October 2006 Archives

Well, I should be stressing out right now... but I'm not. I have my first CPA exam on Thursday and I'm completely unprepared. It will be a minor miracle if I muster the requisite 75% to pass, and yet I'm pretty much resigned to not even trying. I don't know why... but I really do actually.

The only reason I want to be a CPA is to tell people I'm a CPA and to get a bigger paycheck. I guess that's probably the only reason most people want the designation, but it hasn't been so appealing that I've actually felt like working hard for it. Maybe that's why I can't bring myself to study or care. Of course I'll be right pissed at myself when I have to pay for the exam again... but I'm sort of in a hazy world of not caring right now.

I should have spent my day studying, but I didn't even crack open a book, and the five hours I set aside yesterday to study had about a 20% efficacy rate. I swear that I'll study tomorrow, but who am I kidding? The Bears play at noon.

In other news, I got a new cellphone earlier this week. In a stroke of fortune, my work is paying for the phone and I have been placed on their corporate plan. I'm guessing I'll save about $30 a month... so I signed up for a gym membership at the beginning of the month. The economics of the gym thing are favorable too because although I'm presenting the two things as related here, the decision to sign up for the gym membership was really independent of the phone thing.

The gym is cool. I hope I actually stick with it on a regular basis for more than a month or two. The reason I picked it is that it has a 24 hour pool in addition to the normal gym stuff. I've been a half dozen times in the last few weeks and really like it so far. I do enjoy swimming.

Ooh, almost forgot. In my endless search for things to do other than studying for the CPA, I started reading a book on Friday called Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction by David Kuo. It's excellent. I'm about 130 pages in, but its a really interesting story about a young Christian who was interested in politics and how he wrestled with the disconnect between partisan politics and his own faith... and how partisan politics generally won out. Anyhow, it's good. Check it out.

Aight, Grace and Peace my neighbors.

It's been an eventful week in my corner of the world. Currently, it's 2 a.m. on a Saturday morning (Friday night) and I'm sitting up for some reason. I'm tired, but don't really feel like going to bed.

On the Cub front, just hours after I wrote in the last post how I thought there were slim chances of meaningful changes in the Cubs front office, Andy MacPhail resigned. I just happened to be watching the game because it was the last game of the year, and I managed to transcribe MacPhail's exit press conference with the media.

I think I unfortunately wasted one of my fifteen minutes in doing so, but we had a huge traffic spike on Goat Riders at the beginning of the week and I'm hoping it represents a bit of a step up in traffic. Before this week, we had been averaging about 600 - 700 visits per day, but we've been nearly 1,000 the last three days of the week, and there hasn't been anything going on. Late Sunday through about Tuesday, we were buoyed by strong traffic from the MacPhail resignation and Dusty's dismissal on Monday. During that period, we saw about 5,000 visits.

This week, the forums at hprots.com also got hacked as well as the page at goatcasting.org. This led me to upgrade the movable type installation because it may have been the source of the security leak. This upgrade did not go well and I got to sleep about 4 a.m. on Wednesday night/Thursday morning. Plus, I was already very tired from just normal irresponsibility. So, the week seemed to pass in a sleep deprived blur.

I am flying to California tomorrow (today actually). I am excited to go see my new niece (Samantha Rain Villa). Her pictures are absolutely adorable... plus it will be good to see Kyliah and John again.

Also, last week I hinted at big *secret* news, but the secret has been spilled. Myles and Anne have announced that they will be getting married next June. I am super-thrilled for them, and a little depressed that it seems like I'll never meet that special someone... Oh well.

Other notable occurences this week: I am done with CPA classes WOO-FREAKING-WOO-WOO. Oh how much I hate those things. Now, all I have to do is pass the blasted exams. Also, I sold another advertisement for my websites and have a commitment from one more advertiser who suddenly went incommunicado. Hopefully I'll get payment from the second advertiser during this upcoming week... because I "banked" on both advertisements being sold and went out and joined a gym on Tuesday with the money. Today, after work I went for the first time. The gym is pretty nice, but most importantly, it has a 24 hour pool. I swam about five laps before I felt pasted... which just shows how badly I'm out of shape. I dickered around for a few more laps, but I'm itching to go back again. I haven't swam in almost two years and I'm reminded how much I like swimming.

Alright. I hope the laundry is done. I am wearing my next to last pair of clean underwear and would rather not go to the laundry-mat in California.

Depression Day is my unofficial title for the day when the Cubs stop playing every year. It also doubles as the name of the day after the final game of the World Series.

I was tentatively planning to go to the game today, but I didn't because I went home this weekend and decided to sleep in my bed at home last night and drive back this morning. Of course, like any plans that require me to get out of bed, this one was doomed.

So, I crawled out of bed around 10:40 a.m. and made it up to Calvary and went to church with Mom and Dad. I'm sure they appreciated it, and I didn't want to skip church this morning. So, it would have been nearly impossible to make it up to the field on time for the game, and honestly, the Cubs have been so terrible this year that I didn't want to spend another dollar on tickets this season.

So, despite the day being depressing, it is also a day of hope because there is the slim possibility that we will see major organizational change and the Cubs could be on the path to improvement. But that is a slim possibility.

In the rest of my rather one dimensional life, things are going well, if not swimmingly spectacular. On Friday, I learnt of some majorly awesome news affecting our family... but which I cannot share here yet. This capped a good week that sort of started last Saturday when I spent the afternoon hanging out with Mom, going to IKEA, eating at Olive Garden, and just generally enjoying ourselves.

Mom and I then swapped cars. She was going to try and pay the sales tax on the Civic for me, and fix the sideview mirror. Unfortunately, she was unable to do either of these things, but I was happy for her efforts.

On Wednesday, Mom and Kathy Brown were back in town for lunch and we had fun over soup and sandwiches. Mother was in possession of a certain fact that I would have dearly liked to know, but she kept a secret.

Over the course of the week, I was also a little concerned about where the money was going to come from to pay for the car sales tax and new mirror, so I sold some advertisements for TheCubdom and CubsBlogArmy and ended up with what amounts to almost another paycheck. So, that was extremely good, and provided the money for the tax that I finally got taken care of yesterday. One less constant nagging thing to take care of!

On Friday, I had a phone conversation with an unnamed parent of mine who mentioned that the family insurance policy might need to change... and that innocent observation led to this intrepid reporter discovering an exhilarating secret that will come out eventually.

And so, this depression day is tempered with a fair bit of excitement... did I mention that the Gators beat 'Bama yesterday running their record to 5-0? Also, the Bears play the Seahawks tonight to determine the best team in the NFC. Go Bears!