back in the party room, sipping scotch and tequila and chatting a bit. I think Jim and Steve went to earn more money at the poker tables -- I was winding down. A short stay with the single-malt guys, and I was ready for bed at midnight -- sober but exhausted. TPJ had finally showed up, but he was busy with his own thing and I was falling asleep standing, so we didn't talk much. I took off, hoping I'd wake up Saturday a little better feeling than I had Friday....

Las Vegas Trip Report - Day 1 (Thursday)

(Photos not mine: taken by WeeScot, Venom2099, and Mephista. Will be removed upon request.)

I timed things poorly and ended up in a rush to get to the airport. I was a bit OD'd on caffeine, listening to The Crystal Method, and feeling stressed out at every little delay. About halfway to Hartford I realized I was, in fact, going to make it, but my heart might asplode if I didn't calm down. I eased up on the gas, switched the CD player to Beck, and managed to arrive feeling more mellow and with a little time to spare before boarding began.

Flying into Vegas is completely different than driving in. Driving in, you approach the city with this sense of awe and wonder; there's all this desert everywhere and all roads seem to be leading to this one place. As you drive through the "city" you eventually arrive at what we think of as Las Vegas, with all its billboards and neon. Flying in doesn't have that same sense of magic, though it does offer its own surreality as you view the strip from the air.

I checked in, ditched my stuff in my room, and started making phone calls. I soon hooked up with a half-dozen folks sitting at the Minstrel's Lounge bar with a pile of empties listening to an awful lounge singing act and found out that another half-dozen were currently out procuring much cheaper liquor. I was tired from the flight and starving, but after eating a crappy cold cut sandwich and enjoying a couple cold beers, I started to perk up.

Before long, we were all lugging 200 dollars worth of alcohol from a van in the parking lot up the elevator to the room shared by the members of the Bacon Boys band. Coolers, ice, several cases of beer (and fine malk litta), a box of wine, a bottle of Grey Goose, and some 1800 all were successfully deployed, much to our amusement. Security gave us a couple eyeballs but nobody said anything.
Side story: we had a real Vegas moment here as one of our party (name removed since what happens in Vegas stays there, right?) just randomly started talking to a cutie wearing a "Talk Dirty to Me" t-shirt while we started deploying the booze. She ended up taking one of our beers, of course, and wandered off with her friend instead of joining our party. Still, it was an awesome "You're in Vegas now" moment.

So. Once we relocated upstairs, the party really took off. I didn't know most of the people there, but I did know how to drink beer and meet people, so that's what I did.


I couldn't list everyone I met there right here; it would take too long and I'd forget someone :). But I probably spent the most time talking with Tara/Sisqui. A Basin "record keeper," she handles paperwork type stuff, procedure stuff for counting votes, tracking who is applying, who got in, making sure people who apply aren't just banned people reapplying, etc. She does a LOT of work and takes a lot of shit every single time something goes wrong. Anyway, she has no power to actually make changes in people's system status, so we interact a lot -- I do the flipping of various software switches in response to the work she does. Anyway, she and I had a lot to talk about, bitch about, and joke about, so we ended up spending a fair amount of time getting stupid drunk and talking "shop" (shouting over the drunken din).
And I do mean drunken din. I pity the fools stuck in the hotel room next door.

Tons of people showed up, getting into Vegas and calling around to see where the party was. We just kept crowding people into this one room, since nobody had adjoining rooms. A lot of these people I "know" online but had never met. Others I was "aware of" online, and still others were like "who is that?" Anyway, it was great to meet them and chat a little, but eventually it just degenerated into drunken silliness. Lots of shouting of "HEEEEEYYYY" every time a new person showed up ... you get the picture. After a shot of tequila, I realized that even though my cell phone said 12:30 AM, it was really 3:30 AM as far as my body was concerned, and sleeping might be a good idea. Some of our group had already drunkenly stumbled back to their rooms (Tara, for example, had to be helped down the hall), and I decided to follow suit. I managed to flop into my bed before my brain completely shut itself down, but it was a close call.

For a moment of foreshadowing, you'll notice that nowhere in the list of beverages I consumed will you find a single drop of that rare Vegas commodity known as "water."

Back from Vegas

Sorry no updates, still recovering from Vegas. I've been typing up my notes and will post a "trip report" here soon.

For those who bet along at home on my hours of sleep, here's my best guesses.

Thursday night: 5
Friday night: 5
Saturday night: 3

Probably slightly above median for Las Vegas :).

Viva Las Vegas

These eager feet are getting on a plane in a few hours, destination Las Vegas.

If you'd like to gamble along at home, you may place bets on how many hours of sleep I will get each night.

I am not going to bring my (and by "my" I mean "my employer's") laptop, because I don't want to have to worry about it while I'm there. So no blogging from Vegas.

Fear not, I'll provide a detailed summary on my return :).

(In other news, giant yellow construction vehicles are tearing the shit out of my apartment parking lot. It's fascinating in a little boy "wow look at the giant machines" kind of way. )

South Korean dies, gamers panic

I told you I was hardcore.

I used to get all worried when I read stories like this, that people were going to see my hobby as some great evil. But at this point in my life, I just don't care. People die all the time for all sorts of stupid reasons, and I'm not worried about the future of "computer gaming" because of a little bad publicity.

You know, I never really got into Starcraft. It must be doing something right to be killing people off left and right :).

Out of touch: back to Africa

Today's "now what?" moment came when I was browsing the news and saw a headline on Mauritania, a West African country which recently underwent a bloodless coup. The headline which caught my eye stated that the new government had released "Islamist" political prisoners held by the previous government. Without CNN or Fox News spinning this for me, I wasn't sure how afraid to be :).

I first turned to BBC, which had a nice "Q&A" story.

For some dark humor, check out this quote:

This unit of 150 men is still in Nouakchott and failed to notice any change of behaviour in the National Guard.

This refers to US "consultants" in the country who were gathering intelligence and working with the local government in the "war against terror." I'm sure they won't be offering to teach the new government much.

I also found this story from six months ago, where the new government sentenced previous coup plotters to life in prison. Worth noting is that the president who was ousted in this particular coup put himself into power via coup in the 80s.

What a mess. What's the American spin? I went to CNN and read the most recent AP story. It doesn't attempt much spin. Although the message is clear (Islamic fundamentalists take over government, free Islamist prisoners) the overtones are very vague and soft. The story is full of criticisms of President Taya's policies and actions, and very little mention is made of the implications of losing an ally.

Surely Fox News would satisfy my craving for, as the kids like to say, "OMG TERROR." Not so -- Mauritania isn't mentioned on the front page at all, or even the first page of "US & World News." A search found the most recent story from August 3, a full five days ago. That story was just an AP story.

Of course, maybe the real issue here isn't faith or democracy at all:

The country is expected to begin producing crude for the first time in early 2006. Initial output is expected to total about 75,000 barrels a day, significant for impoverished Mauritania but relatively insignificant compared to regional powerhouse Nigeria, which produces about 2.5 million barrels a day.

In any case, it'll be interesting to see how and if this story develops in the US media. The best I can come up with is "more of the same" -- a struggle for power in a poor nation grasping at straws for its future, under the guise of "the will of the people." For once, I don't feel out of touch.

Very Brief Movie Review

Shaun of the Dead. It's a terrific movie, funny, lovingly crafted parody/tribute to the zombie movie genre. Instant classic.

(Yeah, that's all I got right now. It's been a busy week, and today's only going to be busier.)

Half-Blood Review

Yesterday I finished the latest chapter in the Harry Potter saga, and I am completely satisfied.

I'll avoid spoiling anything here, and just speak in generalities.

The story, and the way it is being told, is continuing to grow more "dark," if by dark you mean mature. This isn't the darkness of pointless torture described in detail, but rather the darkness of a young man growing into adulthood with an incredible burden and finally understanding its full extent and its full cost.

Every single chapter I read, I was happy with. I never put the book down without thinking "when can I pick this back up?" Is it because Rowling is some kind of technical genius at the intricacies of writing? No. There wasn't a single time when I stopped reading and admired the actual technique she used to tell the story. I just ate up the setting, the characters, and the story, and let her tell it any way she wanted.

In fact, there was only one time I thought about the techique of the storytelling, and it's towards the end of the book. A couple important events happen simultaneously, and intsead of giving them both "face time," she follows Potter through one and then has the readers learn about the other event through Potter's eyes as he hears about it from those who lived it. It works, but it felt a little awkward.

Other general comments I can make? The characters are sixteen now, and growing up. There is dating in this book, couples "snogging" in the hallways, sneaking off together, and so forth. Some readers might wish we weren't subjected to quite so much of the teenage romance angst, but the books have always focused on the problems of the "kids" at each age. It's a fact of life at 16. I'm surprised the kids had enough mental focus to care about Voldemort at all :).

Anyway. I had a ton of fun reading this book, and will be buying book seven on release day as well. There's a lot left to wrap up ....

My Own Mortality

Yesterday I received the third death notice by company email I've gotten in the past few months. The first two were for people I knew, this one is not. Still, it's never a pleasant email to open. Sad news, tough times, we'll update you about arrangements, etc.

All three died young. Two were somewhat expected, coming after struggles with fatal diseases. One was a complete surprise, an assumed heart attack in the middle of the night in an otherwise healthy individual.

It's hard not to think about your own mortality, and that of those around you, when seeing those messages. It's a cold reality that some day you will wake up to face the day without those you have faced it with for so long ... or someone else will do the same in your absence.

I keep writing and erasing words here, trying to capture what I'm thinking. I'm failing miserably.

I guess it boils down to this. Many people have some kind of mental checklist of things to do "before they die." The whole idea is ridiculous. You could die tomorrow, you could die at 105. If you wrap up the list by 45, are you going to stop living? It's not about what things you do, it's about how you do them. I may never jump out of a plane, or see the Great Wall of China. But when, each day, I make a hundred small choices, I know I make them right. And that's what matters.

I try not to worry about whether I do it all. I just try to do it right, whatever "it" is.

Blackstone River Hiking

Saturday, Jessica and I had some free time due to a canceled BBQ. Instead of doing what I suggested ("play video games and watch TV while you study, dear") we did what she suggested. We dug out the Nature Walks book she got me for Christmas last year, picked a place, and went for a hike.

We ended up on Lookout Rock Trail in Uxbridge. I'd have pictures but the camera batteries died after just one shot -- so that's what you get. The picture was taken early in the hike near the flat wetlands area.


The hike wound through a very brief meadow area and then quickly into the forest, up a hill and to an incredible view from a rock which rumor has it was used by Native Americans as a lookout point (this has been said about almost every prominent rock ledge in New England, I guess). I wish I had a shot from that rock, the view of the river, the valley, and the distant road was great. It was interesting to hike a couple miles and be able to look down at the road where you knew you were parked and feel the sense of accomplishment that comes with saying "that's how far we walked!?"

Anyway, I don't have any deep thoughts to offer on the subject, but I figured I'd at least share the moment.

Football?

Is it too soon to start talking football? Probably. I have done ZERO research into next season's fantasy football potential. I know next to nothing about off-season moves, etc.

But this morning on the radio they announced Ted (Big) Johnson's retirement.
And we already know Ted Bruschi is taking a season off.

It could be a tough year for the Pats' defense, folks. But goddamn if we haven't had a good run. I hope they can keep it up.

I admire Belichick's class:

Although his retirement is unexpected, we thoroughly respect his decision and support him as he moves on. Ted's signature was a work ethic and toughness that were second to none. He retires a champion.

Reading further into the article, I see that we're in a contract dispute with Richard Seymour, who more than once we heard referred to as the best player (period) on the Pats team last year. I imagine this is just a little more ammo in his arsenal....

Out of touch

My usual morning routine involves reading a news page (I happen to use Yahoo, might change some time), skimming over headlines and reading anything interesting. One of the sections I browse is "Full Coverage" which sort of collects stories under categories. So, instead of a half-dozen different headlines on the bombings in London, you get "London Bombings." Same with "Iraq Conflict" and "Space Shuttle." This morning, the fifth topic down was "Niger."

And, you know what? As I read that, I realized I had no idea what events were unfolding in Niger.

And so, I clicked on the link to find out just how out of touch I am.

...

And, yes, I am a complete tool. People are starving to death due to massive drought, famine, and locusts.

I might not be the only one out of touch, though. The five news stories listed? All from non-US sources.

One story had this quote. "I had 50 cows. I sold 20 to feed my family and the rest are dead. Now I have two cows and two calves. I put my future in the hands of God." The countryside is littered with the corpses of cattle who have starved. It sounds hellish to me.

The Boston Globe asked almost a full week ago, "Does US care about Niger now?"

I'd have to say, from where I sit, it doesn't look good.

People crack me up, technical edition

So I'm doing some work-related research, and it leads me to reading this magazine review of JBuilder 2005, the IDE I use at work.

The review is a pretty standard review, talking about IDE features (including code auditing, the feature I was interested in hearing about). In the middle of the review, the author included the following information about Crystal Reports support in JBuilder:

Enterprise supports a wide variety of Web frameworks and libraries, including Struts/Tiles, Java ServerFaces (JSF), Cocoon, and even taglibs for Crystal Reports Engine and JSR168 Portlets and, of course, the Java Standard Tag Library (JSTL).

Makes sense, sure. And then you get to the end of the review, and you find this gem of a comment from someone:

I want to know about crystal report

And then, 30 minutes later, because obviously nobody has answered his question, he follows up with much more information:

how create crystal report in the java program

Thanks, that cleared it right up. Sometimes it's nice to know my job is safe :).

Nerdcore Hiphop

Wired magazine has a bit on nerdcore.

In honor of this moment, I am currently listening to all my Frontalot tracks. And realizing that I'm out of touch -- I gotta find some new nerdy shit to get down to.

Well, I don't really mean "get down to." I more mean "download."

I hate numbers

I actually love numbers, but I hate the way they scale, and I hate the way we use them today.

We constantly hear about how big the national debt is, how many people die per minute from different diseases, how much oil we're burning, and so on.

But the fact is, anything you tell us which scales with population is going to seem immense once you multiply it out. MSN in Australia tells me the average person passes a liter and a half of gas a day. There are almost 300 million people in the US, so each day America releases almost 120 million gallons of flatulance.

That's a lot of stink, by the way.

"US OIL DEMAND, 2004: Over 20 million barrels per day" - from this site. They further tell me that this is about 777 million gallons. The site tries to be helpful as it goes on telling me how deep that much oil would be covering a football field, how many times those barrels would circle the earth, etc. And trust me, that's cool to know. I love having the visual.

But it doesn't mean anything to me. Is it normal for a nation to consume 6 times as much oil as it outputs in ass-gas? What are the ass-gas to oil-consumption ratios for other nations? What do we get in exchange for our oil usage? How much of it is used in cars driven by one person and how much is used in transporting food from the rural areas into the cities? What are the facts behind the numbers?

I'm not saying we aren't being grossly irresponsible in our oil consumption. But tell me about that, don't just give me a number and hope I run away screaming. You have to give me some context.

This same fact applies to the people who try and tell me how many people starve to death each minute. I love this site which tells me that "One person every other second needlessly dies." Now that's a truly useless number, designed simply to scare me. How many people actually die every second? How many are "needful" deaths? How many people are needlessly born (not a very nice thought, I know)?

They further tell me that 578 species go extinct each day, which seems to contrast with Wikipedia's statement of 784 documented extinctions in the past 500 years. This further contrasts with Sierra Legal Defense's estimate of 50 to 75 species per day being eradicated, and SaveTheRainforest's "conservative" estimate of 25 per day. This site tells me (again, "conservatively") that 50 to 150 species are wiped out each day in the tropics alone.

This is even worse than "scare me with big numbers." It's "scare me with completely made up numbers." Do these assholes even know what "conservatively" means when estimating something?

I hate it. It's gotten to the point where I feel no emotional impact from numbers any more. With every statistic I hear, I first question whether they're even right, and then question what it's supposed to tell me. In the end I'm left with one impression: people are much more interested in making me terrified than they are in educating me, and I resent that.

Let me decide whether I should be scared shitless or not, ok?