I can't feel my fingers

It's stupid to complain about cold here, because it's not, it gets chilly in the morning but that's about it. Sometimes it gets really chilly, and you don't really check the weather report out here because you can pretty much guess what's coming. Somewhere between about 65-72 with sunshine and maybe a cloud and if you guess that every day you'll be right about 90% of the time. But if it's been a particularly cold night, and you happen to be biking to work in the morning going about 15-18 mph into the wind with the belief that it was supposed to be warmer today (based on what a co-worker said) you could get a little bit cold. So this morning when I left my house wearing all my biking gear and a sweatshirt, my ears and hands basically "froze" and now 2 hours later I'm still cold.

I'd idle up to a heater and warm up like you could back in DC but they don't have such things in my office. It's silly of me to complain about being cold given that it's snowing heavily in other parts of the country so I'll stop.

What I actually accomplished this last weekend

Given the list I had going into the weekend, let's see what I actually did:
- Go to grocery store----Status: Completed
I will admit that the only reason this task was completed was that I was hungry on sunday mid morning and went by Vons after finishing another errand. I decided since I was there that I should grocery shop for the rest of the week since I was feeling kinda lazy.
- Do laundry----Status: Completed
Again I was bored on saturday evening and went to the bar to play pool and drink while doing laundry. For some reason I generated much less laundry this week than normal.
- Fold Laundry ----Status: Failure
Not only did I not fold my laundry after I was done, it got to sit on a bar stool for an hour or so while I was playing pool (badly) and listening to music in the bar.
- Go buy new dress shoes for work----Status: Completed
This coincided with my hunger and since I had no food at home I was forced to go out to get food, it was at this time that I decided that I could stop by the shoe store and pick out what I wanted before I ate. Luckily my willpower held out and I was able to purchase the dress shoes with all different kinds of textures that make it feel like I have rocks in my shoes at all time.
- Go to the bike store and get a new tire for my road bike---Status:Completed
This errand was completed on saturday after I felt guilty for being a lazy piece of crap and sitting around the house with a hangover all day. Luckily I was drunk when I woke up so I worked out and then the hangover kicked in and I suffered on the couch. But at about 2 I felt like I'd wasted the day so I walked and got a new tire in the sunshine.
- Go to the DMV to register my car----Status: Total failure
The biggest and most important item on my list went uncompleted due to general sloth and laziness.

So all in all it looks like a semi-productive weekend looking at what I wanted to do and what I actually did. 4/6 which might not seem bad, until you notice that the most important things I needed to do were also the ones I didn't do. I award myself no points, and may god have mercy on my soul.

Things I need to do this weekend

Making a list to see how much I actually accomplish this weekend:
- Go to grocery store
- Do laundry
- Fold Laundry (which is an entirely different chore than doing laundry)
- Go buy new dress shoes for work
- Go to the bike store and get a new tire for my road bike
- Go to the DMV to register my car now that it has finally passed inspection


Not too much stuff but we'll see how much I actually get done by sunday evening.

What was I searching for?

I came out to San Diego for a reason, I don't always remember what that reason was, but I know I had a checklist at one point. I feel lost sometimes, unsure of what I'm supposed to do or where I should go. It's not a good feeling, in fact it borders on despair. I'm so independant now that I don't really have anyone I want to ask for advice, and even if I did I'm not sure I would listen to them. I know life isn't supposed to have a compass or a map, I'm not sure I even need either, I just wish I knew what I was supposed to be looking for or doing. It makes me feel cold all over to think about such things, it feels like it's about -10 degrees as I'm writing this. I want to find my own way, accomplish the goals that I set for myself, do the things I want to do...it's just that I forget what all those things are. Where did I go wrong? I guess I should have taken a left at Albuquerque.

All my hard work, gone in an hour!

Yesterday evening I had dinner with my father and some of his co-workers at a Brazilian Barbeque place (I alluded to it in the post about the piano). The food was great, the salad bar had everything you could possibly want in a salad bar, the wine, atmosphere (minus hilarious piano music selection), and servers were all top notch. I ended up having a big salad, whcih I was warned before hand not to do, and while I was working my way through that the servers started bringing around the various dripping meats. It was a who's who of delicious meat, and I tried to moderate which ones I tried, and the amount of bacon that was wrapped around like half of the different things was significant. I also don't like bacon (I know it's weird) but if it's wrapped around a piece of sirloin then I'll buck up and eat it. My favorite was the skirt steak, which was like 90% fat but tasted amazing, the baby back ribs were also amazing as was basically everything that came by our table. The point of all this is to say that not only was the meal good, it was also filling even though it contained relatively few calories.

But regardless of the amount of calories, it becomes clear pretty quickly that with such a big meal, all the hard work and exercise I'd put in during the weekend was destroyed in a blaze of glaze and barbeque goodness. I went for a bike ride on saturday, went to the gym later in the day, worked out friday night, went boxing and wrestling sunday morning and then went for a run to blow off steam when the eagles lost (godamn Eagles). I ate relatively well especially on sunday and monday and then didn't booze much. But Brazilian Barbeque wrecked all that, I might as well have been smoking cigarettes while sitting on a chair made of jelly doughnuts all weekend! Damn you and your delicious selection of 18 meats brought to the table by handsome servers! Damn you and your all too tempting salad bar with everything I could ever want! Damn you and your funny and engaging waiter named Benny! I'll get you Benny, if it's the last thing I do...which if I've just had another huge meal at your restaurant it will be.

Sharp as a cotton ball sometimes

For days and weeks I've been talking to folks in DC about what they are doing during the inauguration. I had stories from dozens of people letting me know that all federal workers are staying home today and not going to work. Hell even my father and some of his co-workers scheduled business out here in San Diego during this time period so he didn't have to be in town for the extra crowds. I talked about it LAST NIGHT how no federal workers were going to work in DC today...and yet I was bright enough to complain to my boss that several folks who work in the Pentagon hadn't answered my e-mail/calls from Friday afternoon yet today....

An old take on a new classic?

At a restaurant last night they had a piano player rocking out to all kinds of crazy tunes. He hit up Coldplay, and did "Under Pressure" by Queen, had some other really odd choices for piano tunes. You just don't expect to hear contemporary or classic rock songs coming from a piano at a nice restaurant like that. It was good don't get me wrong, but just odd that the selection of music was so eclectic given that there are so many great piano songs to choose from (my personal favorite is "Wonder Boy"). It's like if you were at a wedding, everyone was all dressed up nicely and it was elegant, then the DJ started playing KISS or NWA or something out of place. It just doesn't quite fit, like lounge music at a formal dinner (although if Richard Cheese was playing I'm sure it would be amazing).

The best was when the pianist started playing "Stairway to Heaven". Nothing like a little Led Zeppelin with your meal. The best part was during the song various people in my party would break out singing parts or doing air guitar, just rocking out and laughing at the piano cover of the greatest song ever. I especially enjoyed the part towards the end of the song where they have that huge Jimmy Page guitar solo and the song goes from being a soft calm song to a bit more rock and roll. You knew that the crescendo of a piano probably wasn't going to match the enthusiasm of a wicked sweet guitar solo, but the pianist did his best and had me rocking out in an odd setting (read: innappropriate). Although I guess it's not odd if the pianist at the restaurant is the one playing these rock hits, I was hoping him might break into some Black Sabbath or maybe some Aerosmith to go with my second glass of wine.