I know it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything of linguistic substance, but lately I haven’t had much to post about besides Evey.
First of all, Katy Perry’s MTV Unplugged live CD is absolutely amazing. I love her voice so much. She did a brilliant cover of a Fountains of Wayne song, and the entire album has a “lounge” feel to it. It’s really worth checking out if you appreciate beautiful singing.
Anyway…
Yesterday I hit the 400 mile mark on Evey. When I got the car, it had 20 miles on it from the factory and the PDI at the dealership, and I took a picture at 22. The odometer reading grows so quickly. Come tomorrow, I’ll have owned her for a week, and I couldn’t be happier. Every time I walk up to it, I smile. There’s liking your car, and then there’s this – finally having a car that I once called a dream car. I just flat out love this car. It’s so much fun to drive. Everything about it is fantastic, right down to my switchblade key. I think between the Camaro and the Chevy Volt, GM is really looking up (Chevy Volt > all hybrids).
Last week was pretty awesome. I took off on Wednesday to pick up my car, and then I had the rest of the week off for Thanksgiving to enjoy it.
And speaking of Thanksgiving, I hope everyone had a good one. I usually make a post about being thankful, but I guess I’ve just been neglectful of my poor blog lately. We had delicious food (duck and deer, mmmm), and I have plenty of leftovers in my freezer right now. The rest of the holiday was spent with family and friends.
Now, it’s Christmas time and I guess I should be happier about that, but I really enjoyed the Thanksgiving holiday. The tree is up at my parents’ and I put up a little one at the apartment, though I only turned on the lights once.
Other than that, I’ve been watching way too much anime and playing Starfox 64 a good bit.
I need to get back in the habit of updating this thing regularly, because I hate making this catch-up posts where I have to condense a bunch of crap into something readable (or slightly readable ).
In my long, hard years of life, I think my infinite wisdom has finally come up with the recipe for a successful joke:
1) Steal a line from a T-Pain song
2) Success!
I went camping this weekend with Becca, Joseph, Joseph’s brother Kenneth, and Sam (boy). It was pretty awesome, and if I were to hold true to everything I said on Sunday and Monday, I’d owe them each about twenty “dranks.”
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, here:
The lyrics are hilarious if you, like me, appreciate good lyrics. Sometimes while listening to this song, I just burst out laughing at the sheer prospect of buying someone a “drank.”
In other news, I found out if I get to River Road from work by about 4:35, I will see a red 2010 Camaro, and if I get to Brightside fast enough from there, I will see a black 2010 Camaro with gunmetal racing stripes.
Yes, I am obsessed with this car. I absolutely cannot wait to own one. Srsly.
My iPhone battery got down to 3% on Monday. That’s the lowest it’s ever gotten and that’s the only time I ever had to stop using my phone for nonsense stuff (playing “I’m on a Boat” with the iPod, playing “Don’t Trust Me” on Tap Tap Revolution, Tweeting pictures of destroyed hamburgers…) for fear of not being able to have enough battery life to make calls with it should I need to. The point of this is that I’m pretty happy with the iPhone’s battery life, since this is the first time it almost died on me. It suits my lifestyle pretty well.
On a completely opposite note, I had a pretty awesome experience with Microsoft tech support today (can you taste the sarcasm?). Not just any Microsoft tech support, no. This was Microsoft professional tech support.
I submitted a help request on Thursday via their web form for an email response. This is supposed to take one day. The support engineer that gets the request emails me back and pretty much says, “I’m not coming to work tomorrow, if you want this resolved before Tuesday, call into the queue tomorrow.”
Okay, so why did you even take my help request? Whatever. I called the queue on Friday at about 10 A.M. My problem is diagnosed as Severity C and I’m supposed to get a call back within 8 hours. I explain that we close at 4:30, and this is noted in the ticket.
I didn’t get a call on Friday at any point during the day, even after I left. Fine, whatever, thanks Microsoft.
I called back today. Same crap. “We’ll call you back within 8 hours.” Wonderful. I called the guy from Thursday back twice, no dice. I called back a few hours later and explain that I need to get this taken care of today. The lady tells me she can put me in the call queue, but she has no idea how long it will be until someone will be able to answer. My boss is getting pissed at this point that Microsoft is giving us the runaround, so he called, got our problem escalated to Severity A (it was definitely not Severity A, but apparently that’s the only way to get service when you pay Microsoft millions of dollars for enterprise support), and finally, after about 30-40 minutes of being on hold, a very helpful man answered and helped me. The support quality at that point was top notch, but everything before that was completely ridiculous.
I got faster support for having a Joe Blow 3-year warranty with Dell and for paying a couple hundred bucks for Apple Care with Apple (also, Genius Bar is FTW). In fact, I can probably name half-a-dozen companies I’ve gotten faster support from. I really expected better from Microsoft’s *Professional* Support line.
Now, I wasn’t calling about a broken computer or anything – it was a real enterprise level support request dealing with updating Active Directory schema and deleting an old container in a production environment (scary crap if you can’t test it, for those not in the know). This, of course, isn’t an excuse for them not calling me back in two days when they said it would be less than 8 hours; rather, it’s just to let you know that I wasn’t calling to ask how to uninstall w32.backdoor.trojan or anything like that.
I would also like to thank the awesome cashier at Express, who let me use a $20 off of $60 coupon on a $59.50 purchase without making me buy something else to fill in the 0.50 I technically had to buy since tax doesn’t count. I love that kind of service.
This past week has been pretty awesome. I used to have a lot of boring days, but not lately. I even went to Bourbon Street with MC, her two friends from Arkansas, Becca, and Joseph! I had a hurricane from Pat O’Brien’s on the 4 year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina…pretty unintentional, but kind of funny nonetheless. It was so much fun!
I also saw Inglorious Basterds on Sunday with Trent, GP, and one of their friends that I don’t know that well, but have met before (Drew). Incredible movie. Definitely watch it if you’re not squeamish.
So, I know I do this off and on with bands I like, but I’ve been really into Fall Out Boy’s lyrics lately. It (re)started with “My Heart is the Worst Kind of Weapon,” but I just realized what one of the allusions in “Headfirst Slide into Cooperstown on a Bad Bet” means, and it’s just incredible.
“And does your husband know the way that the sunshine gleams from your wedding band?
Does he know the way, does he know the way of the crickets that would convince me to call it a night?”
So the song (in my opinion), is about an affair this dude is having with a married woman, which you can tell from that first line. But the second line I never understood. But then, thanks to the Internet, I realized that “crickets” was a reference to Jiminy Cricket, who was Pinnochio’s conscience. So that second line is basically saying that his conscience is trying to make him quit having this affair, which is such a simple thing to say, and this song has such an incredible way of saying it. AHHH, I love how awesome Fall Out Boy’s lyrics are, and Patrick’s vocals are incredible in this song.
This YouTube video automatically starts at the above mentioned lines, and the lines immediately following those lines are sung so emotionally powerfully, it’s just epic.
Also, I have been playing Starfox 64 a little. My old high score is so epic, there’s no way I’ll ever even get close again, haha.
Last Sunday, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire came on TV, and being bored, I figured I’d watch it. I thought it was pretty good, so I finally decided to catch up on the Harry Potter craze and every night last week, I watched a Harry Potter movie until I was all caught up and ready to see the new one.
Of course, then I ran into a problem – I don’t really have anyone to go see movies with. I actually keep a list of movies that I want to see on my desktop so that I won’t forget about them six months later when they come out on DVD.
Luckily for me, the biggest Harry Potter fan I know (MC) came into town, so I went to see it with her, and it was awesome. Now I either have to wait two years for the final movies or read the seventh book. Not sure what I’m going to do about that.
And on a closing note, I think it’s pretty sad that in the past month and a half, I’ve hung out with someone that lives 6 hours away more than I’ve hung out with my friends that live an hour away. Something needs to be done about this. Becca, Ashley, Cesar – that means we need to hang out!
Today, I was leaving the mall and a random girl told me “I like your shirt!” to which I replied, unusually casually, “Thanks!” It really made my day.
And before anyone asks, because I know someone would, she was probably a little too young for me.
So that made my day (up until that point at least), but then my car decided to die and that kind of unmade it. Overall though, that random comment followed by a good night out with my friends put me in good enough spirits to not let my car dying bother me too much. As long as my boss doesn’t care if I am late/don’t come in tomorrow (on short notice).
I have a lot of catching up to do, but I really doubt I’ll cover everything I originally intended to cover.
I had a party last weekend. It was quite epic, and lots of fun was had.
That’s my favorite picture, though I wish more people were in it, cause that’s not even half. My friends are pretty awesome. I wish we could do stuff like that more often.
I also went to the Chimes twice last weekend, once on Friday night and once on Sunday morning. (The Chimes * 2) + awesome friends + party = super win.
I know I write enough about Buckle here, but sometimes I just feel like they deserve the praise. I looked for months and months for a pair of pants I could wear to work that wouldn’t make me feel like I was 40 years old. Namely, something that wasn’t big and baggy – pants are supposed to fit, not hang off of you, and that’s mostly why I hate Dockers/slacks/dress pants. I finally found a pair of pants that are suitable for work, and of course, I found them at Buckle. Those pants combined with my realization that American Eagle Vintage Fit Eagle Polos are *awesome* has led to my work attire moving from “frustrating and depressing” to “I pretty much feel normal now,” except tucking in my shirt still annoys the ever living crap out of me. I Tweeted this before, but I think it deserves repeating: whoever came up with the idea of tucking your shirt into your pants seriously needs to be punched in the face. It doesn’t make any sense when you really think about it.
And this is really sad, but I can’t think of anything else I wanted to say. *sigh*
Oh yeah, this is about 3 months late, but happy 5 year anniversary to my blog. “Phil’s Waste-of-Bandwidth Website” was born in late March of 2004 and turned into inphiltrate.com about a year later.
Wayback Machine Archive of the first or second version of inphiltrate (highlight the main frame to see the blog posts). I actually still have the entire site backed up. I should throw it up in a subdirectory so you can all laugh at my retarded “OMG I HAVE TO BLOG EVERY DAY OR I FAIL” posts.
I had written the majority of an update on Friday, but I decided against posting it for now. Maybe some other time.
On Friday, Adam and I went to hang out at Keith Carroll’s. We made a trip to Whole Foods, where I got some kind of amazing key lime cheesecake that was so amazing that I have to use the word “amazing” again: amazing!
I wish I could wear whatever I want to work. I feel so out of character in “business casual” attire. The button down shirts are fine (I wear those out of work too), but I hate slacks and having my shirt tucked in. Curse you, real life. Thank God for casual Fridays!
It’s that time of month again. Yes, that time when I apologize for not blogging in X amount of time and then proceed to say that I’ve been busy and perhaps tell you what I’ve been busy with.
Well, if you’ve been keeping up with my Twitter updates, then you’ve pretty much got the gist of what I’ve been up to. I managed to kill a video card and a bluetooth dongle within the span of a week. I already replaced my GeForce 8600 GT with a Radeon HD 4650, but the bluetooth dongle is still broken and awaiting replacement (read: waiting for me to get paid ).
I went out to eat yesterday with some friends, and that was pretty cool. All in all, life is going pretty well, except that my days seem so short now. I got used to having so much time for myself that now, by the time I get off work and cook/eat, it’s already 5:30 or 6, and then I’ve been going to bed at 11 lately so I won’t be tired at work. I’m not sure if that’ll last, but for right now, I think it’s best.
Microsoft’s new ads targeting Macs (and promoting HP?) are finally up to that bar that Apple set for competition between the two companies. The only thing they’re missing is that they aren’t funny (though they aren’t intended to be). So anyone that complained about the Apple ads…Microsoft has struck back. “I guess I’m not cool enough to own a Mac” and “Macs are all about aesthetics” are pretty funny though, in that oh-so-sad way. It’s also kind of funny that they came out with these commercials about the common computer buyer like a year after they stuck Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld in some random family’s house to find out how the average person lives because they were so out of touch. I personally think that instead of striking back at Apple, they need to actually advertise their operating system. I haven’t seen a commercial for Windows in…years.
And speaking of Apple and Microsoft, I had an idea for a post that I don’t feel like writing right now, so…note to self, and stuff.
I had a movie night on Saturday. Eric, Ashley, Alisha, and Jack came, and though it was my first time hosting such an event, I think it was pretty fun. Halfway through it turned into random dancing, and then back into movie night. Nothing wrong with that!
This picture is pretty epic:
We had a random informative session about how to take a proper MySpace picture. Here, I was demonstrating the proper ratio of the picture-taker’s arm that is supposed to appear in the picture:
I’ve got lots more pictures, but if you really care, you can find those on Facebook.
On a more serious note, today I accepted a job offer from UNO (the University of New Orleans), but even though New Orleans is in the name, I’ll actually be working in Baton Rouge. It sounds like a really cool position and the people that interviewed me seem pretty awesome. My official title is “Junior Systems Administrator,” which is right down my alley. So I’m pretty happy and excited about that. I should start sometime at the beginning of April.
I think I’ve said this before, but with my Twitter microblogging, I find that I have less to write about in my blog because I feel like it would be repetitive, even though I’m pretty sure my blog readers and my Twitter followers don’t overlap all that much.
First thing’s first: I don’t think I’ve linked to fmylife.com yet, so…there you go. It’s a great site with some really short, depressing stories (some NSFW – all text though, no pictures).
Last weekend was pretty awesome. I did a lot of hanging out and picture taking, and on that note, my new camera is awesome. I don’t have any videos worthwhile posting yet, but here’s a picture:
I really like that one – not because it’s an excellent display of my camera’s abilities or anything, but it’s just a good memory, I guess. That party was really, really fun and I’m pretty sure everyone had an absolute blast. I hadn’t seen Damien in a couple years, MCat in over a year, and Bates or Mikrish for a quite a few months. It was really nice to catch up with all of them and hang out with everyone that I do see pretty often. We talked and danced and listened to music pretty much all night. Good times.
The Sunday morning after the party, some of us went to The Chimes for brunch and…dear Lord, it was absolutely delicious. Words can’t even describe it. I had a Boudin Omelet which came with some delicious grits and a biscuit. Soooo good. *drool*
As usual, my week was pretty lame after that weekend, until I got some calls to set up a couple of interviews. I had those on Thursday and they went pretty well. I got called back for a second interview on Monday at one of the places, and I have another interview with a different place on Tuesday. At least I feel like I’m getting somewhere now.
Also, I’ve had a cold for a few days now, and it’s been pretty annoying. The good news is that I think it was at it’s worst on Wednesday. I’ve been getting lots of rest, since besides those interviews, all I’ve been doing is watching Dragonball Z (thanks to a heads-up from Keith that anime was on sale at Best Buy). I call it DBZ marathon therapy.
I baked a Funfetti cake yesterday. Mmmm.
That’s it. I hope everyone is having a good weekend. I have to go back to Jeice talking about throwing some ribs on the barbie now.
Come tomorrow, I’ll have owned her for a week, and I couldn’t be happier. Every time I walk up to it, I smile. There’s liking your car, and then there’s this – finally having a car that I once called a dream car. I just flat out love this car. It’s so much fun to drive. 
Everything about it is fantastic, right down to my switchblade key. I think between the Camaro and the Chevy Volt, GM is really looking up (Chevy Volt > all hybrids).
We had delicious food (duck and deer, mmmm), and I have plenty of leftovers in my freezer right now. The rest of the holiday was spent with family and friends.
