I'm getting old.

I don't go out for a beer very often anymore, but last Thursday I walked around the corner to a little neighborhood bar called Good Hurt to check the place out. It didn't take me long to realize that I was the oldest person in the bar by a good 6-8 years.I'm pretty much invisible when I'm in a place like this. The old guy in a t-shirt and jeans on the other end of the bar, watching the festivities. But I hung out for awhile, drinkin' my beers, enjoying the sociological show.

I may be older, but I'm wiser and I can hold my liquor, which is more than I can say for the young whippersnappers there that night.

Netflix.

Okay, so I've blogged about my love for Netflix before, but since they started the "watch instantly!" service, they've re-warmed my cold little heart with streaming video goodness. Sadly, they have not made the streaming video service Mac-compatible yet, but this service is delicious enough to justify keeping a Windows partition on my Mac. I watched about 6 episodes of Heroes on my work machine during lunch breaks and lulls; how cool is that?

I knew I was really into this new feature when I realized that I wasn't pirating nearly as many movies as I used to. Cool *and* legal; I think they're onto something with this.

Mantra.

In my last post I mentioned my mantra. "I will be pleasantly surprised by my faith in humanity and will be proven right when I give people the benefit of the doubt." When I sat down at the computer a few minutes ago, I was all ready to rant about two people who got under my skin earlier today at work.

But I just realized that they're not the problem. They work hard, they mean well, and even though they could use some coaching on how to talk to cow-orkers, they're not bad people. I'm the one who needs to work on keeping the right perspective, not letting people bother me, and following my mantra. Is this what growing up and becoming an adult is about?

Dammit, I was all ready to sit here and pound out an angry post. Now I've got nothing.

Resodictions.

Since New Years, I've been trying to think of some good predictions for 2008. I've given it a total of about fifteen solid minutes worth of thought, and came up with nothin'. Also, I've been unhappy with the list of resolutions I made for 2008 ever since I posted them. Even though I did okay with last year's resolutions, this year's list just seemed depressing.

So fuck that, I'm ditching 'em. I'm going to combine my resolutions with my predictions. I hereby declare this...

Steve's List of Resodictions for 2008.

1. I predict that I will, at some point this year, let a "fuck" slip into my speech at a business meeting. I got me a bit of potty mouth problem. I'm fuckin' okay with that. Almost happened today, but my mental goalie made a nice kick-save.
2. I predict that I will get riotously drunk and vomit at least once this year. If I'm lucky, maybe even more than once. Soon after, I will declare that I will never drink again, a vow that I will break like wind. I'm fuckin' okay with that, too.
3. I predict that I will gaze forlornly upon my chubby gut and wish it gone. Conversely, I also predict that I will continue eating the foods that I love. I used to hate food when I was a kid. Now, there's almost nothing I won't eat - I love it all. Maybe I'll start exercising, but that's not something I wanna predict. Okay. With. That.
4. Either the Minnesota Twins or the Los Angeles Dodgers will win the World Series this year, GODDAMMIT. That's a regular 'ol prediction.
5. I predict that I will do more of the things that make me happy. Travel, create, take pictures, drive fast, stare at the sky like an idiot, spend time alone, do and create crazy shit that makes me feel like I rock the goddamn house.
6. I predict that I will spend very little time worrying about what other people think of me. Conversely, I also predict that I will be pleasantly surprised by my faith in humanity and will be proven right when I give people the benefit of the doubt. This one's a mantra for me.
7. I predict that my friends will make me feel like a lucky motherfucker. Hell, they already do that.

This is a list I can get behind.

Excitement at RPA

The compressor motor on the #2 A/C unit for our server room caught fire this morning. Thankfully the Yahoo! Center building engineers were on top of it and put it out before any real drama.

HDR

Hi, my name is Steve, and I am ricockulously addicted to Flickr. Facebook? MySpace? They's gots nothin' on the Flickr, baybee. I check that damn site obsessively, and post something new almost every day. Mind you, most of the stuff I post is everyday crap, but I do drop some good stuff up there from time to time.

Anyway, for those of you who aren't as Flickr-addled as I am, here are a few photos I've posted recently in my album of HDR experimentation:I shot these on my second drive to Alaska in 2006.

Resolutions for 2008.

1. Get to 185 pounds by the end of the year.
2. Bike to work one day per week until the motorcycle is running again.
3. Find a worthy cause, charity, or non-profit and start volunteering.
4. Finish the screenplay I started last year.
5. See a dentist.
6. See a doctor about my knee.
7. Check into night classes or some other schooling/education.
8. Work to improve my photography skills.
9. Stop worrying so damn much about what other people think.
10. Feel better about who I am.

I'll post updates at the beginning of each month.

Predictions.

Exactly one year ago, I made a few predictions for 2007:
1. The Minnesota Twins will win the World Series.
2. I will move to California.
3. The Iraq war will continue, with no major changes from the way it is running now. - there will be no substantive troop draw-down this year.
4. Paris Hilton will fade.
5. MySpace will fade.
6. There will be a scandal involving the Bush administration serious enough to garner hearings, the interest of the Attorney General, and talk of impeachment.
7. Gas will consistently cost $3 per gallon by the end of the year.

Hmm. Swing and a miss on #1, easy hit with #2, easy hit with #3, definite hope for #4 (aww... too bad about grandaddy's will) and #5 (Facebook is eating their lunch), indirect hit on #6, and a solid hit on #7 (LA numbers). Not bad, if I do say so myself.

Now to come up with some new predictions for 2008...