HBD to ME

12/31/2011

stupidtom None 3 Comments

Traditionally on my birthday I reflect on the previous year like the rest of the world. They, you, aren’t doing it because its their birthday its just that the calendar is going to change tomorrow and new year blah blah blah. As I looked back I’m pretty proud of the whole postaday2011 thing. Aside from a few technical problems I am happy that I posted at least something every day for the last year. So the good people at WordPress have a bunch of suggestions for those who wish to carry on and I think I will use the http://36ixty5.wordpress.com/ idea. Its basically posting a different picture with a small caption every day and I think I can handle that. I will still be writing because I really do love it but I will be doing this as well. And on those days when I don’t really have anything to write about I can use the picture to satisfy the urge to post.

I thought about starting a whole other blog to handle this task but quickly turned away from that asspain of an idea. I had a domain name available with my WordPress Pro upgrade so I used it to get myself a little birthday gift. bigbaldtom.com Don’t bother clicking the link as it will just lead you back here but it made me laugh so I went with it. I have always cracked myself up with the dot com thing because I have never made a dime off of this thing. Wait I take that back. I’ve had some benefactors pay for upgrades and such anonymously over the years and I also am a Beta tester for some iPad product through this thing but I’ll never write about my shill work here.  I really dont know why I got it other than it was free, I’ll keep you posted if I do anything with that nonsense.

No plans for tonight which is strange for New Years Eve but kind of nice. I’ll probably post later just becasue I can. If I don’t HAPPY NEW YEAR!

 

perfect

12/30/2011

stupidtom None , , Leave a comment

Hey Tom, you seem like you are finally at peace. You had a great holiday and your one day away from celebrating your forty seventh year on the planet, you love your job and all seems right in your world. So why not sit back and enjoy a nice stress free winter?

Because I’m an asshole that’s why.

Everything was going along as planned when fate stepped in. Let me explain. Liza has had a burr in her saddle (I have no idea why I went Western on your asses just now but I regretted it immediately after I typed it. Plus I don’t think it would win me any points with the wife for some reason but I will no longer dwell on that particular mistake) about our house for the last six months or so. Max has had to give up a third of his room for me to effectively work from home and we don’t really have enough room for more than one child to have friends over at a time. She also just realized that the boy is most likely going to be big and she worries about him and his big friends lying around the house breathing up all of the good air. OK I made the air part up but they do look stupid all draped over the one couch. And now that Katie’s been home for break with her friends stopping by it has been a bit cramped.

So my lovely wife has wanted to blow the back of this dump out and add another room, a powder room, and a closet sized private office for yours truly. I am against that right now because the appraisals in our hood aren’t supporting a decision like that. If were going to flush money down the toilet it will be on a new boat thank you very much. (you’re welcome and I apologize but my fingers seem to have minds of their own today) In the mean time I’ve been stalking this house in the hood that has had trouble selling and my brilliant powers of deduction combined with a recent sixty-thousand dollar price drop has me convinced that they might be getting desperate to sell. But Liza doesnt really like the house and even at the reduction we would be stretching to buy it so we decided to table both ideas and get bids on refinishing the bathroom which we have to do no matter what.

One of the contractors was over and I told him that we need the bathroom done just good enough to sell should we decide to do so and then we got to talking about what we were looking to do. Then he suggested we look at his old house as it was on the market as a short sale. The next thing I know I’m writing an offer on a house that I’m not sure I really want. And so begins the asspain dance that is loans and banks and applications and earnest money and appraisals and lawyers and happy effing new year jerk. So we are waiting to hear if they will take our ridiculously low bid. I have however taken my time and we need to buy it at that exact spot to be able to swing the improvements we need. ick. I walked right in to this.

whittling down

12/29/2011

stupidtom None 1 Comment

2012 is going to be the year of getting my online shite together and by online I mean technology in general. I have another day off out of nowhere tomorrow (I’m kidding, I understand the whole National Holiday System but its weird working for a company that pushes you toward personal time) and last night I started my digital clean up project. Step one is to reduce the amount of detritus that I belong to or am a member of. I tried to remove myself from no less than two dozen “things” last night and I’m about half finished. I am one of those idiots that, when offered, I sign up. This satisfies my need to try everything I can out there that’s new but it makes for a confusing mess of an online existence.

I will now bore you with my official list of memberships and or things I pay for slash subscribe to:

  • WordPress.com obvious choice because it’s the home of stupidtom.com and I am happy to support them by buying some extras every year.
  • Instructables.com I cant get enough of this site. I could go on but if you’ve never been your missing out.
  • Evernote this is one of my go to applications and sites. I keep everything on evernote, big fan.
  • Facebook reluctantly I will stay because the people watching is just too good. I am not a poster. I get that done here and that’s more than enough for my ego. Also the people on Facebook seem more desperate lately and I don’t know why. I am only checking in about once a week to look for something I might want to spy on.
  • Twitter this is unfortunately where I think the whole social thing is headed so I’m going to try and get better at this pain in my ass. I don’t like it because I know very little about it and that needs to change.
  • Google+ and most things Google I don’t know why but I’m rooting for Big Brother in the battle of the social network thing.
  • Shutterfly because Yahoo and I have officially broken up. Their affiliation with the evil AT&T is the icing on the cake but its sad because I was an original Flickr user. I actually store most of my stuff on Picasa because I can and they aren’t constantly asking me for money.
  • Amazon Prime I did the free trial and got hooked. I wont go in to a whole pitch because its not for everyone but I love the free shipping (included in the $80 per year) and have just started using the unlimited online videos.

Yuck I forgot how exhausting lists can be to write let alone read so I’m going to stop now. Maybe I’ll revisit it if I feel like things are getting a little too exciting around here. This is in no way complete but I really need to trim as much as possible. Every time I cut something I tell myself in my inner Forest Gump Its one less thing…

xmaspix

12/28/2011

stupidtom None 1 Comment

Did you ever wonder why some lessons learned feel like a punch in the brain? (by the way I just purposely bashed my funny bone on the edge of this desk for opening this post like Andy Rooney) I am going nuts because some of the best Christmas pictures taken on my fancy new camera were somehow corrupt in the transfer process. I have spent every day since then trying to get them fixed with no luck. I now know that it could be the fact that my camera software doesn’t support the operating system on the iMac or I could be the old computer itself or the SD card could be corrupt or I could have given the card a little shock when I was working with it or my card reader could be bad or I am a complete douche who reads just enough about his toys to be dangerous. Anyway you slice it I’ve got a couple dozen pictures with big bars across most of the image. The real pisser is that the little thumbnails are perfect and they are taunting me.

But enough about me wanting to punch my camera square in the lens hole. I promised some holiday pictures earlier in the week so I’ll post some of the survivors.

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Making ready for the feast

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Yikes the are even starting to act alike

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Mom having some wine

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My niece cutting loose

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The cousins (sorry mom if this was the one you were going to use for our Christmas card next year but no one will remember)

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The not long for this world because he is peeing on everything and has turned into a general asshole cat refusing to wear his Santa hat

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The dog is done

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And I was done by this point as well

Rearranger

12/27/2011

stupidtom None Leave a comment

This is the time of year when I get an itch to organize. This little house is overflowing with stuff and I want to make it go away. Liza always jokes about my house after she’s gone being barren and cold but I like to think of my dream situation as comfortable Japanese. Not a ton of furniture but what’s there is overstuffed and something you never want to leave. No mats on the floor for sleeping but a bed, a nightstand, a tv mounted to the wall, and a closet filled with my mock turtlenecks and blazers. Yesterday I attacked our bedroom and I am calling it a minor victory.

Santa brought us a new Dynex (jealous?) flat screen tv for the bedroom so I started my project by wrestling the 36″ tube out to the curb. It had to weigh more than a hundred pounds but I haven’t measured to lump on my groin to verify. Next was the metal stand thing required by OSHA to safely hold that beast. I put both dusty relics on the curb and had an interested scrapper in a matter of minutes. I yelled down that the tv worked and wished him luck lifting his own body weight into his truck. I didn’t help due to the afore mentioned groin protrusion.

Anyway, moved some furniture around, installed the new television, and made some definite improvements. Now added to the list of things we can’t afford is a bedroom set. That’s funny. Right now the house list currently stands at upstairs bathroom, downstairs bathroom, remaining pieces of the hutch, new round dining table and chairs, patio furniture (can’t really complain about this one as its my desire to get one of those outside couch and chair arrangements) a bedroom set, and a couple dozen family size bags of potato chips to scatter around the house to ensure that the flames consume the whole thing so we can start over. The chips thing by the way comes from a trusted source on burning a car so I will just take the one bag tossed in the backseat concept and whole house expand it.

It’s my inability to do that which usually triggers the near constant winter screwing around with stupidtom. I am going to resist that urge in 2011 and it should be easier as I have a rapidly filling travel schedule. it might be a bit of a control thing with me but I don’t really care. I need to figure out how to take control of this big ship I’m driving around the planet in 2012 and I will be using the cliched new year to do so. More on that later as I have a multi-pronged attack planned.

Oh, and I will get some pictures up this week just need to work out some computer issues. I have spent some great time spying on people’s holidays on Facebook so I will return the favor here. I can’t start posting stuff on that thing, this is enough douche behavior for me.

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