Please, don’t call me, I’ll call you… really…
The “national do-not-call list has opened”:http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/06/27/financial0943EDT0063.DTL today to stop those damn telemarketers from calling your home at the most annoying times. Which really is everytime frankly.
Do yourself a favor and sign up. It’s quick and easy and will save your sanity (maybe). 
url: “www.donotcall.gov”:http://www.donotcall.gov
June 27th, 2003
Wow! Where does the time go? Aiden is 5 months today, hard to believe that just 5 “short” months ago he was born. Everyday he seems to be doing something new, heck today, he appeared to finally figure out his walker and was able to move it forward a foot or so. Simply amazing. He’s still a big ham, always laughing and playing. Aiden has been a very calm baby, I think even more so than Autumn. Although, Autumn was very easy to entertain, although not so easy anymore.
Today to celebrate his “month day” we bought him a high chair. He was feeding out of his bouncer chair but since he’s now a big boy, it’s time he joins us for dinner at the table. The “high chair is very cool”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00005BW1V/qid=1056517355/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_1/104-5463545-0540769?v=glance&s=baby&n=507846, make by Baby Trend, although a little pricey it does everything we wanted. The chair comes with wheels, removable & washable food tray, travel folding, and a seat that is adjustable. Ah, the life of baby luxury. Now, I just need to get my motorcycle…
June 24th, 2003
Over the weekend we went to “Kid’s Day”:/gallery/album19 down in Larkspur Landing. Autumn had a fun time on the climbing wall, although it was her first trying such a “scary” thing. As Mommy and Daddy looked on, Autumn kept climbing and climbing… *gulp*. She had finally had enough and wanted to come down. I thought I was going to have to go up and get her but she had even confidence to allow the rope pulley to glide her down to the ground. Brave kid.
June 24th, 2003
Unbelievable. The “state tax on cars was tripled”:http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/06/20/financial1339EDT0095.DTL today because Gov. Lame Duck Davis can’t get his own wallet together to pay for simple things like *education*. So, without even passing a “law”, he instructed Mr. Peace (yeah, I know, this guy doesn’t even deserve his family name) to raise the tax and so it was done.
Un-f-in believable. Now my family car, which happens to be an SUV, will cost me $700+ a year in just taxes? I don’t f-in think so Mr. Bush… erm… Davis.
Let the “recall”:http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2003/06/16/national0701EDT0469.DTL began!
June 20th, 2003
Walking on the sidewalk can be dangerous to one’s health. Besides the obvious things like car’s careening out of control, window washers falling from the sky, or complete wacko homeless guys that may cause a heart attack, smokers can cause serious health problems while walking. In an effort to deter people from smoking in public places, I’ve come up with a new plan.
Today, while walking during my lunch, I unfortunately wound up behind a smoker. Normally I would just walk a little faster to dodge the air pollution but today I did something even better. While walking along side the smoker I realized that something was dwelling inside my stomach, oh yes ladies and gentlemen, I had a nice “gas bubble” brewing. So, after I was directly in front of them, I let her rip! With the release of non-cancerous gas into the air, I smiled knowing full well that Mr. Smoker just got a whiff of his own medicine.
Now, I’m not one to fart and tell, but as you can see I couldn’t “hold out” on this one. 
*Pfffffffffffffft…* I’m out.
3 comments June 20th, 2003
Over the last week there have been rumors around the web that “Apple”:http://www.apple.com/ would finally be releasing new Power Mac’s using the new Power PC 970 processor that is 64-bit based. The rumored date is this coming Monday, June 23rd. However, it appears that someone at Apple didn’t get the memo and accidentally released the specs a little early.
Notice in the screen shot above (I took this btw) that it states the Power Mac G5 processor at speeds up to dual 2Ghz with 1Ghz bus and AGP 8x.
*Falls over*.
Excuse me, I must have blanked out from the system specs. Anyway, here’s hoping someone didn’t get fired over the mistake and yes, it’s now gone from the Apple Store. Check it out on Monday though.
June 19th, 2003
A complete dumb ass in New York with an “official” title of Assemblyman Felix Ortiz is attempting to make his first and last “claim to fame” by proposing a “fat tax” on items he feels cause obesity in America.
“The 1 percent tax hike proposed by Assemblyman Felix Ortiz would apply to junk food, video games and television commercials, which Ortiz blames on New York’s growing obesity problem. Ortiz, a Democrat, did not rule out proposing tax increases on other things that he believes contribute to obesity.”
source: “CNN”:http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/06/19/fat.tax.ap/index.html
Is this guy for f-in real? What a complete asshole. If this guy ever ran for any f-in office anywhere near my home, I’d protest his office daily before he cried for mercy. Come on, a “fat tax”? I propose an asshole tax, which would enforce a tax on any item purchased by registered assholes, thus increasing government “profits” ten fold across the country.
I’m just so outraged by this total jackass even proposing such an insane tax it makes me want to vomit. Mr. Assemblyman, please go assemble uranus as I hope it gets handed to you in the Senate of New York.
An interview with Mr. Ortiz shows how much of a moron he really is:
Ortiz: It’s very simple. Our kids are spending too much time behind the TV playing games. That’s one reason the kids are fat. … When my oldest son was 6, he started to be inactive. So I threw his SEGA away. I said, “No way, Jose. This is gone.”
source: “CNN”:http://www.cnn.com/2003/TECH/06/18/hln.game.tax/index.html
So what you do purpose people do with their down time after running a marathon each day Mr. Ortiz? Read a book? That isn’t active, you should tax those as well. Hell, the new Harry Potter novel comes out in a few days and millions upon millions of inactive children and adults will be reading the book, punish those people. What about playing a board game with your child, those aren’t active, tax those too. Let’s also tax computers and the internet beause those are inactive activities as well. Shit, we should even tax sleeping because you get fatter while you sleep and it’s also not active.
Why do we even bother with politicians? All their job is to them is a big game. Let’s try this law today and see if we can get a high score of support. If not, hit reset and try again. *Bastards*.
3 comments June 19th, 2003
I’ve come to realize that no matter what, I will always play video games. During my life I’ve had long periods of time without picking up a controller. These usually last about 6 months to a year, depending on time and/or available funds to purchase new games.
Lately, even with the new baby, a very demanding job, less money, and less free time I’m still playing games. I play them everyday in the morning before work. I try to play everyday on the way home from work, but I usually fall asleep. I think about gaming a lot, not just about what games I want to buy or play, but about what makes games games. I often wonder about how it would be to actually be involved with the development of a video game instead of just being the end consumer.
Sometimes while playing an average game or even a great game I feel that there is something “missing” to make it truly epic in my mind. Did the designers even think about this option or feature? If they did, why in the heck isn’t it in the damn game?
I don’t think of games as just vast wastes of time as some circles may, I think of them as extensions of my mind, a way of thinking outside the box.
3 comments June 18th, 2003
Added more photos of Aiden since “last months update”:/archives/000264.php. Be sure to check out the new photos in the “May gallery”:/gallery/album16 as well as the addition of the new “June gallery”:/gallery/album18.
It’s just amazing that he is growing so fast. As a parent, it’s hard to actually see the growth each day but by taking a lot of photos I’m able to see what I normally would miss.
Looking back, we took a ton of photos of Autumn up until age 3 or 4, tailing off around that time. Granted, we still took photos of her (and still do), just not the insane amounts a parent does with a younger child. In light of this, I’m going to make an effort to be sure to photograph Autumn more often and include her photos in “her gallery”:/gallery/autumn. At some point I hope to go back into the photo archives and digitize her younger years for safe keeping. Wish me luck!
June 17th, 2003
While looking for something to do yesterday for Father’s Day (besides staying inside until 3pm in the afternoon playing video games with Autumn), we decided to visit the street painting festival that was occuring in downtown San Rafael. San Rafael is a small town north of San Francisco on the 101, where I grew up actually.
We all had a good time, looking at the very incredible paintings. Autumn was very interested in the art work, numerous times attempting to run off and look at more as Mommy & Daddy were moving too slow. She actually wanted to pick up some of the chalk and start painting. Had I known that she was actually allowed to in a special area for a small fee of $10, I would have let her. Of course, I didn’t find this out until we were leaving for dinner and the festival was ending. Doh!
Be sure to check out of the other photos in the “moblog”:/moblog/ and in the “gallery”:http://www.snapturtle.com/gallery/album17, including one of the “Sistine Chapel ceiling”:http://www.snapturtle.com/gallery/album17/DSC01178.
2 comments June 16th, 2003
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