Well we decided against the house in Middletown after running into an absolute gem out in PA.
It’ll add a few miles to the daily commute, but the cost of living in PA is insanely low compared to New York. Still some details to hammer out, but hopefully by March we’ll be in our new house!
The year I put snow-tires on my car, it didn’t snow – and I managed to wreck the thing on black ice.
This year so far, it’s been a fairly typical winter (read: it snowed).
So when the weather reports called for snow last night and today, I was hoping to use my new 4×4.
Yes, it snowed, but it wasn’t nearly cold enough to make it stick on the roads – and we didn’t really get much. BAH!
Well we signed off on the ‘official offer’ on the house yesterday and took our favorite contractor for a walk through to see if any dealbreakers really stood out. Besides a few trouble spots and a roof that might need a new set of shingles in the spring – the place got a fairly clean bill of health. Next up, should the offer be accepted – is to have an actual licensed home inspector go through and give us a report.
If all goes well, in the next month or two, we’ll be in our very own house! WOOT!
After watching season 1 of Battlestar Galactica as well as the miniseries and part of season 2.0… I’m wondering.
In an all out hand to hand battle, who would win – a Cylon Centurion or a Terminator T-800 (the Arnold looking model).
Personally, I think the average T-800 could wipe the floor with just about every Cylon model out there. They’ve got thicker, heavier armor and are generally more efficient when it comes to destruction as opposed to the Cylon’s who simply start shooting at everything in sight.
What do you think?
My latest ride, an ’89 Chevy Silverado Z71 is affectionately called Bessie. That’s right, I’ve got a Chevy. I figured with the plan developing to get a house, as well as regular car rentals, all adding up to benefiting from the convenience of a second vehicle – when I saw Bessie go up for sale, I had to have it.
She needs some work, a few of the dashboard functions aren’t working, the front struts are shot, and there’s a little more rust than I’m comfortable with – but she’ll get me from A to B. As time proceeds I’ll work to restore the Bessie from Beater to BEATER so she’ll be in better shape than when she left the assembly line back in ’89. At least this one is registered, insured, and drivable unlike my ‘ol Buick ~sniff~.
Speaking of homes, we’ve made an offer on a home outside of Middletown, NY. ~fingers crossed~. We’re both sick of renting, me more than ever. Wish us luck
On a trip to Great Britain while he was President of the United States , Bill Clinton had a meeting with Queen Elizabeth. During that meeting he asked her, “How does one manage to run a country so smoothly?”
“That’s easy,” the Queen replied, “You surround yourself with intelligent ministers and advisors.”
“But how can I tell whether they are intelligent or not?”, asked Bill.
You ask them a riddle,” she replied, and with that she pressed a button and said, “Would you please send Tony Blair in.” When Blair arrived, the Queen said, “I have a riddle for you to answer for me.
Your parents had a child and it was not your sister and it was not your brother. Who was this child?”
Blair replied, “That’s easy. The child was me.”
“Very good,” said the Queen. “You may go now.”
Sizing up his wife’s chances in her presidential bid, and thinking back on that meeting, Bill Clinton spoke to Hillary. He said to her, “I have a riddle for you, and the answer is very important. Your parents had a child and it was not your sister and it was not your brother. Who was that child ?”
Hillary replied, “Yes, it is clearly very important that we determine the answer. Can I deliberate on this for awhile?”
“Yes,” said Bill, “I’ll give you four hours to come up with the answer.”
So Hillary called a meeting of her campaign team, from top to bottom, and asked them the riddle. But after much discussion and many suggestions, none of them had a satisfactory answer. She was quite upset, not knowing what she would tell her husband, the former President. As Hillary was leaving her meeting she ran into her most formidable challenger to her presidential nomination, Barack Obama.
So she said, “Mr. Obama, can you answer this riddle for me? Your parents had a child and it was not your sister and it was not your brother. Who was the child?”
“That’s seems pretty easy,” said Obama, “I think the child would be me.”
“Oh thank you,” said Hillary. “You may just have ensured my nomination for the democratic candidate for the Presidency of the United States !” So Hillary went back to Bill and said, “I think I know the answer to your riddle.
The child was Barack Obama!”
“No, you Dummy!” shouted Bill. “The child was Tony Blair!”
I’m in the market to buy my own house. I’m not exactly rich, neither myself or my fiancee’ are, but we’re working to make it happen. Several real estate agencies provide some rather nice search tools which allow varied access to the MLS – a database of all available local properties. I’ve got a pre-approval in my hand, one more on the way, an idea of what I want and an eagerness to get the ball rolling.
Now I’d already worked with one local realtor, a small independent shop, to locate rentals. When that didn’t pan out after checking maybe a dozen rentals, we decided to go house hunting. I considered working with the same realtor until we ran into her at the supermarket and she quickly pulled a 180. Good to know the housing market is booming enough to be picky.
So I figure I’ll try the one the big name recommended. After finally getting a hold of her a few weeks back, I send her a list of houses, a pre-approval, and then we make an appointment. Nothing is available right now of course, so we wait until after the new year. The day before the appointment, it’s cancelled. This new realtor is still processing emails, and doing other things, but the appointment has been cancelled with no attempt made to reschedule.
So I contact her… And contact her… and contact her yet again. Finally she says “I’ll call you back after this meeting.” No callback. No return email. Next day I get in touch again, first she asks what my schedule is like, and then refers me to an entirely different broker. At this point, unbenounced to me 5 of the 8 houses I wanted to look at are no longer available. 4 weeks of communicating with someone, and I’m no closer to even looking at a house.
I decided to end that relationship as well. We’re now on to realtor #3, who works with a very small independent agency and hopefully will be showing me some homes tomorrow, as well as assisting us to move the process along. While I understand that the process could take a few months, the fact is – if I find a house for sale I want to look at it as soon as possible. If you’re going to cancel my appointment for anything short of death, you RESCHEDULE. One thing I’ve learned about sales is, you either want the sale or you don’t. Obviously I’ve run into a string of salespeople who don’t particularly care to do their job. Maybe it’s because I’m not in the market for a half million dollar home, maybe it’s because I’m young, I don’t care. I’ve got money to spend and a need to fulfill. Hopefully 3rd is the charm.
Wish me luck.
EA is a big company. Much bigger than it was when I first started playing NFS titles. It started out with near unattainable supercars on the open roads and eventually got to the point of normal cars modified to race on the open streets. Maybe the switch is a result of fear? After all, this game starts with the customary disclaimer – but you’re racing on a track now. They can’t be accused of promoting illegal street racing anymore. All I know is that games should be a release from reality… if they have to become more real to avoid liability – then what’s the point… I’ll just play Scrabble.
I did play Pro Street for a couple more hours last night, I’ll admit it is fun – but it’s not as fun as I recall the older titles being. The money aspect still pisses me off as well. The big thing with PC games, is that they allowed developers to put out sloppy code which was eventually refined through various patches. Consoles offered a reprieve from that because they did not contain any mechanism for updates. You bought the game, and it generally worked right the first time. Now with the online revolution and the major systems all offering permanent storage, developers are again in the position of offering incomplete games that can be updated… Only now you get CHARGED for it.
I’ll admit, I’ve used Xbox Live Marketplace to purchase various arcade titles, and even an update for Crackdown… There’s no incentive to use it unless one owns a game, and with the popularity of rentals growing each day due to the $60 price tag – there’s something to consider in offering the updates for FREE, or just including them in the title to begin with. I can’t imagine the income from a few new cars being enough to justify further shafting the worlds gamers.
What a crying shame.
I’ve been a fan of the Need for Speed series ever since the original came out in the early 90s. Fast cars, great controls, and cutting edge graphics. NFS has always offered the pinnacle of arcade racing on whichever system they release it on, without question. Why they decided to abandon what has worked well for so long is beyond me.
Originally, you got a fast car, a long track, and some in your face racing that sometimes attracted the police. The long, graphically breathtaking tracks slowly gave way to street racing. No complaint here, as the street racing brought back the police chase – one of the most FUN aspects of any NFS title. Then, EA decided to turn the lights on. No more night time racing, you were back in the light of day and the tracks ranged from the tight corners of a city to the long high speed routes of the back country. Then we’re back in the dark again. Who cares, we’ve got the best of both worlds. Open roads, street racing, near infinite customization options, and high speed chases.
What happened? Why change it? Pro Street puts you on real tracks in customizable rides. The physics are far closer to any simulation on the market, and instead of different routes through dynamic worlds, the player is left running laps on the same. tracks. over. and. over. again.
That was the greatest weakness of pretty much every sim racer since Gran Turismo 1 for the Playstation, and why Need For Speed was so fantastic! Instead of a seemingly neverending rerun of the same tracks with newer and faster cars, where the only way to win a game is to give up life if you can stay awake, you had a game with a GOAL. Win races, customize your rides, and after some intense play – GAME OVER. Pro Street has left me scared for the future of solid arcade style racing on the 360.
Instead of breaking the mold and setting new standards, EA has provided us with another plug and play GT clone with marginally better graphics than most other titles in the genre. Is the game fun? Sure. It’s not nearly as fun as Carbon or other NFS titles, it requires more attention, more control, and is more real than a NFS game should be. Not to mention the idiotic load times, pointless cinematics, and the option to upgrade your cars and buy new ones with Microsoft points… I’m INSULTED. Who the hell is dumb enough to buy a virtual turbo on a throwaway car with REAL MONEY!? You charge $60 for a title and then ask for more to give us the whole game we should be playing to begin with?
Total load of crap. I give this another day or so before I send it back and play Carbon or Most Wanted. Those are real NFS games… I don’t know what Pro Street is, but it’s not Need For Speed.
Just got back from Sweeny Todd – The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. I’m fairly impressed – but the elbows on Tim Burton’s favorite outfit are starting to thin out. I get it – he is most comfortable directing certain actors, and his wife. Johnny Depp’s performance was top notch, as was every performance in the flick… but Burton is getting blurry.
From the opening credits where we get a blood soaked tour of Todd’s death chair and portion of the London sewer system – I could only imagine replacing the blood with Chocolate and finding myself immediately confused. He’s got a certain style to him – and it’s getting a little old.
All that aside, I was introduced to the story of Sweeny Todd nearly 10 years ago – since I hate musicals with a passion I probably never would have looked at it without being told to. I loved it. It’s an epic tragedy that’d make Bill Shakespeare blush.
Blood, guts, and gore abound the set as Todd exacts revenge and Carter bakes her delicious meat pies. Short of having sprayers in the theater to add extra stink, sweat, and blood – the story could not have been made more vivid, or dark.
That’s Tim Burton tho, he makes everything vividly predictable.
Can ya sense I don’t care much for Burton yet? Dislike for his rambling redundancy aside – it is a great story, and it was told very well despite Burton’s influence. I highly suggest that anyone interested in seeing this film rent a copy of the 1982 made for TV performance starring George Hearn and Angela Lansbury – it’s a classic (not the first, I know – but the best in my opinion).
Burton’s is just another remake. Worth a watch, but generally forgettable.
