Constant state of flux

Alright well the more I contemplate taking a couple of months off to just bum around Europe after I get the divorce all settled, the more appealing it all sounds. Furthermore the more I think about it, the more possible it seems. Aside from my job I don't see any reason why I would have to not take a trip like that.

First off I have to figure out where I would want to go, and what aside from cycling I would want to do. I have this little fantasy going about cycling from restaurant to restaurant all across Europe, shadowing in each one, learning while I vacation. I wouldn't really be able to spend too much time in any given city, but just the experience I think would be worth it.

I think I should start where I speak the language, I assume that would make things expediently easier. So that narrows us down to England, Spain, or any of the former Yugoslavia states. While my Serbo-Croat skills are limited, I consider myself at least proficient in both Spanish and to a lesser degree English. Europe does seem to be so multi-lingual and if I had myself a little translator I bet I would be able to find my way around near any place I went to. Trips to Amsterdam are always affordable, why couldn't I just start there and work my way around?

There is a pretty good how-to article on Sheldon's site all about how to get things planned out to do so. I am especially fond of the idea of buying picture travel books and trying to visit the areas within all those pretty photographs.

If I plan things right, I might be able to take literally half of a year off to do so. Think about it, with all the cash from selling the house/car/computers/couches/bikes/etc etc, and the relative cheapness of a bicycle vacation, there would be little overhead. Staying in hostels and/or camping I am near certain wouldn't cost me as much as a 2 week vacation in some expensive resort somewhere. I am guessing it would do great things for my mental/physical well being.

What's up with Felipe's gratuitous/annoying use of the "slash" as a conjunction?

So now I have to find a bike to buy...

Surly seems to have found one for me.

The frame is about 425, I don't think it would cost me that much to get it all put together. With the exception of the headset press, all the required tools to assemble a bike are sitting in my basement right now. I would need some 36 spoke or higher wheels, something that really could take the weight of myself and all my gear.

Either way I bet I could get myself equipped for anywhere in the range of 2-4ks, including panniers, racks, and gear. The plane ticket would cost about another thousand, but prices obviously might vary some.

First things first, sell the house.

And I didn't even call anyone about it today.

Almost forgot I bought some new records the other day..

Here they are.





I think this was the 4th time I purchased the NWA album, once on cassette when I was just a lad, twice on CD, and now on Vinyl. The Death Cab is heavy duty 180 gram vinyl, makes the rest of my records feel flimsy.

Quick, I have to shovel before it freezes to the ground and is impossible to move.

Fucking snow.

The more I think about this whole house selling/divorce thing the happier and more optimistic about the future I see thing.

For the first time in many years, I actually have the freedom to do whatever the hell I want. It wasn't the before my wife or the house we live in was in anyway keeping my from obtaining what I really wanted in life by any means. It is just the this whole life we had built up for ourselves took work to maintain. Work just to keep things as mediocre and boring as they had become. Now I am no longer shackled to this house, as it will be gone soon.

Why is that the end all that people look forward too so much in their lives, that marriage thing.

Overrated at best.

Is it that people just don't really feel at ease with themselves and seek out others in some futile attempt to complete themselves? That having that other special someone and starting down the road towards the American mundane dream somehow allow them to achieve what by themselves was never possible. All it does is make you complacent and allows your mind to settle, start to deactivate. Perhaps that was just me, I am sure there are perfectly happy couples out there, living through their relationship in ruby colored bliss.

Point being, is now I can do all those things I had always wanted to, I don't have to worry about what anyone thinks, tiptoeing around just not to set things off.

The house really is the last thing left linking us, and once that is gone I think it will feel like it really is over. The little matter about the divorce papers is still to be reckoned with, but to me that is little more than a legal formality. The tangebility of the house is quite a bit more "real" to me, the relationship, marriage and all it entailed was gone long ago. Now all that is left is the clean up.

I just hope I don't fall into my pattern of procrastination and spend the rest of my life doing nothing but sitting around waiting for thing to happen. I at this moment at least have nothing and no reason to complain about things, so I shall consider myself lucky.

Oh,

I think I fell in love 3 times this afternoon.
Once around 3 o'clock, cute girl with blond hair, brown hat, and beat up Doc Martens at the post office, we made I contact. Really though, it was 3 at a post office, the place was swamped, not what I would say the best place to ask someone out.

At the mall, (I was shopping, sue me) She gave me Free Espresso, how could I not love her. Ahh, espresso.

At the Sprint Store while buying my new phone, we traded faceplates and she managed to get/write down the restaurant where I work. Her name was Lara I think, I wonder if she will really come in and visit? Probably not, but I can live out my little fantasy anyway. I could have asked her out, but then I have to gauge, was she really just being nice because it was her job, or was there something else? Considering I am not desperate right now, I just opted for the first, counted my chips and left.

I guess I could add a fourth, Edina Girl came into the Cafe this morning, she was buying pastries for her co-workers, I was, well working what else. I caught her for a moment while she was talking to Tracy, I had almost forgotten how adorable she was. Sure we still talk now and again, but I don't think things were doomed from the start, I am not quite Christian enough for her and she is far too Christian for me. It was nice while it lasted, albeit fleeting.

Yeah freedom.

(Oh don't tell Edina girl I said she was a dorable, she really hates that)

Alright well I have decided I am going to give up coffee.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I think caffeine really isn't doing good things for me. I am just so damn stressed out all of the fucking time, I have this feeling that the 8+ cups of coffee and 4-8 shots of espresso I have been drinking a day just add stress to my poor poor adrenal gland. Sometimes lately I have been feeling shaky.

So now I am going to have to figure out how to go about slowly weaning myself away from those tasty toasted beans and the wonderful concoctions that are brewed from such. I could start by just drinking more tea (I do already) but that just doesn't provide that kick I so crave. Also having brew pots full of fair trade organic coffee lying so readily accessible on a daily basis isn't really going to make my abstaining any easier. Then again I was able to ditch the whole booze thing without that much effort, and I had a fridge full of beer when I did, so far that has lasted well almost 15 months now. Hell even when I stopped smoking, I did so the day after I had bought an entire carton. I cannot remember exactly what I did with the extra packs, maybe hereNT got some free smokes who knows.

I just know I should probably quit before I get even more stressed out than I currently am, that might not be possible. In the last few months I have probably been as stressed as I ever have been, more than I had even thought possible. Partly because instead of just working in kitchens I have started running the damn things, that for sure has been more to think about. Most likely the divorce and the emotional strain has had more to do with it. I before could at least have taken some solace in knowing that no matter how convoluted and insane my work life got, things at home were always at least stable. Now my anchor is pretty much gone, which is for the best or at least it will be eventually. The support system I once had has now been reduced to just relying upon myself. Hence more stress.

So as a short term relief of aforementioned stress, I am going to stop or at least reduce my coffee intake.

Wish me luck.

Oh,

Almost forgot to mention, I think I am going to have to sell my cute southside Minneapolis bungalow soon. My soon to be Ex is subjected to living a life of near poverty over in Japan because of how much she has to send back to me every month for that accursed mortgage. And really although I can afford it, I would not mind having my "own" place not "our" place. Even though I have had this house for almost 6 months all by my lonesome it still feels like it isn't just mine. Despite my best effort to sanitize the house from everything that reminds my of "her" we did live here together for about 4 years.

So Tuesday I am planning on calling our old Realtor and see what steps we need to take to sell the place. She used to come into a restaurant all the time, so I got to know her pretty well. I don't think she handles selling as much as buying, but I will see who she refers me to.

Good thing is that I should be able to get a good chunk of cash from the sale, money that I could use to either.

A) Go back to school and finally finish my degree
B) Support myself as I apprentice under some big name chefs in either NY, London, Paris, San Fran etc.
C) Waste the money and wonder what the hell happened, I bet with 10s of thousand of dollars I could buy some nice bikes. I wonder which is worse, old lady with her cats, or old man with his bikes.
D) Buy myself another house/condo/townhouse and subject myself to living in Minnesota for god knows how long.

I do need to figure where to live in the interim, before I move away from Minne-slush-land.

Anyone need a roommate? Prefer Seward area, close to work and all.

I really have to hire someone soon.

I have just about a week before one of my full time people leave and I still have no one.

There are a couple of leads, but given training time, and the inevitable 2 week notice required, I need to be a bit more proactive about things.

Looks sloppy outside, I might just say in. I have this bad habit of buying bikes without fender mounts, so I am perpetually with a big stripe of road waste on my backside.

Took a little walk, actually just back to work, I needed to stretch out my muscles from shoveling. Did I mention how much I hate pinche nieve?

Just walked to the Cafe, there was a couple of things that I had to get done anyway, so I figured why not just walk. Considering the state of the brakes on the car, and the fact that my commuter bike is now the Merckx (which I don't want to ride in the snow) walking seemed like the most prudent thing to do.

Good walk, but I found out that the guy who was supposed to buy us a replacement hose for the dishwasher must of forgot. So I had to walk back home to get the car and drive to Menards. Lucky for me, about 3 block into my drive that damn ABS light turned itself off. So at least no expensive car repairs (for now). I bought the hose, and clamps from Menards, and luckily for me, I bought the exact correct size. I wasn't able to remove the hose before I left, so I had to guess about the size, who would have knows they had so many different sizes of internal and external diameters, wacko.

I held off buying a new ladder though, maybe tomorrow. I should discuss that with the owner first. It makes sense to me though, buy a ladder and try my hand at fixing the hood system myself, the cost of the ladder even at 169 dollars will still be less than an off hour service call. We have been talking about buying a ladder for quite sometime now, so this might be some good rational to do so.

Tonight, I am thinking about using the wheels that originally came with the new Merckx and put them on the old Merckx. I have a 70's Falcon built Merckx that is my geared commuter bike, right now it has a flat and a broken spoke. The wheels are getting too old, so breaking spokes is becoming all too common a problem. Easy solution might just be to switch up the wheelset. Good thing about this bike is the Dura-Ace brake calipers have a drop bolt built into them, so I will be able to use them with both 700 and 27 wheels, even though they aren't long reach. Come to think of it, this is the only bike I have seen that has such a thing, too bad hereNT took his camera back, or else I would take a picture for all of you.

First of the whole Turkey day went off without a hitch. Not the largest crowd in the world, but the is to be expected. Holidays tend to spread people out among different families and friends, hard to attract lots of people.

The food was smooth, but again that is to be expected. It isn't really the first time I had to do a Thanksgiving dinner, and probably not the last. The only thing that really sucked this time is that I had to do all of the cleaning both before and after people came over. Before I was able to get out of doing as much, because I did all of the cooking. Now that I am living all by myself, no one but myself will do it for me.

We hit up the local after, some did some drinking, I just played a couple of games of pool and called it good.

I had to work this morning, and really nothing went right.

Started off getting a phone call from my dishwasher, he wasn't coming in. Something about a sick stomach, his cousin ensured me the story was ture, but still little consolation.

Then I notice no one left me a prep list, usually we leave a little sheet telling the following person what needs to be done. This was forgotten, meaning instead of knowing exactly what I had to do, I had to search around the kitchen and look for everything. Not a big deal, just time consuming.

Usually the produce order is in by 7:30 at the LATEST, today it was a little later.

Oh yeah did I mention it snowed today?

Well when I noticed the produce truck still hadn't shown up by 8:30, I called Roots to see if they had placed an order. No, somehow they forgot, funny how people seem not to care as much when they have a week left. So I figure out what needs to be done and place an order for the afternoon.

Ok well that is all figured out, back to prepping.

Coastal overcharged me 40 cents per pound for organic salmon, I was able to get the reversed.

Back from the fish store, the dishwasher I called in to cover for sick stomach boy shows up. She points out right away that a hose is leaking under the sink. Not that, but the spray nozzle that we use to clean all the plates before they go into the machine is leaking as well. I can fix the leaky hose, just a 3 foot section of 1" hose and some clamps, the nozzle requires complete replacement though. At least it still works, just gets everything wet.

The bulb burned out in the freezer, one of those 40 watt appliance bulbs, had to run to Target for that one.

Get back from Target, get told that the hood system isn't working. The hoods suck all of the heat from the oven and stove and exhaust it outdoors. We have had to shut it off and on lately, something was done weird with it, and the air blowing in is SO freaking cold it really isn't much fun, like standing in a walk in freezer. We have to shut the fan off sometimes, or else the bread dough doesn't rise.

I think it must have frozen shut, or there is some snow blocking the motor from starting.

Get the old ladder from the rafters, hang it up against the building, I figure I should be able to fix the problem if I see the unit.

First step,

Crack

Phil falls.

Great.

I guess I am not going up on the roof tonight, unless of course I find myself another ladder.

Say fuck it all and leave for a couple of hours, I still have to finish the schedule, but I should shovel my own walk before it gets too dark and cold.

Driving home, nice and slow. (I had to drive today, I knew I had fish to pick up.)

I get to the driveway and am waiting for the garage door to open, as I release the clutch and brake, the car takes a moment to move forward and then I hear this beeping from the dash. Look down and I see both the ABS light and the BRAKE light flashing. Hmm never happened before, doesn't seem that good now does it?

Pull into the garage, shut the car off.

Restart the car, the brake light has gone off, but the ABS is still lit. A quick once through the owners manual and I find out that somehow the ABS functionality has been compromised, and the brakes are just like old fashion brakes. Gee how much do you think that will cost to fix? I hope the problem just goes away, I don't really care to spend any more money on a car right now.

So here I am at home, about to shovel my walk.

My tooth just started hurting, and my insurance eligibility doesn't start for another 2 weeks.

Well I think that is about it.

Oh on a high note, some slutty looking girl just asked me to be her Myspace friend, although she does already have like 2000 mostly male friends, I don't feel that special.

Poor Poor Sister.

First she didn't know she had to work and was late and ill prepared for work.

Then a keg exploded on her and coated her with beer mid shift. Things like that happen when you work at a bar.

Then finally she got a break and took the bus home. Her plan was to head over to the Wedge and get some fixings for some tasty pies. Searching for her phone upon leaving her apartment it suddenly disappeared. Hmm, she remembered she had it when she was getting on the bus, because she was talking to someone at the bus-stop. Mad dash to use the pay phone to call her number yielded nothing but rings. Subsequent callings dropped directly into voicemail.

So someone has her phone and decided not to pick up, that is really all it could be.

Back to where she worked, with a quick stop by the bus stop to see if somehow she had dropped it, nope. Metro-transit people were kind enough to check the bus she was on, again nothing. At this point she calls me, and I speed off (in car) to pick her up from downtown in time to get to the MOA before the T-Mobile store closes. With barely 10 minutes to spare we make it there, and they are able to get her phone activated. Which is good, considering that tomorrow nearly ever place in the country will be closed.

It did take a little of the time I would have like to have for getting prepped up for tomorrow, but I still am sitting pretty good.

All is good now, minus the lost numbers and missing phone.

There was one extra pie for Felipe to take home from work, which is nice. Just a pumpkin but kicked with a nice maple flavor.

Ok here are all the photos. Notice the cool Merckx stamping on the dropouts, ignore the chipping paint and grime, I didn't have the chance or time to clean the bike up that much before I took the picture. HereNT I probably will build it up as a geared bike again here soon, this was just the quickest means for me to be able to have it rideable. The left STI lever is broken and so I just decided to strip it down to bare basics. I need to find myself a upgrade kit to get newer STI shit for the bike, I am thinking about going campy, that way if the STI mechanism breaks it would at least be serviceable. Also note how cool the made in Belgium sticker looks, and the record headset. I think I got a good deal for 500, even with the scratches in small ding in the top tube. The wheels of course I already had, I pulled them off the orange Miyata, along with the Sugino cranks. I hate to admit that I probably would have been better served to purchase a nice winter commuter with fenders, but I just swooped down on this craigslist find.

I should probably go now and brave the crowds to finish my Thanksgiving shopping. Don't forget people that Thanksgiving is at my house this year, and again hereNT I want you to bring the f'n pie in your bike bag, nana-cream nonetheless. No fucking excuses this time alright?

So I left at 11...

Or really a little after.

Good news I fixed that pesky flat, with re-adjusting my chain tension, total flat change time was about 10 minutes, I wasn't really pushing to go very fast. I think the tire is a little older, so the rubber is easier to manipulate, that helps.

The bike is fully functional and ready for serious riding.

I took it around the block and was impressed, it handles superbly. My fears that it would be a size or so too small were unfounded, as I will need to actually lower the seat at least an inch. I didn't feel like the top tube was too short either, it actually felt about right. Even so, you have a little amount of breathing room with moving the stem up and down, or if nothing else I always have the option of buying a slightly longer stem. I haven't taken it on any long rides yet, so I don't know it feels for an extended period of time.

I have the feeling once I get it how I like it, I am REALLY going to like the bike.

But I am tired as all hell right now, so am going to bed.

About those bike photos, the camera's batteries just died so I have to find some more. I might have some someplace, I just don't really know where I put them.

So the baker called me this evening to state her concern that we might not have enough time to finish all of the pies. This is a fairly valid concern, our ovens are small and our orders are many. So I returned to work to help out and cook some key limes.

That should take a little bit of the pressure off of them tomorrow night.

It does suck that I opened this morning at 6 AM and as of now it is 9:15 PM. I was able to take off a few hours inbetween during which I built up my new bike as a single speed.

Crazy thing is that the clearance for the rear wheel is so small that I wasn't able to use my 28m tire I had on the Phil's. I switched out with a 23m that came with the bike, the tire was in good shape. I just used the same tube that was in there, it seemed to be holding air ok. Quick note, both tires changed in total time of less than 3 minutes, new record for me, I was able to get away with using just one lever as well.

Well the bike was all ready to go, just fill the tires up and go. Fill up the back and the stem starts leaking. I didn't have enough time to do another swap, especially considering I would have had to take the bike back down to the basement in order to do so (chain tension etc).

So as of this I haven't ridden the bike yet.

It looks real nice though, but I need to get a shorter spindle BB, the chain line is a tad off. I don't know how bad it is yet, since I haven't ridden it but I assume it will go clunk-a-chunk-chunk.


Good thing I drove to work anyway, CopyMax messed up our order, so we didn't have any of the labels we needed for this order tomorrow morning.

FYI 7 Minutes from here to the Quarry Office Max.

(I might have exceeded the speed limit a little.)

Back to pies.

So pictures will be forthcoming, but suffice to say I have purchased yet another bicycle. This one is probably the nicest of the fleet, Merckx MX Leader, and while not new it is probably newer than any other bike I have (minus the 2005 Kona Blast of course).

There are a couple of things I will need to do to get the bike up an running, luckily I have an extra shimano 600 left hand sti lever lying around, that makes things easier.

Of course I might just go ahead and tear the entire frame down bare and utilize the horizontal dropouts, I mean really how fucking sexy would that be? Slap the Phil Woods on there, break into my private stash of 171mm Sugino Mighty Comp Cranks and I would be a happy camper. Or I could just save up my money and invest in new parts to build the bike up, not that the old ones are bad by anymeans, but it would feel right to have it pimped out with a full new groupo.

First things first clean and take pictures.

Read about it here.

http://www.competitivecyclist.com/za/CCY?PAGE=PRODUCT&PRODUCT.ID=117

My bike is the EXACT same color, but a few years older. I doubt my frame was ever worth 1800 though, the link is to a 25th anniversary bike.

Had dinner with Jer and Kim, her friend Sarah came for a little while. Not the greatest food but I was starving.

Bed time.

Went into work to turn in some paperwork and edit punches.

One of my night supervisors turned in his notice, which really sucks. He was good, and what more was the brunch guru, now I have to worry about training someone else to do brunches. Brunch sucks no matter what, now it will be even more of a pain in my ass. I hope this new position works out well for him, a little more money and opportunities for advancement. I don't really berate anyone for leaving, as long as they give me 2 weeks notice, that is all I really care about. People are bound to move on, that is the nature of the business, so when it happens, it happens. It might be a little difficult for him, given that his new job is in Chaska, about 25 miles away. Right now he lives about 6 blocks from that cafe, within walking distance. I cannot help but wonder if the modest increase in salary he will be getting is enough to cover the extra gasoline costs of driving 1 hour + each day. Not really my deal though, I might just keep him on in an on call capacity, good people are a little hard to come by.

Hmm I just remember Daniel from the club was calling me looking for a job the other day, might be a good idea to call him up and see what he is looking for. Or I have received quite the stack of applications from some pretty good people, so my options are pretty open right now. The winter time is always a good time to look for cooks, everyone is cutting hours or laying off for the season, the workforce is ripe for the plucking.

So well I didn't get nearly as much as I was planning on doing last night (read nothing). I just sat around watched movies I borrowed from my brother and generally wasted time. I have to rid myself of all this fucking Halloween candy bars I have left over, brilliant me thinking it would be a good idea to buy the jumbo full sized bars. What the fuck was I thinking? Now I have this box full of cheap nestle and hersheys chocolate which is really good for nothing. Doesn't even taste like chocolate, more like wax with chocolate flavoring. Yet still although I know how bad it is, that doesn't stop me from constantly grabbing a bar every time I feel the slightest pangs of hunger.

Maybe people will finish them off at Thanksgiving? Or at least agree to take some home.

Makes me sick and jittery, yet I still have no self control. It used to be like that with the booze, but I kicked that. Tell me why or why am I having so many problems with something as simple as chocolate?

Alright I am giving myself until 11 o'clock to finish all of my paperwork, that is a little less than 40 minutes.

Then I have to head into work and figure out exactly how we are doing each menu item this week.

I put this cranberry squared on the menu, which sounds silly (because it is) but I have these fun Vermont cranberry beans that I am cooking down with cranberries and I am going to be serving them with polenta and whipped thyme goat cheese. Don't forget about Harold's famous Microgreens, imagine mixed greens sprouts and you have them.

I couldn't tear myself away from the phone in time to meet up with my chums to see the new Harry Potter film. Although I probably should have, time just wasn't on my side this evening. I still have about a bazillion things I should be doing, and as of yet I haven't started on a single one of them. I was thinking that drinking myself a French press full of organic fair trade coffee would do the trick, but not quite yet. I sometimes wonder if I am so thoroughly soaked with caffeine that it doesn't affect me like it should. The only time I even notice that stuff is when either I don't have it, or I drink to the point of jitters. Either way I don't get the same effect that I would like.

Ok now I really am going to get motivated.

Alright well I spent a little time fucking around with my template here tonight. When that wasn't good enough I decided to play around with My My Space Profile. And yes I did just use the same damn photo for the background of Myspace as I did on the side here. I should probably have cleaned up the wheel a little before I took the picture, but I had just gotten back from Jerizo's Casita and was anxious to get this up and running. He was nice enough to lend me his digi cam, which really comes in handy in the taking of photos. I still have some little amount of tweaking to get things exactly how I want them, but for the most part I am happy with what I have. And finally after about 5 years solid of having RR as my ISP I set up the free homepage, with 5 megs of free hosting. It seemed the easiest way to get my images on the web.

The party last night was fun, although a little weird. I feel a little weird hanging out with all of my employees, not that I was making a spectacle of myself, but nonetheless it was strange. I haven't really been in that position too often, heck it wasn't until a few months ago that I even started being anyone's "boss". I was pretty tired by the time I finally got home, I ended up just getting about 1/2 hour of sleep after my run. I was seriously contemplating not waking up and just sleeping through the rest of the night. Luckily I thought better of it, and pulled my lazy ass out of bed. The party was equipped with Fire and saxophonist. The fire was being stoked with old boards, presumably left over from some housing construction. Nothing like blue/green flames coming as the treated wood burned ever so slowly. I did have worries that my future children might be born without limbs, but as of now it doesn't seem likely that I have to worry about that anytime soon.

Riding today was pretty easy, the temp was near perfect. I ask myself how many more of these perfect days are we going to have before we are subjected to more of the bone chilling cold we all have come to expect. Enjoy it while we can right?

There are some misc catch up work I should be doing around the house today, little things that I know need to be done. Not to mention I still have yet to plan the big dinner this Thursday. I just hope I don't end up buying everything from Costco, knowing me that isn't too far from reality. I know for a fact I am going to buy the Greens from there, you cannot buy greens retail for cheaper than you can at costco, actually I think they are about the same price I get them from roots.

I might just cause trouble with Jer's digital camera, I know I will probably have to return it shortly anyway so might as well have fun while I can. At least until the batteries wear out.

Just got back from a quick little run.

It has been almost a week since the last time I actually went out running, all of this cold/snowy weather just really isn't that conducive to outdoor activities. I am still commuting via my bicycle, so I don't feel all that bad about not doing much else.

I didn't go too fast or too far tonight, probably about 4 miles, the first of which for sure was the hardest. It almost felt like I had to break the rust off and get all the parts moving before I could actually start enjoying the run. Sometimes it just feels like that, especially if I have been slacking for a while. After things started moving, I felt like I could have gone for more than just the few miles I ran. But I didn't, I just returned home.

Somehow on both pairs of my light weight gloves I have lost the mates. Luckily they are still the opposing gloves so I am able to make a pair albeit bastardized and mismatched. Good thing it was dark and I didn't have anyone to impress, and actually I took the gloves off for the last 2 miles.

I should really finish my laundry, shower and nap before the party tonight. I did the "turn and burn" last night and this morning, meaning I closed the kitchen and had to return to open. That gave me exactly 7 hours between shifts to get home, shower, sleep, wake, return. I don't really mind, especially considering I don't have to work next until Monday morning. Knowing me I will be still find something to do at the cafe here and there, even if it isn't 100% warranted.

Tracy left town this morning to head over to Chicago to some yoga seminar or something. I was left with keys not just to her house, but to her saab as well. I was a little worried about her catching her flight, she was still at the cafe until less than an hour before her flight was to leave. I am not sure that things are entirely in hand for her stead, but we shall do the best we can. I am a little worried about the 250 take out pies we have going out later this week, but I think we have most everything planned out.

Viggo chewed through the some paperwork I needed last night, damn dog.

I made a pretty damn good vegan lentil soup today, our soups have been flying out the door since the temp dropped into the colder end of the spectrum.

The bakers are making a cake tonight for an ex-employee who was fired early last week. He lived just 1 block away and still was perpetually late. Really one block? What sort of excuse justifies such tardiness, on at least a couple of occasions he was late while he was just sitting outside of the Cafe talking to people.

So his roommates are throwing him a "You got fired" party tonight, hence the cake.

As of yet we don't really know what is going to be written upon it, but the top choice is "Get a new alarm clock" I was thinking about hitting up Ikea and buying one of those cheap plastic alarm clocks to use as a decoration on top of the cake. I don't really feel like dealing with the traffic right now though.

United Noodles is having a special on FuKuBe salad this week, anyone know what that is?

I going to check out the Merckx Sunday morning, hopefully all is legit. I of course want to check out the serial number and make sure it isn't hot before I buy it, wouldn't feel right riding someone else's bike.

558 dollars and 76 cents.

That is how much I currently have sitting burning a hole in my pocket.

At this new job I still end up buying lots of stuff, mostly costco, but sometimes other things. Like yesterday when I did a home depot freezer run. Instead of paying out with a check like the club used to, here they just pay me with cash. Usually I don't really need the money, at least not to pay off my credit card bills. I have enough of a buffer built up that I just pretty much use the cash as sort of an ATM, or at least a good reason to avoid having to use one.

So I keep asking myself what I am planning to buy..

Another bike?

Well funny you should mention it, someone in Stillwater is one as I type, well within my budget.

I cannot say I am hyped about the color scheme, but what can you do, it is a used bike for less than a quarter of what it originally would have went for. You know me, always bargain hunting.

Sadly it wouldn't get much use until springtime, no reason to kill a nice steel frame with the salt and slush littering our streets here in the next couple of months. I am heading over there tomorrow morning to check it out and make sure there aren't any problems not seen in the picture. If not it could very well take the place as top steed above all others in the stable. It would really upset me if someone got to it before me, but que sera sera right? Not like I wouldn't be able to find an equally fine bike with all my cash.

Or I could just do the prudent thing and deposit it in the bank, but what fun is that right?

So it was bitch cold today. Windy and frigid, enough to where even with all my layers and baclava I still was a bit chilly.

To start the day out there was some freaky ice around as well, you know the kind where you step on the pedals and instead of going forward your back tire just spins out a bit, like that.

Tomorrow will prove to be much more of the same, part of me really likes this cold weather, everything is so much more peaceful and tranquil. Spring and summer are near chaotic in comparison, always people bustling about, animals scurrying etc. Heck I might even go for a jog tonight if the mood suits me right.

Oh yeah,

FYI Thanksgiving this year is at my house, and I intend to invite a posse.

So far I have family and Chris who I work with.

I am sure I can rustle up some similarly orphaned people from around the city, and really my house is pretty kick ass with the record player and such.

So if you aren't doing anything and want to chill, just call Phil.

Sorry that was cheezy I know.

Later.

target=I may have mentioned it before but, I love the electric blanket on my bed, makes up for the lack of a hot body to leech heat off of

Ok well we finally are getting some snow here in Minneapolis and it is about fucking time, although I would have liked to actually rake my leaves before the white stuff flew. Having to keep up on all the housework both inside and outside while trying to maintain my composure at work and with everyone else has been a little stressful. There is only so much I can manage to get done at a time, and I have chosen not to rake the leaves. They really didn't seem that bad this year anyway, the grass is (was) still visible near everywhere.

I think I will just wait until spring time and do the mowing/mulching thing to chop all the leaves into little pieces before they get thrown about.

Cold and windy it is tonight as well. Sleet, snow and sometimes rain are all wisping around, fun times. I rode my bike to work today, aside from the fact that I usually do ride, it had even more motivation tonight. The forecast did call for snow and ice falling, which would require scrapping and brushing of my car right? If I take how much time it would take me to scrap all the windows and brush excess snow off of my car, I could have been home already. Hell for all I know it might put me outside longer just getting my car ready than just simply riding home.

It really wasn't even that cold on the way home, I have ridden through much worse. Like the time my eyelids froze shut and I was subjected to 3 miles of practical blindness. That wasn't fun. Having to wait for my eyes to thaw before I could even think about changing into my work clothes wasn't particularly an experience I would care to repeat. Luckily I was able to snag a ride home so my fate wasn't repeated. That was one of the great things about being married, you always had someone to count on, if you really needed something they were there for you. I am sure I could convince someone to give me a ride if I was in a similar situation again, but it just isn't the same. Spouses are pretty much required to help, although really I did a fairly lousy job. Mostly in the whole giving rides situation, not something I could do at all back then, kind of helps to have a license right? Tonight isn't near as cold as the frozen eyes day, it was negative 10 that night, and right now it is just 29, nothing.

I have to figure out the entire menu for next week, Tracy is going on vacation soon and I am going to have to figure out exactly what we are doing before she leaves. I have no clue yet, but that hasn't really stopped me before now has it?

A few of the FOH staff are pissed off that I didn't end up naming the pork sand this week "Three Little Piggies" instead opting for the name "Fischer Farms Trio" after the farmer I buy my pork from. Pork tenderloin, smoked ham and bacon, with Gruyere and aioli on organic baguette. It is very yummy, we are selling quite a few given how slow the last couple of days have been. The cold weather hits us a little hard, for sure we are busier during the summer months. But anyway people are pissed I didn't use the Fairy Tale name, I do have the power and ability to change it back though, so I might tomorrow. Even Jo who I saw at Rainbow last night was upset I didn't use my original choice. She hasn't worked there for a couple months now, and still somehow was in the know about potential menu names.

But enough is enough, I need to get some menu planning started and I still smell like work.

Not that I have anyone who cares how I smell right now, but still.

I was late to work again today.

This time I blame the power going out and my inability to distinguish between am and pm on my little alarm clock. Although I didn't realize this was the case, until I got home and heard my alarm going off right at the time when I walked in the door, exactly 12 hours after I should have been waking up. I hate being called awake by my baker wondering when I was planning on coming to work, really uncool and unlike me.

Bought a freezer for work today.

3 firetrucks parked right in front of my house right now, wonder what is going on?

We had a semi-famous Minneapolis based musician eat here today. I don't want his name to show up in google searches, but he is a local singer-songwriter who is getting pretty popular lately, and just was signed to m0dest m0use's label. To those still not in the know, here is another hint, he sings about butterflies and California.

He had the salmon, although his 1 year old toddler ate as much as he did. I asked how they liked it before I realized who he was, all was good.

Tracy is trying to set me up with this girl who is going to house/dog sit for her this upcoming weekend. I guess she had been asking about me after I worked this party a couple of weeks back. Not too sure if I am that interested, but I will give it a shot, or else I will have to suffer the wrath of Tracy being pissed at me, not a fate I care to subject myself to.

We finally got new chocolate callebaut brand 60/40 concentration instead of the cheap as hell sysc0 brand we were using. Sara the fire breathing baker made some expresso mousse for this espresso soaked chocolate cake she made that was fucking right on. She was calling it "PMS" cake for some reason, I think because she is currently afflicted by that condition this week and she wanted something to satiate her cravings. Seemed to do the trick.

BTW the sun setting so quickly really is fucking with my yard work schedule. I was planning on doing some leaf raking after work today, but instead the sun set before I even got home. Hell right now it is just a little after 6 and already it is dark as hell.

Going to try and see the Sarah Silverman movie tonight, I could use a good laugh.

I almost forgot, the fun new sandwich this week.

I call it Mock Tuna or "I can't believe it's not tuna". Basically a vegetarian Tuna salad made with crushed garbanzo beans and your regular tuna salad fixings. Sure it is mostly for novelties sake, but it will prove to be fun nonetheless.

Just a little caveat, carry on.

Where I work I pretty much change the entire menu weekly. This means that we don't really have to keep the same products week after week, which is nice. It allows us the opportunity to vary what we sell, again that is nice. For example for the last month I haven't had a single dish with fresh tomatoes on it. The quality has been so horrendous that there isn't any good reason to use them. At best late fall tomatoes taste like cardboard, or else they are shipped in from halfway across the country, either way I don't care to use them.

I have been trying to find a better way to illustrate to the cooks how to construct each dish. I write the recipes, and make this little sheet detailing how every sandwich or salad goes, but still there seems to be some constant confusion going on. This week I figured how better to illustrate things than with an illustration? Makes sense right?

I won't actually be in a position to take photographs of everything until tomorrow, so I did the next best thing tonight. I created a little spread sheet deconstructing each dish and drew cute little pictures describing how to put it all back together. Tomorrow lets just hope I can get my copy to work unscathed, I still need to make photocopies for each side of the line.

I have yet to figure out exactly what I am going to do for the Prix Fixe tomorrow evening. I guess I will do what I always do and just wing it. Probably cliche, but I always surprise myself with what I am capable of doing when under pressure, sometimes I purposefully procrastinate, just to have to bust ass for a couple hours. Not the best thing to do, but works for me.

I made the big ass robot, it wasn't easy.

Looking at the instructions didn't make things easy per se, but at least it wasn't impossible. There would not have been any chance of getting the two robots together as giant big ass robot if I wouldn't have had cute illustrations of how to do it.

Now I might take it back apart, just to see if I can get the robots back into regular robot stage.

The squirrels in my 'hood are causing trouble again. Or at least an annoyance.

I bought some pumpkins to put on my step for the Halloween festivities. Kids don't visit unless you have something to offer them.

I kept the pumpkins sitting on the front steps, I figured I would just let them chill for a while, brightens up the house a bit. I noticed yesterday there was a little nibble out of one of the two pumpkins I had. Probably the squirrels, cool I thought give those little buggers a little food. On the way to work this morning I noticed the little nibble had gotten a bigger. Home from work and I noticed the pumpkin was sprawled out seeds littering every step. Last time I ever help a squirrel out. Now I have to go clean up a bunch of pumpkin seeds. Fucking squirrels, first the black walnuts now this.

Got to work late, left early.

Geez Felipe, what a fucking slacker. Today is my 13th day in a row, so really I don't feel all that bad about thing. There also wasn't room for me to actually do any work, I was just getting in the way and telling people what to do. On account of all that I just opted for the leave work early route. I was going to try and rake up some of the leaves, finally. But the droplets of water spraying my face from both the sky and my bicycle tires spoke otherwise.

So now I have nothing to do but sit at home and play with my Transformer. I don't know if I mentioned it, but I don't see how this damn toy can be rated for 5 years old and up, I am confused as hell. The instruction sheet is a freaking poster with little 1/2 inch illustrations throughout. I can barely get Optimus into his truck form, not to mention somehow build the big OMEGA PRIME. If is wasn't so creepy sounding, I would entice some child off the street to do it for me. Probably not the best idea, single guy, trying to get children into his house to play with his transformers, the neighborhood watch would be all over me.

At least I have some Green Juice to drink, hopefully that will help rid myself of this massive coffee induced headache.

I got a crazy garbled message from Beng, one of my old co-workers today. I couldn't understand a single word that lady was telling me, NADA. I didn't even know who it was until I did a quick google search of the phone number. Her English never was really that good anyway, add to that talking through a cell phone and the results are intelligible at best.

So you know, don't try and buy a Keg for your 30th birthday, really.

Just as I predicted, a solid turn out but not near enough justify a 16 gallon keg. Even with Pete and Lenny, there was no chance of getting that sucker finished tonight, not even tomorrow.

Shame.

Well I have to work in a few, so night.

Tonight we all get to see how much party draw someone has when turn 30.

My buddy is thinking that he should be able to attract a big enough audience to consume an entire 16 gallon keg. Really what are the chances of that? By this point in our lives most everyone that I know is done with the wanton abandonment of their ability to watch their limits. It is just that usually everyone knows their limits by the time they are around that age, what you need for a kegger are a bunch of kids willing to drink themselves silly.

Too bad I don't think I am going to be much of a help in finishing off the keg, unless I drag some of my co-workers along. Should be fun.

I bought that Transformer toy I was talking about earlier, still in the box but really kick ass. It actually is two toys in one, Optimus Prime and Ultra Magnus which come together to form the impressive OMEGA PRIME. You know you all want one, don't even play. Here it is although I didn't pay near as much as they are charging. Either I was going to buy myself a digital camera which would have cost around 500 for the one I wanted, or I could buy myself a 30 dollar transformer. Both will probably keep me occupied for about the same amount of time, so I opted for the lesser of evils.

Right know I have the toy on display in the box at work, lets hope grease doesn't get splattered all over it.

And looking for images made me realize that transformers fans aren't exactly the hippest people on the planet. I had better stop my toy purchases with this one, no reason to digress into antisocial behavior.

Not that most of you really care, considering all of my regular readership aside from one are female. Only the coolest of cool girls dig transformers, do you really want to be a square?

Did any of you know that KFAI had an all accordion show Friday mornings?

I just found that out.

So yeah I didn't end up having to come into work this early, so I am spending my time just kicking it drinking a bit o coffee. There must be something in the air, or I am just watching at the right time, so far I have seen numerous cyclists ride by my window. Quite the disproportionate amount to that of the combustion driven engines.

Even more pirates in Somalia, fucking nuts?

Sucks being the boss.

I spent the entire day trying to figure out what to do about this baker situation.

Trying not to step upon toes and still find a way in which we have all of our bases covered and everyone stays happy. Can't say it was the easiest off all the tasks I have done in my life, but I was at least successful.

Everyone is happy, at least for now.

I might just have to work tomorrow morning for one of my employees though. From 6:30 to 10 at night, sounds like fun.

Wish me luck with finding some time in the interim to head to costco and buy myself one of those Transformer Optimus Prime toys I saw yesterday. Serious I am buying one, the first "toy" I have purchased in many years.

We used to have this cat, bitch of a cat. I am hesitant to mention it's name for fear that it will be like that movie candyman and suddenly reappear to wreak havoc upon me. The cat was seriously no bueno, bad enough to the where I still have some scars on various portions of my body as a result of him living with us. What makes a cat think that it has a chance against someone 20 times their size? Stupid feline.

Anyway, the cat not only attacked myself, but also near every plant we had lying around the house. Very Garfield like big fat ass orange cat attacking people and eating house plants. A couple just didn't make it, became fodder for the compost bin. One plant in particular was seriously maimed but not quite dead. One of those broad leaf potted plants, it used to be huge but was reduced to a few sparse leaves after the cat got hold of it. My idea was to just toss the plant at that point, it seemed like it wouldn't ever recover. We got the plant from behind a dumpster 6 years before anyway so what was the big deal?

Me ex persisted, she wanted to keep the plant and somehow nurse it back to health. That was all cool with me, but I wasn't going to be responsible for keeping it alive, heard the term exercise in futility before? My ex is worse than even myself when it comes to gardening and plant tending, she has some problems keeping those little buggers alive. That was what 2 years ago? The plant has yet to recover much at all, still with only 4 leaves which look damn pathetic within the large pot.

I stopped watering it a couple weeks back, and pushed it aside into a room I have no need to ever go into. I am happy to say that the plant is on it's final days. I would be surprised if by the end of next week there is any sign of activity left.

So first off one of my bakers is pregnant.

Three months along and I JUST found out a couple days ago. I guess that the entire kitchen knew, and somehow managed to keep the secret from myself and the owner. Even the son of one of the other bakers knew, he is 6 years old. I wasn't really expecting this coming from this particular baker, last I had heard she had a girl not boy-friend. Anyway she seems to be happy about the whole ordeal, which is of course good.

I just find it pretty amazing that everyone was able to keep the secret from us, but I guess I am no longer in the "know" now that I am the boss. I hate that people might think of me a little differently than they would have if I was just a cook, but inevitably that is the progression of things.

Now the other baker, the one with the 6 year old is also pregnant, albeit at a point where it is no longer much of a secret. She is due to burst here within the next few weeks, and I am sure she is wishing it would come sooner. The drama is two fold here, the first is that she is having a child (son) with one of the shift supervisors, which I guess isn't that big of a deal. So really that isn't much drama, the drama really starts when I think about how she quit on my tonight.

In the last few weeks, her concentration has been off, which I am sure has to do with her pregnancy. Isn't it true that in one day more hormones course through a woman's veins than in her entire child bearing years sans child? We were expecting that she wouldn't be quite as good as she regularly would be, that just goes with the territory. But to her I think it was too frustrating, and tonight it just came to a head. She really shouldn't be working right now, her body is too worn out from just carrying the baby, let alone having to work and care for little punchy 6 year old.

So she quit on me tonight, although she didn't have the gumption to actually tell me to my face. She had some problems, a couple of recipes didn't turn out right, and she just lost it and said she had to go home. She also started spouting off about how there wouldn't be a place for her to come back to, and how she had no job security (totally false). I think that she is creating a scenario in her mind to justify to herself getting some time off before the baby comes. So somehow she is fabricating that her job is in jeopardy so she decided to quit before it slips away from her.

Rational eh?

Pregnant women I have found as of late aren't the most rational of all "god's" creatures.

So we are giving her a day and then we are going to call her and explain that she does in fact still have a job after her maternity leave. Luckily the owner is opting to do the calling, I don't know how good I would be at such things.

Although it might be one of those cry for attention things, they say this isn't the first time she has done something like this.

So I just noticed that for some reason I chose to have my Blog in pink.

I just for some reason never took much notice before of the color, I think I just randomly chose the template, not really giving much thought to the color or anything else. I still don't really consider this my "blog" just a place to write down what I am thinking about at the time. The last one I had I was really more into, I actually cared and thought more about what I had to write. Here with this new one, I am just sort of half assing it, not even bothering searching for those perfect images that help to illustrate my point and break of the blog monotony.

But why oh why pink.

Anyway,

Started the Prix Fixe menu tonight. It all went well, although I would have liked to sell a few more (isn't that how it always is?) I must say I was quite happy with how all of the food turned out, the quality was much better than that of what we usually do. It had more to do with how I could concentrate more on each plate, I wasn't distracted by much else around me. I scheduled myself as the extra person tonight just to get things ready for the Pri-Fi, and since it was a Monday, it was easy. I am really looking forward to doing this Prix Fixe thing on a weekly basis, it will give me something more to look forward to.

But all that aside, the night went well, I didn't do much, and now I am going for a run.

Somedays things feel good, like all that is happening to me really is getting better. The whole divorce process isn't what anyone would describe as an easy one, and as things go I have the feeling I will look back upon this one with out the animosity many people do towards their experiences. Neither my ex and I are the type to hold much of a grudge, I am also sure that we wont end up living in the same city, so that will make things easier. I know that she isn't thinking about returning to the US anytime soon, and if she did, Minneapolis would be near the bottom of the list for permanent residence.

Shit she was the only reason I was staying here, not even her so much as the life we had built up together. Stopping the momentum of something so established isn't something that is done lightly, and I wasn't the one to put things in motion to do so. I still even now am stuck here, unable to leave still having to support the "house" even though now it is just myself living here. Things are for the best now, I never realized how much I actually enjoy being single. Not just because I am free to date whom ever will have me, although that part is nice. Just because it frees me up to be the person that I always have known myself to be. All the "roles" that we played over the years, we just fell into them, without really giving it much thought. I look around now and see couples in a quite different light, I see how people become complacent with their lives and pretty much lose all ambition. I don't mean to sound bitter, but it is a little sad, many "happy" couples just seem to be wasting away. I have a feeling that is the recently separated portion of myself noticing these things, and as soon as I find someone I care like that, I probably will start to see things differently.

The point is that right now things are good.

Right now is a good day, hell a good week.

I think I have finally crested above a certain point, a point I hope regression doesn't once again affect me. I don't like it when my relationship actually starts to affect the rest of my life, both personally and professionally. And right now all that is affecting me is myself, I don't feel influenced by what is going on anymore. Given the alternative I prefer days like today, even if things are less than perfect.

Caveat: 40 Year Old Virgin was good, although not great. Frankly I was expecting a little more, but then again I don't really complain when I see a film at the Riverview, how can you when ticket prices are so damn cheap.

Ok well let's start this out on a high note.

Friday when I was riding my bike to work, I get to this little underpass on 36th avenue that goes under a rarely used underpass. Old and concrete, looks like shit, falling apart. I always find a way around it if I can, or at least when there is a train passing above, I worry about the structural integrity of something so rickety. Now I am for sure going to veer in another direction when I see a train going pass. For this time, not only was the bridge it's normal beat up self, but there was a delivery truck that didn't judge the height perfectly and wedged themselves underneath. The poor driver was in the awkward situation of not being able to go forward or back, just stuck there kicking themselves at their momentary lack of judgment. It was hard for me not to find a little humor in the situation, even if at the expense of someone else.

I hope they remembered the easiest way to get out of a situation like that, all you have to do is release some of the tire pressure from the tires and that can drop the vehicle a couple of inches. It is pretty important of course to remember to fill the tires up right afterwards, you don't want to ruin the rims, or tires, but it is at least a way to get through.

I have a employee meeting to conduct today, my first ever. I don't really know why we are having it, so this will be fun. Also there is going to be a little baby shower for a pregnant employee, that should be fun as well. I need to find something worthy of a baby shower gift, not like I know what I know what people actually need for babies nowadays. Blanket? Silly toys? Really I have no f'n clue.

So I get to choose as to which I would rather do, clean my house, figure out the meeting, purchase a gift, or just slack off and enter into my blog. So far the later is getting the highest priority, although I attribute that to my needing to drink a couple of cups of coffee before getting moving.

I was up working and generally wasting time until pretty late by Felipe standards last night. I didn't finally hit the hay until around 2:30 in the AM, compare that to my regular bed time of around 11, quite different. I don't really know why I stayed up so late, but I got caught up in what I was doing.

Then god knows why I woke up at my normal time, and was unable to fall back to sleep. I have operated on less than 4 hours of sleep before, so I really don't have much to worry myself over. Today is my day "off" from work anyway, so I have little or nothing to actually do. OK well I say that, but I have still given myself a substantial list of all the tasks I need to get done this afternoon. Mostly stupid shit in preparation for the weekend and the like.

Watched that movie Donnie Darko last night, I can see why it has achieved a semblance of a cult classic. Better than I was expecting, I like that whole paranoid schizophrenic angle, works on so many levels.

Well I should get ready to do some work now, I have a bunch of errands to worry about and run today.

I felt like I had been a little out of sorts recently. I was having trouble staying concentrated, maintaining focus. I usually don't have much of a problem keeping things together, at least at work. It wasn't like things were falling apart or anything, it just felt like I didn't really have everything tied up and under control like I usually like to. I have been accused of being a little OCD lately, and I think I just might have a few of those tendencies. Not that anything is wrong with that, I just like to make sure that things are a certain way. Really is that so bad? My focus has been off, I have been forgetting things that if you know me I never would have missed. It had felt like my spiraling out of control personal life was leaking over to the rest of my life.

Now I think things are finally getting back in line. I feel that person who has everything under control returning.

Part of the problem was that I was causing more drama than I really had do, *note to self*=Don't start dating someone and expect it not to complicated while you are still married. Or if you do, try and keep it from turning into anything but a casual thing. Like I don't have enough to worry about with my EX, I threw another girl into the mix. I am not really severing things completely with the new girl, but I am going to take it down a knotch or two. Now that I don't have to worry about somehow maintaining a relationship as deep as things seemed to be going, I can finally focus on things that are more important.

I was thinking about completely just ending things with the new girl, but I don't know if that would even be the best idea. I mean I really like her and like to spend time with her, even if she does make 3 times my salary. It isn't like I am going to be settling down with her or anything, there is no way our relationship would develop into anything lasting. Just given the religious differences would be enough to keep us apart, mostly to her. I don't really care much either way, religion never was a big issue to me, I would prefer to be with someone who did share the same belief structure as myself, but I don't consider it a contentious issue if we don't. If I don't agree with someone, I just keep things quiet, no reason to stir the pot needlessly. There is no reason that I see why my opinions are anymore valid than that of the next guy, so why try and impose them on someone else right?

For example right now I have about a bazillion (my favorite word) things to think about with an upcoming meeting and getting things ready for some new menu ideas. We are going to be starting a Prix Fixe here on Monday, so I need to make sure that I am ready for that. I am not really anticipating it being that difficult, especially since it is in fact on a Monday.

Just bought Donnie Darko, I had never seen it so I figured at 10 dollars how could I go wrong right?

NY Times.

I read the online version of the NY times on a fairly religious basis, what ever that means. Better put I am a devout reader of the NY times, that sounds a better than using the "R" word to describe things. In the last few weeks or so they have changed the way it works, so that you cannot read an entire article without subscribing or being an online subscriber. Which means that I only get the first few paragraphs of an article before I am left guessing what else is said. It feels like I am being teased, and it might just convince me to subscribe to the paper, those devious NY times people.

Or I might just focus my nightly internet perusing in other areas, time will tell.

Another day another dollar.

I know it sounds a little cliche but things are getting to be fairly routine in my life as of the last few weeks. Like today for example, I didn't really have to do much of anything, and things still flowed nice and smooth at work.

It was one of those days where things don't get complicated but just flow like they are supposed to. I cannot really complain, given the alternative, I would much rather have things like this. My day was spend organizing the back store room and engrossed in general cleaning and the like. I find that the older I get the better suited I become for doing such tasks. Could it be that I am getting more anal as I age? I would like to think that I just am realizing how much easier it is to stay organized with a clean work environment.

That said again I didn't do much today. I should really focus and try to figure out what I need to get done for the meeting we have this weekend. There are about a million minor issues that will need addressing, I have to decide which are the most pertinent.

I am thinking about going out to buy some new pants tonight, I could use some new pants. I lost a bunch of weight after I quit drinking and all of my pants have gotten a little too loose. I cannot say I am really fired up about the prospect of driving someplace given that it will be rush hour soon. I might just meander down to the train station and just take the lightrail to the MOA, not my favorite place, but quite accessible.

Of subject, I have gone through and entire case of Pellegrino large bottles in the last 2 and a half days. These are the 750ml bottles, not the little guys either. That is what I get for buying in bulk. The same thing would pretty much happen when I would have lots of beer around my house, I would just drink until it was gone, regardless of how much I wanted to drink. I guess that would be called a lack of self control. As long as it is out of my view I don't think about it, but put those bottles within reach and they are gone.

Time to clean.