December 2004


2005 Begins

Instead of struggling to stay awake to watch Dick Clark ring in the new year with 100,000 people who are having a lot more fun than my sorry ass in front of the TV, I went out for the evening with Melanie. Andrew was dropped off at grandma’s in the afternoon. The rest of us left the house a little after five. We first had to drive out to Metairie to drop off Jeff at a friend’s house where he was to stay the night. We then drove uptown to pick up Melanie. After we arrived I waited with her sister while Melanie resolved an ‘accessory problem.’ With that out of the way, we departed and drove out to the French Quarter. Mom and Dad dropped us off at on Decatur, as road blocks prevented them from taking us all the way to Frenchman St. It was just as well, since we had plenty of time before our 7:00 dinner reservation. We stood outside the Spotted Cat for a minute to listen to the act that was playing before walking across the street to dinner. We were seated immediately. It didn’t take us too long to figure out what to order. I ordered the barbeque shrimp, Melanie got the fried shrimp. It didn’t occur to me at the time how much of a hassle it is to eat barbeque shrimp, which needed peeling. It was almost embarrassing, having my hands so messy. The waiter brought extra napkins and hot lemon water, all of which were much needed. After finishing dinner and thoroughly washing my hands, we went to the back of the club to the stage to find some seats for Astral Project’s nine o’clock performance. We took our seats at around 8:10 so we had plenty of time to wait and talk. The set started promptly at nine. The performance was quite good. They played some recognizable tunes that I may have heard the first time I saw them at Snug Harbor. They also did a couple numbers from their new CD. The act concluded with a final number and a rather amusing monologue from drummer John Vidacovich. After the show we made our way out and walked down Decatur St. to Caf Du Monde. The thick fog was rather unusual I suppose. You could barely see past four or five car lengths. Unfortunately the Cafe was quite full. There were no tables and a good number of people waiting for them to pop up. We would have sat outside the awning but it had recently started raining so crossed the street and made our way along side Jackson Square, under the cover of the adjacent buildings. The rain subsided and we walked around the square to the Jax Brewery. It looked closed, we then stepped into the Walgreen’s across the street, I thought I’d buy an umbrella. Melanie found a chair as we were wandering the aisles and took a seat for a short while. I just stood around the closed pharmacy with her for maybe 10 minutes. We talked and were occasionally asked if there were bathrooms somewhere in the store by a variety of folks. After Melanie had her fill of sitting we walked back to the front of the store and I bought an umbrella. Of course no sooner had I completed my purchase did the rain stop for the remainder of the evening. We walked back Across Decatur and up some steps to a deck on the Jax Brewery. We saw that it was open and went in and walked around a bit. We went back out to this large patio or whatever it was, which normally overlooks the river, although on this night you could barely see past the Streetcar stop immediately behind the building. I think we pretty much remained here until after midnight. One could barely see the lit ball that was set to drop at midnight. The crowd grew thicker as 2004 came to a close. 12:00 was marked by plenty of cheering and noisemaking. There were no fireworks however due to the thick fog. We did here some folks on the riverfront with some fireworks of their own. At about 12:15 the crowds thinned out a bit and we made our way to Conti St. to meet my parents at the Bombay Club, a little place inside the Prince Conti Hotel. It was a little over a ten minute walk. The hotel was just past Bourbon St. The club was rather small, I saw my folks sitting right by the door. We sat around there for a good while, watching the party continue to die down. I’m not entirely sure when we left. When we did we all walked to the car which was parked on North Rampart. We made our own way home after dropping off Melanie. I wasn’t particularly tired after getting home. I used the computer for a short bit. Bianca called to tell me about her evening. I think we hung up about three, after which I went to sleep.

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Home Again

I was home all day today, mostly because everyone else was. Nobody went to work today but I was on the clock for a while to do the reports I didn't get to yesterday. Bianca came over soon after I finished that around three. She just came by to visit and do some homework she brought with her. Dad took her home sometime after six, after which we had dinner. We had some hamburger steaks that grandma gave us, there were pretty decent. Later in the evening I watched Von Ryan's Express, a pretty good movie I had yet to see in it's entirety.

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Lots of Work

Dad and I left the house for work at about 11:30… A bit late. We stopped first at the mid city office to pick some things up and empty the trash and such. After that we drove to the east office where we remained until about half past six. There was a substantial amount of dictation to do. Doc brought something to eat from Rally's around 3 o'clock so that was lunch. I got some of it done but not nearly all. We were at the office until about 6:30. We went from the east back to mid city for a minute to drop some things off. We then made our way to the west bank office to pick up a package, but it turned out that the package wasn't for us, so we went home. Jeff made pork chop casserole for dinner, which was pretty good… it's my favorite dish. Mom finished taking down the Christmas tree today. Later in the evening I talked to Ami on the phone for three hours and then I talked to Bianca for a while before going to bed.

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Vaio Wallpapers Now On Website

I didn't go to work today and I was home without any chores that needed doing. Throughout the day and inte the evening, I finished the new Vaio wallpapers page for the website. Having recently acquired a Vaio laptop, these desktops have been of some interest to me. I also watched Chain Reaction in the evening.

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No Work, but I Went to the Office

I went to the office this morning with dad. There was really no work waiting for me, I was just there for the sake of being there. Dad was in and out during the day, he took the Taurus in for service and was gone for a while due to that. With no work to do, I was able to amuse myself by fooling my my new laptop. Eventually I decided to try and do something productive so I started working on a new page for the website. I continued working on the page later in the evening while I watched The Philadelphia Story. I also spoke to Khadijah on the phone this evening.

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New Toys

Today passed rather quietly without incident. Most all evidence of yesterday’s snow fall melted away. Dad and Andrew went to the Saint’s game this afternoon. We were supposed to go visit some relatives after they got home from the game but we didn’t come because my aunt was sick. I spent some time in the evening trying to get a DVD recorder my dad bought to work. I wasn’t able to get it to copy from our camcorder but I was able to dub a video so I know it works. I was up late doing some housekeeping on my computers and watched Philadelphia before I went to bed around three.

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White Christmas

I got out of bed a little before ten on this Christmas morning. Shortly thereafter, the family opened their gifts. Andrew got a keyboard, a full sized noise maker. Jeff was pleasantly shocked with his new laptop, a story in itself. Dad picked up the tab for the laptop I bought for myself. I also received a cell phone, my first. I suppose I am now a bona fide member of the 21st century. Dad gave Mom an iPod. She made no secret of her desire to have an MP3 player. We had lunch a few hours later. We had a baked ham, sweet potato casserole and spinach casserole, along with an assortment of miscellaneous side dishes. Following that meal we had intended to drive to Metairie to see my dad’s family. However, we stayed home all day due the bad weather. The roads were icy and several major thoroughfares were closed. I understand we’ll be going there tomorrow afternoon. After lunch I used the computer on and off. Looking out the window I could see the bitter cold weather outside. Sleet was falling, Andrew insisted it was snowing. Before long he was right. For the first time in 50 years, there was a white Christmas in New Orleans. There had been no snow here at all since 1989. I hadn’t seen snow since leaving Colorado about eight years ago. Like most everyone else here I was quite surprised. Andrew played outside for a while and built a snowman. I took a number of pictures. A lot of the neighbors were outside to observe the rare spectacle. Later in the evening, I played a game of Scrabble with Andrew, Mom and grandma. I also updated the log a bit. I finally finished watching The Manchurian Candidate.

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Christmas Eve

I went to Circuit City with dad this afternoon. We had to return an item and wanted to pick up a couple of things. When I got home I tried connecting the camcorder to my new laptop with the firewire cable we just purchased. It connected and functioned just fine. Transferring old video to digital format will probably become a comon practice in our household in the near future. Grandma was home when we returned . She came over to join us for dinner this evening. Dad made his jambalya, which was especially good. The fresh shrimp he got were a big help. A short while after dinner we opened the presents from Grandma Laughlin. She have be a biography of Richard Nixon, some camera film and a few other assorted items. Following that I folled with my laptop for a good while longer, updated this log somehwat and went to bed around 3 AM.

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Laptop Arrives – Evening at the Riverwalk With Bianca

I woke up a little before 10 this morning when Mom woke me up to tell me a package arrived. It was the laptop I won on ebay last week. It's a Sony Vaio R505GL, a rather nice laptop in my opinion; the model is a couple years old. I was quite pleased with the immaculate condition it arrived in. I took it with me when I went to work this morning. There was some dictation to do but I spent most of my time playing with my new toy. We left the office around three I believe. I continued to fool with it when I got home. This evening, I went with Bianca to the Riverwalk, she had a little bit of Christmas shopping to do. We got lucky on the transportation front as Dad had to drive to Houma to pick up a gift, so he dropped me and Bianca off on his way there. After walking in, Bianca and I decided to eat first. We both settled on Chinese, but we had to wait a few minutes for the sweet and sour pork. After eating, we walked through the mall, making several aimless stops. Bianca wanted a whittling knife but the only knife dealer had none. We stopped to look at cars and model cars. Bianca more-or-less dared herself to try on a dress a boutique store. She didn’t have the best of luck although the red one seemed fine to me. After stopping in the Sharper Image, we eventually found ourselves outside in the bitter cold and walked to the Canal Place mall, a stone’s throw from the Riverwalk. Again we wandered around for a while and didn’t but anything. We sat in the Wyndam’s 11th floor lobby for a short while and then decided to get something else to eat. We ended up walking to Popeye’s up Canal St. We each got a biscuit and some fries. Having eaten again we walked further up Canal St. and ended up in Walgreen’s for no particular reason. Having perused all their aisles, we walked back down canal and stepped into the Pelican Bar in the Sheraton Hotel. Bianca made herself comfortable on a sofa and I sat in an adjacent chair where we remained for a good while. We discussed long bows, bow staffs, arrows and other such things. We must have been there for well over an hour. Dad arrived back in town around 10 I believe and met up at the hotel to take up home. After getting home I played with my new laptop for a little while longer before going to bed.

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Wednesday

Worked 11 to 4.

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Tuesday

At Home.

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Monday

Worked 11 to 5.

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Lunch and a Russian Movie

A short while after getting home from church, Andrey called asking if I wanted to go to the movies so he, Khadijah and I drove out to the theater. There was nothing we wanted to see starting at a convenient time so I suggested we go eat. There are a couple of restaurants a stone throw’s distance. There was a wait at Semolina so we went to Chevy’s instead. As it turned out Andrey had something to do at home so we would only have time for lunch. I had some beef quesadillas. The waitress was a new hire in training. Through our meal I thing we were greeted in some fashion by at least six different employees. I suppose they were busy today. We heard the wait staff sing happy birthday to in Spanish to four people while we were there. I’m willing to bet they had done plenty that day as they seemed just a bit tired of it. I suppose one can muster only so much enthusiasm for a several stranger’s birthdays in one shift. After lunch, Andrey took Khadijah and I to my house. Having an impromptu guest forced me to move things along with the newly washed laundry that I had sitting around. We talked for a while and she napped for a short bit. Andrey called around five to let us know that the need for him to be home vanished from existence. He suggested we go over to his house for the evening to see a Russian movie, the title of which translates Night Watch. It was an interesting movie, although I don’t have much of a taste for the fantasy/thriller genre. After the movie we hung around his house for a while. He showed Khadijah and I picture of the house he stayed in during his summer in Moscow. I think Andrey took us home sometime around midnight. I left his house with some movies of his to watch and a couple CD-Rom drives that I will try and fix. After getting home to a dark and quiet house, I was on the computer for a while to update this log before bed.

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Second Anniversary of Daily Log – Company Christmas Dinner and Otra

Today marks the 2nd anniversary of this log. I started it halfway through my senior year of high school. I started it as a mundane way of keeping a current date on my home page and it has served that purpose well. I swear I started doing this before it became the fad blogging is today. Would you believe I actually though this to be a novel idea at the time? �neither would I. The company Christmas dinner or whatever you want to call it was this evening. I suppose Dad thought a Christmas party or something was impractical so we went to Copeland’s for dinner. Mom, Dad, Melanie, Deidre, Bianca and her ‘friend,’ Stephanie and her ‘friend’ Cedric and myself were in attendance. Most of the guests arrived around 7:30. My parents, Melanie and I had been there since seven, when the whole thing was supposed to start. We all just sat at the bar until most everyone arrived. When Deidre and Stephanie showed up we had enough people to claim our reserved table. Dad made the reservation for 14 incase everyone invited showed up. I ordered the barbeque shrimp, which I am told is what I got the last time I was there. The food was great. The affair as a whole was a bit rowdy and amusing, although much like a regular day at work with the snappy quips and conversation… although the nurses aren’t late to work and nobody drinks during office hours. It may have been a bit of a shock for Melanie, but I think she said it wasn’t much stranger than her family. We were there a bit of a while, we all left around 10:30. After leaving Copeland’s, Melanie, my parents and I went to the Spotted Cat on Frenchman to see what was going on there. We were there for a while before the night’s musical act started. Otra, an Afro-Cuban jazz band started playing around 11 o’clock. They were quite good, I enjoy their variety of music but I seldom get to hear it. The Spotted Cat is a pretty small place and it gets pretty pack while a live act is going. I suspect very few people just walk by when someone is playing there since they book pretty good bands. While there, Melanie and I made things official so to speak so we’ll just see where that goes. I think we left somewhere around 11:30. We took Melanie home and then went home ourselves. I used the computer for a short while before going to bed.

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