Monkey Love

Specifically, too much of it. Sienna Miller got plenty:

But the over-zealous creature proceeded to stick its little monkey tongue into Sienna's mouth.

The Alfie star adds, "I sort of made out with a monkey... It was a sweet monkey but, no, that's too much." And to finish off the bizarre encounter, the monkey proceeded to urinate on Sienna's back.

And down in St. Kitts it's a major problem, I guess:

There is no point talking about increasing agricultural production in St. Kitts if we continue to ignore the serious monkey problem we have here -- namely, the huge and ever increasing population of monkeys that wander the country side devastating vegetables and fruit crops wherever they go.

Personally, I'd go with the monkeys eating my fruit rather than sticking their tongues down my throat.

Shotgun

OK, so... Sorry about the week an a half of nothing. I wish I could say I've been busy or some such, but no. Mostly I've been sitting around alternately playing World of Warcraft and watching TV while trying out new and exciting pillow-influenced hair styles.

I suppose I can blast out a short list of tidbits for you though:

  • The big news is that not only did Rod and I jump ship from my old place of employment; now Brandon has followed suit. He's working for an interesting new company, too.
  • Oh, yeah, I start my new gig today. I'm psyched.
  • Related to that, I had the best intentions to try and learn Ruby on Rails this past week that I've had off. That didn't really happen. I've got time, though. ;)
  • I did try to get right on switching my 401(k) plans to an IRA, but only got as far as opening the IRA because the 401(k) people didn't know I'd quit yet. Super...
  • Last Thursday, The Wife and I took in a matinĂ©e of Pan's Labyrinth -- totally frickin' awesome. Funny how Fascism and faerie tale allegory goes hand in hand so often.
  • Rod got my hooked up with a private torrent tracker site... Now I'm obsessed with keeping my upload/download ratio above 1.
  • Last night we mixed up a pitcher of martinis and took in the Screen Actors Guild Awards. It was generally an inoffensive evening of festivities, though I can say that some of my favorite shows (24, Weeds, ... that may be it) got robbed, but whatever. They did show Dennis Weaver in their "fallen soldiers" tribute, reminding me of the time he popped into a gas stop cafe in the middle of nowhere (aka Western Kansas) while Miracle Ed and I were having breakfast and trying to get our collective shit together at the tail end of a 31 hour single shot drive from Boston to Denver. Let me tell you, having a bunch of flatland hicks (remember, I'm somewhat of an expert in the field of recognizing and categorizing hicks) freaking out about how "that was the feller that played on that show!" really turns the surreal dial to 11.
  • Ever heard of "Toddy" coffee? Neither had I until the other day. I don't think I buy it.

I guess that will have to do for now.

Obama '08

Wow. I was absolutely sure that Barack Obama wouldn't bother running for President this time around. I figured he'd let Hillary and Rudy duke it out and then continue to make a mess of things for another four years, leaving him with an open door in 2012. Not so.

Instead, Obama has officially tossed his hat in the ring by launching a Presidential Exploratory Committee, and I'm all giddy about it.

We'll see what happens... Is this country ready to let a non-white sit in the driver's seat?

Birds Flying High, You Know How I Feel

Near the end of August in 2001, after a four month period of being unemployed, I finally found a job with a Boulder company called e-InfoData.com (Holy internet cliche overload!). We'll round the ensuing passage of time up to five and a half years for the purpose of this discussion. In that period the company changed it's name to InsightAmerica, moved its office to Broomfield, and eventually was acquired by a corporate giant (name uselessly withheld). The basic "job" of the company never really changed, and the work was mostly interesting on a nuts-and-bolts level (I still think we regularly pushed ColdFusion well beyond its normal bounds and managed to make it work.), even if the bigger picture at times gave me the heebee-jeebees.

At a more micro level, I've had the opportunity to work with some amazing people (particularly within the technology teams - but outside that, as well). In fact, most of the people I currently consider my best friends were first coworkers.

On a work level, there have certainly been ups and downs, but on a personal level this job has been nothing but positive.

You've probably already guessed that I've decided it's time for me to move on.

  • I'm going back to Boulder. (meh. I'll miss my 10 minute commute, but I only think I'm doubling it.)
  • It's a very small company. (sweet! I enjoy the dynamic of a small company much more than a megalocorp.)
  • I'll be working with an old friend. (yay! This is actually the only reason I applied for the job when I saw it come across the wire.)
  • I'm going to be working daily on a Mac. (w00t! This excites me unreasonably. Not to mention the HUGE monitors they use.)
  • I'll eventually get to work with Ruby on Rails professionally. (double w00t!! I've been a fanboy since the early days, though I've never actually done anything with it.)

I'm also leaving a lot of friends behind. Hopefully I'll be able to keep in touch - the Denver Metro area isn't a very big place, really. Some of us already have outside-of-work connections, but I want to cultivate more of those.

So, yeah... That's what's going on with me.

Let's have Nina Simone carry us out, shall we?

Its a new dawn Its a new day Its a new life For me And I'm feeling good

We got weather! (AGAIN)

So, we haven't had the You Gotta Be Fuckin' Kiddin' Me Snow Event of 2007 (yet), but we've got some interesting stuff going on this morning after a fairly restful weekend. This morning we have a wicked wind blowing. Blowing so hard, in fact, that I got introduced to a new weather phenomenon: the ground blizzard. This hurricane force Chinook pretty much closed Boulder this morning. Supposedly, there's an 18 foot deep snow drift right down the road from my office. Along the way to work, I saw a couple cars that were actively stuck in snow drifts (plus a giant 4x4 that had gone off the road) and a couple that were abandoned overnight. A large hanging street sign was hanging from only one hinge at Wadsworth...

It's like a friggin' apocalypse out there.

Oh, and there's snow in the forecast for Friday.

High Ho, High Ho

I have no idea how long it's been since I've actually been to work. I had the week between Christmas and New Year's scheduled for vacation, but then we had the Hanukkah Blizzard of 2006 so things got started off really early for me. I guess two weeks ago today was the last time I was in the office. Take a guess at my motivation level... ;)

Thanks to the Hanukkah and Kwanzaa blizzard combination, we ended up spending the holidays doing a lot of sitting around and staring at each other. We did get out to the tattoo shop to get the Mother-in-Law a new piece (of which I should really get a better picture) and for The Wife and I to get some touch up done.

Other than that, not a lot to report. We did watch some DVDs:

  • Nacho Libre (B) -- Jack Black, yo. Plus I love me some Lucha Libre.
  • Talladega Nights (A-) -- Best Will Ferrell joint ever. Period. John C. Riley is a king.
  • Aeon Flux (B+) -- I was a big fan of the animated shorts on MTV's Liquid Television, but I kind of like this better. There was actually a storyline available without creative interpretation. Plus Charlize is badass.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean - Dead Man's Chest (B-) -- Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow was weird in this one. Not nearly as good as the first one.

One quick link, while I'm at it: I like this guy's style.