Omm Shews

Had a pretty great Christmas :) The drive down after work on Tuesday wasn't too bad. The kitties slept most of the way until about an hour and a half from Gainesville. When I arrived at Mike's around 11 at night, he had chocolate fondue set up for me as an anniversary dessert, since our one-year anniversary had been the day before. Was very sweet :)  He even had a variety of dipping items, including cheddar cheese, which I don't think he expected me to actually use :D

We went over to my parents' house for Christmas the next morning. I don't think Mike expected to make out like a bandit, but my Mom wasn't going to not get him Christmas presents :) I had gotten him a replica of Altair's sword, the #6 Dragonball, and a functioning Nerf gun painted to resemble a gun from Mass Effect. I also had a pair of dog tags made for us, one for each of us to wear :) I ended up getting a second monitor for my desktop computer (finally, yay!), some floating shelves, a Korean style hoodie, and Lego Marvel Heroes :D I brought the kittens over to enjoy the festivities, but Ayla decided to hide behind the couch for all 5 hours. We enjoyed a huge Christmas lunch, and Mike and I returned to his house to spend what ended up being the most time with him I would get to spend the rest of my vacation.

Thursday and Friday, Mike and I both had to work, I just did so remotely from his house. I did get to go out to lunch with him and Dwyer on Thursday, and then Dave and Tina at Bentos on Friday, but otherwise I was stuck at the house coding. We were (and still are) buckling down to get this site done. Even after Mike got home from work, I spent most of my time working while he finished Assassin's Creed IV.

Friday night, after going rockclimbing, Mike cooked steaks for us, and we watched my Christmas movie (Love Actually) together :) That was definitely a nice time :D

Saturday I had some more work to do, but I did get to meet Matt and Liz out at Burrito Bros with Mike for lunch :) Woo! Got to see great people and accomplished my three Gainesville visit requirements.

Dinner Saturday night was "new years eve" with my family, since I wasn't going to be there tonight. Had our delicious yearly tradition of King crab legs and beef tenderloin :D Also played a fun game of Big Bertha!

Sunday I got my things together, spent a little bit of time with Mike playing Terraria together, and then headed home to Knoxville. Only took me 7 and a half hours to get back with 2 stops for gas. Atlanta was a bit trafficy, but that's normal. Cats were excited to be home, I'm sure. They both were super quiet on the way back. Maybe they're getting used to the traveling? :)

Mike and I reinstated our WoW accounts last night. Didn't play for long, but I'm already 85 and we're in Pandaland! Probably what I'll be doing tonight... and tomorrow XD

Get me gaming

Had my first 12 hour work day yesterday. I always get into the office at 7, well before anyone else. Yesterday was no different. I had been previously warned that my officemate Chris and I would not be leaving until the new website project was testable. Turned out that meant C# coding until 7 at night. I didn't even leave for lunch, as I'm usually one to take a 20 minute kitchen sit down for lunch. Been a long time since it was dark outside when I both went into and came out from work :o The 12 hours actually went by fairly quickly.

I had been invited to meet up immediately after for dinner with 2 other coworkers, Nathan and Rose, and with Nathan's partner Jamie. We went to a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place called Chez Guevara. Was really good, although I'm still craving a sweet potato burrito from Burrito Bros ;) We had a fun time! And apparently my office Christmas party dress made a great impression :D

Already back at work at 7 this morning. My brain is still fairly spent, so we'll see how it goes :)

Missed the afternoon Steam sales yesterday due to the crazy coding. Hope I didn't miss anything good!

Ready to go at noon!

So officially GRU won't be doing anything about my last water bill for my condo (surprise there.) Someone must've seen the For Rent sign and used one of my outside water connections while it was vacant. Damn old people neighbors. Oh well. I'm thankful it's not a water leak. I'd rather pay the nearly $200 water bill than have to pay to have my floor torn up to have a pipe replaced again. Nothx.

I got the okay from my boss to work remotely next Thursday and Friday, so I'll be able to go to Gainesville for Christmas :) There are 2 things I must do while there: rock climb because I still have a membership until January, and eat at Bentos or Chopstix because thus far there exists no similar restaurant in Knoxville that I've found or my coworkers have been able to point out for me.

Went out to the bar down the street last night with coworker Chris and his girlfriend Lindsey. Not the first time, but this time some of his friends showed up, including 2 nerdier than him! Michael (yay more Michaels...) and Matt, who I believe are roommates, both have participated in DnD games before, and mentioned wanting to get into a Shadowrun game! OMM YAY NERD STUFF! I told them to keep me in the loop if a table top game of any kind is being assimilated. I need my fix so bad! Stupid Chance not wanting to let me play via Skype :( They just lost a player, too. I think that makes it a 4 player party, which means I could help round it out! ;D

Steam Christmas sales ahoy! Although I haven't bought anything yet. My wishlist is nearly entirely on sale however, so if none of those go on a crazier sale before January 2nd, I'll probably be picking up a few of them. It's hard to resist when most are only around $5 a piece or less.

Mario's Disenheartening at 6:30

I've been really terrible at this blogging thing. Not that I haven't been getting myself into things, or that I've been to busy, just haven't made myself sit down and do it. As a result, this entry may be jumbled... so yay!

 

I had a fantastic Thanksgiving, despite not heading home for the holiday. One of my coworkers invited me over to his family's house for dinner. They cooked 2 turkeys even though there were only 9 of us, and there were plenty of fixings to go around! :) He (Darrin) and his wife sent me home with 4 huge tupperware containers full of food. They're awesome people!

After being apart for a month, Mike and I had last week to spend together. He came up to Knoxville late last Friday night (not this past Friday.) We went to my company's Christmas party, played video games together, went out to eat, and then Monday morning we left for Wisconsin. The thermometer gage on my car slowly went down from a lovely mid 50's temperature, to freezing, to a balmy 1 by the time we arrived at the Grand Geneva in Lake Geneva. I was worried there wouldn't be any snow (per weather reports), but that had all changed. Nature's icing was everywhere :D Mike had never seen snow before, but I think I was far more excited than he was.

 

 

Because the temperature would regularly dip below zero, we didn't spend much time outdoors. Besides, there wasn't much to peruse in the metropolis that was Lake Geneva anyway. We did go up to Two Rivers to visit with my Grandma and her boyfriend, and they took us out to a lovely, delicious dinner where I was convinced to enjoy a beer sampler. Terrible influencers!

 

 

I woke up with a cold Thursday morning at Grandma's, which meant I wasn't up for touring Milwaukee :( Also meant that we decided to return to Knoxville on Friday, instead of Saturday as previously planned. Still had a great time tho :)

Knoxville has been a very welcoming place to live thus far. My first month has been almost nothing but awesome, and my new job has definitely been pushing the developer knowledge I have (very challenging!) It's been good tho :) Been out to dinner and around town with several of my coworkers already, so they are definitely fun people to hang out with.

Received my last GRU bill for my condo for the month that it was vacant, and the water usage was crazy high. Normally, I would use around 4kgal, and it listed my bill as having used 24kgal... but no one was there! Of course, it's nearly impossible to get through to GRU over the phone, so Mike was kind enough to stop by and check my water meter. It appears as though it was horribly misread. Hopefully, I can get through to them, because they don't deserve double my normal bill for a vacant condo!

Against all odds and my dislikes of these two video game series, I have started playing Assassins's Creed Brotherhood and Mass Effect 2. So far, the latter is much more entertaining than the former. I also borrowed GTA V from my officemate, Chris, and have been tooling around with that. Luckily for me, I was selected to participate in the Hearthstone beta. I'm so far absolutely terrible at it, but it's quite simple to learn, fast-paced, and fun. And speaking of betas, there's another game I've been testing, but I don't think that I will be anymore... it's just not what I would hope for :/

I am intending on returning to Gainesville next week for Christmas, so long as my boss allows me to work remotely for 2 of those days. Still have to check with her. I'll also be bringing the kittens along, so I'm sure they're looking forward to another road trip!

I had a slice of the most delicious red velvet cake I've ever had today. I must find this Linton's, and eat moar cake!