Happy New Year and all that jazz. Monday night headed up to Lakemoor to Missy's, Lisa's friend, for New Years Eve. Picked up McDonald's for dinner on the way up. It was snowing, but it wasn't too bad for driving. I've been in that neck of the woods before, just never went that way to get there, up 53 north to 12 north to 120. First time going by Deer Park, which is a nice area. Played Celebrities, had some champagne, did some talking, had a good time. Finally headed back around 3:30 yesterday, stopping for lunch at Panera Bread before heading down Lake Cook Road to 94 instead. Ended up doing some grocery shopping at Dominick's, which was very empty. Kinda nice doing grocery shopping when it's empty. Also, because of the route we took, ended up driving by 3 shopping malls that had Apple Stores, Deer Park, Northbrook, and Old Orchard. I find that amusing. Tracy made some chicken soup last night, watched some Two Guys and a Girl. Wore my new wool pants since it's freezing today. Doesn't block the wind as much as I thought they would. Might have to just go with some long johns instead.

So, Jesse told us on New Years Eve about this website, Calorie Count. And now Tracy and I are addicted. Go figure. I give myself till February until I've given up trying to keep it updated. But it'll be interesting until then. It does help, to actually keep track of what you eat. In other New Years resolution type stuff, I reorganized a couple cabinets in the kitchen, so instead of just shoving things onto shelves after grocery shopping, there's a little order to the madness. Next up would be the spice and oils and sauces cabinet. Tracy made meatloaf for dinner last night, and leftovers for lunch today. I'm also trying to stay hydrated as well as I did while I was on the Master Cleanse. Just watched some more Two Guys and a Girl. No watchable reruns were even on last night. A bunch of the episodes are out of order, so that's a little annoying. And Tracy and I are wondering whether to go for a CD or go with Apple stock with some Christmas money. The Apple stock is tempting, but no guaranteed. High risk, high reward.

So I've kind of been fighting off a cold for the past couple of days, and well, it's almost done with, (knocking on wood). I actually thought I would have gotten worse, but I actually got better instead. Go figure. I think the whole hydrating thing helps a bunch. Not to mention I think it helps with my weight. Tracy made steaks for dinner last night, with some broccoli, which was awesome. She just used the grill pan, no oven to finish it off, and they were cooked perfectly. Watched random stuff on TV, including the end of Music and Lyrics. Which was funny because Tracy was just chatting me about that song yesterday during work. Going to try out the Muvico Rosemont 18 tomorrow to see National Treasure: Book of Secrets. Already bought tickets, and picked out seats, since we're going with the VIP reserved seating. Looking forward to that, the 4K Sony digital projectors, the love seats, and the food, which include Dungeness crab quesadillas and Parmesan-Truffle fries. Hopefully the experience is as good as it sounds. And then I'll have a new favorite theater.

Ok, I've got a new favorite theater. Muvico Rosemont 18. It's awesome. The Sony 4K digital projectors. Premier section: reserved seating, 21 and over, concession serves hot food (like Parmesan truffle fries) and alcoholic beverages, and huge comfy love seats. Seriously awesome. Totally worth the extra costs. Too bad it's not that close. Friday night Tracy just made chicken adobo for dinner, and we watched TV. Saturday had a haircut, then went out to Woodfield before going to the movie theater. Sunday watched Unaccompanied Minors, did the weekly shopping down Broadway, and did some work on the bikes. I should be back to commuting by bike pretty soon. Need to put some handlebar tape on the Sprint and I could probably start using the mtb since I put slicks on it already, except I still need a rear shifter. I did put inline brake levers on the road bike, so I can brake from an upright position. That's pretty cool. But while I was getting my hands dirty with the bikes, I wondered what it'd be like if Apple made bikes, and how easy it might be to work on them. Even though they're pretty simple machines, I'm sure there are ways to make it easier to use or maintain, of course with a cost increase. Oh, and I've been uploading my old email to the Google Apps account for abando.com. I've got archives going back to the end of 1998, which is pretty cool. Headed out to Boundary Tavern & Grill tonight to watch the BCS National Championship game with the boys.

Odd, thought I had updated the Memex with yesterday's current events, but I guess not. Anyway, beer, food, and company was good last night at Boundary Tavern & Grill, not so much for the game though. Sorry Russell. Got to see some people I haven't seen in a while, like Bryan and Bjorn. Bryan was actually nice enough to give me a lift home. Other than that, not much. Waiting for Macworld San Francisco 2008 Keynote next week. Watching Eureka on the iPhone on the commute. That's about it. Oh, RCN might be switching over to SDV, but I might have skipped over that, and so we might be out of luck until we get a new box. Whoops. I'll have to call in for that one. The good news will be when the switch is done we'll have more HD channels, including the Food Network and Universal. Doesn't really bother me too much since I'm all about the Apple TV anyway.

Ok, so the RCN SDV switch, or maybe not SDV switch isn't happening till January 15 or February 9, but either way, we need a new DVR, as the one we have is pretty much gone. Although I might have broken it myself. I think the coax cable was a little loose, which didn't seem to be the problem because it could still get basic cable and local HDTV stations. Just no cable guide. Tried the trick of resetting and downloading the firmware, but ran into some issues. Hopefully, they'll just switch the 6412 for a 3416 or something at the service call scheduled for Thursday early evening. But I think I'd be fine without cable. Really. The Apple TV works out pretty well for me. Tracy had Sunday's episode of Desperate Housewives on the DVR, but in case it can't get fixed, I bittorrented it, converted it with the turbo.264 and Perian, and put it on the Apple TV. Super easy. Probably should have just bought it from iTunes Store. Found out about Motor Row Lofts in the South Loop from YoChicago Article, and Tracy and I are hoping to go check it out this weekend. She also made dinner (pork chops and green beans) last night. Did some exercises, (adding the jump rope actually turns it into a real workout), and watched some Two Guys and a Girl.

I get to leave work early to be home for the RCN Tech visit this afternoon. Yay. Otherwise, just another Wednesday yesterday. Tracy made a chestnut soup and a chicken asparagus pasta for dinner. We watched Two Guys and a Girl. That's about it. Bus riding is always interesting. I usually take the third bus that comes in the morning, as the first is packed, the second still has standing room but the third I'm usually able to get a seat. I usually only wait for the second bus on the way home. In the mornings it's always fun to see 4 152 Addison buses starting their routes at Addison and Lake Shore, oh, right after each other. I always thought the bunching occurs due to traffic and having to pick people up, but no, there's definitely some routes where all the buses leave together at the same time. I noticed the 147's going down Lake Shore today, first one was packed, the one pretty much right behind it? Available seats. Can't wait until they enable GPS tracking via the website for all buses.

That was quick. RCN Tech came 8 minutes early. Replaced the old DVR, a Motorola Dual-Tuner DVR High-Definition Set-Top DCT6412 with a new Motorola DCH3416 Host Set-top. Took like 10-15 minutes. He also checked signal strength I'm guessing. I was back up and running by like 5:15pm. Awesome. Wish I could switch my work hours, and work earlier in the day, and leave earlier. The commute was just so much nicer. Whole Foods did have some sort of food, welcome to the neighborhood thing in the lobby last night as well. Tracy snagged some samples, not a meal, just a taste. I did some exercises, then got to make macaroni & cheese and kielbasa for dinner. Finished watching Knocked Up and watched some more Two Guys and a Girl and the episode of Desperate Housewives. Found out that Tracy's gonna start working weekends, starting next weekend, so might head out to Woodstock after checking out the Motor Row Lofts on this Saturday instead of next weekend.

Friday night Tracy went out to her parents house to visit and so she wouldn't have to deal with Friday night traffic into the city. She did bring back some lumpia and some groceries. I just had some leftovers and watched Resident Evil and The Fast and the Furious, sort of a preview of this coming weekend when she's working. Saturday we had breakfast at the North Coast Cafe, which was ok, then looked around for best rates on Certificate of Deposits, and ended up scheduling a financial adviser meeting with Chase for today. This was before we went down to take a look at the Motor Row Lofts, which are pretty sweet, and might have kickstarted the real estate process for us. After that, we came home for a bit before heading out to dinner at Coast, which was pretty good. I'd never had fatty yellowtail before. We picked up some sake since it's BYOB, so it was a pretty short night for us. Watched some Two Guys and a Girl before bed. Sunday drove out to Woodstock to visit my parents, and I upgraded my dad's iMac go Leopard and iLife '08 and iWork '08, and removed their old email accounts to the non-Google Apps abando.com. Had some good food, talked to my brother, brought some food back, and I watched Clerks II. Also watched some football.

Followed the There's Something in the Air (Macworld San Francisco 2008 Keynote). Nothing got me too excited. Although I haven't seen a MacBook Air in person yet. I'm surprised that leaked though. Apple Stock as expected tanked today. I'd say the biggest surprise? Full studio support for movie rentals. I wonder if they'll open it up for TV Show rentals. I think that'd take a big chunk of NetFlix subscribers. Not sure what pricing you should have for it though. Want a Time Capsule. Glad I'm getting free software updates for the iPhone and the Apple TV. Otherwise, eh. Went and had some introductory meetings with a Mortgage Officer and a Financial Advisor at Chase. Opened our eyes a bit more. We're probably going to go with Lisa and Ryan's advisor. Find out more after we meet with him at some point. We are going to get a find out how much we can afford, what we can get preapproved for. You know, so we have a price range to work with. We finally finished up Two Guys and a Girl last night, and it's a little sad not having Pete and Berg and Sharon and Johnny to watch every night anymore. Tracy made dinner, some pasta with some of my mom's chicken that we brought back.

Yes, I want a MacBook Air. No, I don't need one. Moving on. Apple stock continues to tank. Sign of a bigger trend, or just a good buying opportunity? Good question. Watched the pilot of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles last night. Not sure I like the action for an hour show. I seem to look for humor in my TV shows. I'll give it a couple more episodes before I give up on it. Finished up transcoding season 1 of Alias and plowing through Season 2. Upgraded the iPhone to 1.1.3 last night. I actually find the customization of the home screens a little annoying, mainly because it's in a flow grid, and I can't place icons wherever I want. Otherwise, the location mapping feature in Google Maps is pretty darn cool. Also working on getting any intros and guided tours onto the Apple TV so I can see it all pretty like. Hopefully the Keynote will get processed as a podcast soon so that can get downloaded.

So, watching Cashmere Mafia last night, and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Notes from the Underbelly, someone from Kitchen Confidential was on each of those. The owner's daughter on Cashmere Mafia, the sous-chef on Terminator, and the female head chef on Notes. Oh, and the rookie on Bones as the psychologist. It's good to see them getting work, since Kitchen Confidential was so good. Speaking of that, odd to see Anthony Bourdain back on the Food Network with A Cook's Tour, except I think it's all old stuff back from 2001-2. I wonder why they're bringing that back? Otherwise on the TV and the DVR are house hunting shows, what you get for the money, stuff oh HGTV and stuff. There's a lot of shows out there like that. Definitely. Speaking of which, we're meeting with another financial advisor probably this weekend. Kind of growing up I think. Also finished up watching Eureka on the iPhone on the ride home yesterday, so I'm back to actually reading via the Sony Reader on my commute.

Need some coffee. Last night Tracy made pork, lima beans and asparagus for dinner. We watched Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which got a lot better in the second episode. So it's still on the watch list. Downloaded the podcast version of the Macworld San Francisco 2008 Keynote, turned it into a regular Quicktime movie so I could put it with the other Apple related videos when synced to the Apple TV. I'll have to watch it this weekend sometime. Wore long johns to work today, because it's supposed to be freezing, but it's not that bad. Of course I say this before leaving for the day. Dinner with the potential financial advisor at the Chicago Firehouse Restaurant on Saturday and chili and football watching at Bryan's on Sunday.

Leftovers for dinner Friday night, watched It Could Happen to You and 30 Rock after exercises. I did get intrigued about Tabata, from this blog from the Ultimate Talk RSS feed. 20 seconds of exercise, 10 seconds rest, for 8 cycles. Sounds simple. Haven't tried it though. Saturday, started redoing all the wiring for the home theater, which meant I did some rewiring for the computer network as well. Didn't finish up that project until Sunday. Did go with Russell to Hot Doug's for the first time. And yes, it was everything I heard about and more. Awesome place. Hung out at Russell's for a bit, got to see Marla before getting a ride home. Then, dinner with the financial advisor, or maybe it's more like a financial planner, at the Chicago Firehouse Restaurant. Good place. A little drafty, but good. Sunday wanted to use the blueberries, so had to do some grocery shopping for supplies (just milk and butter). Made a blueberry loaf to bring over to Bryan's, and took the 152 over. Hung out, caught up a little, and the blueberry loaf went over well. The chili was good, the tres leche from Pierre's Bakery was awesome, and then Bryan made a fabulous bread pudding. Probably the best I've every had. It wasn't too dense to too sweet for my tastes. Just about perfect. Oh, and watched some football. Caught the 80 to get home. About 30 minutes each way. Oh, and restarted the document filing project from long ago, since we need to compile stuff for the meeting on Tuesday night. Oh, and selling the iMac G5 to Bryan to use with his new iPhone, which makes Tracy happy because I get rid of another computer from the house. Real Estate for us continues to be a moving target. We've pretty much completely written off Motor Row Lofts due to the neighborhood, as walking around is too important to us. We do like our current neighborhood, and if only someone would buy and convert this warehouse to lofts, we'd be set. Otherwise, maybe no to a loft. As always, wait and see.

While gathering documentation and statements for the meeting with our new financial planner tonight, it was enlightening. I actually looked at the Social Security mailing, and it showed my taxable income going all the way back to 1994. That's a long time ago. And I'm continuing to push my email archives up to Google Apps, which is fairly slow going, but I have stuff from '98 and '99, which I decided to peruse. That's a trip down memory lane. Also it'll come in handy for my Ultimate Timeline. Lots of ultimate related emails from back then. And, I think that started more reminiscing so I started reading my own Musings from the start. That's just good stuff right there. I actually miss how I used to write, but don't want to be what I was in order to write like that. If that makes any sense. So with selling the iMac to Bryan, I've got an LCD arm that needs a computer. Also threw in the old school bluetooth mouse and keyboard. So less junk, or more like making room for new junk. The Cube is now just sitting, powered off, as a bookend. But just have the Mac mini and the Macbook left. And I think the mini is overheating, but I need to start logging temps in order to test that out.

Yup, found a couple really cool web things. I've always wanted to make a 3-d web browser, where you travel through space to get to the next site. You could use traceroute to find the spots along the way, and then use some db somewhere to map IP blocks to geographic locations. Someone's done it, at least with traceroute and Google Maps. See Visual TraceRt Tool. It's pretty sweet. Hmm, maybe a Firefox extension, oh, and Google Earth, that can do flythroughs, hmmm. The other thing? EveryBlock. Hyperlocal news aggregation. Seriously cool. Other than that, meeting with Jason went well last night. We're apparently in pretty good shape. So that's good. Had some frozen pizza for dinner last night. Watched Carpoolers, and some real estate TV stuff. Also trying to figure out what's wrong with the Mac mini, and it might be EyeTV issues, probably from trying to use old preferences. We'll see if I can get around those.

Late night last night, with having to do some work after hours. Ugh. Tracy made crab cakes and kani su for dinner. Watched some real estate and Cashmere Mafia. I also watched Art School Confidential. Oh, and did my exercises as well. Still fighting with the firewire enclosure and the Mac mini, although I've narrowed it down to the enclosure, since the drives on the first bridgeboard aren't mounting. Ugh. Should have just gone with more Mac friendly devices. Might have to break out the Cube, because I don't think that guy had any issues connecting to the enclosure. The Bus has been interesting the last couple of days. Long waits before an available bus comes by. On the way home last night we stopped and picked up riders from another bus that was stopped on Lower Wacker before Lake Shore Drive. Not sure what happened there. This morning the bus didn't get on to LSD at Belmont, opting instead to go down to Fullerton. And that was after waiting 30 minutes for a bus with available seating. Lots of people walking North, hoping to get to a bus before it filled up. Probably the most people I've seen yet. Awesome.

Weekend. Awesome. So the firewire enclosure is just not making me happy. I was hoping using the Cube would make all the drives show up, but that's not the case at all. One of the bridgeboards definitely is sketchy. Wonder if I should just replace the board, or switch concepts entirely and go with individual enclosures. Hmmm, I'll just spend the weekend trying to get it to work again. And then make a decision. I also need to do an extended hardware test on the Mac mini, as it seems to be freezing up around 9:48am. I can tell because I get it to show the clock in the screen saver. And that's the time it shows when I get home from work. So the computer problems mean that I haven't been transcoding anything for the Apple TV, can't really sync up the iPhone because music/TV shows/movies are all on the enclosure served from the mini. So that's awesome. Tracy made Salisbury turkey steak, mashed beans and green beans for dinner last night. Watched Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which I'm starting to enjoy more, and most of High Fidelity. Not much planned for the weekend, maybe check out some open houses, take a walk around the neighborhood looking at real estate, that's about it.

Not much went on Friday night, but Saturday made waffles, watched some movies, and went out walking. Checked out neighborhood real estate, got some coffee, stopped off at the Gap, picked up another blazer on sale, came back then headed out to try and catch a movie. Apparently, a lot of other people wanted to catch a movie on Saturday night as well. Wanted to see 27 Dresses, but sold out, so we just decided to go to dinner instead. Tracy had a craving for a French bistro/cafe, I think from watching A Good Year, so I suggested Brasserie Jo. So we started heading over, but checked out places along the way, and came upon Kevin's, which reminded us of Nolita, so we tried it out. Eh. Then homeward bound. Sunday, more walking around, found a new place to get pastrami reubens, The Bagel - Restaurant and Deli, picked up a book from Borders, did some grocery shopping. Tracy made BBQ ribs in the oven that were pretty good. Oh, also fixed the Mac mini. I think Perian was part of the problem. I did clean out the insides of the firewire enclosure, so that might have helped as well. Also added smcFanControl2 to spin up the fans, and that helped with the random reboots while transcoding. Also finally looked up Handbrake issues, and it's the queue that's causing the problems. So, the mini is back up and running and stable.

I've taken to updating my Facebook status all the time. Partly because I can because the iPhone Facebook website is super easy to update, and, well, just for giggles. Since they did away with the default "is" part of the status, I'm trying to be more active in my descriptions, like writing a resume, but a side effect is that it seems like I'm writing in the third person, which I am. But it's odd nonetheless. Anyway, I just updated my status to updating Facebook to writing about Facebook. Which is awesome. Tracy made chili last night for dinner, and she'll be eating it for the next week or so. I finally got around to trying out a recipe for pumpkin loaf, so I don't have to buy it from Starbucks anymore. I've got 3 to try, and this first one is good, but not dark or dense enough. I am still working on Book 1 of The Baroque Cycle. Ugh. Can't wait until I'm done, and then I can move on to something that doesn't take any thought. Maybe some Harry Potter, or Ludlum. Oh, and I did transcode The Freshest Kids and Scratch for watching on the iPhone. Might do the same to The Unit, and get Mad Men as well.

Walked by a couple other properties on the way home from work yesterday, 3052 N. Sheffield and 831 W. Buckingham. Both pretty nice. Working on getting a mortgage pre-approval and finding a real estate agent. Then comes the legwork. Gotta love the internet though. Best real estate search site so far? Urban Real Estate. Block Shopper is also pretty sweet, as they include market time in their search results. Of course, I don't know exactly what market time is, but it's probably days. Anyway, found another one at 645 W. Briar Pl.. That sounds interesting. Aside from that, watched more real estate tv shows, Tracy made a version of chicken marsala, and that's about it. Since the queue doesn't work in Handbrake, I figured I'd try writing shell scripts to use the command line version, and just need to find the time to create them. Then it'd off to the races for the rest of Alias to finish transcoding.

I'm not good at tagging, adding keywords, categorizing. Makes it hard to look at the data or content that I create. Anyway, just figured I should start looking into adding keywords to the photos in iPhoto, and get around to uploading more photos. Haven't done it in a while. Pretty much was looking for a more up to date photo to use for my Facebook profile. So walked by 645 W. Briar Pl. last night, and it's in a great location. Down the street from Cupcakes, and we've been doing a lot of walking/shopping down Broadway. Otherwise, it looks a little smaller from the street than the other places. Actually meeting with a real estate agent on Monday night, and playing phone tag with another agent, but both our phones seem to go straight to voicemail, which is weird. Of course, AT&T is having some issues, which means I can't use Visual Voicemail, which is just a hassle. Anyway, hopefully we'll finally get in touch, and we can sit down and meet. Or, maybe we'll just go with the one we were able to get a hold of. I was surprised that it snowed pretty much all day today downtown, but pretty light stuff. Snowstorm tonight, and I need to guess which way (Bus or El) will get me home with the least amount of aggravation. I did catch the 3rd of 3 135's this morning, but then we proceeded to sit at Belmont for like 10 minutes or more, probably to get back on schedule. Stupid. Tracy made stir fry last night, I brought it in for lunch, and we watched House last night.

Ah, February. What a month. Some of my worst months were Februaries, but I'm sure some of my best were as well. Would be interesting to plot over time. Anyway, another month down in 2008. Last night was going to take the el home, but saw that traffic was moving on LaSalle, so walked over and took the 135. Big mistake. 1:45 later, I go grocery shopping. There was a point that the bus seemed to break down on lower Wacker just before getting onto lower Lake Shore Drive. That would have been awesome to deal with. But some revving of the engine, gears engage, and we made our way slowly North. Picked up a premarinated pork roast and zucchini and squash for dinner, and put it in the oven, since Tracy had a 2 hour drive home herself. Watched some real estate shows, of course. Actually have meetings set up with some real estate agents next week. Hopefully we'll pick one right away, and go from there. Got to come in a little late today, because of the weather. Not much planned for the weekend, maybe get out and see Russell, but just gonna be Tracy and I for the Super Bowl, since she's working.

Go watch this now. Yes, it's a political speech set to music. Yes that, like Tracy said, automatically gives words more emotional weight. But the words themselves, well, wow. And yes, it took a music video to turn me on to Obama. Looks like he's a tech friendly candidate as well. So fitting that I see that the same day the Giants win the Super Bowl. Yes they can. That was a pretty exciting game. Annoying that the DVR stopped at the 3rd down of the Patriots last possession, and the overlap with the House recording missed the last 3 downs of the game, so Tracy and I missed the actual clock winding down. But still. Wow. Food was good, but not that good. Tracy and i were both disappointed overall with our culinary spheres. I'm definitely out of practice with my pastry making. That's sad. As for the rest of the weekend, watched a bunch of movies off the DVR, Three Kings, Breach, and The Lookout. Moved some stuff upstairs so the condo is a bit more open. That's pretty much it.

That's in reference to Super Tuesday and Mardi Gras falling on the same day. Planning on voting tonight, while my polling place is still in the building, that is, until I move, whenever that may be. Met with Adam Garvey, real estate agent with The Brad Lippitz Group, and arranged some showings on Saturday. Got flights booked for an anniversary vacation with the Cases. Had leftovers for dinner, watched Carpoolers and Welcome to the Captain. Started watching Scratch on the iPhone. Oh, and probably because of all the real estate, how to sell, tv shows we've been watching, we started rearranging living room furniture last night. Actually opened up the blinds last night as well, and all those windows does make the place look pretty big. And the piano and the tv limit furniture layout.

Meeting with Jason went well last night. Got through some stuff. Which is good. Weather never really got bad, so that was also good. That was pretty much the night. Tracy made some guacamole and some beef wellingtons for dinner. Watched some real estate tv shows, some cooking shows. This morning probably marks the third time in a row I've made it out the door only to see my bus pulling away from my stop. I could run for it, but that's not my style. Finished watching Scratch and started The Freshest Kids on the way in. It is really nice being able to watch stuff wherever I am. Very nice. Oh, played the lotto yesterday, didn't win. Jackpot's up to $122 million for Friday.

So Lent is here again. No meat yesterday, went with a tuna salad sandwich for lunch and a Margherita frozen pizza for dinner. Good thing to look forward to? Possibly more sushi in the next 40 days. Snowstorm fizzled a bit in Chicago proper. But my mom got stuck in Detroit on her way back from the Philippines, and my dad was on his way to the airport and turned back before they decided to shut down McHenry county because of whiteout conditions. And here in downtown Chicago? No problems. Actually, might have been the fastest bus ride home since the holiday inbetween week. So that was nice. Otherwise, watched some real estate tv shows, a bit of Employee of the Month. I did turn off Spotlight on the MacBook. I thought something was off, and I think my email archiving and migration might be cause it fits. And I think it's running cooler. Maybe. After I get all my email uploaded to Google Apps I'll turn it back on. I did finish transcoding Alias for the Apple TV. Next up I think is another set of movies, before moving on to all 10 seasons of Friends.

So mom got home really late on Wednesday night. That's good. Otherwise, not too much going on. Tracy made a goat cheese, sun dried tomato, roasted red pepper sauce for the pasta I boiled and the turkey brats I cooked. That was good. Watched Cashmere Mafia. And more real estate TV shows. I should get around to listing all the different ones, but there are so many of them. Tried using iTunes built in convert to iPod/iPhone transcoding from the Apple TV version of the transcoded DVDs, but takes way too long. I should compare it to a DVD transcode, but I'm pretty sure it's much slower. So that means double rips for when I want to bring stuff with me. Actually looking at 8 or so properties tomorrow, just a quick run through them all. Hopefully we'll find one we like. Otherwise, maybe do some painting of columns this weekend, but not much else. Lots of sleeping. Forgot to mention that RCN is switching to all digital, which means more HD channels, and that I need to get a STB for upstairs.

Well, after looking at 8 properties on Saturday, we're narrowing the field. So that's good. Also good is when Tracy and I both agree on the place we do like. Hopefully we'll get another showing in this week sometime. Definitely exciting. Friday night Tracy made vegetable risotto. We watched Eli Stone and Peggy Sue Got Married. Saturday went house hunting, had a late lunch/early dinner at Wilde Bar & Restaurant, and napped and watched some TV. Sunday ventured out into the cold, did some window shopping, dropped in on Russell, got a snack at Whole Foods, did some grocery shopping. Tracy made a pork loin for dinner. I ended up finally making Chocolate Mousse, but not early enough to eat. Waited 30 minutes for a bus this morning, and there was definitely a big backlog of people waiting for buses. Worse than the last time I saw a backup like that. Can't wait until the weather gets nice enough, or I get courageous enough to start biking again.

Picked up a bottle of wine, some strawberries on the way home from the Belmont stop last night. It'll be nice living closer to Kafka Wine Co in the future, hopefully. Also living closer to the Belmont stop as well, as I wouldn't be waiting for bunched up buses, instead waiting for bunched up el trains. Watched Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, the last episode, and of course, some more Real Estate TV Shows, and Tracy made her eggplant and ground turkey lasagna. Updated the MacBook and Mac mini to 10.5.2. No problems there. Supposedly the new software update for the Apple TV is now available, so I'll have to download and try that out tonight. This morning, had a much better commute by leaving 15 minutes earlier, and managed to finally finish Quicksilver (book), and started up Candy Girl again, figured I needed something lighter to read. Not sure what's next after that, but definitely something light. Maybe Ender's Game? Oh, also picked up some chocolate Skittles, because I was intrigued. And now I never have to get them again. They ain't so good. I forget what chocolate flavored candy I do like, but that isn't it. Gotta remember to play Mega Millions tonight. $150 Million.

Updated the Apple TV to the Take 2 software upgrade. It's pretty sweet. Haven't tried the AirTunes support yet, but that was a nice pleasant surprise. Also haven't tried the HD rental yet, but looks really easy to do. Even to the point that I might look into getting rid of cable. Almost completely. At least the premium channels. I'm looking forward to the day when the weather is really bad, and there's nothing to watch, so we just pick a movie to rent and there it is. That's just slick. Also, there's support for 5.1 Dolby Digital surround. Just have to figure out how to get DVDs transcoded to take advantage of that. Figure I'll only transcode the movies that need the sound, like The Matrix. Tracy brought her car to the dealer last night, so was late getting back due to the all the traffic, which meant I had to make dinner. I went with chicken in a bag, a recipe by Jamie Oliver. It was ok, but I don't think I put enough salt, or thyme. It was a little too bland. Or maybe not enough butter. Today Tracy has to go and pick her car up (she got a rental from them in the meantime) so I get to make dinner again. I think it's gonna be stuff cabbage, if I can pull that off. Watched some TV last night as well.

Made dinner and another mess in the kitchen last night since Tracy had to go pick her car up. Made stuffed cabbage, or, in this case, meat wrapped in cabbage. It was pretty good. Sounds fabulous right now, since I'm fasting for a blood test tonight. It's a physical for life and disability insurance. Exciting. Can't wait to eat after that's over with. Watched Smallville, a little bit of Deja Vu, had Cocktail going in the background while cooking. Also made some Apricot Jell-O, and I might sneak in the pineapple or cranberry flavors this weekend. I'm definitely stocking up the movies for this weekend since Tracy's working. Looking forward to Starter for 10 which is playing on some HD channel, as recommended by Jenkins, and Crank is also premiering this weekend.

I don't like fasting. And I can't believe that I did the Master Cleanse, and I could never do it again. Anyway, physical went well, and I forgot I had to pee in a cup, which always takes me forever to do. If I had remember I would have been hydrating as soon as I got home. Tracy made steak and caprese for dinner. We just split a T-bone, Tracy got the tenderloin, I got the strip. Good stuff. Actually ate at the table without the TV on. Watched some Deja Vu and some House Hunters. Also downloaded and compiled the newest dev version of Handbrake to transcode The Matrix with 5.1 Dolby Digital surround sound for the Apple TV. Found out this morning that it works beautifully. Now that means retranscoding all the stuff I had, but I'm gonna wait for an official stable release for that. I think I have over 100 DVDs and a couple different TV seasons done, so that's exciting. Started reading Bringing Down the House again, which is great. Checking out 907 W. Roscoe again tonight. Plan on watching movies and doing a couple loads of laundry tomorrow, then out to dinner with my parents and Tracy, I think we're going to try Magnolia Cafe in Uptown. Sunday, lunch with Russell at Kuma's Corner, more movie watching.

Yup, I'm 31 now. Anyway, Friday night had a second showing of 907 W. Roscoe. Still really like the place. Forgot what we ended up having for dinner, something Tracy made of course. Watched some House, Cashmere Mafia and Eli Stone. Saturday sent Tracy off to work, and finally finished off Deja Vu while doing laundry, then Where the Money Is and Blood Diamond, which I really thought was a great movie. Made myself a nice traditional Filipino breakfast of Spam, eggs and fried rice. Parents came in to town and we went to mass before meeting up with Tracy after work to head up to Magnolia Cafe for dinner. Good stuff there. On Sunday, watched Gray Matters and Starter for 10 before biking off to meet Russell for lunch at Kuma's Corner. Had the Sloth, which was a burger with a Cuban sandwich on top. It was good. And yes, it knocked me out for about an hour after I got home. I did get caught in the rain on the way back, which was funny, because I started the ride with sunglasses on because it was sunny. Watched Crank, Tracy came back, started to go for a walk, but couldn't get over to the lake because the underpass was flooded, so just picked up some stuff from Whole Foods for dinner. Rented the HD version of No Reservations on the Apple TV, which was pretty seamless. Except that it didn't download completely by the time we started watching, so we had to wait at the last 15 minutes for it to finish downloading. Other than that, super easy and pretty nice quality. Tracy tried making homemade mac and cheese, but it didn't turn out like she wanted. I made her some chocolate covered strawberries, and I had a slice of Black Forest cake from Whole Foods. Overall a pretty good birthday. Right up my alley. Catchup dinner with Leah at Sai Cafe tonight. Oh, and happy birthday to my dad today.

Sai Cafe is so good. Seriously. Awesome. Good catching up with Leah. Walked all the way down to get the 151. It was pretty cold out. Helped my dad with setting up wireless at home, because Al and Nicole got him a new computer, a 20" iMac for his birthday. He moved the old iMac G5 to the kitchen for my mom, and at one point, I was iChating with them both, one in the study, one in the kitchen, and me in Chicago. We're supposed to do another iChat this weekend with my brother, so that'll be fun. And I was Remote Desktop'ed into the iMac G5, since that's were the ports are being forwarded to, but then used Leopard's built in Screen Sharing to connect to the new iMac to help out with some networking things. That's awesome too. Oh, and totally forgot about that Wedding highlight video, so converted that so I can carry it around on my iPhone. Which also reminds me that I need to get in touch with our videographer and see if he's finally up to ours. Meeting with Jason tonight.

Meeting with Jason went fine last night. Got some things to discuss with some other advisors. Other than that, Tracy made roasted chicken quarters, fingerling potatoes, and green beans for dinner. She was watching Blood Diamond when I got home, too. She had one of my days on her day off, curled up on the couch, laptop, watching movies. That's my wife. Got another showing of 907 W. Roscoe tonight with another advisor and our agent, Adam, and then some discussion afterwards. Could be that we're falling out of love with that place. Maybe. Wait and see. But damn if that 1/2 bath on the roof wasn't so cool. Handbrake released a new version, with support for 5.1 surround sound. So, started ripping DVDs to start transcoding, again. Pretty much gonna do 'em all over. Not sure, but reading through some forum posts at the Handbrake site, there's some settings that might allow pretty good quality for both Apple TV and iPhone watching. So maybe I need to do some testing and find that out before starting to transcode.

Yes, we still like 907 W. Roscoe. So we're still moving on that. More news as it comes along. Otherwise, leftovers for dinner last night. Watched The New Adventures of Old Christine and some other real estate shows. So pretty low key there. As for transcoding, supposedly the iPod-HiRez preset in Handbrake should give good Apple TV results as well as ability to play on the iPhone. So gonna try that out to see how it goes. That's pretty much it.

Tracy picked me up from work yesterday, and we drove up and went to a Home Depot. We were looking at Trex, to see what that's all about for the roof deck, and also to look at lighting fixtures, and outdoor furniture, and paint, and other random stuff. Then we went up to Los Nopales, because Tracy had a craving for Mexican, and I wanted to try it out based on Akira's recommendation. It was good, but not the best ever. There was, I think, a hint of seafood flavoring or something in the rice, which of course set off Tracy's allergies, so that wasn't good. Maybe we'll have to try it in the summer instead. After that, just a couple TV shows and bedtime. We're headed out for dinner with my in-laws tonight, to show off the photos we have of 907 W. Roscoe. Headed out to Woodstock at some point this weekend for my parents anniversary. Also want to check some stuff out at Abt Electronics.

Friday night took the Metra out to Orland Park for dinner with the in-laws. Ended up at P.F. Changs, as everything else had like an hour wait. Pretty good stuff, they now have these mini desserts for $2, so it's not too much at the end of the night. Got back to their place and showed off some photos of 907 W. Roscoe. Saturday April dropped by after work, Tracy made her ham, I made eggs with tomatoes and onions, and we watched Yes We Can and Kitchen Confidential. After April left, Tracy and I went out to the 'burbs to check out The Great Indoors looking for light fixtures. Then we went to Abt Electronics to check out appliances, and I'm glad Tracy likes that store as much as I do. We wandered through all the kitchen models, drooling at all the stuff. Best detail? Anti slam drawer hardware. Then we went looking for The Glen, which Tracy had read about in the paper, and we eventually stumbled upon it, and ended up eating at Flight. Another long wait, except the kitchen bar was open. So we got to have dinner looking into the kitchen. Like pretty much in the kitchen. It was awesome. Best part was when the expediter called out a string of medium rare entrees and said it sounded like a real restaurant or kitchen or something. Anyway, ate too much that night as well. Sunday drove out to Woodstock for my parents 35th wedding anniversary, and they ended up renewing their vows at a mass on Sunday afternoon and had a reception at St. Monica. Lots of food there as well. Then, capped off the evening with a family iChat, wishing my brother a happy birthday as well. A pretty full weekend all told.

Waiting for the bus to go home last night saw the rain turn to snow. Always nice when it does that. Also always results in a very pretty snowfall, as snow falls pretty gently, sticks to trees, and piles up on branches. Best snowfall I ever saw was like that, and I spent the afternoon after I got home from high school just watching the snow fall. Anyway, I had my head down watching The Fifth Element so I had no idea how much snow had fallen by the time I got home. And it was pretty substantial. Got our first bill for life insurance, and didn't know what the monthly cost was going to be, so that was interesting. Made me go and create a personal budget in Numbers, which is absolutely awesome. Things I wouldn't have even bothered with doing in Excel, I'm totally willing and able to do easily in Numbers. Did some exercises last night, made some mac & cheese and kielbasa for dinner, watched Cashmere Mafia. Transcoded The Matrix for Apple TV and iPhone, to compare and contrast with the existing 5.1 Apple TV version. I did The Fifth Element wrong, so I had to try it with something else. As for news on 907 W. Roscoe, we're getting ready to put an offer in, and looking for a lender as well.

So getting a mortgage, not even getting a mortgage, just trying to find a lender, has got to be the most annoying part of the home buying process. Ugh. Anyway, finished up watching The Matrix last night, and the transcoding for Apple TV and iPhone looks good, so I'm starting with the entire season of Alias. Also came up with some shell scripts to make it easy to do a bunch of rips with Mac the Ripper and then do a batch transcoding. By my rough calculations, it should complete around this time next week. Awesome. Also bought an upgrade to iBank last night. Love the OFX downloading, and of course only 2 of my accounts support it. Also love the iPhone integration. Means I'll actually be able to keep track of my cash expenditures. Meeting with Adam tonight. Started watching Center Stage last night. Also watched Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Put in an offer last night on 907 W. Roscoe. And now the waiting begins. Think we've found a lender, too, and going with Wells Fargo. So that's exciting. Kind of unnerving. Went grocery shopping after working with Adam on the offer, picked dinner up, which was ravioli and a vodka cream sauce, to which Tracy added onions and peppers. Watched some Eli Stone. I did my exercises. I did make some chocolate covered strawberries for Tracy again, and I'm having trouble recreating the smoothness from the first couple of times I did it. And, a quick Google search later: it's wet strawberries. So, all I have to do is clean them and pat them completely dry beforehand, or not wash them at all. And dark chocolate covered blueberries aren't all that good. The blueberries are for some sort of breakfast grain. Started reading Neuromancer on the Sony Reader on the bus again. Always good, no matter how many times I've read it. I think the next one will definitely be Ender's Game. That is, unless I start watching Alias, since I'm now on Season 1, Episode 18. It's been transcoding since 10:27am yesterday. Only 91 more episodes to go.

The leap year day. Surprised I hadn't written before on the elusive February 29. Looks like there was a musing from 2000, but that was also during my break from Daily Dose. Anyway, sellers came back with a counter offer last night on 907 W. Roscoe. We've countered back today, and waiting to hear back. We did start looking at other properties, to hedge our bets, and to guard ourselves if we don't end up getting it. Tracy made stir fry for dinner last night, using soba noodles. Watched The Office rerun, and some more real estate shows. Otherwise, pretty low key, just sort of in a holding pattern, waiting to go through all the steps until we know if we got the place or not. Tracy's working this weekend, so watching more movies. Might get out for some exercise on Sunday, got a haircut tomorrow, and that's about it. Planning on making some shrimp dish of the peel and eat variety tonight, something with Old Bay, something to remind me of that place in West Palm Beach just over the bridge from that one year of BOTB.

Plowed through another 7 movies this weekend, 3 from the DVR, 2 from the Apple TV HD rental, 1 just caught on cable, and 1 in the movie theater. Friday night tried making some peel and eat shrimp, but made it too saucy. Maybe I need to just steam the shrimp and cover it in Old Bay. Watched Carpoolers while doing exercises, and then Eli Stone and Bones with dinner. Saturday thought about doing laundry, wanted to make the blueberry loaf again for breakfast, but didn't have eggs, so went grocery shopping, and forgot to get laundry detergent. Had donuts for breakfast and frozen pizza for lunch. Watched Lucky Number Slevin which was pretty good, Gladiator which was pretty boring except for the fight scenes, and Next, clairvoyant Nicholas Cage movie, that sounds like it should have been directed by John Woo. I liked that one too. Made OpenTable reservations at Nacional 27, to help get over the sting of not getting 907 W. Roscoe (seller's lower limit and our upper limit didn't meet). Ended up buying tickets for Jumper via the iPhone while at dinner. Jumper was pretty good, but just seems like a setup to a series or a franchise or at least a sequel. Anyway, small theater at River East was full, so maybe they will get a sequel. Sunday all set to do laundry but no detergent, so went grocery shopping after mass, but by then the laundry room was pretty busy. Watched 300 (still good), Shoot 'Em Up (I really liked this one, fun), and Snakes on a Plane (which I just stumbled upon on cable, and I thought it was entertaining). Went for a walk with Tracy when she got back from work, writing down more addresses of properties, came back and made coconut chicken curry and sesame green beans for dinner. I worked on getting some more books onto the Sony Reader, like Ender's Game, Rainbow Six, Dragonlance Chronicles, and the Harry Potter series. Got a day off tomorrow, going to see the accountant, might try and see some more properties as well.

So, took the day off yesterday to head out and meet our accountant, Steve Piatek, for the first time. So that was good. Monday night Tracy made pork ginataang for dinner, I put together some tax forms and client information for the meeting on Tuesday, and watched Welcome to the Captain, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, and No Reservations: Jamaica. Tracy also managed to break our ceramic honing rod. Tuesday drove out to Oakbrook, had our meeting, went to get breakfast at Moondance Diner in Westmont, then did some shopping at Oakbrook Center. Hit the strip of home stores, Z Gallerie, Restoration Hardware, Pottery Barn, and Crate & Barrel. Tracy needed a belt, and picked one up from American Eagle, I got to check out the MacBook Air which is amazing, and got some baking supplies at Williams-Sonoma. Got some hot chocolate from Moonstruck Chocolate Cafe before heading back into the city for a couple some more home showings, 842 W. Aldine and 3504 N. Fremont, which is the new leader of the pack. Did some grocery shopping, Tracy made turkey sloppy joes for dinner, we watched Carpoolers and The New Adventures of Old Christine, and I ordered up a replacement ceramic honing rod. Also had to order up a replacement power supply for my firewire enclosure, which died at some point in the last couple of days. So the Apple TV transcoding is on hold. Days off during the week are great, not a lot of people out shopping during the day, or in restaurants. It's just nice and quiet. Wish I could do it more often.

Seems quiet around the city, at least during my commutes. Not so much traffic, either way. Seems odd. Last night Tracy made turkey paninis for dinner, while I made some pumpkin muffins and a loaf with the leftover batter, with our new muffin and loaf pans from Williams-Sonoma. Watched the season finale of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, or the supposed season finale, since it's the 9th of 9 filmed episodes for a 13 episode season that was completed before the the writers' strike. I like it, it's grown on me, and I want to know what happens. I am interested to see how the new trilogy of movies that are supposedly lined up factor this TV series into the equation. Dinner with the Russells, extended, at Chicago Brauhaus tonight. Headed out on Friday to Toronto with my family, extended, to visit my Auntie Mindy before she goes home to the Philippines next week. Driving, so that should be long. And just me, cause Tracy's working this weekend. So short week, but lots going on.

So left early on Friday morning, like 5am. Took the first shift driving out of Chicago, ended up somewhere in Michigan at a Denny's for breakfast and switching drivers. Finished up Neuromancer and started Ender's Game. Stopped for lunch at a Wendy's somewhere in Canada. Decided I needed to try Tim Horton's at some point before heading back to the States. Took over again just in time for rush hour in Toronto, which was slow going. Lots of snow falling, which really wouldn't let up until a couple hours before we left on Sunday morning. Greeted Auntie Mindy, and started eating. My mom brought a cooler and lots of food. Saturday we only ventured outside to go to FV Foods, a Filipino grocery store, and stocked up some more, and to go to mass. Otherwise, watched HGTV, finished up Ender's Game, and more eating. Then said goodbye, left my dad to hang out with his sister, and headed back home on Sunday morning. My mom took the first shift and drove us through one open lane on snow covered 4 lane expressways. We traded off a couple more times before I took us into Chicago. Tracy and I went out to dinner at Angelina Ristorante after she came home, then a fairly early bedtime. And now I've got a full week of work ahead of me. Not much going on this week.

Traffic seemed light yesterday, at least from my seat on the bus. Started reading Dragons of Autumn Twilight again. Hard to read that without thinking of D&D character creation, class and race modifiers, alignments and all that jazz. Tracy made steak for dinner, which we shared, and some broccoli, and some leftover baked beans in the fridge. I did some exercises, watched Eli Stone. Also started looking into trying out iPhone development, not sure why, but seems to be the hip thing to do. Trying to come up with a good idea. Figured it's a good time, since Tracy needs to be study for her Indiana license, I think, just the law part anyway, so that means less TV and more computer time at the kitchen table with her. Should be getting my replacement power supply for the firewire enclosure, so I should be back to transcoding soon. And I'll be able to sync my iPhone again, which I can't because all my media exists on server shares. Oh, tried to watch Unhitched pilot, but DVR decided to record Family Guy instead. So, I've got to get that in some format.

Met up with Tracy at Caribou Coffee on the way home from work where she was studying. Don't really spend any time in coffee shops, preferring home and a familiar couch or chair instead, but I can understand going to one to remove distractions. We ended up walking around a couple blocks, between Cornelia and Addison on Fremont and Reta, looking at buildings. Doesn't seem to be any more properties coming on the market that meet our criteria, so not sure what our next steps will be. We have a couple we want to check out, and we'll see what happens. Got my replacement power supply for the firewire enclosure, got it put back together and running, and the Mac mini back up and transcoding. Sweet. Didn't really watch anything on TV for once, Tracy made lime chicken over onions and red peppers for dinner, and that's pretty much it. I started uploading more email to my Gmail account. I started slacking on that.

Tracy's old coworkers are in town, so I'm on my own for dinner tonight. Not sure what I'm in the mood for, but we'll see. Something unhealthy, I'm sure. Last night did some exercises as did Tracy, started watching Children of Men, which I'll finish up tonight, and then she made dinner, a chicken and sweet potato gnocchi in a butternut squash sauce. We ended up watching New Amsterdam. And then a pretty early bedtime. I did flip through some show on hot dogs, which of course meant I had to get some for lunch today, which I did. Yum. Also, some movement on the real estate front, as we might start up negotiations for 907 W. Roscoe again. Something Tracy and I need to talk about. What else, weather's taken a turn for the better, and I'm sure that it'll end up snowing once more before spring sprints by and leaves us in summer. It's right around the corner. And that means I should start biking again. And actually the thought crossed my mind to go out for a run. Outside. Oh, and seeing the trailers for Speed Racer? I want to see that movie. Looks like a visual feast.

Finished up Children of Men last night, as expected. Also, transcoding of Alias finished up, and I started on The Unit. I might do some for Tracy next, maybe some Arrested Development, or some Sex and the City. Or I'll just whip through Firefly and Serenity. Either way, lots to do, and definitely might run out of disk space. All 5 seasons of Alias take up roughly 75 GB of space. That's 4 seasons of 22 episodes, and 1 season of 17, for a grand total of 105 episodes, roughly 42 minutes each, roughly 73.5 hours worth of video. Wow. Had some leftovers and some frozen pizza for dinner last night. Headed out to the Argao's tonight on the Metra, Gabe and Sania have their baby shower tomorrow. Oh, and looks like we might be putting in another offer on 907 W. Roscoe, with the seller coming down a bit, and paying some closing costs to help shorten the distance between our max buying price and the sellers min selling price. We'll see what happens there.

Taking the Metra out to Orland Park is much nicer after Daylight Savings Time; I could actually see things out the window. Like a parking lot so forgotten that trees have grown, breaking through the cement. Did some wandering around Orland Square after I got picked up by Tracy, then headed to her parents house to wait for Gabe and Sania and Mike to come with dinner, which finally ended up happening around 10:30ish. Saturday went and got my eyes checked out, they're A-OK, drove there and back via 355, which rocks. Got to take photos of the Gabe and Sania's baby shower with Gabe's digital SLR (a Canon Rebel), which rocked. Of course when I got home later that night I started looking for DSLR, especially the Sony alpha series. So put that on my Wants list. Watched my first movie in 1080p via a Sony Playstation 3 and a Bravia LCD TV, which was impressive. Had some corned beef for dinner, watched The Bourne Ultimatum. Sunday headed down to Phoenix Restaurant for dim sum with the Argaos and the Tongs, checked out a condo building under construction in Chinatown, a little shopping, then headed up and walked around Roscoe Village. Went to 2 open houses of single family homes, both out of our price range. One we couldn't get to the master bedroom because we were defeated by a child-proof gate, and the other was a $2.4 million dollar home, which was awesome. But who has an open house for a home like that? Anyway, we're gonna try and spend a little more time in that neighborhood, maybe hitting up some restaurants, maybe some Finer Things Club action. Leftovers for dinner, and we ended up watching TMNT and Anthony Bourdain: Into the Fire, which was pretty sweet. I still don't know why Kitchen Confidential got canceled. Finished up transcoding The Unit, and will start Firefly probably tonight. Of course, have to redo all the movies as well, but I'll just stick with TV for now.

So, with the WGA strike passing out of memory, there's lots of TV Shows on the DVR now. Although I can't seem to record Unhitched, only 1 of 3 successfully saved, the other 2 didn't, one recorded Family Guy instead and the other had a recording error. Ugh. Looking forward to Miss Guided, as I've read it's similar in humor to Arrested Development. Started transcoding Firefly, and just tacked on Serenity as episode 14. Tracy made corned beef hash for dinner last night, I put eggs on mine, and toast. We watched The New Adventures of Old Christine and Eli Stone. I also did some exercises. I haven't been filing up the humidifier, since it was raining last night, but I did wake up congested, so I'm thinking I should keep using the humidifier until I know the building's turned off their heat. Also, I think it's Spring Break, because it doesn't seem as busy commuting or in the Loop. I've also started using hellotxt to update both my Facebook and twitter statuses at the same time. Just for fun.

Pretty quiet and standard evening last night. Watched Jamie at Home and New Amsterdam. Tracy made a pork stir fry for dinner. She studied some more, I working on more transcoding, now doing season 3 of NewsRadio for Tracy. Finished up Firefly, and started adding them to iTunes. I did end up using more gift certificates at the iTunes Store for Mad Men and It Happened One Night/It Never Happened At All by John Wesley Harding. Did some dishes. That's about it. Might have some movement on the real estate front, just need some more discussion. I do get to make dinner tonight though, since Tracy needs to study more for the Indiana Boards which she's taking tomorrow. I'm going for an old standby, mushroom stuffed chicken breasts, roasted tomatoes, maybe some green beans for a veggie. So that's exciting. Also since Tracy's studying, that means no TV tonight. Also realized that we need more light in our dining room/living room.

Dinner was good last night, and I still can cook. Mushroom stuffed chicken breasts are one of my few, if not only dish, I can cook without a recipe. Only got to watch How I Met Your Mother with dinner. Otherwise, spent some time adding information to the Alias, Firefly, and The Unit episodes I have in iTunes. Doing that made me realize that I'm missing the first episode of Firefly and one episode of Alias Season 3. I think in my script I'm not correctly checking minimum run time of DVD chapters when checking which ones to transcode. Ideally, you only want the episodes to transcode, not any featurettes which are usually much shorter than episodes. But I probably don't handle episodes over an hour well. Hmm, I'll have to look into that. I'm also having issues with NewsRadio, as some episodes are ballooning in size, and Handbrake seems to crash more than usual. So I may end up just doing those manually. I did get to ride in to work this morning with Tracy, and we got to have lunch together at One North Kitchen and Bar.

So we put another offer down on 907 W. Roscoe last night, and while we were signing it at Caribou Coffee, Adam heard from Rick (Seller's Agent) that someone else was putting a bid in. We went ahead and put ours in anyway. And we did not get it. So, moving on. I did get to leave work early yesterday to take care of that, so that was a bonus. Tracy eventually made dinner, after her chiro appointment (with massage). She had a craving for pesto. Watched Kickin It Old Skool while she was away, then Miss/Guided and The Big Bang Theory with and after dinner. Made Jell-O for Tracy. She thinks it's an Easter food, and I disagree. I don't automatically think of Jell-O during any particular holiday season. Also, it's Easter this weekend. Tracy's working, so I don't have a car to drive out to Woodstock, and the weather's not so good, even though it's Spring, so my parents aren't coming in to the city, so that means a nice quiet Easter sunday. And, since Tracy's working, I'll be able to watch a bunch of movies this weekend. Although I don't really have a whole lot on the DVR, just Hot Fuzz.

Friday night, last Lenten Friday, ordered some sushi and stuff from Chen's, watched Eli Stone. Pretty low key. Saturday started 5 loads of laundry when Tracy went off to work. Watched Hot Fuzz], which I liked, and Shooter, which was OK. Made myself SPAMsilog for lunch, and Tracy made turkey chili for lunch. Watched New Amsterdam with dinner. Sunday cleaned up a bit before taking the bus to the train out to Woodstock for my mom's Easter Lunch, and then got a ride from my Ate Joy back to the train station, then the bus until I got home. Ended up spent more time traveling than actually at home in Woodstock. But good nonetheless. Made it home about 5 minutes before Tracy walked in the door. Had some leftovers for dinner, watched Keeping the Faith, Unhitched, The New Adventures of Old Christine, and Miss/Guided. Also have been keeping track of Scandal at Paganello this year, and congrats to them, as long as the results reporting on the website is official, but Akira finally managed to bring home the umbrella, on his 9th try. That's awesome. Not completely sure of the roster, but Akira's the only original member at 9 times, Bjorn I think comes in 2nd at 8 times going. I was there when it started, and it's awesome to see something I was a part of in the beginning, finally reach the top, even if I'm 5 years removed. Congrats to them.

Nothing exciting going on. Did my exercises last night. Leftovers for dinner. Watched New Amsterdam and How I Met Your Mother. Working on ripping Las Vegas (tv show) for transcoding to Apple TV. Trying to figure out which episode I'm missing for Alias Season 3 and which episodes are dupes in Season 2. Also, the issue I had with transcoding NewsRadio was because the first title plays all episodes on the disc, so I was transcoding a 3 hours of all episodes plus each individual episode. Oh, I have decided to start using Flickr again, instead of Gallery. Upgraded to a pro account, got FlickrExport, uploaded some older Paganello photos. Still have to figure out how to integrate it well with Daily Dose. Being back on flickr means I can email photos directly to my gallery, which means I am more likely to post photos again. Even better would be when an iPhone Flickr client comes out, whenever that happens. Also think I've finally figured out my problems uploading local archived email to my Google Apps IMAP account: take the account offline in Mail.app, copy the messages over, then bring the account back online. Seems to work, but I started it when I left this morning, so I'll know more when I get back. But my %used keeps going up on Gmail, now at 2630 MB (40%) of my 6551 MB. When it's all said and done, I'll have online email archives available back to June 1997. Awesome.

Still waiting on some sort of news/writeup on the Scandal Paganello win. I will have to try out Blockstack.tv coverage tonight though, as they actually cover it. However, people are probably just getting back into town today, so maybe they'll be some writeups in the next couple of days. Finished up Dragons of Winter Night on the bus home last night, started up Dragons of Spring Dawning. No idea if I'll keep up with the Dragonlance reading with Legends, or just give up and start riding my bike to work again. That'll happen eventually. Leftovers for dinner last night. Watched New Amsterdam, The Big Bang Theory (which doesn't seem quite as funny anymore, but nice to have Rent play a part), and some Real Estate shows. Almost done ripping Las Vegas (tv show), which means I can start transcoding them soon, all 4 seasons. The trick to upload large quantities of email to Google Apps seems to work OK, but it chokes on some random emails. Probably did 16K yesterday, another 12K today. And I still have lots more to do. Also got a snail mail flyer for Toast of the Town, a wine tasting at the Field Museum on May 1, 7-10pm. Already bought our tickets, should be fun. A little expensive, but always cool to drink wine while walking around a museum. Oh, and we'll be participating in Earth Hour on Saturday, March 29, at 8pm. See Earth Hour Chicago for more details.

Did a quick grocery shopping on the way home from work yesterday and only picked up one impulse buy: popsicles. Just had a craving. Gotta satisfy it. Otherwise, did some exercises, watched Top Chef, I think for the first time, mainly because it was set in Chicago this season. I like it better than Hell's Kitchen, at least after 1 episode. Tracy made chicken adobo for dinner, which I had leftovers for lunch. Otherwise, watched some more real estate shows. Speaking of which, we're checking out a couple other places tonight with Adam, one around the corner from Sai Cafe at 2041 N. Bissel and another way up there in Ravenswood/Lincoln Square at 4842 N. Damen. Gonna keep looking. Read a pretty good article on real estate in the neighborhoods we're looking in. Oh, and it snowed, is snowing, will continue to snow. Awesome. Watched the blockstack.tv coverage of Paganello, and there wasn't enough Scandal to satisfy me. Weather did look pretty bad though.

Ok, so passing on the places we looked at yesterday. Eh. We do have an open house at 3519 N. Fremont to go to on Sunday, from 11am-1pm. So hopefully that one we'll like. The only issue with the Fremont ones is the proximity to Wrigley Field, or whatever they're gonna call it. Ended up having dinner in Roscoe Village, at Restaurant El Tinajon, a cute little Guatemalan place. Not bad. Gotta play the lottery tonight, Mega Millions is up to 113 million. That would broaden the real estate search a bit. Lisa and Ryan are in town this weekend, and Tracy and I get to play chauffeur and pick up Lisa from O'Hare tonight. Tracy had to find someplace for a bunch of us to go tomorrow night, and eventually came down to Mystic Celt, over on Southport. Should be good. Hopefully not too busy. Other than that, got a haircut tomorrow morning. Might go out and get preapproval for a loan, someplace local this time.

Out and about for a good part of the weekend. Friday night did some exercises, Tracy made some roast chicken for dinner, we watched Eli Stone before picking up Lisa from the airport and bringing her down to the Hilton Chicago to meet up with Ryan and have a couple drinks at the Lakeside Green Lounge. Saturday got a haircut, then we wandered down to Macy's to spend the giftcard that was expiring. It was actually a little hard being forced to spend money like that, looking for things to buy. After a short nap at home, we met up with Jespy, Lisa, and Missy at Coobah for dinner, before heading over to Smart Bar where Ryan and eventually Tony and Carlo joined us as well for drinks and dancing. Ended up at Pick Me Up Cafe for a late night snack, before walking home. I tried to keep up with hellotxt and Flickr. Sunday, wandered about checking out open houses: 3519 N. Fremont (same old same old, but bad kitchen peninsula), 3518 N. Reta (older duplex up, out of price range), 550 W. Wellington 7W (super fancy well decorated out of price range), and 717 W. Briar Pl. (loftish needs some work). Had lunch at The Bagel, Tracy got some cheese from Pastoral, and I got another nap in. Worked some more with Mint.com. Tracy made a roasted lamb shank for dinner with some beans. Oh, and like Saturday night, completely spaced on Earth Hour. We didn't have our lights on, but at the same time, had no idea that the lights went off. Oh well.