Just wanted to give a heads up that I had some problems setting up the RSS feed on my new blog. I somehow managed to have the RSS links on the new site pointing to the RSS feed address for this site.
Bottom line, if you tried to switch over and set up your feed readers for my new site, you might want to check to make sure they’re pointing to the right place. I believe I have it properly set now. If anyone still has problems with it, please let me know.
Thanks to TJ for letting me know about the problem.
In an effort to gain a little bit more control over my little piece of space on the web, the PresentTense has set down roots in another spot. I’ve purchased my own domain over at www.thepresenttense.net and have a stand alone version of WordPress running there. If you’re one of my three subscribers, I hope that you’ll correct any RSS or email subscription feeds you have so that you can still get my totally awesome content.
My own domain will allow me to set up things a little bit more the way I want on my blog. I have more control over the design and some of the plugins that I have running. That being said, it will also give me the chance to screw things up more. If you happen your way over there and something isn’t working, please leave a reply at on the “Feedback” tab so I can try to figure out what the problem is.
I’ve been pining after an xBox 360 for a really long time now; pretty much since I bought my HD TV last May. The combination of my government stimulus check, a gift card my parents gave me for my birthday, and a drop in the prices of xBoxes sealed the deal for me and I finally picked one up.
The system came with Marvel Ultimate Alliance and Forza Motorsports 2, and I had to pick up NCAA College Football 2009. Ultimate Alliance is okay. I don’t see myself playing that a great deal. The other two are a totally different story.
My biggest complaints about Forza and NCAA is that they have too much to offer. Forza is a pretty straightforward racing game with a rediculous number of cars you can race with even more ways to upgrade them to make them better and cooler. The replay value on Forza is almost limitless.
NCAA is your typical solid offering from EA. I haven’t spent a terrible amount of time playing it yet, but I think the gameplay mode I’ve been playing is one of the most interesting aspects of the game. In Campus Legend mode you can create an athlete starting in the playoffs of your senior year of high school. You pick a position and outfit him the way you want him to look. You play as many games as your team plays through the playoffs trying to rack up stats to get yourself recruited to a good school. After you get a scholarship, you settle in on campus and try to rack up as many stats as you can, hopefully on the way to a Heisman trophy winning career.
The interesting thing is, you only have control of your player, and you only play the plays he’s involved in. You also have to work your way up the depth chart before you get to play in games. You work your way up the depth chart by going to practice to improve your skills between games and pick off the field activities to improve. One of those off field activities has to be going to the library some to keep up your GPA.
Now that I have my 360, all I have to wait for is Rock Band 2 to come out next Sunday. Oh Yeah, we’re gonna rock our faces off.
Beware, this thing will steal your life away. Someone linked to this on a web forum I frequent. Clicked over to check it out. Looked at the clock just a second later and an hour of my life had disappear. I didn’t want to be the only one wasting my life away on Internets games so I thought I’d share and try to bring some of you with me.
So I come off the elevator at my office today and the janitor had taken two trash cans that he would normally use to come around and collect our trash with and put them into a rather large trashbin, I would assume to make them easier to move. On seeing this I think, “if you wanted to throw away trash cans, how would you do it?” Keep in mind that I’m talking about the larger trash cans that you would normally put out next to the street. I don’t really know why you would want to throw one away, but if you take it out to the curb with the rest of the trash, the trash guy is just going to think you didn’t have any trash this week or that you never took it back up from last trash day. You probably also couldn’t put a sign on the can that said “throw me away” beacause he’s likely to just grab the sign and toss it.
Most likely you would have to tear up the can to get the trash guy to take it with him. Seems like a lot of effort to go through for somethong that you don’t want anymore, but what are you goung to do.
Just thought I’d share some of my mental randomness for today.
According to the L.A. Times, one of the cringe inducing fads from my middle school years is making a comeback. Apparently someone thought it was a good idea to bring back Hypercolor clothes. For any that have no idea what I’m talking about, hypercolor clothes would change color in reaction to the application of heat. So for example, if your shirt was blue when you put it on, it would react to your body heat and turn a different color, possibly green, in the hotter places and stay blue in the cooler places.
It had its entertainment value for a short time, and probably served as an annoyance to teachers at my school. I also know of one instance where a hypercolor t-shirt led to relationship strain and disciplinary action when a girl at my school thought it was a good idea to try to make her boyfriend jealous with strategically placed handprints applied in the ladies’ room. Yeah, that didn’t turn out like she had planned.
Now there have been some clothes that have successfully made their way back in to retail stores that I thought were dead forever. Some of the resurrected offenders I’ve seen in malls lately are tights under skirts, flats, and the side pony tail. I can’t help but look for Cindy Lauper or the GoGos whenever I see a bunch of highschoolers running around like that. It kind of freaks me out. I recognize that I likely looked like an idiot in some of the stuff that I thought was “the coolest” when I was growing up, but there has to be a line somewhere.
My list of clothing trends from my middle school years that should never be allowed to be sold in any store ever again; not even Goodwill:
Hypercolor – Novelty clothing is not supposed to stand the test of time. Its just not. Hypercolor falls into the same category as the beer helmet. Its good for a laugh and you break it out when you’re drinking with friends as a gag, but it should never be considered appropriate attire for anything. I could see having a hypercolor shirt for sentimental value so you could show your kids the kind of goofiness we had growing up, but that’s it.
Tight Rolling pant legs – I’d really like to be able to explain what the hell we were thinking, but I can’t. I sat here for five minutes trying to figure it out and I have no idea. All I can think about is my parents telling me that I looked like I was waiting for a flood. If that comes back, I know the end is nigh.
Hammer pants – Another sign of the impending apocalypse if they make a comeback. Any pair of pants that looks like you pooped yourself shouldn’t be allowed out in public. MC Hammer requested the pants be made extra baggy so he could get his dance on during concerts so I can’t begrudge him that, but all the people that wore those in middle school (I can happily say I never owned a pair) just looked like they should have asked for a hall pass sooner.
I could probably go on, but I’ll leave it at that. I’ll conclude by seriously pleading with any and everyone out there to not buy one of these things.
Wait, now that I think of it, I may have just come up with my Halloween costume for this year. Tight rolled Hammer pants with a hypercolor t-shirt and braided friendship bracelet.
So we’ve been in LA for almost two weeks now and I thought I would share some of my thoughts and impressions of the city so far.
The weather is pretty awesome. It actually hasn’t even been that good by LA standards, but its still great. Its much cooler than I anticipated, ranging from the high 50s as the lows to the high 70s for the highs. Most days its been really sunny most days and the humidity is perfect. In comparison to the thunderstorms, high temps, and high humidity in DC, this weather wins.
The area we’re staying in right now is pretty nice, as well. We’re staying in Marina Del Rey right next to the Marina. Pretty good neighborhood. Easy to walk to a number of restaurants right around here, and we’re only three or four blocks off the beach. But given the much lower than expected temperature, I’m not sure how much time we’ll be spending at the beach, and I definitely don’t see myself actually getting in the water.
Traffic is interesting. My commute hasn’t been that bad so far. Worst day was an hour, typical day is around a half an hour. I might actually like the freeways at rush hour better than non-rush hours. This is because the drivers here are totally and completely insane. I’m used to people driving fast on freeways, but sometimes I feel like in the middle of a game of Mario Kart with how much people switch lanes back and forth.
Its expensive out here. Gas is around $4.29 a gallon, food is generally more expensive, and the haircut I need to get is going to be at least twice what I typically pay back home. The people here seem to be pretty decent. I’m discovering that of all the cities I’ve been to, my mindset about LA has been influenced by movies and tv more than any other. Needless to say, what I had in my mind wasn’t really accurate. Except on the freeways, everything is pretty laid back and casual. Huge difference between here and DC. Hardly anyone ever wears a suit here, where back in DC more people wear a suit than don’t.
All in all the experience has been pretty good so far. I’m just hoping that the rest of our time here is as good as the first couple of weeks has been.
I had a mini-freak out today. I just realized that I’m leaving in less than two weeks to live and work in Los Angeles for a month. I mean, I’ve known for a while that I was going, but I just realized that we’re scheduled to leave in two weeks. I’m really not sure I’m ready. There isn’t a lot for me to do to get ready, but I’m not sure I’m mentally prepared.
Its sort of a weird situation. My fiancee is working at a firm in LA for the summer with the possibility of being offered a job at the firm after she finishes law school next year. Since I’ve only spent a couple of days in LA in my life, I got a 30 day assignment to work out of our office in LA to help my fiancee and I get an idea of whether we’d be happy living in LA. Given that we’re going together, I’m not anxious about missing her, but I feel a bit weird about leaving my apt. behind for a month. Not like its going to get lonely not having us around, but it still feels strange. Maybe its a little bit of the control freak in me that wants to make sure things are fine around here while we’re gone.
The other thing I am a little anxious about is the fact that we’re driving out to LA. My friancee needed to have her car out there this summer and since her first day of work is my 30th birthday we decided to make the trip or combined “get her to LA/30th birthday road trip.” I’ve always thought driving across the country would be one of those adventure/self-discovery kinds of trips that would bring about self-evaluation and personal growth and a new wonderful outlook on life. Given the limited time we have to make the trip, I’m not sure there’s going to be enough time for self-exploration. We’re going to have hard days of driving broken up by days visiting family and friends in W.V., Missouri, and Denver, with a stop at the Grand Canyon thrown in for good measure. It should be a really interesting trip, but I’m sure I’m going to be ready to be out of the car by the time we get there.
One way or the other, it should be a fun time and I’m looking forward to it. At least I will be when I get my mind wrapped around the fact we’re leaving so soon.
If Sears runs their entire business like they run their appliance customer service, there is no way they could still be in business. In the last couple of months our drier has decided to give up on this cruel world and join the the rest of the aged, overly-used appliances in the junk heap. It hasn’t completely died yet, but its voicing is lack of desire to go on living by sounding like a bunch of gremlins are wrestling in it whenever we try to dry clothes.
Since we still rent we assumed a quick call to our landlord would get the problem taken care of in short order. Oh if it were only that easy. Our landlord was great and put in a call to Sears since that’s where he’s typically purchased his appliances in the past and set up a service appointment to have someone come out and check the drier. Given the age of it, we all assumed that it would need to be replaced, but he wanted to do the repair call just to be sure. The appointment was set and everything was great until Sears didn’t show up and they didn’t decide to call until 45 minutes after the back end of their 10:00 to 12:00 time frame was past. And when they did call, they called the wrong contact number and then told us it was our fault and they couldn’t get anyone out for another week at least. Always nice to be told its your fault that they didn’t show up or call.
So fast forward to the service appointment and the drier is, in fact, on its last legs. A call back to the landlord to let him know the situation got him to Sears that evening to purchase a new drier for us. He gave us the number to set up the delivery appointment so we could fit it around our schedule as we needed. This was a great idea, until we discovered that Sears wasn’t interested in actually making what people typically think of as an appointment. They could only schedule the appointment for a day, but no kinda of time frame. They didn’t even want to say morning or afternoon delivery. They just wanted to say, “Sometime on Tuesday.” After significant diplomatic efforts we were able to get the customer service rep to agree to put a note saying we’d greatly prefer a morning delivery on the order, but we wouldn’t know if they were actually going to deliver in the morning, much less deliver at all, until the night before the scheduled date.
The final kicker came two days later when we received a call from Sears telling us that they didn’t actually have the drier that was purchased in stock and they wouldn’t be able to deliver it until sometime next week at the earliest. Now I can understand selling an appliance that’s not in stock, but it would probably make sense to let your customer know that its not going to be available for a couple of weeks when they purchase it. What gets a little beyond my understanding is setting a delivery date for an item that you won’t even have in your possession until a week after the delivery is supposed to occur.
Worst experience in the world? Definitely not. Frustrating? I’d have to say yeah. Will I ever buy an appliance from Sears? Nope.
Instant Update: As I was a writing this, my friancee told me that our landlord canceled the order with Sears and bought a new drier from Home Depot. My fiancee spoke to Home Depot delivery to schedule the appointment and they told her the washer would be ready for delivery later this week or early next week. Now its just getting funny.
Posted by Erik 
Posted by Erik 
Posted by Erik 
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