three course meal

I'm participating in TV Turnoff Week and so far, it's been such a busy week that I haven't noticed my lack of television of any form. TiVo, Netflix and my torrents are probably wondering what's happened to me. I don't tend to watch a lot of TV, but I'm a sucker for "Huff," "The Sopranos," and, yes, "Bonds on Bonds." I'm missing my movies as I type this, because 99% of the time I'm online I have something on as background noise. Instead, I put the ol' iPod on random and have it hooked up to the surround sound and am jamming away. I wonder what my neighbors think of my music tastes -- the last three songs have been by En Vogue (I know )DMB and Snoop Dogg. I pretty much don't care what they think, anyway.

So!

It's been a busy couple of weeks.

I'll gloss over most of it because once things happen, I don't like to rehash. Pictures usually tell the story better anyway.

I had the trees trimmed in my backyard last week. I'm almost embarrassed to show the "before" pic, but oh well.

Before:




After:




Pile o' rubbish:




I know, huh? What a difference a guy with tree experience, $250 and an hour makes, right? Notice also how the tree in the first pic is actually standing upright after the guy tied it back for me. It'd been knocked over so many times in our winter wind storms this year that I got tired of putting it back up again.

I went to the City Friday, Sunday and Monday. (That's a lot for me.) I had a blast all three times, perhaps paving the way for more frequent trips. Friday night I went to a going away party for a friend of mine who has now moved out of the country. After being at the bar for a mere two hours, I got kicked out. Why, you ask? I didn't have my ID and I went up to the bar to merely get a glass of water and the bartender said he never saw my ID. I'm in a crowded bar in North Beach, mind you, and have been there for two hours -- how in the hell did he remember me?! So that was that.

Sunday I cruised up there with my family and hung around Fisherman's Wharf for a short time.

Monday she and I went to a Giants game...and they won! We were a day early for Barry's HR, but what are you going to do. I love Pac Bell SBC AT&T Park because it's so easy to get a view of the game from different angles. Behold left and right field views and club level views:









Tuesday I randomly got tickets to see Jimmy Buffet at Shoreline. I'm not really a big Jimmy Buffet fan, but can't pass up the chance for free tickets with great seats (and an exclusive party beforehand) so I took my friend Angie and we had a blast! The people that go to these concerts, er, the parrotheads are really into it. And I mean really into it. We sat next to a guy that was the living, breathing version of Peter Griffin, but I don't want to be that person and make disparaging remarks about someone and then post their pic on the creepy internet. (Tim and Lis, I'll show you soon!)




The countdown begins!







Today after work I got all domestic and replaced the sliding screen door in the back. I attempted this once before last summer and had no luck (wrong size, these things are finicky) and decided to give it a go again. I'm happy to report that I did it by myself, and (gasp) it actually works! I also replaced the latch on one of the back gates. My dad came over on Saturday and helped me with a couple of smaller projects, and I let him in on the full scope of what's on the agenda as far as home improvement goes. I needed to get him on board to save on actually hiring an electrician! He's started to replace all the light switches and plates from the ugly almond color to white. I have white walls in most of the house, and the almond switches/plates were making everything look dingy. It's one of those fixes that I thought my dad would balk at (if it ain't broken, don't fix it) but he was 100% behind it. I'm happy to report that the switches that have been done look fantastic (sometimes it really is the little things) and I bought the rest of the supplies to do the outlets today at the Holmes Depot. I'm on the lookout for lighting fixtures, but the standard fare isn't striking me, so I need to do some online shopping, methinks. Home improvement really comes in spurts for me, so I'm taking advantage of my current desire to actually do something about it instead of all the talk, talk, talk.

And I'm done.