May 2008 Archives

Well after much wrangling to get the closing moved up to Wednesday and some more back and forth with the insurance company after that we are proud new home owners.

I spent a good amount of time out at the house yesterday doing minor repairs and cleaning up crap they left in the house. We've already spent $400 at Lowes and that was just stuff to "get us started" It was mostly on new locks for the doors. Found a nice set of locks that let you key them yourself. Kinda nice that it doesn't require a locksmith.

I also got quotes from a house painter and fence rebuilder. Both were a little more than I was expecting but that's always the case.

We're in Oklahoma now for memorial day to see family. Next week starts the packing/moving process begins in earnest.

The sellers originally told us they wanted to move up the closing for the house one day. This wasn't a problem since we did as well. Apparently though, they wanted to move it up one day from THAT. So now we are closing on the house tomorrow. Not really a problem for us, it lets us get in the house one day earlier. I've already got some contractors lined up to come give us some estimates for repairs on Thursday.

The wife and I spent the weekend in Arkansas visiting her family. They live near Hot Springs, so its nice to go and visit and be out away from the city for a while. There are a lot of trails and logging roads out there so we talked about getting some mountain bikes and going out there sometime. No time for that now though, we are in full move-in mode for the new house. We're planning on moving in on June 12th if we can get everything taken care of by then. I really need to make a list of all the things that need to be done.

My wife is out of town this week so I've haven't been doing too much in the evenings. Last night I planned to go cycling again but it was rainy so I decided to stay in. I did watch Aliens Vs Predator 2. I got it from Netflix and I knew the wife would have no interest so I watched it while working out the last 2 days. WOW was that a stinker. It was like a sci-fi original movie with a bigger budget. They pretty much threw out everything from the other movies and made some kind of "slasher movie with aliens."
The basic plot Predator ship carrying Aliens crashes in small town Colorado. Aliens escape, Predator hunts them down, mayhem ensues.

Some Highlights:

Scenes stolen completely from Aliens. (They used the music as well.)
Plot threads that go nowhere.
The aliens can now be implanted, gestated, and fully grown in a manner of minutes.
The Acid-blood is used/ignored depending on how much gore they want in that scene.
The predator, for no reason whatsoever, removes his his shoulder mounted lasers, and converts them into a pistol.
Bad political posturing ("The Government wouldn't lie to us!")

Whew, even if you liked AVP 1 I'd skip this one.

The new house is located in Grapevine and since the wife and I are avid cyclists, I started poking around on the city's web page for information on bike Trails.

I found a map of the cities paved bike trails. The map looks great. Though no one I know has ever talked about cycling the grapevine trails so I was dubious to the quality of the actual trails. I went out yesterday evening and tried them out.

I started out on the Big Bear Creek trail. It's a very nice trail, well marked, running alongside the city parks. Next I hit the Pool Road trail, or really just Pool Road. If there was a trail, I couldn't find it. I rode up the sidewalk to the Ira E Woods/Cotton Belt Trail. Here I found an actual paved trail. It followed along next a to busy street, so I had to stop at every cross street but the trail itself was nice and well marked. The next trail on the map is the "downtown grapevine trail." As far as I can tell this trail just doesn't exist. I rode down the street for a bit looking for a trail but was unable to find one. I turned around at that point rather than ride through anymore traffic.

The next time out I plan on starting at the end of the "Downtown Trail" and going further north to check out the rest of the trail system.

Now that I have the new Channel Zero up and running I guess I should actually use it. We had a lot of fun this weekend. Halo and his wife and our little nephew all came in town for the weekend. Friday we went and looked at the new house and tried to get some idea of how much needed to be done before we moved in. Not too much really, some fence repair and painting.

Saturday we all went out to Scarborough Faire, the renaissance festival in Waxahachie. It's always a good time. I can't even remember how many times I've been now. I've lived here in Dallas for 11 years now and I've gone almost every year. Sometimes more than once a year. Elanna and I didn't dress up this year as all our costumes are packed away. I did buy I cool painting of a dragon that will go in the gameroom in the new house.

I created a new blog today just for RPG stuff. I'm moslty using it to archive things I've written for various RPGs. I've written a lot latley that gets sent out over email. I end up searching through my outbox to find the emails later so I can share them. I'll also be using it to keep track of any new RPGs that I am running like the Dark Heresy Game rather than creating a new blog for each game like I did with Delta Green and Eberron.

Well here it is. The new Channel Zero. I did like the old gray and black design but I thought it was time for a change. I'm not totally happy with this design but it will do for the time being. I've already created and thrown away about four other designs and this is the one that works the best.

Busy time this weekend, my brother, his wife, and the nephew will be in town this weekend. We are going to go to Scarborough faire this Saturday.

We finally settled on a contract for the new house so we are closing on May 22nd. June looks to be a busy month!

The new Channel Zero is almost ready. This site is barely functional but I just had to share this littel bit of comedy my Aunt sent me. Elanna and I finished the MS-150 this weekend. 83 Miles on Saturday and 75 miles on Sunday. It was brutally cold and windy on Saturday. Sunday was better but very hilly.

You are 100% Oklahoman if:

1. You can properly pronounce Eufaula, Gotebo, Okemah, and Chickasha.

2. You think that people who complain about the wind in their states are sissies.

3. A tornado warning siren is your signal to go out in the yard and look for a funnel.

4. Your idea of a traffic jam is two cars waiting to pass a tractor on the highway.

5. You've ever had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
6. You know that the true value of a parking space is not determined by the distance to the door, but by the availability of shade.

7. Stores don't have bags, they have sacks.

8. You see people wear bib overalls at funerals.

9. You think everyone from a bigger city has an accent.

10. You measure distance in minutes. ("I'm about 5 minutes away.")

11. You refer to the capital of Oklahoma as "The City."

12. It doesn't bother you to use an airport named for a man who died in an airplane
crash.

13. Little smokies are something you serve only for special occasions.

14. You go to the lake because you think it is like going to the ocean.

15. You listen to the weather forecast before picking out an outfit.

16. You know cowpies are not made of beef.

17. Someone you know has used a football schedule to plan their wedding date

18. You have known someone who has had one belt buckle bigger than your fist.

19. A bad traffic jam involves two cars staring each other down at a four- way stop, each determined to be the most polite! and let the other go first.

20. You know in which state Miam-uh" is and in which state "Miam-ee" is.

21. You aren't surprised to find movie rental, ammunition, and bait all in the same store.

22. Your "place at the lake" has wheels under it.

23. A Mercedes Benz is not a status symbol. A Ford F350 4x4 is.

24. You know everything goes better with Ranch.

25. You learned how to shoot a gun before you learned how to multiply.

26. You actually get these jokes and are "fixin" to send them to your friends.

27. Finally, you are 100% Oklahoman if you have ever heard this conversation:

"You wanna Coke?"

"Yeah."

"What kind?"

"Dr. Pepper."