Reporting in.

I know I haven't posted in weeks, but there's a good reason for that. I'm lazy.

Okay, that is true, but isn't really the reason for not posting. I've just been really, really busy. It's a crazy time for me right now, both at work and at home. And while I've still been doing my best to have some leisure time (or escape time, as I like to call it), where I zone out and get away from the crazy world, I just haven't chosen to use any of that time blogging. After all, when you type on a keyboard for ten hours a day, that's not necessarily the best thing to do to escape from your work.

Anyway, because I know the Internet is dying to hear about my life (otherwise, why would they allow me to have my own domain name?), here's a bullet point update:

• We're no longer sick! Actually, I shouldn't say that. We did beat the last of the colds that we've been passing around to each other. But it's allergy season for all of us, so there are still runny noses and watery eyes. And Josie is going through a really rough spot with her eczema. Also, even though she's been wearing her glasses, her eyes seem to be crossing more. And I can't forget about Alecia's upcoming laperoscopy tomorrow morning. She's getting some abdomen pain checked out through exploratory surgery. Okay, maybe we don't sound so great. But for us, this is all par for the course.


• I got a promotion! This actually happened almost a month ago, but the announcement sat in limbo while the powers-that-be worked out the rest of our departmental re-org. I'm not sure that the change has been officially announced, even yet, but I've been given permission to use the new title, so I'm going for it. The momentum for this change came due to a great offer I received from another local company, so I really owe them a debt of gratitude. I was hoping for a bump to coincide with our restructuring, but having an offer on the table gave me the bargaining power I needed to make sure I was in good shape going forward. And it wasn't just a power play, either. I was really close to taking that job and changing the course of my career to become an agency man. It would have been an exciting change, but I decided to stick with the company in which I've invested almost a decade of my work life. Hopefully, I won't grow to regret this choice.


• We're buying a second car! This is exciting in concept, but is actually turning out to be a pain in the ass. Finding a good, used car isn't easy. There are some con men out there just waiting for a sucker like me. And several of them seem to be Turkish. Seriously, last night I drove up to Kennesaw to see a Mitsubishi Galant. The seller, a heavily-accented Turkish man, met me in the Costco parking lot to show me a little silver four-door with hubcaps tricked out to look like expensive rims. An hour after seeing this car (and listening to his BS about how Mitsubishis have perfect transmissions that will never go bad), I met another man in Smyrna to see another Mitsubishi Galant. This seller was ALSO Turkish, and fed me the same BS about the transmission. Even stranger, his Galant had THE SAME FAKE RIMS. It's like there's a school somewhere teaching Turkish immigrants how to sell that particular model of car.


• Soccer has been going great! After yet another player shuffle in the offseason, we've finally cobbled together a team that would be competitive with some of the classic Eagles teams I've played on in the past. We're currently at the top of our division, and have a winning record against teams from the next division up. I don't want to put the cart ahead of the horse, but I'd be surprised if we didn't win the trophy this season. Even better, I'm actually playing well for a change. Not only has my defense been on point so far in 2007, but last weekend, I got to play forward for the full game and had two assists to show for it. I still need to get in better shape, but at least my head's in the game.


• I beat Marvel: Ultimate Alliance! Okay, so you can probably tell that the news is getting less impressive as you go down the page. But it was a great game--probably the best superhero game I've ever played. And beating it was a big accomplishment, considering that my game-playing time is limited lately. My only complaint about the game is that they offered bonus characters in next-gen versions of the game, but none were available in the PS2 version I got for Christmas, or the PC version I got from a friend. I agree with putting extra characters in as incentive to get people interested in the next-gen consoles, but what's the harm in putting different exclusive characters in the current-gen versions? So you got to play with Moon Knight or Colossus if you have a PS3 or X-Box 360 (and four more characters with the PSP!). Why can't we maybe get access to The Vision through the PS2 or Cyclops through the PC? Cheap bastards...


• Volleyball starts next week! I'll have a bunch of rust to shake off, but I'm excited about the season beginning. The only problem is that I feel a little pressure to perform. I'm playing with my friend Gary, and both of us were shaking off a ton of rust the last time we played together. In that season, we were also playing with some girls that weren't very good. What that meant was that there was no pressure to perform. We knew we wouldn't win many games, so we could have fun with it and take our time getting back into playing shape. This season, though, we have better girls and a full season behind us (even if it was months and months ago). I was hitting well at the end of the last season in which I played, so I almost feel like I have to hit well right away starting next week. I hope the rest of my team is patient with me, or that I start out lucky. Otherwise, it could be embarrassing.


• I redesigned this blog! I know it still looks the same to you. That's because I never LAUNCHED the redesign. I liked it okay, I guess. I've been wanting to move to a "light text on dark background" style for a while now. But I thought the content area was/is too restrictive, and I need to rework the formatting of the nav bars. I may fix it or I may not. You'll just have to wait and see...

Anyway, there's surely more to write about, but I need to get back to the grind. The sad thing about blog posts, even useless updates like the one above, is that they take so long to type. Seriously, if I had a program that would type out the words I say and turn them into legible, accurate blog posts, I'd be in hog heaven. Then, I could "blog" on the way to work every day. Sure, it would be pretty random stuff, and would be broken up by frequent cuss words, but how would that be any different from any of my other posts?