What's new in your world?

February, huh? Yeah, it's been a little while. And even that was sort of cheating. December before that. Wowsers!

Life has been a little bit busy lately, and I haven't really been sitting around at the computer blogging, reading blogs, or hanging around facebook. Sorry if you all feel neglected, it was not my intent. 

The big news since the last post is that I am a freshly-minted husband. I have the jewelry to prove it. Married life has been great so far. I'm no longer the only person who feeds and walks the dog (Mac), the cooking has more variety, and most importantly of all, I now have half the closet and dresser space I used to have. It's my way of working on the simple life. ;-)

The other cool thing that I did recently was play 7 games of softball in 2 days. I played in a church league tournament this past Saturday, and we ended up playing 5 games that day: 9:00 am, 11:00 am, 1:00 pm, 2:00 pm, and 3:00 pm. Whew! Then I had my normal double-header on Sunday  night as well. It was a ton of fun, but I got some nice sunburn on my face, neck, and arms. Oh, and my legs were just a tad sore...

I hope to be a little more regular in posting again, but don't get your hopes up yet Dan on a daily schedule. Baby steps.

DotD: Free MacBook Pro battery. Okay, so it's not for everyone, but my laptop has been acting strangely when running off of the battery recently. It would be fully charged and then after about 20 minutes on the battery, it would just shut off with no warning. It's only about 1.5 years old, and I don't use it every day or anything, so the battery should be just fine. I took it into the Apple Store today, they confirmed that the battery was defective, and gave me a brand new battery right on the spot for free. They never even asked me for paperwork or anything, other than to sign the form saying they performed the work and I owed nothing. Sweet!

New Job(s)

This past Friday was my last day at Teradyne. I'm officially unemployed for about 3 weeks until October 22, when I start at my new job at Logic Product Development. Why three weeks? TEC, of course! I really wanted to work this particular TEC for a number of reasons, and since I was fortunate enough to sneak onto the team through the back door, I wasn't going to give it up. I wanted a little time off between jobs since I haven't really had much time off while saving up vacation for the wedding. So, I could either start at Logic, work a couple of days, and then have to burn my only vacation for the rest of the year for TEC, or start after TEC and enjoy a few weeks off. Granted, it's without pay, but I think it will be worth it. The downside is that my first day is now the first day after a TEC weekend, so I'm going to have to grab every last possible minute of sleep I can find during the weekend. Hopefully I can count on a particular Rector to help me out with some of his own bedtime stories, so I can fall asleep faster. ;-)

One interesting twist to this is that in the process of looking for a new job, I got to interview with Bob. No, not just Bob's company, but Bob herself. At my previously mentioned introduction to High Society, at the hands of Bob herself, she mentioned that her group was looking to hire. This was part of our computer geek conversion mentioned in that post. That was probably the weirdest, yet most fun interview I've ever done. I was both relaxed, since it was Bob, and yet not too relaxed, since she had a cohort with her for the interview. However, in the end, Bob's influence and bribes were not enough to overcome the lack of some specific skills and experience that they really wanted for that position. I am no longer speaking to Bob. Well, except for this past Sunday, next Sunday, the Sunday after that.... ;-)

I would like to point out that this was the first time I've ever applied for a position and not been offered the job. And it was all Bob's fault! Never again will I listen to her lies and deceit! Or something like that. ;-)  Actually, the recruiter from her company said the feedback from the interview process was really positive and they thought I would be a great fit for the company, but just not for that position. Which is just dandy. But in the end, I decided that without the special draws of that position in particular, the commute to Eden Prairie from Andover was going to be a bit much (probably about an hour each way, a little longer in the evening), and the Logic position was still a possibility. So, in the end, I chose not to work in the same building as Bob, as crazy as that sounds. I'm not sure that company was ready for the two of us in the same city at the same time anyway.

So, why the potential plural in the post title? I just found out yesterday that big brother is also getting a new job. Neither of us knew that the other was in the process of looking, so we surprised each other with new jobs at almost the exact same time. His last day was yesterday. Little sis got a new job a couple of months ago as well. I guess I should expect some news from my parents in the next few days...

DotD: Superman keyboard and mouse - Free! - Newegg again has the Superman keyboards and mice in various colors for free after rebate. I picked up the red and blue keyboard and mouse awhile back when they were also free and really like them. They're not the highest quality, of course, but I think they just look pretty cool and they've worked fine for me. The keyboard is available in blue, black, or silver, and the mouse is available in red/blue, blue/black, and silver/black.

How long have you been in Fertile?

Just got back from a trip to Iowa for a friend's wedding for which I was one of the scripture readers (Psalm 121, baby!). During the rehearsal dinner, I was catching up with another good friend who is just finishing up his internship for seminary. He's in a small town in Minnesota called Fertile for two more weeks. I wanted to know how long his internship was (a couple weeks, the whole summer, a year, etc), so I asked:

"So, Ryan, how long have you been in Fertile?"

Immediately, Ms. Fiance burst out laughing. It was at this point that I actually realized what I had said and how it sounded. He took it quite well, and was laughing along with everyone else at our table.

Another interesting note from the weekend: When I was first asked to be one of the scripture readers, I asked the my friend (the groom) if he wanted me to read from a particular translation. He said probably the same one they used in their church, which was NRSV. I hunted around my house to found my first bible, given to me in 2nd grade, which was NRSV. I brought it with me to the rehearsal, and all three of the scripture readers used it since there was no bible up in the pulpit. After the practice, the pastor came up to me and asked me which translation the bible was. I replied, "The one the groom requested." As I was saying this, he grabbed the bible (which was in my hand), and read the spine himself to make sure it was the right one, and then said "Good." I thought it was a bit strange. I guess just hearing us all read our versus moments earlier wasn't enough reassurance that we weren't using the Hawaiian Pidgin bible or something.

Regardless, the whole wedding went very well and the reception and dance were great. The reception was at the Iowa Arboretum, so some of us took a little time to walk around outside and take some pictures. Ms. Fiance and I did a lot of dancing, so much so that I think I lost about 50 pounds through sweat alone. We made sure to do enough Swing dancing to be ready for the next time we see Janet. And since there were no polkas played, my parents started to polka to one of the songs on their own, so Ms. Fiance and I joined in. After a bit, I switched to go polka a little bit with my Mom (which let Ms. Fiance polka with my Dad), followed shortly thereafter to dancing the polka with my Dad. My parents are awesome dancers. They were teaching a couple of the little kids how to do the twist, and pretty soon one little girl kept hanging around my Dad to dance with him. It was really cute.

DotD: Da Jesus Book (Hawaiian Pidgin New Testament) - $10.41 - "Da peopo dat know Jesus, if dey goin do good job fo help odda peopo find out bout Jesus, an teach, dey gotta use peopo's language, so dose peopo can know him fo real too."

Wedding Blues

Come on now, don't get so carried away already! I never said these wedding blues had anything to do with my upcoming wedding. Get your facts straight before you jump to conclusions like that!

Anywho, Ms. Fiance was in a wedding this weekend, the much-hyped 7-7-7 thing. As wonderful fiance, I attended the rehearsal dinner and wedding reception. I did not go to the wedding itself, since I did not know the bride or the groom at all (hadn't even seen a picture), and since Ms. Fiance was in the wedding, I would have been sitting by myself, not knowing anyone (except a couple of people I met at the rehearsal dinner), in a Catholic wedding. I get a little nervous in Catholic churches, always a bit afraid I'm going to be standing or sitting at the wrong time, or doing something that only Catholics are supposed to do or something. I think I need a Catholicism For Dummies book or something to help me out.

The rehearsal dinner itself was fine, although as previously mentioned, I went into it knowing nobody besides Ms. Fiance. I did get to chat with a couple guys who were going to be sitting near me at the reception the next day. Yep, because Ms. Fiance was a bridesmaid, I got to sit at a reserved table, having my own name card and everything. 

And where, pray tell, did Mac Man get to sit?

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

Oh, none other than the front-most, center-most table other than the head table. In other words, here were the guests at my table:

1. Bride's mother

2. Groom's mother

3. Groom's father

4. Groom's grandmother #1

5. Groom's grandmother #2

6. Priest

7. Scripture reader and husband of one of the bridesmaids (no, not Ms. Fiance)

8. Me

Oh, and my chair was the absolute closest to the bride and groom of anyone in the entire room, other than the wedding party. Even the parents were farther away than me.

Don't get me wrong, it was a nice reception, pretty good food, and Ms. Fiance and I enjoyed a little swing dancing, a little polka, a little YMCA, a little Chicken Dancing, and a little slow-dancing. But man, was the whole ordeal uncomfortable at times. 

Random happy thought from the wedding reception: I saw two iPhones in use. A husband and his wife each had one, and the husband, who was also the Best Man, also made reference to Steve Jobs in his toast. Nifty!

DotD: 320 GB hard drive - $59.99 - A great price for this size hard drive. You can either install it inside your computer, or buy an external case for it (like this one, free after rebate) and be able to move it from computer to computer.