Crazy Lawsuit Game

No one really calls Fort Collins, Colorado "FoCoCO" but they totally could. Some already call it "FoCo". For TBTL purposes we will call it Fort ColTENS, because listeners of the show are called Tens and Tenver is just down the road.

You don't know what TBTL is? It's only one of the greatest pop culture/news/music/life podcasts/radio shows on ye olde interwebs! Hosted by Luke Burbank, Jen "Flash" Andrews and "Japan's #1 Mixer" Sean DeTorre! It's great and pretty much the only podcast J and I listen to on a regular basis.

So J and I moved to Ft. Collins. I quit my full-time teaching job in Denver and am trying to break into the renewable energy industry up here. No, I don't know what I was thinking quitting a full time job with benefits in this economy. Seriously. I had shed a few tears over that decision but we're trying to make the best of it. My back-up plan is an evening chem course at another college. My back-up back-up plan is a server position with this restaurant chain. So there is money coming in and our rent is cheaper but it's still tight.

I'm networking and trying to get my name out there, so people know my skills and what I'm looking for and what I would be good at. It's scary in this country right now and I read in the week that salaries are at their lowest levels since the 1950s and all the record profits are due to the companies not paying their employees much and still raking in the cash. Go capitalism!

Another reason I'm bummed is I had to abandon my beautiful garden in Denver, I mean Tenver. Six tomato plants, one out of control cucumber plant, some dead pea plants and seven foot tall sunflowers. All gone. I had one lousy tomato before I moved out. Colorado and their short growing season. Nothing goes in the ground before mid-May and sometimes early June. Seriously June! This Southern boy cannot handle that. I'm used to late March and April plantings with 'maters poppin' by May or June.

I always toy with whether or not to keep this blog "professional" since it's indirectly findable via my twitter name. That's too much work though, so no super taboo subjects but not stuffy and uptight either. I still can't say y'all. I might have to skin it at the restaurant if I'm sat an especially redneck table, but otherwise I'll keep my Southernisms to myself, although I've always been against y'all for some reason. Don't worry; I still love biscuits, okra and grits, just not "y'all".

Hmmm, Ruthie wanted to know what else has been going on besides biking. Currently it's networking, applying for positions, toying with a grilled cheese cart idea, getting ready for class next week, hanging with J and the cats, light gardening, unpacking, moving furniture, and getting to know our new town of Fort Collins.

Y'all come back now; y'hear! (See, I should not say y'all cuz it only leads to phrases like that one)

Labels: Denver, Fort Collins, Foxy and Leon, job search, moving, podcast, TBTL

Wow, so far we abso-freakin'-lutely LOVE Denver! What a neat place, and we haven't even seen most of it. J and I found an awesome place that is near the light rail, so I can commute to work downtown easily and it's near a really cool street with coffee shops, restaurants, pet supply store and even a garage/auto repair shop!

I'm still wrestling with corrections and revisions. The current snafu is converting from old Word (no online pdf converting service recognizes Word '07) into a pdf file. The text moves around a bit, which moves figures and captions. Of course the free online converter (courtesy of the National Institute of Health and the National Library of Medicine) is slow and takes about 15 minutes to convert my massive 234 page document into a pdf file. Then I review the pdf, try and predict what changes are needed, predict how to make those changes in Word so they look right in the pdf, convert, wait 15 minutes and do it over again. And of course we're in Mountain time now, so it's early afternoon back in SC and Clemson shuts down at 4:30. Ugh. I don't think they'll take away my degree for this, but I'd rather not tempt fate.

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Driving 1800 miles in a Penske truck full of stuff, towing a '92 Tercel, being followed by a '04 Focus with 1 wife driving and 2 cats periodically sleeping and howling
Getting to know Denver

Labels: big moments, cats, Denver, moving, road trip, South Carolina, writing

Just got done reading this gem of an article from the NYTimes about how the unemployment rate is 9.5%, the worst in 23 years, and the fact that this is the economy in which I'm looking for a job. We're planning on moving to Denver, which I just calculated will cost about $2300, but we'll have all our stuff and enough money saved up to live for 2 to 3 months. CO has a stronger economy right now, especially compared to circling the drain SC with a top 3 unemployment rate in the nation, and it just seems like a really cool place to live. Southwest flies out of there, so I have a cheap way to get to B'ham if a family emergency comes up, or want to see my folks this fall. Plus J and I want to get out of SC and the South and experience a real winter.

So far our plan tentative plan is to load up the U-haul and head towards St. Louis, where PoP has graciously offered a place to stay (I think and I hope the offer still stands!) on Sat. night, then after lunch or so, head to Omaha and see J's sister and newly moved Mom, then probably Monday or Tuesday, head to Denver with 2 chemists, 2 cats and a small houseful of furniture.

Of course all this hinges on my defending my dissertation successfully on July 20th, and getting it formatted, reviewed, and printed at least a week before that and then the same process after, then we'll move. Yikes. Send any positive thoughts you can spare my way. The small upside is that I'm mostly done with my writing, so I actually have a bit of free time so I can physically exert this stress away!

Labels: moving, writing

-E.L. played by Seann William Scott in Road Trip

Yes we're watching more of our DVDs now that we have no TV. I still haven't tried cramming a wire in the back for broadcast, but that wouldn't work in a few months anyway. Also most TV is available for free online. J and I watched 2 episodes of "The Colbert Report" at Super Bi-Lo yesterday. Thanks to Fosters for the few commercials!

J and I worked out our "Worst Case Scenario" last night. Basically if I graduate and can't find a job we get to "boomerang" back into her parent's house in Orlando, find any job we can, save up money while we both look for real jobs and then move out. We would stash our stuff in storage up here and the cats might have to live at J's brother's house because her dad is pretty crazy allergic although he hasn't been around our cats, so that remains to be seen. Seriously last time we were down there I pet a neighborhood cat and his eyes watered halfway to the airport just with my fingers being inside the car. But that cat was hairy and dirty, very unlike our sweet kittehs.

Labels: cats, internet, moving

Focus' accessory belt is still squealing. The guy sent me the wrong part, but I assume he's going to work with me to replace it. I knew it looked like the wrong part.

Leon finally calmed down and is now right at home, chasing his spongy soccer balls and trying to get out the door.

There is still a good trip or two worth of stuff at the old place but we still need to paint and clean, so we're in no hurry to get it completely empty.

We went washer and dryer shopping yesterday. We really want the fancy pants front loaders because then if the TV goes out, you can watch your clothes flail about; plus they use less water and are gentler on your clothes. I need to research washer and dryers a bit on ye olde internet before we start swiping plastic cards though.

Our 5 year first date anniversary is coming up on Fri. I'm not sure what we're planning on doing to commemorate it.

I came to the conclusion that I would rather not buy a new digicam and buy a big TV. But the TV we want is still a bit out of our price range, so J might get her new pink camera soon enough.

Labels: Focus, moving

I'm loving the bamboo in the backyard and can't wait to break out the mini-saw and get medieval on that fallen tree's ass.

I'm hating the dirt at the bottom of all the windows left by my property management and previous tenants.

Leon is freaked out. He barely leaves the safety of the twin bed's box spring. But his tail is slowing coming up, so he'll get used to it.

Thanks to the neighbor for the internet.

Moving sucked and I think we have enough empty boxes now to completely clear the old apartment out.

The new non-Tivo DirecTV DVR is installed. I paid nothing, got some "free" programming and it's not a horrible deal. Plus I hate our local cable co.

We still haven't made a meal here yet but that'll soon change.

If we have internet, I'll catch you, my loyal readers, up on the past two races in this year's F1 season.

Labels: moving

That's a bumper sticker from one of my favorite shows. It takes place in the future and is contains some drama.

I moved the first load of stuff over to the new place before work this morning. Basically it was one less trip that we would have to do later and would also give me a chance to make any final demands of the property management people. Yep the old tenants couches and bed frame and desk and coffee table are still there. Great. Oh, and our keys don't work on the deadbolt. Nice. So I ran back by and let them know that they can leave the microwave (I hope it's clean and works) but get the rest of that junk out of my apartment!

I'm not sure what Leon is thinking. He might start freaking out as the apartment gets emptier and emptier but I assured him that we're taking him with us and to not be worried. And he'll be getting a new sister soon, but that'll happen once we get settled.

Oh! As I was leaving there were 2 old doormats laying on the stoop. We have at least one so I threw one of them in the trash. This doormat was either hiding a wasp or was in a relationship with a wasp because it came out of nowhere and stung my calf. Luckily only once and it's a dull pain but I'm still not allergic to bees! Hooray! My leg hurts and I can't remember the last time I was stung by anything, but it's always nice to know that it won't kill me. I guess that means it'll make me stronger but my leg disagrees with that stupid saying.

I can't wait to get the plants over to the new place and get the backyard under control. There is a downed tree but the bamboo that is growing there is gorgeous! It's like a Chinese jungle. All I need are a few panda and I'll be set. There will definitely be pics once everything is up to J's lofty standards. I have standards too but usually hers are higher.

Labels: Futurama, moving, wasp sting

Subaru and I worked on the car yesterday. She has this really annoying chirp of the accessory belt slipping right when you start it up. Sometimes it goes away and sometimes it gets worse and then other times it sounds like there is a team of banshees lighting screaming bottle rockets under my hood. There is also a lower radiator support that has been bent by me on 2 separate occasions. We also had to replace some lug studs because I keep breaking those bad boys. I had some H&R lug studs that were supposedly hardened but I snapped 2 of those and when I called H&R's customer service, the lady (whose name I should've gotten) was decidedly unhelpful. So I turned to ARP (Automotive Racing Products) and picked up some Camaro lug studs that fit Focus. They're pretty long. Long enough so that I had to take the brake caliper off to slip them into the holes whereas the H&R and the OEM studs you can just slip in from behind without removing anything.

Some basic parts that needed replacing, nothing major.

I don't know how I've survived this long without a drill. Well I do know actually. I've just been borrowing the lab's drill and drill bits. But one day I'll have to break down and get my own drill. Maybe cordless if I can get one with enough voltage to be effective. But the thing I dream about as I'm laying on my back wrenching on a bolt is an air compressor with some air tools. The stereotypical garage sound of the impact wrench is what I want emanating from my garage. Bolts would fly off with my air ratchet. I could've busted out a grinder and ground down the piece that was preventing me from slipping the new lug studs through. Toss in a lift, a few thousand more in tools and machines, a welder and some schooling and experience and I'll have a garage capable of most anything. That's the dream. And if I have friends who come over and help out with projects and bring in projects of their own, even better.

The Move keeps getting closer and closer. There are no books left on the main bookcase. The couches have been donated to the Salvation Army. J is bringing home a few more boxes. We still have suitcases and duffel bags for clothes if need be. I'm just hoping all the utilities get turned on tomorrow and that we have a nice strong wireless signal waiting for us.

Labels: dream garage, Focus, moving

We hit up Blockbuster, returned some movies, picked up some others and exchanged a piece of paper for a free Wii game rental. We decided on Marvel Ultimate Alliance because most everything else was out. It isn't a terrible game but it isn't going to win any awards. If you're a Marvel fan, you would love it. In between levels, you can switch your party of 4 with any number of Marvel heroes. Thing, Daredevil, Elektra, and some I had no idea existed like Moonknight and Ms. Marvel. During play you can switch to any of the 4 characters in your party. The problem for us is we played through the first 3 levels and then had no idea what to do. It's a decent multi-player game for the Wii if you're tired of mini-game type games but I'm saving my pennies up for Zelda and Resident Evil 4 when it come out.

We pulled stuff out of closets, threw some stuff away, boxed other stuff up. I think we have a pretty good plan. We move on 6/15 and that week we are going to bribe a neighbor into using his truck to take our old couches to GoodWill and this will really open up space in the living room for the real moving which will happen on Fri. evening. For some reason the Penske truck place has different rates for a full 24 hr. truck rental so instead of $55 for 5 pm to 5 pm, we are paying $35 for 5 pm to 8 am. It's worth $15 to me to wake up that early, even though I might have to promise J some breakfast to get her out of bed. I'm planning on taking at least that Fri. afternoon off and getting a jump on moving. We have lots of little boxes that we don't need the truck for.

Oh yeah, also on Sat. morning [originally I was to go bouldering in NC with Subaru, his wife and some other folks but the forecast was foreboding so everyone bailed] Subaru and I put replaced Tercel's struts. Care to venture a guess as to how many of 4 were completely blown? J guessed 4 and was close. 3. 3 of 4 struts were useless. But Tercel now feels like a new car! And I keep toying with the idea of keeping her as my daily driver and taking Focus off of insurance, taking the plates off and making her a full-fledged race car, but that is very space dependent. Of course, now it's painfully obvious what Tercel's shortcoming as a car is. Tires. Remember our tire discussion from the other day? So Focus wears 205/55/16s. Tercel is rolling around on some paltry 165/80/13s. That's alotta sidewall my friend. And lots of sidewall means lots of sidewall flex. I found some inexpensive 175/70/13s online and will be getting those sometime soon. But what I really like about Tercel is her bolt pattern and that she's a Toyota. She has a 4x100 mm bolt pattern which is shared with most econo cars on the road today. And she's a Toyota so she'll run for a long time, but when she does bite the dust, just plop in a new engine and keep on running. Nice. I just hope wherever I end up I can find some cool guys to help out with engine stuff like that. It isn't a one person job by any stretch of the imagination.

The Wii is still awesome and I can't wait to try it out in our new house.

My Xbox died this weekend. We were watching a DVD and it froze. So we restarted it and a message popped up saying "Your Xbox needs customer service." Nice work Microsoft. Just in time for me to go out and buy a 360. I wonder what they would say if I called up and said my Xbox was broken. I still have quite a few Xbox games that I enjoy playing and it was our main DVD player in the living room. For the record, I would like to point out that to this day I have still not purchased a standalone DVD player. So far the only DVD players I have bought have been a Xbox and a PS2. Honestly, I'm waiting for the format wars to die down a bit before I make the move up to a PS3 or Xbox 360. I just wish the Wii played DVDS. I hear it's coming down the line, but it isn't here quite yet.

Labels: moving, Tercel, tires, video games

The zucchini, tomatoes and bell peppers I planted are doing well. I doubt they're going to flower before we move, but that's okay. I think some of the plants need more soil. We didn't have enough dirt to fill all the pots to the top, so some are just halfway and I think their growth is already stunted. At our new place there is some nice dirt out front, so I might transplant them all into that. We'll see.

I'm taking a couple boxes home tonight so that we can begin The Packing. The Packing will be followed by The Move. I need to call the furniture guys and tell them when we want our new furniture delivered. Thankfully the only utilities we have to turn on are water and electricity and tell DirecTV where we're moving. Although I recieved an offer in the mail from them trying to convince me to start new service and we'll probably do that. It's a new Tivo, some portable DVD player and some free movie channels for 3 months. Not bad, but maybe I can get them to sweeten the deal if I tell them I don't want the DVD player. Maybe I could sell it.

Lunch for now, but I'll be back with many many stories concerning our trip to Charleston and co-worker's cruise.

Labels: horticulture, moving

One of the songs that, for me, really solidified the Rolling Stones as one of the greats. It didn't hurt that my suitemate (one of the two guys in the adjacent dorm room with whom we shared a bathroom) would start his day with that Stones CD and made sure that it was loud and we could hear it. Wonderful way to start the day.

Heroes was pretty good last night. We leapt into the future 5 years after the nuclear bomb (aka Peter Petrelli who absorbed the radiation guy's power) has destroyed half of NYC and "mutants" are considered terrorists and being captured. If you don't think you need a shape shifter on your side, think again. Magneto's righthand wo-man is Mystique, a shape shifter, and in Heroes, many people have been tricked by the shape shifter, but it turns out that Peter's brother Nathan is president of the USA except we found out he's really Sylar! Oh no! And he was the mastermind behind people with superpowers becoming outlaws. It's alot easier to take over the world if a) you're the president of the USA and b) you're using said power to exterminate all other mutants, so they're won't be anyone left to stop you. Kind of the reverse of Magneto's plan in the first X-men, which was to turn everyone into a mutant. It's still a good show even if they're "borrowing" some ideas from great comic books.

So Peter is helping Past Hiro (who can teleport and time travel) get back to the past and kill Sylar before he orchestrates his plan. I'm not sure if they're going to wrap it up in 3 seasons, or wrap up a few of the storylines, but I'm fairly certain we'll at least figure out if they stop the catastrophe from happening.

Another thing I noticed they've never addressed is what Sylar does after he takes off the top of the skull. He pops the top and then presumably does something sinister with the brain. I have taken the liberty of adding my own slurping sounds whenever they cut away from what is about to happen. Maybe he makes a smoothie. Maybe he just touches the brain and gets the power. Who knows? It isn't super important but just something I was wondering about. And if you're trying to recreate my slurping noises at home, it's very similar to the sound Sir Anthony Hopkins made after delivering his famous Silence of the Lambs line: "I ate his liver with some favre beans and a nice chianti."

I planted some tomatoes, green bell peppers and some zuchinni yesterday so I'll keep you posted on that. Maybe even a pic or two.

We also found a new place to live. The previous tenants skipped out and left holes in the wall, a hole in a door, some gross couches and a bedframe, so they're gonna clean all that up and make it "reasonable" to use their word. I also had to sign a paper stating that the security deposit I'm giving them is mine but they get to keep any interest that it accumulates. Nice. I wish I was a slumlord. But it's a 2 story townhouse which will be a first for both J and myself. We've been one story dwellers our entire lives. I'm sure Leon will like running up and down the stairs.

We had a call about Julio but it was a fake Julio. This cat had orange spots on it and not stripes. Julio has about a month and a half to show back up before we move. When we move out, I will officially give up hope that he will ever come back.

This weekend was lots of fun. I autocrossed Focus at the BMW factory in Greer. We set up a small Focus showdown and had Foci from ATL, Asheville and even Knoxville. I came in dead last out of the Foci. But that's okay. I'm still learning but am to the point where I need some semi-professional instruction, so I'm gonna try and make it to a driving school this summer. It was still lots of fun. Check out the results here. My class, Street Touring, is about halfway down the page. I'm #21 and got 8 out of 11 cars in my class and Foci swept the top 3 spots! Hooray! Focus Powah!

Then we went to eat at TGIFridays and talked, hung out and enjoyed each others' company.

I'm getting the new set of wheels I picked up for Focus sandblasted tomorrow. The previous owner spraypainted them black and their original paint color was a bronzish/gold. The gold might look good on my black car, but I don't think there's a good way to get just the black off, so we're going to bare metal and then I'll decide if I want to spraypaint it another color, or just clearcoat it and keep it bare aluminum. Right now I'm leaning towards bare metal but we'll see.

Labels: autocross, Focus, Heroes, Julio and Leon, moving, Samford

Work. I'll play some this weekend. Hopefully we'll be looking at our new place to live at 3.

Labels: moving

Why is mold on some cheese delicious and gross on others?

J and I are looking for a new place to live. So far it's been pretty frustrating. We found a very cute house in a nice planned subdivision that is $134,000 for a 2bed/2bath and a garage, but we're not really looking for a house and don't want to use every last penny we have on a down-payment. We're still planning on renting. Everything is either too expensive or too crappy. One house we looked at had one closet. One. No dishwasher and the sink in the bathroom was a pedestal one so not even under sink storage in there. And they wanted $650/month. Crazy. You would have to knock at least 50 off of that just so we could afford the storage unit to keep all our stuff. We have an appointment to look at a duplex that is close to our apt. now and from the outside they look nice and the realtor said that the kitchen is being renovated this summer, which means all new appliances for us if we live there in July/August. I really hope we like it.

Oh yeah, another place, we made too much money to live there. It's a LIHTC which stands for low income housing tax credit. And for 2 people to pay $595/month, we were only allowed to make $22,600/year gross. So we did some quick math and took out a quarter for taxes, then 12 months of rent and came up with around $9500 for every other expense for the whole year. WTF mate? That would be an impressive feat. I told the lady that I guess my wife could quit her job, of course then we wouldn't be able to pay rent. Maybe if you are in fact a low income household, then maybe you also are getting some welfare or food stamps cuz that's the only way you could make ends meet if you were to live in this supposed "low income housing". And then I wanted to ask how they determine everything and if we could count the cats as people, but I didn't want to go through the hassle of buying them social security numbers and falsifying documents, so we'll keep looking.

I've taken up residence in our spare bedroom. I'll be living in there until my pre-oral is over. It's nice since we moved out the TV and the computer there is only small furry distractions running over your papers and books every once in a while and even then you could close the door if you wanted and keep Julio and Leon out.

Labels: moving

Hello, we're sorry but Clemson University is closed today.

I'm here though. Why? Mostly because the parking service Nazis are off today so we can park wherever we please without fear of being ticketed.

It's a fairly relaxed day though. And man is the weather down here unbelievable. The highs tomorrow are supposed to be in the low 80s. And they're in the mid-70s right now. And I'm thinking of moving to Canada. What the hell is wrong with me?

I'm in flip flops today. My grandmother really hates them. She is scared that we drive in them also lest an errant flop wedge itself inbetween the brake and the floor and send us careening into a milk truck.

Why a milk truck? Beats me. But can you imagine the smell of that after a few hours in the sun? Yikes.

J and I are planning on moving this July/August. We've started to look and there are some places that are hopefully nicer than our place and only slightly more expensive.

I like moving. It gives you a chance to purge some of your belongings. We don't need everything in our house, so it's nice to sell and give away some of it and lighten our load.

I freaked out about my pre-oral yesterday, which is okay because it always sends me into a tizzy of work and stress. I usually work better with a little stress to keep my mind focused.

The set of wheels (rims) I picked up from another Focus guy no longer have crappy old tires on them and are ready for cleaning. They're a sort of bronzish color that he spray-painted black over. It looks okay but some of the paint is chipping. I assume they're aluminum underneath so maybe I'll just strip off all the paint and go with bare aluminum and some wax. Currently that and washing both cars is my planned Saturday morning activity.

After getting the wheels dismounted, I was near Anderson so I swung by our local Ford stealership. Have I done my "why the 2008 Focus sucks" tirade on here? If not, I'll do that maybe this weekend or Monday. So I was enquiring about replacing my front wheel bearings and a few other odds and ends. They bring out a tech and he says the bearings alone are 2.5 billed hours of labor on one side, so that's 5 hours labor, $84 parts, $61 belt tensioner, a $60 alignment and we're at a grand total of $653.51. Shit. Thanks for the estimate and I hightail it out of there.

The big part of that job is you need a press to press the old wheel bearing out of the wheel knuckle (the part that keeps the brakes connected to the suspension and the wheel) and press the new one in. The wheel bearing is what lets the wheels spin, so they're mildly important. However, Ford Racing sells a "Rally Brake Kit" that replaces all 4 steering knuckles and has the wheel bearings already pressed in and would also replace my crappy rear drums with some nice new disc brakes. That kit goes for $995. Ugh, decisions, decisions. Actually it isn't really a decision at this point, it's just convincing J that it's worthwhile preventative maintenance and a cost effective upgrade. All she hears is the big number and the word "car" and then starts griping that the car is a money hole. I can't really argue with that since I'm a terrible arguer in the first place and that she has a very valid point.

Hmm, maybe if when we can start going out to eat again, I start bringing sandwiches and drinking water, I can convince her that I can reduce the cost of eating out?

What I should really do is just postpone this whole racing thing until I have a real job and can afford to do stuff like this, but what fun is that? It's a knife edge, this tight-rope walk between being a responsible adult and blowing money on hobbies.

Labels: Clemson, Focus, moving