So a week or so ago, we decided to take the family out for an evening walk. We thought it’d definitely put Kaden to sleep, and be good for us to get some exercise. Now, mind you this was around 9pm, so it was getting dark, but our neighborhood is a nice one, well lit, all that jazz, so we were comfortable taking a quick stroll around the block by the school and park, and then back to our house. Things were going just fine until we turned the corner and headed through the edge of the park, when we noticed that our quiet suburban neighborhood had been invaded by a snake.
Now, I’m not going to say that I have an irrational fear of snakes, but I have a significant disdain for them existing within my sight, and would much prefer to never see one again. But as it turns out, we saw this snake (thankfully 10-15 feet before we got to it), crossing the path just ahead of us. Now, this is not the simple little garter snake I’m used to from Missouri. I’ve only seen maybe three real snakes since we moved to Texas, and in order I’m about to tell you their stories.
Snake the First: Leaving work very late one evening, as I was driving across the parking lot there was a large (read: greater than three feet) snake making his way home from work as well, or perhaps he worked 3rd shift and was just heading in, all the same, our paths crossed, although simultaneously too close and not close enough, as you’ll see with the next encounter.
The second snake Kassy & I saw whilst driving home one evening, in the middle of an intersection near our house. This intelligent beast was slithering his way across four plus lanes of traffic, diagonally through the intersection we were turning left at. I simultaneously lost my breath, swerved around the snake, and for reasons still unbeknownswt to me, used the power locks to lock all the doors in our car. Now granted this snake was quite possibly the largest, non-captive, snake I’ve ever seen, but he still probably wouldn’t have been capable of operating the door of our car, let alone as we passed at 15mph.
The most recent snake was probably similar in size to the first, somewhere between three and maybe four feet long, but seeing as how we were out-of-doors, as the kids say, it scared the living daylights out of me. Not to mention it was dark, and who knows how many others were there just waiting for us to cross their paths. Anyway, now anytime I have to go out into the yard after dark I’m get anxious worrying about whether or not there is a snake in our backyard.
So without saying “I have an irrational fear of snakes,” I believe I have proved my point. And now back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Anyway, things are good here. About to turn another year older, so I’m doing some introspection. But honestly, Kaden’s not sleeping really well right now because he’s sick, and so I’m just trying to survive.
Well, Scrubs has come to a close, but I have to say that these last few episodes, although the season was cut drastically short by the writer’s strike we’re absolutely some of the funniest in a long time. This one, in particular has had me laughing several times, and has been mentioned at work a few times as well, so I thought I’d share with anyone out there who might have missed it. Thursday night is the season finale for The Office, and with that effectively the end of new TV until summer for our house. Oh sure, we’ll still watch The Daily Show, and Mythbusters, and a few other things, but really, what is TV without painful new episodes of everyone’s favorite manager stooping to all new lows. Here’s a bit to keep us all hanging on.
Wow, I had no idea we were even up for best blog of all time, but apparently CNN is already selling shirts saying so.
I stumbled across this new feature of CNN.com early this morning, where they allow you to buy a t-shirt ($15) with one of the day’s top headlines printed across it, like this. The funny thing is that I also noticed that the URL was not protected at all, and so it allows things like this, that, or more deviously these. I had a lot of un with it and couldn’t help but share the love.
Hope you enjoy!
I’m not really sure what hulu.com is up to, but it looks interesting. Full length episodes on-line, full length feature films, really? OK. Sure, I’ll watch “Monty Python’s Meaning of Life,” thank you very much. Waiting for the shoe to drop.
[Edit:] Apparently, Hulu is a joint venture between NBC(Universal) & Newscorp(Fox), and they’ve signed agreements with several other production houses. I’m pretty impressed with it overall. We watched a bit of “The Meaning of Life” tonight, honestly just from about 22 minutes in to around 35 minutes (nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more), but the resolution’s pretty good (not fully DVD quality mind you, but full screen is watchable), and it’s able to very quickly scan to wherever in the show you’d like to pick up. All in all the web site is well done, and if they get more content I can guarantee that I’ll be back.
This is baby care information that I could have used a while back. Not that I’ve violated too many of these guidelines…They are guidelines/recommendations right?
If you have any additional tips I should know about, please let me know soon. This little guy’s about to hit a year, and things are about to get outta control. What with all of the walking, self-feeding, and soon to be talking, it’s going to be a fun ride!
Two quick notes tonight, before I head off to bed. First, my first trip to Las Vegas was last month. Wow. What a crazy city. Afterwards, while still decompressing I ran into a friend who said that Las Vegas was a look at all of the American vices, and while I agree with him in principle, I found it very interesting that there were two things that were verboten in Las Vegas. First, prostitution. Sure, there are plenty of erotic dancers, and girlfriends for an evening, whatever you want to call it, but the fact is that the county Las Vegas sits in has made prostitution illegal, unlike most of the rest of the state of Nevada. Secondly, it turns out that while you can do just about anything else while gambling, saying the “F word” is not OK. Granted it was well past 2am, and we’d all had enough to drink to loosen up the tongues, but I was still very shocked at the response of the pit boss to two slips of the “F bomb.” Oh well, I guess they have to draw the line somewhere, right?
As for rediscovery, I have recently been introduced to two old friends by way of their blogs, and I can’t tell you how excited I am to continue to catch up on what they’ve been up to these last five years plus. I cannot believe that Kassy & I have been here in Austin nearly five years already. Time flies, and speaking of that, I have got to get to bed.
Although I match several of these descriptions from time to time, I thought I’d share the love with this great poster of “The 56 Geeks”. Not much been going on. Seems like all our time goes to work and Kaden, but we squeeze in a home project, Christmas decorating, and other important stuff as well.
I almost never do these things, but I cound’t resist this one. I knew this a long time ago, but this test really spells it out:
As expected, I’m a science/math/technology/computer nerd. Not too into sci-fi or comics, although I dabble. I really don’t like History much, although I enjoy good books (mostly fiction though), and I’m not too terribly dorky or awkward. Yeah, that sounds about right.
If the rest of these videos are anything like the first one I watched, I’m going to be a busy man for the next few days. Why do I even need TV anymore. Now, granted it is summer re-runs, but we haven’t even seriously turned on the television in I don’t even know how long. To make it worse, we recently moved the TV back downstairs into our main living room and so it’s much more accessible, but still nothing. Sure we’ve watched some movies, and I finished playing Halo 2, but that’s been about it.
When the fall lineup kicks off, I’m sure there’ll be some more stuff I’m interested in watching, but for now, I’m officially tuned out. Of course, Halo 3 drops in just a few short weeks, so I guess I just have my seasons.
Although I match several of these descriptions from time to time, I thought I’d share the love with this great poster of 
