So last night, we made it out for “Bowl your brains out” Sunday night bowling at AMF Showplace. $12 all night is an awesome deal, considering that bowling here is usually $5-$6 a game. And they don’t even turn off the lights! I had a decent night last night. Six games: 163, 184, 185, 182, 215, 197. Not bad at all. My average after my ridiculous set last time Jim (the non-updating blogger) was down here is up to 176, so I was just above average for the first three games. The only really disappointing game was the 197. No open frames (until the tenth of course). After throwing five solid shots leading up to the tenth, I wash out for the first time all night earning a five count. I miss the spare and miss my chance for what should have been a 230 game. Boo!

The really interesting thing is that during our last game a family showed up with two little kids (probably between 9-12 years old. It was just after midnight. Seriously, who takes their kids bowling at midnight on a school night?!? I see shit like this all the time. I don’t understand it. In the end it was all good though, because the parents were at least teaching the kids proper lane courtesy. They may be lacking in other parenting skills, but if they can teach their kids to wait for the person next to them to bowl and to get off the approach when they’re not bowling, then they’re ok in my book.

The other day I was driving behind a mid-nineties volvo with a brown magnetic ribbon on the trunk. In black marker someone had written “R.I.P. Dimebag Darrell”. You may remember Dimebag as the guitarist from Pantera or from his post-Pantera group Damageplan. While the way he died (he was killed on stage by a concertgoer) is undoubtedly tragic, it seems odd to have a ribbon for it. I think the use of ribbons is already out of control, but this is a whole new level. I think I’m going to have to buy a Scion Homie Box Car to have enough bumper space for all these ribbons.

Run Lola Run is still an awesome movie. Watched it while I wasted away my Saturday afternoon.

I bought a Bonterra Viognier. It’s either the nastiest Viognier or the bottle I bought had turned. Either way, I’m not buying it again.

Pimms is a tasty liqueur. Drink it with ginger ale. Thanks Colleen.

I managed to get in and out of Oslo last night without getting kicked out. I think it would have been more entertaining if we had gotten kicked out.

I broke my travel headphones. Who designs travel headphones that can break in a backpack anyway? Shouldn’t they be more rugged than that? Ridiculous.

I’m leaving for San Jose on Thursday. I’m excited because we’ll be staying at the Crown Plaza, which should be awesome. Attention stalkers: book those flights now.

Sunday night bowling at AMF Showplace is awesome. $12 all night from 9pm on.

I finally bought some Adidas Superstars. Not the 35th anniversary edition, just the regulars. The collectors on that site are crazy though. I could go for five or ten pair of them, but thirty?

The burgers at Casino El Camino are awesome. Thanks Amanda.

I still don’t sleep enough.

So even though I had my birthday party two weekends ago, all last week was really a continuation of the celebration. My actual birthday was last Saturday night and combined with an annual conference for work all week, it meant I was hitting the bars almost every night from Tuesday on. It was quite a test of endurance. It’s hard to explain to anyone that wasn’t there exactly what happened. All I can say is that it was a lot of fun. I don’t know that I could have had a better time if I would have actually planned something. Instead, the plans were simple: I’m going out and I’m going to get drunk. Kelly got me started on the right foot on Thursday and when Amanda got back into town on Friday, we were totally on the same page. Good times, good times. A lot of people came out too, which was awesome: McP, Colleen, Balki, Xuan, bartenders at glass, free beer girls from both dos equis and amsdel light, and of course all the people at the clubs that we watched and made fun of for three nights.

So, since I can’t put into words what happened over the weekend, I’ll just go with some of my favorite quotes:

“It’s my birthday, really?” – Said by multiple strangers, to which I replied, “Of course not, it’s my birthday!”

“Happy birthday man, this drink/shot is on me.” – Said multiple times by my new favorite bartender at Glass. All you have to do is get really shitfaced at the same bar three nights in a row and they’ll remember you for life.

“I think it’s time for me to pass out.” – Me, every night/morning.

“I think I’m still drunk.” – Me, on those difficult afternoons.

“I could tell you had a lot to drink last night because when you walked up all I could smell was mouthwash.”
“That’s funny, all I could taste was lime.” – Post-Friday morning exchange.

“I think it was something I ate. Like all that lime. Or maybe all the tequila that came with it. One or the other.” – I might have said that.

“Double bacardi coke” – Me, ordering multiple times throughout the night; I don’t fuck around.

“I’ll take another one of those free Amsdel Lights” – I love free beer nights.

“I want to be that drunk girl that’s all dressed up whose friends have to carry her out of the bar.” – Amanda, setting her goals high.

“You are sooooo terrible! But funny. You crack me up.” – me, to Amanda because she is and she does.

“Chilled Patrón” – Uttered by a number of bartenders more times than I can count over the weekend. I don’t even drink tequila. Ummm, well maybe I have tasted it before. Just a sip though.

“He just wants to dance.” – Multiple people, torturing balki all night. He’s a good sport for putting up with us.

“Hey kid, P(Y*kjn3wl4uhvsr#t8:LKj’3wzdghnliuh4.axdgiuhy” – what all the messages I left on balki’s phone over the weekend sounded like. And somewhere along the line, I took to calling him “kid”.

“Hey Gus, let’s do a shot of Jack.” – McP, in what was probably the worst decision I made over the weekend. After so many tequila shots, you’d think Jack wouldn’t phase me, but oh my it did.

“Can you wait here one second? I have to go throw up and then I’ll come right back and pay you.” – Me, to the cab driver that drove me home on Thursday. I didn’t actually throw up that night (w00t!).

“Are you white?” – Most obnoxious pick up line I’ve ever heard of. Unsuccessfully used on Colleen over the weekend. I mean seriously, if she says no are you really going to walk away? Of course I had to ask her if she was white for the rest of the weekend.

“Hey, I think you’re the bouncer that kicked me out last time.” – My statement to the bouncer at Oslo. I think the humor might have been lost on him. I’m sure I’ll be getting kicked out of there again soon enough. It’ll be funnier then.

In addition to the good times, I got a number of phone calls on my birthday, including a phone call from every immediate family member. Crazy. Even Saby and both of my parents. Actually, I guess that makes up my entire family, with the exception of Gus, but you get the idea. I have more things to write about, but I have some work to do tonight, so I’ll have to get to it another time.

Jim came down for the weekend to go to the birthday party and no weekend with Jim would be complete without some bowling action. I had an amazing run. I bowled the highest game I’ve bowled with this ball as well as the highest series. Last time I bowled with Jim I bowled a 160, 172, 159 for a 491 series, the lowest set I’ve bowled since I got this ball. I actually wasn’t bowling that bad, but if I remember correctly, I opened in the nineth and tenth frames of all three games. This time: 251, 204, 169 for a 624 series. This breaks a bunch of personal records for me: highest game, first set with two 200+ games, high series, first 600 series, most strikes in a game (9), and most important: the first time I’ve swept Jim in all three games (since I’ve been keeping track). So all I need to do now is win all three games every time we bowl for the next two years and I might catch up. Or maybe I should just never bowl Jim again and rely on my memory of winning one time. That sounds easier.

Its that time of the year again. My birthday is coming up next weekend, so its time for my birthday party. As always, the usual gang is joining me for the joint birthday party and it should be a hell of a lot of fun. This yearsparty is on Saturday and the theme is grunge, so Ive been spending some time ripping my Alice in Chains, Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam cds. Its nice to throw a party thats themed with a time period where your music collection peaks. Jim is once again coming down for the festivities, so it should be a good time and maybe I can redeem myself for my bowling performance in OK last time (I can’t remember if I mentioned it before, but I sucked).

If you read this and are wondering why you werent invited, consider this your invitation. I didnt get around to putting as many names on the evite as I normally would have because Ive been buried with work. If youd like to stop by and see what I look like when Im really plowed, leave a msg or email me and I can get you the info.

It’s as if Nero is designed to piss me off. I’m glad I bought 100 blank CD-Rs since I’m going to blow through 20 or 30 trying to figure out how to keep Nero from putting the three second delay between tracks. Every other fucking program in the world calls this “Disc at Once”. No matter how many times I select that and anything else that resembles this setting I still end up with a three second delay between tracks. Nero you fuckity fuck fuck. You’re pushing me to try out the burning capabilities built in to Windows XP. See what happens Larry?!?