Chuck Norris Facts

This web page is so funny! You've got to check it out. The extra facts (not in the top 10) seem to be even funnier. The best one is this one:

If you ask Chuck Norris what time it is, he always says, "Two seconds 'til." After you ask, "Two seconds 'til what?" he roundhouse kicks you in the face.

I'm so Evil

This can't be right. I answered this honestly, but sure enough this is what I got. I knew I was messed up, but come on.


How evil are you?

Political Quiz

I'm not sure how much this reveals, but it was a little insightful nevertheless. Check out this political quiz. According to this I'm a "Centrist", even though I'm on the border of Centrist and Libertarian.

The Centrist definition is as follows: CENTRISTS espouse a "middle ground" regarding government control of the economy and personal behavior. Depending on the issue, they sometimes favor government intervention and sometimes support individual freedom of choice. Centrists pride themselves on keeping an open mind, tend to oppose "political extremes," and emphasize what they describe as "practical" solutions to problems.

And here's my chart (the red dot on the chart shows where I fit on the political map):

Christmas 2005

Well, I'm back home and back to work after a good 10 day vacation. It was great seeing family and friends. Usually when I get time off to go back to the sunny Rio Grande Valley, I only have time to see family. Although, this time I got to see some old friends, Johnny P. and fam., Nino, and The Kellers.

I learned a lot of things about myself and people in general over those days. One is that no matter how old you get, you'll always be just a kid in the eyes of the elders in your family. I lost count of how many times I got talked over, ignored, or disregarded. Although, I should note that not all of my family is like that. There are those few that genuinly asked about me and seemed to realy be interested in me as a person.

I also have to say how appreciative I am that my Mom, Dad, and brother Jacob let us spend so much time in their house. I know it is a big deal, because my wife, son, daughter, and I got to sleep in my parent's room while everyone else shuffled the sleeping arrangments around between my brother's twin size bed and the couches in the living room.

My son loves to go see the chickens that my Mom has in their chicken pen. He also loves to jump on their trampoline (for hours!!!!). I have to say that my brother is the best 4-wheeler rider I know. He amazed me with all the extremely high jumps, spins, and driving around non-stop on the 2 side tires. I wish I had video or pics of him, but I do not. I need to get some next time.

Bless everyone out there in blogger land. And I stay on top of my blog for now on. It seemed like everyone I met asked why I didn't update this thing.... I didn't know so many people were reading, but I do now. Peace.

An interesting Christmas list

My brother is into video games, tv, 4 wheelers, etc. Well, I ran across his Christmas list this year and I'm a little worried about some of the things on his list. Let's see if you can spot the items of interest:

• Half-Life 2 Stategy Guide
• Short-haired Dachshund puppy
• Fox racing gloves
• Money
• My choice of clothes
• World Domination
• 4 wheeler tires
• What I want as it comes to mind
• Chess/checkers board
• Cleaver - The biggest one you can find with a wood handle
• New leather wallet - bifold
• Black razor cell phone
• Digital camera

Go Wikipedia!!!

I use Wikipedia a lot to get information. I know that it just allows normal peer reviews to get it's information on there, but from what I see it works. That's why I was very pissed that the news media (I heard there was some sort of bad review on Fox News) was trying to make it sound like Wikipedia was just chalk full of incorrect information.

Well, I'm glad that the journal, Nature, came out with their research findings that says that Wikipedia is about as accurate in covering scientific topics as the Encyclopedia Britannica. And you know what else... Wikipedia is a whole lot easier to spell than that other source of information. Read On.

This guy is huge!!!

I don't really follow boxing but looking at this image, it just looks amazing. I would be pretty intimidated to fight this giant guy. According to the story it was pretty close. The normal sized guy is John Ruiz. The 7-foot tall guy is Nikolay Valuev. If you want to read the article I read, then here you go.

Thank God it's Over

After months and months of my project at work, it finally went live today without any huge issues. I can finally relax and start doing stuff I love... music, and being lazy! Haha! I can't say too much about what it is I did, but I can say that it basically is a system that uses some artificial intelligence to do work automatically that a real person would normally do. I think it's pretty cool. I wish I could share more, but alas, I need to keep my job so I can eat.

Let's see if I have hell to pay.

Well, back to work today. It's kinda relaxing actually. I'm just double checking everything to make sure that my project that goes into production tomorrow morning is good to go. I've been working for months on this thing and it hasn't been easy.

I'd have to say it was one of the hardest projects I've worked on so far. Not so much because of the technology involved, but because there was a lot of turnover on the project and one of the people that left was the business analyst. So I didn't have someone to just go and gather requirements. To make it worse, the scope of the project kept getting larger and larger with almost no control.

Tomorrow morning we're flipping the switch and we'll see if I'll have hell to pay. So far everything looks good, but I've worked on so many projects, there is always something you miss.

Saturday cartoons went where?

Today is Saturday, and I'm being a lazy punk! Well, maybe not. I woke up cooked breakfast and watched cartoons with my son. Why aren't there any good cartoons on on Saturday's anymore. In fact, the they are kind of scattered.

I was watching on channel and then all of a sudden at about 9am, the cartoons stopped. Then it was the news. NEWS!!! What the hell!?! If I am a kid, why am I insterested in the shooting that occured on the other side of town. Show me cartoons damn it!!

I thought maybe it was like one of those 5 minute break things, but I switched to another channel and came back 10 minutes later and it was still news. I started finding out that other channels seemed to stop showing cartoons are irregular intervals too.

About 9:30am I came back to the channel that had news and it started showing cartoons again. I was like ok...thank you for that little break. What ever happened to just showing toons until noon? I think it was like that when I was growing up. Maybe not... I have a blurred sense of what happened growing up.

Keep it real ya'll.

Working today

Well, I really, really, really need to get back into blogging again. I guess I'm a little discouraged because when I stopped not many people complained. But I really miss putting my thoughts down here.

Anyways, I'm actually working from home today. My work place is upgrading some major software and I have to test a few of my team's applications. It has been a pain, because I have to test several apps and then while I was testing them I had another department call me about another application that wasn't working and wasn't in my list of apps needed to be tested. It didn't needed to be tested but geez, I am only one man. Anways, it isn't fun having to work on the weekend, but that's what pays the bills.

Who spammed my blog???

First off, I just want to say that today sucks!!! I have been in a state of depression for a while, but today was bad. I came into work to find out there were more orginizational changes. These were bad, but they ticked me off because they came just after there being a change just like 3 months ago. I'm pretty sure in another 3 months I'll have yet another boss and then 3 months after that another.

To top it off, I'm still working on this project that started in February. I'm getting pretty sick of it. My coworkers are sick of it, my family is sick of it, management is sick of it. And all the weight slams down on me because it feels like it's pretty much been abandoned, as with all the org changes, everyone's moved on to bigger and better things.

So to boil it down, I've felt like I was on the verge of crying all day today. Not sure why though. Even when I'm just working, I can feel like the tears are about to flow. I just want to crawl into a bed, and slept for 100 years. This weight of impending doom is too much. Everything from work, finances, thoughts, dreams, are in a state of flux. I'm loosing grip here, yet the world keeps going. In the end, when it's all over life will go on. Hopefully, there will be some change.

Oh and one more thing... when they hell did people start using blogs as spam? My last blog entry had a comment from someone, but when I looked it was just spam. What gives you punks!?! Do you just want to destroy any sense of accomplishment that society and technology makes. Give me a break. I could delete it, but I'm leaving it here for people to see. If nobody has done it already, there needs to be a new term for spam in blogs, spammed blogs, etc. Maybe, blam, splog, spog, spag. I don't know... something... it is a little different

I'm Back!!!

I just wanted to let everyone know that I'm back. I've been away because of so many things going on in my life. Be prepared for more to come...

Let the flood gates open.

In my "This is just stupid" post, I had a lot of good responses. Although, the goal of my post wasn't REALLY to say homosexuality was wrong or right. It had more to do with people minding their own business and moving on to more productive aspects of society. Here is some of my reponses to some comments that actually got me thinking...

First off is 1 Corithians 6:9-10:
"Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do no be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards not slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God."

I was actually surpised when I saw this scripture, because of my many years of being involved in the church, I don't remember coming across a scripture that used the word "homosexual". I soon found out why. My family was big on reading (what they called) the original translation from the Greek writings.

What I had seen before was this from the King James Version (KJV):
"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God."

Notice, then KJV version says "effeminate", while the NIV (New International Version), says male prositutes. Also, notice that the KJV says, "abusers of themselves with mankind", while the NIV says, "homosexual offenders". This can be very confusing to people who come across this since there are about 25 different major translations of the bible.

So here it goes...
The original Greek text had two other words these two sins (in bold above). They were "malakoi", and "arsenokoitai". At the time of Paul's writing (yes Paul wrote this book), the standard word for homosexuals was "paiderasste". In fact, without going into details of research, "malakoi" meant "soft", or "loose". So as in loose men, loose morals, etc. The other word, "arsenokoitai", meant roughly, "an economic exploitation by means of sex". So basically pimping. It is interesting to note though that it used to be translated as "masturbators", until about the 20th century when masturbation become commonly excepted behavior and was then changed to reference homosexuals. The last religious writing in English that interpreted 1 Corinthians 6:9 as referring to masturbation is believed to be the [Roman] Catholic Encyclopedia of 1967.

But anyways, getting back to pimping... this was a big problem in Paul's time... temple prostitution. It is also interesting to note that one of the other verses given in a comment was from (another book by Paul) Romans 1:26-27 (although stated as 2:26-27). These verses seem to be the most obvious as being against homosexuality except that they are a little out of context. So starting at Romans 1:24 we see, "Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another." If you read everything in completness, you see the link to 1 Corithians 6:9-10 about the temple prostiution. Paul is again talking about temple prositution (according to my research). In fact he starts off by talking about these acts between men and women (heterosexual), and then goes on to talk about men and men and women and women. Although, I think the overall point was temple prostitution and not homosexuality.

Phew!!!!...
Well, that sums up my info for today. I love looking at this stuff actually, I have several books about different religions and how they came about and evolved from their start to present day. If we are going to use Paul's words as reference (which statistically you'll have to since he did write 13-14 of the 27 books of the new testament), then let me leave you with this one (which was my whole point in the original post):

Romans 2:1-5
You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things. Now we know that God's judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God's judgment? Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God's kindness leads you toward repentance? But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.

P.S. Please blog anonymously or with a fake name for your protection.

Ancestors of Birds

I don't think this is something controversial, just interesting. I've been reading a lot of modern discoveries over the past few months that lead up to a starting theory. That theory is that dinosaurs never completely died out. Instead they evolved into what we know as birds. Pardon, my lack of wanting to look up the correct definition of a dinosaur, since I've read that not every ancient reptile is known as a dinosaur (just bare with me). Anyways, I thought this new find was really interesting.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8072396/

They even go as far as to state the following, "Anyone who would argue that birds and dinosaurs are not related — frankly, I'd put them in the Flat Earth Society group." Very intersting indeed. If I had to choose I guess I'd rather have the flying ones that poop on my car instead of biting my head off.

Change of direction

The last post I did called, "This is just stupid" caused a lot of feedback. I had readers from everywhere that showed up. If you haven't read that post below, and the comments, then please do. Anyways, now I'm addicted. Prepare for some other topics of controversy. ;-)

This is just stupid

I think people should have equal say and I also believe in fairness and equal rights. Although, I am always surprised when we try to push society forward in being tolerant and peacefull and religious groups try to push society backwards.

The link below is to an article on MSNBC about a Christian Activist group going after Ford Motor Company because "the company which has done the most to affirm and promote the homosexual lifestyle". To me, this seems like the same mentallity of people who wouldn't let go of segregation. That's just my opinion.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8047423/

While, I'm at it, I have to state the obvious. If Christians are supposed to believe that homosexuality is so wrong that we must stand up against it, then why not stand up against other real "crimes". Being gay seems like the least of all sins if you ask me. What are murder, theft, spousal abuse, drug addiction, etc.? Why are these groups wasting so much time and energy on gay people?

I think it is because they are an easy target. Most gay people I think want to live normal lives, unless they feel like their rights are being trampled on. Why not tackle violence in the US? Probably because that is too dangerous. I still have a hard time seeing the exact line about homosexuality being a sin in the biblical text. There are lines about sodomy, but a report I saw about gay men in the US stated that a very small percent actually did that. The other larger percent performed in other ways. I would imagine that there are more heterosexual men sodomizing women (I can't believe I'm writing about this).

Anyways, I'm through writing about this. Let me know YOUR thoughts!!

Working on music again

It's been a long time since I've put any music out here. I've got this one song that I'm really excited about. I can't wait to put it here for people to check out, but it takes so long with me having a day job and then trying to be a decent husband and father after work. By the time I have any minutes left in the day I am usually so exausted. Anyways, I figured while everyone waits the can hear my little ditty I came up with (which is not a part of the song I'm currently working on).

This is what happens when I listen to too much hip hop in a day.

Sickest blog posting ever right here.

My friend Nino has one of the coolest blogs that's been around forever. I would have posted this sooner if my site hadn't been down, but here it is. This posting he had was funny, but as some of the comments posted on it stated, "This is by far the most f'd up and disturbing blog entry I’ve ever read. Good lord Nino!". Don't forget to click on the links he has for the pics.

Check it out at Nino's Joint

How did they know!?!?!

It's been a long time since I've posted anything because there have been issues with my blog site. Everytime I came here, it just gave me a blank page. It took a while, but it's back online again.

This time I want to talk about my trip to Taco Bell. Yes, I love Taco Bell. The place has good food, as long as your not in the mood for real Mexican. Anyways, if you've been to Taco Bell resently you would have noticed that the hot sauce packets there have little sayings on them. I find these usually amusing. Although, this time I began to worry if someone was watching me. If you notice this quote, you'll see that it says, " Nice palm. I read a great deal of pleasure in your future." At first I found this funny, but soon my paranoia emerged and I couldn't help but wonder... how did they know?

PS. If you take one of these hot sauce packets and squeeze the sauce on a US penny, the copper lining will be so shiny and new after sitting in it for about 5 minutes.

Hit and Run

I am pissed that I don't have pics of this but I was on my way to work and stopped at this stop light that takes forever. Right when I stopped the car behind me comes to a screeching halt and rear-ends me. The impact actually wasn't that bad. It was like a little bump in a parking lot. So I look back in my rear view mirror and I see this young 20-something girl yapping on her cell phone. I think, "well, it figures". So when the light turns green I pull over into a parking lot, thinking she would do the same, but she just kept going. I couldn't believe it. I think she didn't even notice she hit me since she was talking so much.

I had already stopped, so I ran out and glanced at the rear of my car. Everything looked ok, so I ran back into my car and tried to follow her, but I lost her. I probably shouldn't have got out of the car to begin with, so that's my falt. After getting to work, I inspected my car again and I couldn't even find a scratch. I have a Saturn, so thank goodness they are made out of Rubbermaid material!!!

Great stories

I'm always browsing the web at interesting news articles. I have been finding so many lately, but here are some that I think anyone will find interesting.

• Exploading Toads
• Scientists say humans can read minds
• Scientists create mythological creature

A good use for condoms

I always hear so many interesting stories from India. Here is the latest.

Toys and more toys

I finally took the plunge and rode my bother-in-laws motorcycle. I have to say it was pretty fun. Although, I only road it around my neighborhood block about 3 times, I was nervous the whole time. Well, actually, only every time I had to turn. I know that when you ride a bicycle, you have to "lean" into the turn, but on a motorcyle, it feels like I'm gonna fall over or something. I guess it is just something you get used to.

Also, I got a 30" Sanyo HDTV and the picture is really good. I know that I've read a lot of reviews that say that the screen size isn't big enough to give you that feeling of "being there" that you get from the larger HDTVs. That's ok for now. I'll just wait until that communications act goes into affect and everything is HDTV.

Blogging for the sake of blogging

Hello everyone. I don't have much to say. I have been busy fixing up our house and doing yard work. Nothing big. I am going to start learning on how to ride a motorcycle. My brother-in-law, left it with us after he moved, so I thought I'd take it for a spin. Hehe. I need to buy a helmet though first.

Another friend lost

I heard the news that a friend of mine from high school lost her life on Wednesday, March 30, 2005. Her name is Miroslava Barrera, more commonly known as Miros (pronounced Mee-dose). She died in a car wreck in California. She was a good friend of mine for all 4 years of high school even though she went to another high school in another town close by. We met at a local church and that is how we became good friends. We actually we together (boyfriend/girlfriend) seriously for about a month. Unfortunetly, we didn't ever keep in touch after high school graduation in 1995 (except for a couple of emails we sent briefly to each other in college). I have a lot of good fun memories with her and the friends we shared. We all will miss her.

Hello BIG TV...goodbye, BIG TV

Well, I got word of my bonus from work the other day, so I decided to go buy a big screen TV I wanted. I had been looking for some time because I wanted to buy one with my huge tax refund I got (having a house and dependents pays) this last month. Well, that didn't go so well, as I had some credit card debt that needed to be paid. So I thought, "alright... bonus time then!!!" Well, so when I heard about my bonus, I jumped the gun and got this TV. It is a Panasonic 43-inch lcd projection HDTV. DVD's look really good on it and most digital cable channels look good too. Although, the SD channels on the low end (channels 4-20-ish) look a little blurry.

I haven't had a chance to see what HDTV looks like yet, but it seems as though I won't for a while. I'm gonna return this prized beauty tomorrow and be a responsible person and use most of the money for bills. College loans, credit card debt, that new A/C had to buy for the house since the old one went out last summer... it sucks to get rewarded and not really see much come out of it.

Sure I'll be closer to being out of debt, but while everyone else I know (especially in my line of work), is getting nice houses, nice cars, big tv's, multiple computers, pda's, game consoles, high dollar food, I must put up with my old stuff for a little longer. Although, I'm gonna at least buy some parts to upgrade my computer just enough so I can at least play some modern computer games on it. I will probably buy this 30" widescreen Sanyo TV from good ol'Wal-Mart later too. It was only $560 (or so). As much as I hate the idea of big corporate America, I have to admit that having Wal-Mart helps gives us poor folk a chance. Damn you college loans!!!!!!!!

Completed the Fence

I have been working for the past couple of months on this fence in our backyard. There was a few storms a long time ago that knocked part of it down. Several places I called said it would cost about $1000 - $1500 to replace the whole fence. I then decided that I would just do it myself. So far I fixed the part that fell down (which is about half the fence), and it has only cost me about $100. Not bad. It only took so long becuase it seemed to rain every weekend. I also tore down a small wall around a mesquite tree back there and prepared the soil by digging up several small rogue trees. Now I need to just put up a new wall and mulch for that finished look. Special thanks to my pomeranian, Indi, for modeling the fence for me.

Big trucks people drive

Living in Texas, you see a lot of trucks. Extended cabs, quad cabs, extended cab/extended beds... then there is my all time favorite (which you see a lot in Texas)... the quad cab, 8ft bed, dually (I think I spelled that right) with the 4 tires in back. Although, as you see in this pic I took at our movie theatre nearby, sometimes the biggest isn't big enough... move over Hummer!!!!



This thing would be sweet for the high schooler. It's got the actual bed to sleep in too attached. I should have knocked to see if someone was home.

Fight Club, one of my all time favorites

My wife's cousin, Hope, borrowed my copy of Fight Club a long time back and has yet to return it (or even watch it). She lives in Austin, so it is a little hard to just run over there and get it, but I love that movie. Sure it is a little strange at first, but there are a lot of sub-plots and meanings going on in there.

Anyways, I am just mentioning this because that is how I have been feeling lately. Like life is just passing by. Everything is a copy of a copy of a copy. Every day is the same thing. Every night is the same night. Thank God for Miller Lite.

Anyways, life was more interesting when I was in school and every day held a range of events. I knew so many people, had so many friends. Now I have the few guys at work, but we don't really hang out much (except for Jeff... shout out to ya!!!). I used to get together a lot with some of the workers there for happy hour, but I don't do that anymore. I still have my friend Noe, but he is just married and is now in the boat I'm in. How do you find time for yourself with other friends without feeling like your abandoning your family? So alas I have basically no friends to hang with. To quite frank, I feel the most happy when I'm playing video games. It makes me feel like the whole world disappears. Right now I'm playing Halo 2 and Fable. Lots of fun.

Valley Drivers Do Suck!!!

I had to include this post from my friend Noe (aka CodingMonkey) about drivers in the Rio Grande Valley being so horrible. It is so true. I don't even have to look at those stupid road signs that say "Edinburg 64 miles". Once you see people darting in front of you, driving on the shoulder (the whole time), and dragging those damn crappy used cars to sell down there, you know you've arrived. Please read his post and see the pic he took of some moron. He should sell that puppy on eBay.

Whiter Teeth, Brighter Smile

I threw down $27 US dollarz on the new and improved Crest whitening strips. I've heard a lot of good things about them, even from my sister-in-law who is a dental hygenist. These new bad puppies promise the removal of 14 years of yellow teeth in just 7 days!!! The older version of these things took 14 days. Like who is gonna wait 14 days to remove 14 years of daily drinking of Dr. Pepper. Mmmmm..... Dr. Pepper!!! In fact, I'm drinking one right now. HooRhaa!!

My Birthday and Valentines

Well, I've fallen behind again with my blog by a few days. Anyways, thought I'd catch you all up on the events. Sunday was my birthday and now I'm 28 years old. Man, 2 more years until 30! I still feel pretty young. In fact most people seem to think I look like I'm right out of high school. I don't think so, but oh well. This is nice except for the fact that my work place seems to put more value on years experience, more maturity, etc. Which I think have all that, but when people meet me for the first time, I kind of get blown off. That's about the time, I reach behind my back and grab my sledgehammer of information technology acronyms, and talk a bunch of useless non-sense like every other IT person does. ;-P

Anways, Valentines day was cool too. I cooked my famous grilled ribeyes, garlic mashed potatoes and steamed asparagus. MMmmmmmm... I love that stuff. My wife thinks a lot of my cooking is better than most restaurants. That's why my new idea is to open up my own restaurant. I'm just in the beginning stages of even thinking about this, but if anyone knows anything about making a business like that work, let me know. I think if I'm going to make any real money, I'm going to have to start some sort of business and something tells me that getting into the music business after 28 years of age is going to be a little tough.

My Highschool Rating…

You scored as Loner. Loner 44% Prep/Jock/Cheerleader 38% Geek 38% Drama nerd 38% Punk/Rebel 31% Goth 13% Stoner 13% Ghetto gangsta 13% What's Your High School Stereotype? created with QuizFarm.com

My good friend Nino had his results on his web site. I decided to try it out and I guess it is close. Although, I think the "prep" and "rebel" scores should be switched. (ps. I had to modify the html the results give you because my blogger template here doesn't allow for such large images... I need to fix that).

To quit or not to quit that is the question.

Man alive!!! I am so tired today. This past week and a half have been nothing but hell at work. I've been here every day until about 7pm, and I'm still so far behind. Every minute someone wants something that is NOT on my already long list of to do's. And they can't take no for an answer either... or even a wait. How does this happen you ask? (well I'm glad you asked)

Well, let me explain life at work according to Jonathan. This may not be totally true, but it is true based on my observations and comments from other people I work with. Ok, here goes...

Basically, there is a team next to me that has somewhere between 12 to 18 people on it for one application. For those out there that don't know IT lingo, an application is like Microsoft Word, Blogger.com, anything that has code for a specific set of people to use. So anyways, 12-18 for one app. Then there are 5 programmers on my team. 3 of them work on one application in all its glory and one other guy works on 2 (1 of which I help and 1 I will probably take over). Then I have 3 apps I work on by myself, plus I help the one guy that has 2, plus I help the other 3 guys that have 1 all to themselves. Now granted the 1 that those 3 have is pretty big. Or at least everyone makes it out to be. Oh, by the way... the guy that has 2 apps is leaving to a special project soon, so those apps (for sure 1 of them) will be put on me to manage. That means I'll have 4 apps by myself and 1 that I'll help another team of guys with. This is getting to be really hard since I cannot bounce off ideas from people nor offload any work. There was one guy I tried to get to learn one of my apps but it was like pushing peanut butter into a tube of toothpaste. I got tired of hearing, "no later", I'm busy now. Wow!! There sure is a lot of work on that one app for those 3 guys. Makes me wonder if the stuff I work on is pretty easy or something (not).

Anyways, something tells me that I'll never be happy with a job unless I am in business for myself. This is a pitty though. I love computer programming and I've been programming since I was in 11th grade. While most people were changing majors trying to find out what to do, I pressed on with the same old thing though these years. My last job, they saw me as quote, "the most technical person on the team". Wow!! And there were some guys there that I really admired too.

Here I feel under utilized. I still wish I was designing that next big thing that would save the company millions of dollars, streamline business processes, etc. But now I fix bugs and listen to gripes all day.


Blast! There I go again complaining..... I'll have something happy and fun here tomorrow... I promise.

Sick of this crap!!!

After reading this article on MSNBC, I was so upset. There were two girls who took some cookies to a neighbor at 10:30pm at night. Apparently, the lady at home got so scared that she fled to her sister's house and thought she might have had a heart attack and went to the hospital. I guess the lady didn't see the cookies or the note or something. Anyway, the girls families offered to pay the ladies medical fees but the lady did not accept and decided to sue. Appearently she won!!! What the hell is that all about?! I can't believe we allow these stupid cases to waste tax dollars. What kind of person sues to high school girls? The lady was quoted as saying that the girls showed "very poor judement". Ok, I can agree with that (although I don't think 10:30pm is very late), but to sue someone over it. Come on!! I think someone should sue this lady for using very poor judgement for bringing this crap to court and sueing two teenage girls for being nice.

My Family

I've had some questions from people asking what I look like and my family web site at thekeels.com just doesn't have a decent picure of me. This one I thought was nice. It is of my wife, Audrey, my son Ashton, and me on a train at Knott's Berry Farms in California.

Here's something worth looking at

It seems as though Bill Gates was quite the man in his 30's. He looks so young here.

Work sucks... no respect

I'm getting pretty sick of the work I'm doing now. I just had to write about this, as it has been on my mind for some time. Granted this has to be the 2nd most laid back IT job I've had. I have so many projects to work on, it drives me nuts. Actually, I should rephrase that... I love being on many projects and being s t r e t c h e d , but the problem is that most of my applications I support are support by me and me alone. No help! The worst part of this whole mess is the fact that I can't ask for 2nd opinions on bugs, tasks, ideas. I'm completely alone.

In my last job I worked for a rather large corporation... actually THE largest corporation in the world (you can figure that one out). While I was there I worked horrible hours and for huge amounts of time (60-80 hours per week). This job had ok pay, bad medical coverage, and other sub-par benefits. BUT, I do have to say that I was constantly innovative. I usually worked on the largest projects there... known as tranformation projects at that company. I had nothing but respect and people valued my ideas.

What really got me going today was someone asking everyone around me for help and not stopping by to ask me (let me finish the story so you know what I mean). This individual was asking different people around me for help. Sure I heard him, but I was so entrenched in my own dilemas that I figured if nobody helped him, then he may ask me. Well, he didn't and I'm not sure if he found an answer to his problem. But later at the end of the day another guy on my team, said "hey you should have asked Jonathan... he knows how to do that." And the guy flat out said no Jonathan doesn't know that..and can't help me. In to make me more upset, he had some questions earlier about some similar stuff and said the same thing about me not knowing it and didn't need my help.

Now, granted I feel like I've gotten remarkly stupid at this job since I do not stretch myself and a lot of the technology I use is out dated and what we do use is usually used in the not-so-best of situations. But come on,... over a year ago at my last job I had managers and directors begging me for my ideas... to come to their teams... to promote me to where I wanted to go. I wanted to move to Texas to be closer to family, which has been nice, but I'm getting sick of the lack of respect. I feel like I used to be somebody, and now I'm considered a "junior" developer at my new company. I'm sorry that designing the worlds largest company's single sign-on security system, corporate wide J2EE standards, rolling out 3 of the largest eCommerce web sites in ONE year, being one of 3 developers on the worlds largest employee portal systems, and not to mention a multitude of other corporate web sites wasn't enough. I'll go ahead and keep my "junior" developer title thank you!!!! While everyone else works their way up because they have "more years" in the industry than I (which for some reason this company thinks is more important than actual knowledge). I'll never figure that one out.

God I'm so pissed right now!!! I better stop before I start composing my sentences with nothing but 4-letter words.

SoCal

Hey folks! I'm down in South California for some training with my company. I love California... at least this part of it anyways. Although, I wouldn't live here... it is way too expensive. As long as my company is flippin' the bill, then I'm alright. I'm here with 2 other guys from work, learning some software called FatWire. It is a Content Management System (CMS). For those that don't know, a CMS is used to update a dynamic web site, without having to manually type out all the HTML formatting. Usually, you have a few screens and you just type the text and stuff. I would consider this form I'm typing in now on blogger.com a form of a CMS.

Anyways, we've been having fun. We're staying at Embassy Suites and from 5:30pm to 7:30pm every weekday, they have an open bar. Last night I had 4 long island iced teas. MMmmm... so yummy. Today, I'm gonna try something different. Like Gin and Tonic or something. Well, class has started, so I better go.

Sleep and the afterlife

I was coming home tonight from my mother-in-law's wedding (she got remarried) and on the 45 minute drive back to San Antonio, I began to think of how sleepy I was. And then, as I usually do, started thinking too much and wondered why we don't remember things when we sleep.

I'm constantly reading different books about religion, spirituality, and little about history. So I like to try and think of things that people may not normally think about. I'm sure someone has thought this before, but still... I wondered... If we have a spirit and die, then we are supposed to go somewhere. Some people believe in heaven, hell, purgatory, nowhere, etc. Either way, I thought, if we die, our spirit is released and we are still supposed to have some sort of conciousness. So basically, our spirit is separate from our bodies.

Well, if that was the case, then why don't we remember things when we sleep? I mean... our bodies are taking a time out... so where is all that spiritual activity? Does the spirit take a nap too? Granted, we dream, but most of the time, I don't remember my dreams. And they are usually so far out there (the dreams), that I know it is just in my head. I almost think it seems logical that if our bodies where sleeping, then they would be slowing down and basically nearing death (not really, but closer than when we are awake). So while our bodies are sleeping, shouldn't our spirit be able to roam around and see what's up around town. =)

Anyways, just another crazy idea from yours truly.

Working late

I'm here at work a little late. Actually, this is my normal time before leaving, but I got here a little early for a meeting. Things are going good. Projects on time, bugs being squashed (yes, I am a software developer). Speaking of work, I have to fly to Brea, California for some training down at the home office. That should be fun. I'll be there with 2 other guys from work. Training in another city (especially close to LA), is always a blast! It's like a vacation and you don't even have to pay for it. Company picks up the tab.

As for my music, I'm finally getting the hang of my crazy synthesizer. I have to admit, that I'm more used to traditional instruments, guitar, bass, saxophone, drums, etc. This thing has so many menus, buttons, etc. But I'm excited. I'm working on that test song, Take Away. I've created some interesting sounds with this thing. I hope to turn this song into a really interesting piece. Some people don't like the harder part of it, but hopefully, I can balance out the rest of the song with something new.

Oh, and I've added a link to the side here for merchandise. Yep! That's right! You can actually buy some stuff with the Seken logo on there. I just have simple shirts for now. Also, I set it up for at charge. In other words, I make no money off the merchandise. It is a little expensive for being that I make no money off of it, but the way the web site works that sells it, they have to make something too. Plus, they create the stuff on an as needed basis. Pretty nifty! You all should at least take a look and tell me how crappy you think my artwork is. ;-P

Fun Friday

Actually, I have no updates today concerning my music. I just thought I would right about what I felt today. I had to drop a guy off from work at the airport here. While driving home in rush hour traffic I got this overwhelming sense of how depressing the day was. Just because it was Friday and I used to be able to get out of work and go and hang out with my friends for a while at night. At least for a couple of hours.

That doesn't happen anymore. Once you have a wife and a kid, you have to be "responsible" and come home. I actually love being home. That's what I like to do on the weekend. Just sit at home and spend time with my wife and son. But life just doesn't seem right without some play time. Without some "just for me" time. Instead, usually I just come home and hang out, kinda grudgedly, and drink down a few beers.

It is just hard to head home when you know there is energy out there. People getting ready, people heading out. Meeting old friends, getting acquainted with new ones. I've been in this city now for over a year, and besides the people at work, I haven't met a lot of people that I've grown too close to. I have met a lot of people, but it always seems that when you start to be better friends with them, I have to back away. A lot of the people at work have their own lives too. So even the ones I've come to know don't seem to interested in spending time with other friends. They just want family time. Which is ok! I was at that point a couple of years ago, but I feel like I'm in a different stage now. It's just hard to talkt to people about how you feel on issues such as this. How can the world feel so lonely?

In the beginning...

Hello everyone! This is the start of the Seken music blog page. I decided that just having the static web page that I did, was a little boring. My hopes is that this will become something more interactive. I plan on posting news about myself, and what I'm doing with my music and this band, Seken. Look out for great things to come, such as music, art, merchandise, etc.