Today I'm enduring what millions of others have endured over the years.
I applied for a mortgage refinance, and I'm waiting for word from the bank.
If I get the loan, the money will go to much needed things like a new roof and new exterior paint on my house.
I'm actually pretty nervous because I'm making a lot less money now than I was when I got my original mortgage four years ago.
I will also say that the loan officer at my bank is pretty cute.
To continue my brief tradition of ranking the night's performances on American Idol, I submit this list:
John: Sucked. 40 points.
Elizabeth: I love Elizabeth, probably because she reminds me of Kelly Clarkson. 70 points.
Katie: Cute. 60 Points.
George: I don't get why people like this guy's artifically low voice. Just barely better than John. 50 points.
Suzy: This girl can sing well. She should get through. 65 points.
Matthew: Easily second best of the night. I can easily imagine this guy's voice on my radio. 80 points.
Leah: Hot and very talented, and will only get better. Best of the night. 90 points.
Jennifer: I really like Jennifer's voice, but tonight's performance left me a little bored. Only 60 points.
Who I want to advance, based on all I've seen, not just tonight's performances:
Elizabeth, Leah, Matthew, and Suzy.
When I first walked in to Rich O's last night I already knew what my last beer of the night would be. I asked the bartender to put a bottle of Alaskan Smoked Porter on ice for me, since they usually keep it at room temperature.
While waiting for my real beer to chill I had a couple of NABC's Community Dark pints. There was some weird guy playing what I suppose could be called music and doing what I guess some would call singing, but my musical tastes are not nearly broad enough to appreciate the poor bastard.
Once again there were none of the women I know at Rich O's so I spent most of the night talking with CoffeeDude about things neither important nor interesting.
Once CoffeeDude left my Smoked Porter was ready so I moved to the bar and tasted that beer for the first time in several years.
Definately more smoky than I remember, but more complex also, I liked it a lot. I'm not sure if I like it as much as the Alaska Brewing Company's Alaskan Amber, but I'd have to put Smoked Porter in my top five beers. I'll definitely be having more of it, at least util Rich O's decides to stop selling it.
Not that I'm bitter about Cone Smoker being discontinued or anything.
Nope, not me.
For months I've been convinced that my 'blog software was corrupting some of my entries, and that I'd need to wait for a new release to solve the problem.
Well I've identified the real problem - located between my chair and my keyboard.
It was all my fault. My program that I wrote to display the log entries had a malformed expression, that, given the proper characters, could completely mangle the offending sentence.
I've fixed it now, but there's no telling what other bugs still lurk.
Last night I was in the mood for some Newcastle so I went to Hooters and met up with my cousin Jeff. This time I even remembered to ask the Hooters girl to give me my beer in a non-frosted glass.
Newcastle remains one of my favorite beers, and I enjoyed a couple while catching up with Jeff and admiring the Hooters scenery.
Next I moved on to Rich O's and had a Beak's Best. It wasn't too bad - better than the last time I had it. This beer is not fluctuating. It's just that my enjoyment of it depends greatly on what I've had to drink earlier. It tastes pretty good when following Newcastle Brown Ale.
Last night Rich O's for some reason was severly short on female presence. LaptopGirl was nowhere to be found, and MisunderstoodGirl only made a brief appearance. I spent the time talking with one of the regulars about his homebrewing and his plans for some bourbon char we'd picked up at my work earlier in the day.
At one point the guy went out to his truck and came back with some homebrewing sample bottles and several of us got to try his latest brews.
I don't remember much about what happened after that - except that I didn't like the cider, and all of the samples were very strong on alcohol content.
I woke up this morning pretty dehydrated as is usual when I drink stronger brews.
Last night they had this IQ test show on TV. I Tivoed it and took the test this morning.
I don't consider myself particularly smart - the smart people are the ones who fly through tests like this - I'm usually more likely to label others as stupid than to call myself intelligent.
The test was a struggle for me for two reasons. One was the time limit they gave for each question. I know I could have answered that memory question correctly if only they'd given me another hour or two to memorize that stupid yearbook information. The second excuse I'll use is that I'm a bit hungover from last night's experiments.
Tonight, when I answered the door for the pizza guy, the neighbor's dog ran up to my door, picked up a bowl full of water, swung it around, and got the pizza guy right in the face.
It was really quite funny, and I doubled the guy's tip.
Well they advanced the redheaded dillweed.
Looks like the Claymates are still in force this season, and they've managed to find someone even cheesier than Clay to vote for.
I just want to get my rankings on tonights AI performances down for the record - before I go to the message boards to see how stupid people are.
From best to worst:
Jasmine (had one really horrible note that I'm surprised none of the judges mentioned)
Suzy (second best of the night, and one of only two good performances)
Tiara (stupid name, but sang the song well)
Lisa (was screaming the song, but looked hot)
Heather (butchered the song that killed Tamyra Gray)
The guys (they all sucked - especially George)
I'd like to see Jasmine and Suzy advance, but I could also accept Lisa. As long as that redheaded dillweed doesn't make it I'll be okay)
Today I did my part to keep the economy moving by taking my Christmas lights down.
This helps the economy because my sister Dina had a bet that the lights would still be up next Christmas.
