Rainy fridays

But I'm stuck in my basement/bunker workplace, so i don't get to watch all that glorious grey and blue. Soon we're moving our office to a location on the fourth floor of a building located above the Burlington town center (square mall) and supposedly has a great view of the waterfront...
Currently it's Friday, i haven't had coffee yet, i haven't fully adjusted to the whole 9 to 5 thing, and since i've finished everything i have to do on my current project (revamping the syndiocompany corporate website) i'm blogging.

A Brief description of my mornings, per average:
1. Come in between 9, 9:30... sit down, if i have coffee, drink coffee stare at turned off monitors,
2. 10ish: turn on monitors, open up laptop.... stare some more.
3. 10:30ish, take out danish/bagel/scone/pastry/etc eat while reading morning newsfeeds (google news, Newsvine, wired news, crooks and liars, fark, Boing Boing, Pop Urls)
4. 11ish, read blogs/write-return emails
5. 11:30 - bang out some code, Cascade some style sheets, strap on the feed bag and eat some serious work.
6. 11:35 - Smoke break

Reguardless, my work gets done, and havning nothing to do until later when i move the test server over to the live server, is proof... i'd say the final site will be up over the weekend, so feel free to travel over to www.syndiocompany.com - i dare to you try and figure out what exactly it is syndiocompany does, judging from the website. Seriously, i've worked here now for a month... i still don't know what we do.
I still havn't really adjusted to the whole not-a-recordstore thing... luckily i get to dress however i want, and there are no time cards to punch... But i have been learning alot about Web design and CSS. Lately it seems like i havn't been seeing much of anyone, and i think i tend to do that when my life gets a little hectic, i tend to hole up, and when things calm down i venture forth... I'm a bit of a wuss like that i guess. Or i just like my quietude. Either way, this winter may just be the winter i get some spiritual edjumcation - my friend Scott, Adrienne's father, was the director of the shambala center here in town, and while i was living with adrienne i had quite a few enjoyable conversations with Scott about his beliefs, Buddhism, psychology (he's also a psychologist...) life, etc and i told myself that when i was in the right place i'd look into it further... we'll see...

while i'm rambling...

Tonight i'm re-adopting my sweet old cat JC Penny's from friend/ex Sara Paule, who adopted her from me when i moved to Olympia a few years ago - since then i've missed that little kitty so much. And now that i'm settling in for a long winter i'm really excited to have a little friend around the house. Expect gratuitous kitty shots soon enough...

Hello Cthulhu

gotta love that fuzzysquid

An American Beagle in Berlin

Fellow pure poppers, friends, and newly minted ex-patriots, Nick and Sue have started documenting their love affair with Berlin on their new blog "Jenks uber Alles" which... means, something about their Beagle "The Jenks." or the "Lizard" or whatever new and cryptically absurd nickname they've given her.

It's a load of fun, as well as incredibly informative for anyone who's ever wondered what it's like to just pick up and move from a farm house in rural Vermont to a major metropolitan European city, with your dog in tow.

It's also a load of fun if you've ever wondered what common German words and expressions sound like English swears, and if they print them on their public transportation...

Bill got Boinged

and he also got married...but that's beside the point; congrats Bill and Emily on your marriage, lovely wedding, and your 500+ hits.

What Boingboing said:

Bill celebrated his wedding last weeked in two unusual ways. First, the procession was led by a little girl in a Darth Vader helmet while a "hipster-country" version of the Imperial March played. Then Bill caught hidden-camera footage of his nogoodnik brother planting a camera in his nuptial suite as part of an elaborate "Shivaree" prank, and posted it on the Internet in revenge. About Shivaree, Wikipedia sez, "In the American Midwest, along the Missouri River in Nebraska and Missouri, the term takes on the meaning of playfully kidnapping the bride, curiously similar to some Central Asian traditions." Link to Vader flower-girl post, Link to practical joke post (Thanks, Bill)

(candleblog)

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This is also a reminder to anyone in the area that The Greendoor Studio is hosting another Greg Davis curated show this saturday night, i'm at work right now so i'm not gonna go into to much detail, instead i'm just going to copy and paste some more of what other people said, specificly Casey:

MORE AT THE DOOR
Just received word about another avant-garde performance taking place at Burlington’s Green Door Studios on Saturday, Sept. 23. In case you didn’t manage to swing by during Art Hop, the location is 20 Howard Street.

Performing this time around is Can’t, a.k.a. Jessica Rylan. According to local sound explorer Greg Davis, she’s “the queen of noise.” Which begs the question: Who’s the king?

Anyway, Rylan builds her own synthesizers, and recently crafted one for Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo. She’s also performed with his band mate Thurston Moore.

Sharing the bill is Door, whom Davis describes as “a young chap from New Jersey who travels with large speakers.” Hope they fit through the, um, door. Man, that was bad!

The show starts at 8 p.m. and costs a mere $5.

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also, i'm not sure on this, but it seems like the Greendoor may be this town's only remaining location for outsider/weird/experimental/good music... the Narthex? is that still going? and the Box... well, i won't get into that one... Anyway, so support your local hole in the wall.

They're baaa-ack

Looks like College is back in session, know how i can tell? No, it's not the autumn leaves beginning to fall, the shortening of days, the cool crisp air and sharp blue skies... or the bright smiling faces of young people walking with purpose to and fro - nor is it the sudden disapearence of all spaces parkable, and the noticable reappearance of all things daddy's money...

Wanna know how i can tell College is back in Session?

When i opened my apartment door saturday morning to this:

Grumble grumble, huff puff....

OK, i know I've pretty much alienated all my readers, going from a, nearly once-aday posting schedule to my new once every, when-the-fuck-ever schedule, but i promise i'll write more regularly soon enough - So much cool shit has come down the pipes lately too... anyone catch that whole 9/11 jazz... That shit is so 5 years ago. Bring on the Nukes, then we got a party. Though to be honest i feel like all these years i may have been giving 9/11 a bad rap, maybe those weren't squibs going off, or buildings collapsing for no reason at all and i've just been confused, well, thanks in part to ABC's fact-o-mentary and the well timed Presidential speachmercial break - now i think i understand, i understand that i probably should have seen United 93 and World Trade Center when they were in the theater, cause they probably won't translate well to the small screen.

It's go time.

In a few hours i start my new job - and i'm kind of nervous, the most i've been asked to do at a job in the last, oh... ever, has been a little customer service, a little ka-ching ka-ching, and a little open/close.... Now i'm on Salary and have obligations, deadlines, and ... a desk? probably. i don't actually know what i'm going to be doing. My business Cards read "Tanner McCuin: Web Designer" (they wouldn't go with Sir Tanner Moore McCuin Esquire: Web Auteur Extrordinaire" cause the card wasn't big enough) so that gives me a clue.

Either way i can't sleep... so instead i guess i'll stay up all night and organize my MP3s w/ all correct Tags and associated Album artwork, delete all the duplicates and then re upload them to my ipod. That should take my mind of things for a bit.

Also, as far as this blog goes - i'm gonna try and keep up with it more, but like everyone it seems, i'm really busy right now, but more so, i'm going to be hosting my blog on my own domain, it's good practice for my job and will give me more opertunities to play around with whatever new webtoy i come across... i'll keep you posted.

Ch ch ch changes....

Where have i been the last few weeks, i know you're all wondering out there in internet land... Well, i have returned with the answers, not the important ones, just my own... It's been a wirlwind end of the summer for me, which is a fitting ending to my most despised season of the year, the season where it seems unlike most people, i see less of the people i like, and spend more time indoors due to uncomfortable temperatures. Maybe next year i'll finally find that flattering bathing suit and loose those winter pounds... then i'll enjoy the summer... perhaps i'll brave one of those Marosy Pool Parties... probably not though, besides, i plan on being in Germany by next summer. (that'll happen...)

Anyway, so what seemed like all at once, i moved out of the sin-a-gog, turned 25, quit my longtime and much loved job at Pure Pop and started on my way to my new career in Web Design working for a software upstart. (thanks luke!) So for the last few weeks i've been trying to reorganize my life in many different ways - cleaning out old cobwebs, throwing out old clothes that don't fit me, papers and notes that as i read them i think "what the fuck was i smoking when i wrote "Calisthenics / Yoga? / windshield wipers or Duct tape?""

of course, i wasn't smoking anything, I figured it out - since i went with Yoga, and made wiper blades out of ductape...

So much stuff that i dont really need anymore - and somethings that i really need that i couldn't find forever like 2, 1/8" to RCA adapters. (these things are like gold to me.)

All this change luckily came along with an almost two week vacation - without which i would have gone completely shithouse, and even with it, i've only had a few days recently to catch up and relax, i wanted to do more studying for the new job (Java... sadly, cannot be learned in 2 days, no matter how much i try...) But i figure, i learn better by doing anyway so i'm ready to dive in and swim (flail madly.)

I got to take some lovely drives up and around the FC as we like to call Franklin County, did a little impromptu off roading, retreaved an old couch, and put in some face time with the grandparents.

My birthday was a lovely event, with friends from all the various branches of my life coming out together in an endearing, and only initially awkward evening of food and drink at the Seamonster banquet hall, AKA American Flatbread - i cannot explain how surreal it was to me to see my Father, sitting next to, Herb, sitting next to JB, sitting next to Sarapaule, sitting next to Todd, sitting next to Breiner, sitting next to Gahlord, etc etc - though, of course, since all my friends are awesome, they were all able to find common ground and the i guess the tasty beer and pizza helped too.

Afterwords it was drinks at the OP. Anyone who knows my father knows that the man cannot drink, he's like me but old w/ curly hair. Getting him to come out and drink was hilarious, as was watching him try and order a "blended strawberry daquiri" from Matt who in typical matt style just stared at him with incredulity. Then my dad asked for white zin... for his longtime girlfriend / evil whore, who in traditional FC white trash stylee drinks only the finest Box wine, and when forced to drink red, has to have it on ICE (!?)

anyway, i got drunk, and i forget the rest of the night, except that Eva took me home around 11:30... I'm a lightweight...

Then there was the moving, which was hell - not so much because i have alot of things to move, in fact, i really own very little... a couple computers, a bed, a few peices of choice furniture, lots of ratty old clothes i've been trying to keep alive for years now... but because moving involved not just taking my things to a new apartment, but moving my roomates things to his new apartment, and moving the things in my new apartment over to the previous tenents place. Not that i minded really - and i had some help from JB and Todd, not to mention Eva as my ever present cheerleader, not to mention she can carry twice as much as i can - it was actually a fun few days. There's something really enjoyable about literally deconstructing the physical world you inhabit.
It feels like what i imagine one of those deep cleaning bowel treatments feel like...
Like a big long ropey turd. But for your life...