Pretend Like You Don't Live Here

So Ron and Margaux have arrived, and Ron's sister, Amy, and her two children are soon arriving, well, at 12:30 AM. So to host these arrivals, my mom has kicked her own mom out of the house, and me onto the couch. It feels just like when I graduated from high school when they turned my bedroom into their office.

I kinda find it humorous and annoying when my mom, in striving to accommodate everyone as immaculately as possible, tries to hide the evidence of my existence. For example, I had to move my toiletries out of the bathroom and into the office closet. Isn't that a bit too far? O how about when I pushed all of my stuff (laptop, pillow) into a corner of the living room, out of sight, and she thought it was too visible and had to hide it behind the couch. *rolls eyes* Margaux was nice enough to point out that the dog's toys and beds were left strewn about in plain sight. Really puts things in perspective.

Well anyways, now I'm just sitting on my new bed, zeh couch, trying to keep my brain from rotting before next semester. Stumbleupon, Googlereader, and the Arduino board. I promised myself I would learn something during this winter break, and I guess I have, just not enough. I should work some more on the Arduino board.

It's probably just me, but that thing is kinda sexy.

Give Me A Break

So how am I supposed to maintain a blog without an internet connection?

I know I said I'd make an entry every night, but the cruise thing, that's an exception. A 6 day exception. So what happened the day before the cruise? O yeah, whatever, so I was hanging out at Chelsea's place. The person I traveled to Japan with.

Woops.

That ended up pissing my mom off to no end. She thought I was coming in Saturday, and actually, I think she was in the right. But whatever. She could have texted me (but knowing her, that's actually a little too much to ask).

Back in Miami now. Brought my DJ equipment and I'm gonna try and figure out what to do tonight, but I am awfully tired. Maybe I'll hang out with Satan or Kyra. Those are the only people I can get a hold of.

The Last First of Starting A Journal Habit

I'm going to make this thing a habit from now on. This is where I set my foot down. Hopefully it sticks.

Today I finished with school. I did better than I thought I would, thanks to the teacher's numbers games on calculating that final total (Thanks Hinze).

I hosted a couchsurfer named Eiji Kobayashi. He sounds like a pretty cool guy. But it sounds like he doesn't really have a footing yet, kinda floating on capital until he finds the place he really wants to stay. I wish I could find him the female flight attendant who 'gives benefit packages to their boyfriends' in an area involving a lot of 'kiteboarding' that's in dire need of 'nurses'. If only I could layer searches by throwing these three points together and end up with a Zip Code. Sometimes I expect too much of Google.

The Reason My Mother Can Never See This

Gordon's Beer, leftover pizza, some Southpark episodes. This is my night and it's pretty nice. Gordon's beer is pretty strong though, so coherency ain't something to depend on.

News in the world of Garrett:

1. I've received a ticket from the bowl of anus-puss we know as Sunpass. Ok ok, so maybe I've passed through tons of these checkpoints along my routes to and from Miami without the total confidence of whether I was being properly charged, but give me a break. They could have at least sent me an email.

2. Stocks are doing well. I invested all of my savings in an index fund. Yeah, diversify, fuck you. I know. I was young and dumb. But regardless I can get 3.6 % profit on a portion of what I bought. To put this in perspective, this stock had been down nearly 40% since when I bought it. It's a bit of relief.

3. Ugh. Soils. I have a lab for that class tomorrow. I read part of the assignment for tomorrow. Looks like we get to punch soil for a while. We're compacting it. I've got no problem with that kind of lab, just I have got to get this surveying take home test done too. *grumble*

4. Jess is gone for the weekend. Speaking of the weekend, I have no idea what I'm going to do for this one. O. Yep. Buy Modern Warfare 2. That'll pretty much suck up any free time I might have. God I love the gaming industry.

The Harbinger of Failed Exams

I've got to give it to Google for all the things they've done for me. I use their email service, I use their calendar, their reader, their browser, and now even their blog (not to mention my medical records are stored with Google too). It's really made an improvement in my life, and I heard today that they're actually paying for free wifi in 41 airports around the US. Go Goog! Rah!

Anyways, aside from these mad props, this is the beginning of my blog. The title is all in jest. You all should know I have a dark sense of humor. I'll turn up the heat as we get further on. For now this is all very aimless and I'm not quite sure what I'll end up doing with it. Let's just say it's for whatever catches my eye so I can look back and get back on track to what I should have been doing.

Why don't we start with that then - I mean aside from school and the fact that I have the GRE to study for tomorrow - there are some things that I think are more important to do. Maybe not as pragmatic (yeah, I've been studying for the GRE) as preparing for my big test tomorrow, but doing what excites me keeps me fresh. So without further ado, I present the awesomeness of today.

This is my next project, and I'll be damned if I don't actually succeed in this one. It seems so do-able. It's basically an Arduino based knock sensing lock mechanism. In layman's terms, this thing will detect a certain signature knock on my door and unlock the deadbolt. Screw finding my keys in the middle of the dark anymore, now all I need to do is knock Shave and a Hair Cut, or at least that's what I'm hoping for.

Yeah so he has some fancy PVC pipes, but I don't need that stuff. I might as well just fasten it right to the door. Here's a website with all the details.

http://grathio.com/2009/11/secret-knock-detecting-door-lock.html#more

Well that's it for the first post. Phew. O. Yeah. The GRE. I guess I should learn how to write that essay section now...