Wow what a busy but great weekened.

Friday we took a trip to Mike and Brandon’s for dinner. Thanks guys it was so much fun. I hope our lateness didn’t ruin dinner too much. It didn’t taste like it to me!

Saturday I totally overslept at Mike’s and we got a late start to my folks. It was my dad’s 53rd birthday on Saturday and we wanted to take him to the movies and dinner. We got there around noon and had a quick lunch. We went to the theater to get tickets for The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King. We had intended to go to the 1:40PM show but we could only get tickets to the 3:20 show as all 4 shows inbetween were sold out! We went and had some coffee and shot the shit as we always do(Me, Shawn and my Dad can really gossip!). We had a great time and went to stand in line for the movies. The movie started at about 3:30 after the previews. The movie is DAMN long at 3hrs 35 minutes. My dad said there should be an intermission, and sadly, we got one, at the height of the movie where Elrond was giving Arragon the Sword of the King, they stopped the movie. There was a guy in the theater who apparently was going into Diabetic Shock. It took the EMS guys abt 30 minutes to get him under control and out of the theater. It was actually not that bad cause Dad got to take a leek and ask some quesiions about things that happened in the last two and we finished up the movie and went to dinner. We had a great time even tho my mom chose not to go. But we ate, drank and laughed. I am sure he had a great time.

We finally got back home around midnite. Willow was very glad to see us. After unpacking and getting settled, I did not get much sleep and we got up early on Sunday to finish up our shopping. We had alot of fun even tho I was kinda cranky from not sleeping too much!

We did have some very sad news Sunday in addition to some really sad news earlier in the week. Our friend Pamela L. was killed earlier in the week in a car accident in Wels, Austria. Also, on Sunday morning my best friend Sue’s dog Bear passed away. He was like our dog too and very much loved Shawn. They will both be missed.

Well it’s back to work tmrw, and I need to get some damn sleep.

Zya

Music playing during post:Christmas Eve (Sarajevo 12/24) - Trans-Siberian Orchestra

Drama. I try to avoid it but it does seem to be unavoidable. I really had a ton of drama this week with my phone. I have a Sony Ericsson T68i using AT&T Wireless GSM Service. I love the phone. It has built in bluetooth so I can easily synch my Address Book and iCal via iSync, and it’s neat looking, however… AT&T’s GSM service is horrid. I don’t get signals where I used to on my Digital (TDMA) phone and my past visit to NY was horrific. I had places of no signal and worse at Steve’s in Jersey City, I couldn’t find a NETWORK let alone a signal the WHOLE weekend.

So while kvetching to Brad, he asked me an important question… Why did you buy your phone…my answer, it looked cool, synched with my Mac so I got it. He then said something VERY important that I hadn’t thought about…he said he bought his phone to “MAKE PHONE CALLS”. So I decided to go back to TDMA service. So began my issues with AT&T Wireless. I’ll say this before I start. Everything was resolved, and AT&T does a great job, as long as you do NOT go to the AT&T store(at least not the one at the Exton Mall!).

I went to the Exton Mall AT&T Store to explain my situation where I was first ignored and handed a phone which I had no idea was connected with the warranty department. I didn’t want to replace my phone, I wanted to change my service. I figured I’d give it another try maybe it was the actual phone until the nice woman at AT&T told me that I’d most likely be getting a refurbished unit. But by that time, the order had been processed and there was nothing they could do! WTF! I stormed out of the store and went back to work.

I called AT&T when I got to work and a very very nice woman answered all my questions and helped me understand that it was indeed my service and not the phone. She offered me a few phones that would try to find GSM Service and then fall back to digital, but they didn’t have any of the features of my T68i and if I was going to end up on digital, why did I need GSM? Once again I decided to go TDMA.

I went back to the AT&T store at the behest of another AT&T Customer Rep, who was so sweet and so nice to me. I can’t remember his name but I’d buy him a drink for all the help he gave me. But the store again was a BADDDDDD experience. The guy who had ignored me they day before, couldn’t figure out how to log on to the system. (Well It was WINDOWS but still!). His arrogant, rude coworker informed me that there was nothing we could do because I had my phone for 9 months already. WTF? Stormed out again. The NEXT day, I was in KOP for my department holiday luncheon (MAGGIANO’s rocks!) and decided to stop by the KOP AT&T store, where I was politely explained that I couldn’t do anything because I had NOT had my phone for 9 months, not what the guy said the day before! Corporate discounts on phones (I get one from work) are only every 9 months in the store. He said perhaps I could call the National Business Office and get some help. He even gave me the number. NOTE TO CLUELESS DUDE AT EXTON AT&T…That’s customer service!

The wonderful woman at AT&T’s NBO, apologized for all the headache I had experienced and asked me…WHAT SHE COULD DO TO MAKE ME HAPPY! OMG, I was floored. I said… could you close my GSM acct, give me a TDMA acct and a new phone without it costing a fortune? She said no problem tho I wouldn’t have a cell for a coupla days (they had to close the one account immediately and would mail me the other phone.), but for free and it was the phone I wanted I was NOT COMPLAINING :).

So I was without cell for Thursday and Friday, but my new Motorola V60i was at my house on Saturday morning (I didn’t get it until late that nite!) but it was there!

Today, I used that damn thing all day everywhere I went and did NOT LOSE my signal! Not once! I am so happy. To all my friends who used to have to say…”I CAN’T HEAR YOU!!!!” I am sorry. I hope it will be better.

If you had my old number and I haven’t given you the new one, email me and I’ll let you know what it is!

Zya
Music playing during post: Mele Kalikimaka - Jimmy Buffett

Today is my dad’s birthday. Happy birthday dude!

Well I just got back from my weekend in New York to see Steve. It was a great weekend. Started with a very early train on Saturday morning but Shawn dropped me off and waited with me while the train was 30 minutes late. It was so cool tho cause we got to talk and chill, I was actually glad the train was late cause it gave me more time with him before I had to go…

The train ride was not too bad, I got the rest of the work done on the guestbook for macboyX. I think it was at Trenton that this girl got on and sat in the seat next to me (it was PACKED!) She did NOTHING but bitch and complain the whole time we were on the train (THANK GOODNESS FOR THE iPOD!). Luckily for me the ‘Pod was fully charged and The Smiths and The Cure drown her out. We had to wait right outside of Penn Station for about 10 minutes while they cleared out the southbound trains from the station and all she did was call every person she could think of on her cellie and complain about how much it sucked and how unfair it was…HELLO? it’s a damn train! Get out and walk!

When I got to Penn Station, I could get a signal on the T68, but the f’ing AT&T network was constantly busy. After 20 minutes, I finally got a hold of Steve and he was in the tunnel, the train was 45 minutes late and I spent 20 trying to get ahold of him and he still wasn’t there LOL. You gotta love it!

Luckily for me Steve’s friend Craig drove him to get me and I got to ride in a car instead of walking around Manhattan! It was great though because I always love hanging out with Steve and Craig was sweet and friendly and listening to the Go-Go’s greatest hits. Craig also had a sweet Altima and my ass was riding around in the heat on some comfy leather seats…so WHO COULD COMPLAIN??

We finally found a parking spot no where near where we wanted to go but after almost an hour of circling we took it. Jumped the subway and went to SoHo. I got treated to lunch at Canteen (check out the pics of the place and me and Steve and Craig in my photos section). I had an awesome hamburger (yes, at a trendy SoHo bistro I got a burger !) and some great company. We then headed for Apple Store SoHo, I took tons of pics and then a cute security guard came up and told me no photos were allowed! (Steve swears he was cruising me!) I said oki and we rolled out to some “Power Shopping”. It was so much fun because Craig and Steve’s tastes are pretty different but kinda bookend mine so I had a fabulous time in and out of stores. One store that Steve took us to was YRB (Yellow Rat Bastard). Such cool stuff but of course not made for the bear or cub among us LOL. We even stopped at the Armani Exchange where Steve tried on 85 dollar stocking caps! A lot of the stores had DJ’s and the AIX store was playing a great remix of Milkshake. I swear there were more gay men in AIX than are in the whole city of Philly. A cute salesman DID smile at me like 5 times and I actually think he was cruising me!

We finally packed it in cold and tired and drove back to Jersey City, we went grocery shopping and had a ball. Craig was so nice. I was really glad he came along. After loading up the car we finally made it to Steve’s new apartment. It was nice, much roomier than his other apt but I liked that place too! Craig came in and hung out for a while. It was so fun to be around the two of them cause they have such a cool friendship and repoire. Craig went to get his friend Ben and they both came back, I liked Ben. He was very friendly . He and Craig went to the movies, but I think it woulda been fun if Craig had stuck around a little longer, I really enjoyed hanging with them.

Finally I got to upgrade Steve’s iMacs to Panther and we had dinner and Shawn was got on the iSight back at the macboyX compound so Steve and I got to see him and although I still wish he had come with me, it was really cool, and nice to see him.

Steve tried sooo many times to watch the Two Towers, but he kept coming in and chatting with me and it never happened. Around 230 I was so tired I could barely see straight. We tried one more time to watch the Two Towers but I passed out (and I think so did Steve!). I woke up around 430 and he had gone to bed and thrown a blanket over me! We slept late and got up to hear about Sadaam Husein being captured (as Steve said “I was GAGGING!”) and to see about 2 inches of snow outside. I took a shower and then called Shawn (yes again). We then got our crap together and jumped the PATH train to NYC and got me on the train.

I had a great time! I really love hanging with Steve and I had so much fun with Craig. I am certainly looking forward to seeing them again.

Oh well… it’s back to work tmrw! 7 days til my WINTER VACATION!

Zya

Sorry it’s taken so long to say something in my blog but WORK is kicking my tail.

This past weekend was a great one. We had abt 9″ of snow and it was beautiful. What better way to pass a weekend than snowed in with your boo?

We had my boyfriend’s godmother over this weekend and we decorated the house, set up the Christmas tree and listened too way too many Christmas songs. I actually even coughed up some dough to the mighty iTMS for some new Harry Connick songs and discovered Michael Buble too.

My boyfriend’s grandmother gave us ornaments that she had made before he was born. They are so intricate and beautiful. I can’t get over how amazing they are.

With the snow however, we had some uninvited guests…MICE! Willow was going nuts all weekend, she must have smelled them under the stove because she spent the better part of 3 days in front of it. Alas, we seem to have caught them (or not) and hopefully we’ll be rid of them forever (no I am not holding my breath!).

Well an uneventful and enjoyable weekend is always good. I’ll try to post again this weekend when/if I get to New York to visit Steve

Zya
Music playing during post: This Christmas Day by Trans-Siberian Orchestra

Ugh what a day.

I woke up this morning and it was so cold in the house the cat wouldn’t even go in the bathroom cause the floor was too cold! I got a shower and heard on the news that it was going down to 25 tonight, I didn’t want to but I had to call and do a Work From Home day cause I had to get those people out to get the furnace fixed.

Luckily, I got someone on the phone and they sent someone at about 11 am. They got the heater fixed around 3 pm. Apparently the builder of our house didn’t get the pipe that carries the condensation out of our house at the right angle so we the heater kept stopping because it couldn’t function with this problem and kept blowing the fan to try to fix it. The HVAC guys took the siding off the house, fixed the pipe and finally HEAT!

Byron came over tonight with his poor HP. He got a virus that some idiot wrote with a trial version of Delphi so the damn thing couldn’t deliver the pay load and never launched so Norton couldn’t find it to clean it, but you couldn’t click anything without it launching. Sadly it required a rebuild. The good thing is I think he crossed the “Macs are cool” line and is now firmly in the “I WANT ONE” field. We spent some time checking out Panther while XP chugged along (why does it take 15 minutes to install OS X and 45 to install XP?). He really liked it. He got to spend some time with Shawn too and kept raving about him when I talked to him later.

So what started as a cold, bitter morning turned into a fun filled enjoyable evening with my baby and a good friend (even tho I was working my ass off fixing another PC!)

Well time for bed.

Zya

Music playing during post:Hey Mama, by the Black Eyed Peas

Good Grief did we have an interesting holiday!

I started my long weekend with an amazing dinner at my boyfriend’s grandmother’s house. Way too much food was had and I almost passed out from the amount of turkey I ate

After dinner, we saw Bruce Almighty, it was a good movie, kinda funny, a little heavy on the God message but cute none the less, I can honestly say that Jennifer Anniston was not too bad in it. I spent the rest of the evening in bed exhausted and tired!

Friday brought a day of relaxation watching the boyfriend playing the Sims, getting caught up on all the shows on the TiVo we had to watch and finally realizing that I some how lost all the changes and progress I had made to the guest book. That was frustrating. Thanks to my friend Steve who helped me realize it’s only time and I have lots of it left and thanks to Shawn for cheering me up with Pizza and X2. After watching X2, a must see by the way! I had a bit of disappointment when my parents called to say they couldn’t come for a visit on Saturday and Brandon wasn’t going to be able to make it on Friday nite.

Saturday was another LAZY day BUT… it was a bad lazy day. The heater stopped working correctly and I had no idea why. I called the maintenance people with their 24/7 Emergency service and got no response. We went to go grocery shopping and surprise there was NOTHING at the Wegmans We just went and had a great dinner together laughing our asses off. However when we got home, we were freezing our asses off. NO heat and it was down to 66 in the house We went to bed…with a good reason to snuggle up. Even the cat tried to get under the blankets.

Sunday morning brought even colder temps in the igloo on Lexington Way. More calls to the HVAC folks went un answered but I got the heater working for abt 3 hrs just long enuff to get the temp up to almost 70. Thank goodness cause Shawn’s grandparents came to visit. We decided neither of us needed a big Sunday breakfast (I was sorta sad cause you know Shawn can throw down!), so we decided to start decorating the house. What used to be too much stuff in the apartment is no where near enuff in the house!

We had a great visit with Shawn’s grandparents, went to lunch at the Windmill and watched the Eagles squeak out another victory (9-4 yAy). Willow got to meet Angel and let’s say it’s only the second time I ever heard her hiss!

Alias rocked today! I love this show! Jen Garner is the best! I gotta remember to call Don and see what he thought! Well it’s about 65 in the house again (did I mention the heater still blows cold air just no hot!) and I am off to bed I can’t take it not to mention it’s the first day back to work tomorrow!

Nite!
Music playing during post:Let it Snow by Harry Connick Jr.