Weekend. Here. Yay. Got the pumpkin off the upstairs deck. Only 4 months late? It was actually frozen in place the last time I tried, so with all the warmup and the rain I figured it was a good time to get it off. So that worked. It's in a bag, along with the garbage that's been sitting up there since October, but I think that was mostly ashes from the grill. Tracy's working this weekend, so I've got some chores to do at home. Still chugging away on DVD transcodes, up to Fast Times at Ridgemont High. Hoping we'll actually get up to E-Town tomorrow to see little Gavin and the Russells. Otherwise, can't think of anything, or anywhere to go for the weekend. Should be nice and quiet.

Played Wii Sports last night. Almost a pro in tennis and bowling. Still not all that consistent in bowling. Kind of annoying. As much as I prize consistency, I can't perform physical motions consistently. Definitely annoying. Oh, and went to mass for Ash Wednesday. Showed up 30 minutes early, service took an hour and a half, so I didn't get home until 8ish. Kind of surprised at how busy it was. Ended up eating cucumber sandwiches and some cream of mushroom soup for dinner. Watched Mythbusters: MacGyver edition. Got to put the closet back together. Today got to wear my waterproof socks on the way home, since I still don't have my waterproof boots yet. Worked like a charm. Closet is definitely fixed, no leaks there, but only one window seems to have a leak. So that's good, and just a little bad. Did some Urbanathlon training, watched Dan in Real Life, Tracy made skirt steak, asparagus and guacamole for dinner. Also going to scrape the pumpkin off the roof deck.

Looks like our closet is all fixed. So that's good. Lent arrived. So it's all about finding non meat stuffs to eat on Fridays. Last night worked out after a couple week hiatus. Of course I'm sore today. Watched Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice. Also made some phone calls to family members. Also cleared out that closet for the workers today. Also tried out Safari 4 Beta. I'm a fan. The only thing I still don't like? Using the keyboard command 'v' in Google Reader opens the link in a new window, at least on Windows, and you can do a single window trick on OS X so the link opens in a new tab, except the tab comes to the front. There's options on Google Chrome and Firefox that make it a lot more usable. I like to go through Google Reader opening interesting items up in the background, and after finishing, go through the opened links. Oh well. But it's good enough I think. So I'm using it.

Happy birthday to my brother and a happy anniversary to my parents! If you can't figure it out, February's always been a pretty busy month. But at least now most of the family holidays are out of the way, except for my mom's birthday in June. Picked up a couple more bottles from Kafka on the way home. I think I'm done until we need more. Picked up the Wii again, first time in a couple weeks again. Not good. Leftovers for dinner, watched Bones. Also noticed a little dripping from the ceiling in the closet by the kitchen. Jerry's gonna come in tomorrow to take a look. He thinks it's probably from where they added the gas line to the roof. Hopefully that's all it is.

Metra'd it out to Orland Park Friday night, got picked up by Tracy, picked up one of her parent's cars, convoyed up to Lisle to drop her car off for service, then headed over to Red Lobster for dinner. Got home, watched Babe. Saturday Tracy went to the gym, I had breakfast, started watching Daredevil Director's Cut, then after she got back, we went out to pick up her car, return her parents, and then went shopping at Orland Square. Finally got a pair of brown shoes, Keen Austins. Also got another birthday present, the KitchenAid Pasta Roller Attachment Set. So I got to make fresh past for dinner. Which was a little plain, and a little too thin. But it's really easy to do. Wonder how many times we'll have to have pasta in order to recoup the cost of the rollers. Also, next time have to add a little flavor, since I don't have access to farm fresh eggs or super awesome Italian flour. Watched Eagle Eye after dinner. I liked it. Sunday after mass lounged about, watched Fool's Gold, then headed out for a boys night dinner at The Publican. Awesome. Need to go back and bring the wife. Didn't make it out to Woodstock Saturday night because of weather travel advisories.

Just found out there's an easy way to add comments using Facebook's Connect technology. Intriguing. Of course, what would be the point if no one comments. Which is entirely possible, considering an average readership of 14 per day. Well, take myself out of that, maybe both home and at work, and that goes down to 12. Which I think is still a little surprising. I'll just throw it on the list of items. Another web site I'm trying to use is Daytum (my displays). A little annoyed at the limit of 6 data sets, and tempted to just roll my own, but it still takes an effort to remember. At least I can use Twitter via SMS to update it. See how long that sticks around. Speaking of Twitter, just found out that @hotdougs is on there. Of course, reading the specials just makes me sad that I don't go there nearly as often as I wish. Tried making Shepherd's Pie for dinner last night, failed blandly. Not enough seasoning, not enough cooking, removed too much fat from the pan. Disappointing. Ended up watching Top Secret! since it was on, and amusing to see Val Kilmer's first feature film. Headed out to the 'burbs tonight so Tracy can drop off her car, then we can catch dinner out there. We'll come back in and head back out tomorrow to pick it up hopefully, and also make a run out to Woodstock to see my parents. Mom heads off to the Philippines next Thursday for a while. Also got a boys dinner on Sunday at The Publican, looking forward to that.

Still February. Cold this morning on the walk to the Belmont El stop. Should have gone with the leg warmers, but didn't remember. Caught the Purple Line down, got off at Merchandise Mart because I wanted breakfast from Specialty's. More walking. In the cold. But worth it. Last night had the meeting with Jason and after then watched The New Adventures of Old Christine.

Today's my dad's birthday, so a Happy Birthday to him. Yesterday, on my birthday, I got langonisa and tomatoes and eggs over rice for dinner, watched part II of the Grey's Practice/Private Anatomy giant crossover. Seriously, it's getting to be a little difficult figuring out which tv show I'm actually watching, with 4 characters jumping from one show to the other. Wow. Slightly entertaining, and odd trying to figure out how that group of doctors know each other, I think there was a college reference, but if that's true I'm surprised they all ended up as doctors if they didn't go to the same medical school or do residencies near each other. Maybe it's just a New York thing. Eh. Went out for lunch at Poag Mahone's for a belated birthday work outing. Good burger. And it's snowing again. And it's still February.

Stopped by Gap on the way home from work last night. I was having second thoughts about the v-neck sweater sale they were having, and wanted to check them out. And since they didn't have any orange ones left, I decided to pass. I did manage to pick up another 2 bottles of wine at Kafka, since it was a Monday. Maybe 1 or 2 more weeks and we'll be good for a long while. Threw in a load of laundry, Tracy made chicken marsala, watched Dollhouse and House, got a birthday call from Jenkins. Tried to do a little more work on rewriting musings. Still have to gather information for our meeting with Jason tomorrow. Turned off my wall posting on my Facebook account for the day, as I didn't want it getting cluttered. I'll turn it back on tomorrow.

Completely missed an update on Friday. Oh well. Thursday night watched some Scrubs, Tracy made chicken adobo for dinner. Friday nothing too interesting. Finished Debt of Honor and started Heat (book). Watched 30 Rock and a couple episodes of Smallville. Saturday got a haircut, tried to get tickets online to the Elton John/Billy Joel concert at Wrigley this summer and failed horribly. Went shopping, stopped by a Dick's Sporting Goods so Tracy could get some swimming gear, then up to Old Orchard. Got some socks, a jacket on sale, and a French press. Then dinner, and I got to make dessert, a chocolate souffle with Earl Grey custard sauce. Souffles were overcooked, but the sauce was pretty good. Tracy made a rack of lamb for dinner, braised leeks, roasted grape tomatoes and mashed beans. Sunday she worked, so I was on my own. Cleaned the kitchen, folded some clothes, did some work for work. Fairly uneventful. French presses are awesome. I did manage to break one of our bowls when it slipped and I hit the counter with it.

So not so much with the headache today. I think it was sinus congestion related. However, I did have an achy neck today. Interesting. Pretty low key last night. Ended up watching Definitely, Maybe, had some leftovers for dinner. Upgraded to a new version of eReader for the iPhone. Has themes now, and I use the Aluminum one, makes it look like a paperback. And now Debt of Honor is getting to the good parts. The economic activities from the book are very apropos for today's financial situation. It's rather interesting. Ride in to work was ok. Had to wait for the 3rd train, since the 1st was taken out of service at Belmont due to defective equipment, the 2nd had all the passengers from the 1st, and the 3rd had empty seats. Love the El.

Struggling right now with a monster headache. Wondering if it's caffeine related, since I skipped having coffee today. Hope I'm not that addicted to it. Last night there were some Loop switching problems on the El, so it took me a while to get home. Of course, announcements weren't all that helpful. First announcement maybe 5 minutes after I get onto the packed platform at Washington/Wells: There was a switching problem that's been fixed but all trains are running normal. Packed Purple Line goes by. Trains take a long time leaving the station, and stand waiting to get into the station. And then at least 2 Purple Lines go by on the outer track. And still no announcement. Maybe 30-40 minutes later, a Purple Line comes by and they start making announcements about Purples on the outside track, and that there's a backlog of trains that they're working on fixing because of the previous switching problems. Nice. Anyway, Tracy made a grilled chicken and asparagus salad for dinner, and we sat and watched the first part of the Grey's Practice and Private Anatomy crossover two parter. Oh, and stuck a load of laundry in. So I've got socks again.

Got official versions of Tom Clancy Debt of Honor, Executive Orders, and Rainbow Six. I was reading an OCR'd version, which was annoying in spots. The official legal version? So much better, and so worth rebuying it as an ebook. I think I'll have to rebuy some of my physical books that I had rebought as Sony Reader DRM ebooks. Of course, if the new Whispersync part of the new Kindle means a Kindle reader for the iPhone because available, I might have to rebuy again as Kindle books. DRM is just awesome. Almost forgot yesterday was wine Monday, until I walked by Kafka on the way home. Picked up another red and white, and just have 2 more reds before we're pretty well stocked. Of course, I can't remember the last time we actually drank some wine at home, but it's good to have some handy, just in case. Watched Bones and Scrubsx2. The ukulele player (Kate Micucci) was absolutely adorable. I'll probably end up getting her EP off iTunes Store at some point. Need to do some laundry tonight, since I'm out of socks. I could just buy some, and I need to, since I have to throw out every other pair because of the holes that form.

Another weekend in Vegas down. Good food, good family, good times. I think I did an ok job updating Brightkite. I do not like how there were multiples of some locations, so on the way back I checked in at 3 different McCarren Airports. Thought there was a women's college ultimate team on the flight out with us on Thursday, but not sure. One had a backpack with a frisbee, another had cleats on her backpack. I think there was the Notre Dame ultimate team at the airport throwing around in camo, while we waited for our bag. Line for taxis wasn't so bad. Checked in, nice suite at The Venetian, chatted with the parents for a little, then searched out some food. A bunch of places were closing the kitchens for the night around 10, but we snuck in to The Grill at Valentino under the deadline. Not much going on afterwards, got some gelato at Espressamente Illy, where Tracy got some peanuts in her hazelnut, and we had to track down some Benadryll for her. Friday, slept in, met up with Al and Nicole after they arrived and had lunch at Enoteca San Marco. Played a little family craps at The Palazzo, the Tracy and I went shopping at Fashion Show Mall, since I needed an outfit for dinner at Morels French Steakhouse & Bistro. Finally saw why they call it Fashion Show Mall. After dinner, played some slots with the family at The Palazzo, before heading out to watch the fountains and have a drink at Bellagio. Tracy was tempted to smoke a cigar, but we never got around to it. Maybe next time. Saturday wandered around Wynn Las Vegas for a bit before brunch at Bouchon, then mass, then going down the strip. Family gambled, Tracy and I walked around. At Bellagio, got drinks at Fix, then dinner at the buffet. Over to Paris Las Vegas, then back to The Venetian, attempting to find other places to have some cocktails. David Burke, not so good. Didn't want to venture outside anymore because it was warmer and drier in Chicago on Saturday than it was in Las Vegas. Sunday, Tracy got a massage, checked out, and lunch at Canaletto with Al and Nicole, since my parents had already left. Arrived at the airport 3 hours early, and with no long lines to check bags or in security, had 3 hours before flight. UIC softball team was flying back on the same Southwest flight. Got some White Castle on the way home from Midway for dinner. So busy. And now back to the grind.

First off, congrats to the Russells on the birth of their son, Gavin! Nice job! Next to that news, I've really got nothing. Went over to the old home after work yesterday, just to check on things. Leftovers for dinner. Watched House and The Big Bang Theory before packing. Ended up using the bigger suitcase, since we don't have multiple smaller ones. So I was "that guy" on the El with the bright blue suitcase. Headed out on Southwest 347 this afternoon to Vegas. Staying at The Venetian with the family. Again, not sure if I'll get around to posting while I'm gone. No laptop, just the iPhone. I will try and check in at Brightkite. And post photos to Flickr.

Had a nice quiet night last night. Needed it. Was a little out of it. Did some chores that have been building for a couple days, dishes and folding laundry. Tracy made salisbury turkey steaks and mashed beans and green beans for dinner. Watched Private Practice and How I Met Your Mother. Thought about packing. Because we're headed to Las Vegas tomorrow night for a long weekend with my family. Hard to believe, but I think the last time I was there was for my bachelor party in 2007, and the last time I was there with just family was in 2006. So the Abandos in Vegas is long overdue. So gotta pack for that tonight. Just about time too, as the weather in Chicago got a lot colder after the weekend.

Went out for our first date anniversary last night at Angelina Ristorante. Bottles of wine where half off, which was nice. Dinner was good, and brought leftovers for lunch today. Of course, wasn't in any condition to gather more financial documentation, so we pushed up the meeting with Jason for a couple weeks. Kind of slacked with cleaning the last couple of days. So I've got to work on that. Oh, and Comcast doesn't carry The Travel Channel so I couldn't record the episode of Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations Chicago that aired last night. I'll just have to buy it off iTunes Store. I did read a little about it and seeing some photos of the restaurant makes me want to go to L2O.

Groundhog day. Again. Weekend was mostly full. Friday night went and picked up some Crisp carryout for dinner, even though I went there for lunch on Saturday with Karl. Caught up on Heroes. Saturday morning had breakfast with my parents and friends at their condo, and sat and talked for a bit, before heading down for lunch. Ended up at Red Hen Bread for coffee and met up with Bender and Sara. And then over to erehwon to pick up Tracy's boots and some gloves and say hello to Russell. And then I came home. So for a Saturday when Tracy's working and I'm usually couch bound, I spent the whole day out and about. Leftovers for dinner and watched Smart People. Sunday was a usual weekend day, spamsilog for breakfast, watched Hellboy II: The Golden Army. Went to mass, went shopping, looking for shoes, didn't find any, got some t-shirts on sale at The Gap. Got home, leftovers for lunch, watched Death Race, which I really liked. Vacuumed. Watched the Super Bowl with the white bean chicken chili Tracy had made the night before and finished up with The Office that had me, at times, rolling on the floor laughing. And yes, I typed the entire phrase out. Best/most memorable commercial for me: the one where the insects steal the Coke bottle.