All I can say is — baby, we are not alone! Can you tell that I’m bored? We had twelve inches of snow today plus a pounding sinus headache equals just-stay-home-from-work day. Thank god there was room for one more on the vacation calendar otherwise it would have been make-up time for me next weekend. Not that it would have been too bad considering Brian is back to his crummy 3:30 pm to midnight schedule with Fridays and Sundays off so I could have done my make-up time on Saturday while Brian’s at work also — but I have my much needed hair appointment (cut and color, my first hair coloring ever — yes, I’m a hair-dye virgin) at 2:30 pm on that day. What’s really sucky is that I have just enough in my checking account to pay for my hair thing so I can’t spend anything for the next two weeks — not a freaking dime! And why is this? Well, Brian is broke so I had to cover groceries. We were so organized that we did a month-long food planner thing and grocery list for the next week or so. I guess-timated about $30 if we shopped smart but you know how that goes. You find this and that. And then they’ve got those two-fors so instead of buying just one everything instantly doubles, which actually goes for the cost too. Anyway, I ended up spending exactly $68.66 (more than 100% over-budget, we’d do really terrible at supermarket sweeps) but when you consider that it’s after $30.40 ($11.20 in manufacturers’ coupons, $3.70 in doubled coupons and $15.50 in store coupons otherwise known as Dillon’s Plus Card discounts) savings, we really did pretty good. I mean, that’s $100 worth of stuff for less than $70. Brian and I are seriously re-thinking this coupon thing: instead of being casual coupon clippers we want to go all out and start training for the next coupon olympics (although I doubt we’ll be able to get to the same level as the people on those talkshows and infomercials who have the ability to purchase hundreds of dollars in groceries for less than five bucks). Brian is really considering subscribing to the Wednesday and Sunday editions of the Wichita Eagle (our local newspaper) just for coupons (who cares about the news anymore, it’s like the same thing over and over again).. But I digress.. I feel awful for staying home and being a bum but in my own defense I’ve been pretty productive. We’ve restocked our refrigerator and pantry. I did last weeks’ dishes (finally) and the rest of laundry (well, some of it is still in the dryer). And, if I can get my but off this chair and away from the computer, I may even do some workouts!
February 24, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Life
My first two Mirror Project submissions were accepted! I’m soo happy!
I’d never ever submitted anything before because I couldn’t find any cool reflective surfaces. Some of my other mirror pictures were kind of boring. The Exploration Place offered an abundance of reflective surfaces (walls, display panels, doors and such). I was really excited! I took several mirror pictures which I’m keeping for later submissions (you’re only allowed to submit three pictures per week).
February 23, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Memes
Here’s a photo log our adventures at Exploration Place..
[ I take a picture of Kevin standing under the Red Bean's Cafe sign while we wait for their friend Keith to show up ]
[ Brian as he waits for the restaurant to open and Keith to show up ]
[ Kevin takes a snapshot of himself ]
[ me by the fancy wire metal sculpture thingie; more pictures of the sculpture thing are show below ]
[ pretty neat, huh? ]
[ me waiting for our food ]
[ Keith Morphius ]
[ cool background-foreground picture; a picture of Brian with Kevin and Keith in the background; they were smoking outside ]
[ Keith and Kevin as we line up to for the "Roller Coaster" show in the simulation theater ]
[ a couple of pictures of the three guys: Keith, Kevin and Brian ]
[ inside the simulation theater; preparing for the show to begin ]
[ Kevin and Brian goofing off in the Explore Store after the show ]
[ Keith pretends to browse the shirts ]
[ Brian seriously contemplating whether to add another toy to his already extensive toy collection ]
[ playing with the magnetic board ]
[ can't remember why Brian made this weird face; it was pretty funny though, so it deserves a place here ]
[ Brian playing with a couple of eyeball bouncy balls; we had a lot of time to kill before our next show ]
[ Brian and Keith head toward the cyberdome theater ]
[ Brian and Kevin as they wait for us to be led inside the theater for "The Hidden Dimension" show ]
[ inside the cyberdome theater ]
[ a picture Brian took of me as we waited for Kevin and Keith; they went for a smoke before we headed to the exhibits ]
[ Brian takes a snapshot of the two of us ]
[ Brian takes a picture of the hallway ]
[ Brian ]
[ Keith and Brian watch as Kevin tries to fly a simulation of the Wright brothers' airplane ]
[ Kevin above; Keith's turn to try below ]
[ Brian also gives it a try and fails miserably -- twice; he just kept crashing into the sand not even two seconds after take off ]
[ Brian takes some pictures as I have go at it; I actually got it cruising until I finally got bored with it and let it crash ]
[ Brian looks for something to play with ]
[ Brian playing with the airhose which inevitably gets pointed at other things ]
[ Kevin designs an airplane ]
[ Keith ]
[ Brian and Keith ]
[ bullseye ]
[ Brian told me what these are called but now I can't remember ]
[ playing with the simulated tornado ]
[ Brian, Kevin and Keith ]
[ Kevin ]
[ my magnified fingernail ]
[ Brian's hand magnified; he thought it looked like an ass; what really happened was he looked like an ass doing it; just kidding, baby ]
[ Brian squeezing one last picture before the battery died on my camera ]
After lunch at Red Bean’s we watched the “Roller Coaster” presentation in the simulation theater and then “The Hidden Dimension” in the cyberdome theater. We did a little goofing off in the gift shop in between shows (as you can see above) and then afterward we walked through the exhibits. We had such a blast!
February 22, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Life, Reviews
Dunkin is out, Krispy Kreme is in! Welcome the new era of donuts.. I remember back in my high school days in Las Pinas, my friends and I used to hang out at the local Dunkin Donuts. We used to call it D2 (read D-squared). We were nerds like that. We shared a lot of fun times there. And even just watching my friend Mickey eat a whole box of munchkins (the little donut middles; I don’t know what they’re called, I just always called them munchkins). I don’t even know if they make those anymore. 
Anyway, Brian and I will just have serious donut cravings from time to time and the generic grocery store variety ain’t cuttin’ it anymore so we had to look for a good donut place. Did you know that all the Dunkin Donuts in town have vanished? I don’t know what is up with that.. I didn’t think they were that bad. But I guess Krispy Kreme has ushered in a new era of donuts. Shoot we really didn’t care where we got our kicks but I gotta admit Krispy Kreme has a lot of plusses. First off, the best time to go is right when they close (they used to be open 24 hours but I guess they didn’t find that profitable), from 10:30 to 11:00 PM. Brian and I have found the few times that we’ve gone around this time that the red sign outside has been lit. You know what that means. Free donuts baby! Well they give you a free glazed donut (pictured left) anyway. Last night we had talked about just going through the drive-thru but when we got there the sign was lit and Brian got all excited. He goes, let’s go in! 
I gave in. Who cared if I looked like crap from hanging out at the house all evening? Free donuts is free donuts. Their store is actually pretty neat. Brian and I discussed actually bringing our camera to take pictures next time we go. Yeah, we’re real nerds like that. But it’s so cool. Have you ever seen a donut being manufactured before? It’s really neat! You get to watch everything right there as it happens. 
And then of course their donuts are the best! When they opened their first store in town there were lines out the wazoo and I didn’t know what the fuss was all about. To me, donuts were pretty much all the same. But then I had their donuts, which are just melt-in-your-mouth (literally) delicious! I was hooked ever since. Our favorite is the chocolate-glazed custard-filled variety, shown right. Brian and I are so compatible we even like the same kind of donut. They have lots of other great flavors but this is the one that we always order. We’ll eat the free donut of course but we only buy the chocolate-glazed custard-filled kind. So anyway, I had a couple of donuts last night and another two this morning for breakfast (if you want to know how much damage that’s done, check out the Krispy Kreme nutritional fact sheet and feel sorry for me). I didn’t work out at all this week like I was supposed to so you’ll probably hear me whine about being fat for the next few days. I’ll try not to blog about it but I’m not making any guaranteees!
February 21, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Food
I summoned all the courage that I had and ventured (albeit rather timidly) into the world of online auctions. I’ve never even bought anything from an auction before but a couple of my friends, namely Sarah (experienced buyer) and Lindsey (experienced seller), practically live on eBay. Lindsey has only positive things to say: mostly how it has improved her cashflow and such. Sarah, who represents the other side, has experienced both ups and downs. You get good deals and you get ripped off too. It’s a fact of auctioning life that buyers just have to accept. Needless to say, I know enough to proceed with caution. Right now I’m making baby steps. While I know that it may take years before I start bidding on stuff online, I recently posted my very first auction. I figured that less risk is associated with selling. I minimized the risk even more by reviewing and comparing almost every detail of eBay auctions versus Yahoo! auctions (mostly comparing the fees) until I finally decided to start with the latter. I don’t think there is as much action on Yahoo! than eBay but, then again, I’ve got very limited experience in this area. Anyway, I figured if I have a good experience with my first auction I may just sell everything in our house (I’m exaggerating, of course). Lindsey tells me that whenever she gets bored or is broke she just goes through her closet and starts listing stuff. From what she tells me, the revenue it generates is pretty good. My cash flow (or lack thereof) needs all the help it can get right about now so I went ahead and gave it a try. Of course, I’m super-eager and I just have to check my (one and only) auction every single day. Anyway, everytime I check my auction my enthusiasm is constantly met by disappointment because I’ve only got six days to go and I still have no bids! Sarah tells me that it’s normal. She says that people usually don’t bid until the auction is almost over but you know what– I don’t think I have any page views either! I feel like crying.
February 19, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Web
We couldn’t get into
Restaurant 155 (even after I explicitly expressed my desire to dine there for our vday dinner and gave Brian months of advanced notification) so we ended up having dinner at
Redrock Canyon Grill at
Bradley Fair. After running errands on Friday morning and purchasing our Friday evening tickets for “
How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days” and Saturday matinee balcony (you can’t beat reserved seating) tickets for “
Daredevil,” I told Brian that we probably should make reservations. He goes, “No. We can call them and make our reservations tomorrow.” “I’m going to call them anyway,” I insisted. “I have a bad feeling that we’re not going to be able to get in.” Sure enough I was right. They were completely and totally booked. This shit always happens to us every year on Valentine’s Day! I told Brian that he has a year to get us reservations for next year. He has promised me that he will deliver, as my Valentine’s Day present for 2004, a night in
The Royal Court at
The Castle Inn Riverside along with dinner reservations at
Restaurant 155. Let’s all cross our fingers! So anyway, we ended up waiting almost two hours for a table at
Redrock Canyon Grill. Thankfully, we got seated before my patience wore out completely. Here are some pictures:
The place was completely packed! Even the bar was crowded! The standard wait was about 1:30 to 1:45 hours. We got there at six and didn’t get seated until after seven thirty. You would have been proud of me because I voiced my dissatisfaction in a civilized manner. I mean, after having waited for almost an hour Brian come up there to ask how much longer before we were seated and they tell him another 30 to 35 minutes. About ten minutes later, his parents show up and I tell them that it shouldn’t be much longer because of what they had told Brian. Anyway, twenty minutes pass and Donna gets up to ask and they tell her 40 to 45 minutes! I’m like wait a second, that’s even longer than the time they told Brian a half an hour ago. I wait a few more minutes, until I absolutely can’t contain myself anymore and I get up there myself with Brian in tow. I explained that we’ve been waiting an hour an half and wanted to know when we were going to get seated and they give me the 30 to 35 minutes crap. I’m like, no– that’s what you told Brian over a half an hour ago. She’s like, well we usually tell people 1:30 to 1:45 and I told her yes– that’s what they told me when I first came in to put our name on the waiting list. I told her that when Brian checked the first time, he was told 30 to 35 minutes. She really had the audacity to say, “Are you sure? We’re usually pretty good about this.” I was fixing to open a whole can of whoop-ass when this other guy finally said that they’ll go ahead and seat us next so she put a big star next to our name and sure enough ten minutes later we were seated. That’s why it pays to be diva!
February 16, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Family, Life
I have a feeling that Jen will not renew her hosting contract come August. I am really worried. I’ve been scouring the internet for a good, reliable, inexpensive host but finding one that possesses all three is extremely difficult these days. Plus, the last two times that I’ve sought out paid hosting I’ve been burned. I can’t even remember the name of the last one back in 1997 which I ended up getting my dad into. The more recent fiasco was with Cyberwings. The was the crappiest deal and the biggest mistake ever. It came highly recommended my an internet friend Reggie, though, and they were great at first so I recommened them to other people.. That’s how they got everyone. Friends telling friends and they had this big pool of people and they defrauded us all. Granted it was really cheap hosting but I got only three months of service out of it despite the fact that I signed up for a year (two individual accounts and one reseller account). I got no refunds what so ever. Plus, I feel extremely guilty for the other people I told about it and for the people who they told about it because they might have even sank more money in this pit than I did. Wouldn’t that make you mad? Anyway, everytime I think of going the paid hosting route Brian just gives me this oh-no-not-again look. And I can’t say I blame him. I must have a sucker sticker on my forehead or something. Anyway, I’m trying to keep my cost down and also keep Brian happy so let it be known that I am open for adoption. If I can find another compassionate soul like Jen to adopt me when I go homeless in August that would be just sooper-dooper.
February 12, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Web
Kevin decided that Brian and I (because we are such hermits, specially now that we are watching movies through internet downloads — we are coming out to celebrate vday next saturday by doing a two-movie extravaganza: Daredevil during the day at the balcony, it’s reserved seating so we won’t have to fight the crowds, and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days in the evening so we are both pacified, one for him and one for me but I don’t think dinner at Restaurant 155 is in the cards because after purchasing our vday gifts to each other we are both semi-broke, we’ll see though) deserved a night out so he treated us to cosmic bowling at Thunderbird Lanes.. The photos below are an account of the experience.
Kevin told us that we didn’t have to be there until a little before eleven thirty (when the fun actually starts) so Brian decided to play The Getaway while I was getting ready. He actually got past the point that he’s been working on for the last two weeks now. However, he’s now stuck at another frustration point. I could never get into that game. I hated GTA3 and GTA: Vice City(two of Brian’s most favorite games).. And I really hated Max Payne. Even Brian admits that one was crappy (shouldn’t have bought it, just because it looks cool in tv commercials doesn’t mean it actually is).
For those of you who don’t know, Chris is the new girl in Kevin’s life (recently promoted to girlfriend status, I might add). If you thought Stephanie was it (after all, she caught the bouquet and he caught the garter at our wedding — how much more perfect could it be — it was so perfect, even I thought it was rigged), well so did we.. Things just didn’t work out, unfortunately.
Brian was kind of hungry after exerting himself more than usual and I don’t ever really pass up the opportunity to eat so we decided to stop at Burger King on the way home. Their fries are nasty but they offer one of my guilty pleasures: cheese whopper with bacon, no pickles and onions. Whoppers are the best, man! Other burgers just don’t compare. Brian and I actually had this discussion once about how all fast-food burgers are the same. He says they’re all microwaved. I told him no, Burger King whoppers are special. Could he not taste the difference? It’s flame-broiled, I insist. He just shakes his head. It says so in the commercials! There is no point arguing with me. Anyway, I guess I should probably take my own advice and not believe every tv commercial out there.. But the taste! It’s so good! Anyway, we ended up watching Serving Sarah while we ate. It couldn’t really keep me a awake. Then again, I can’t fault the movie completely. We were watching it at around three in the morning.. It’s just that the movie itself wasn’t as funny as I thought it would be. Good thing we didn’t pay for it! LOL!
February 9, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Family, Food
“Welcome to being a Brubaker,” was all Brian could say.. He said that once upon a time one of the Brubaker forefathers must have pissed off some voodoo queen or witch in a land far, far away because Brubakers have the worst luck imaginable. I am just so frustrated. I’ve had a run of such bad luck the last couple of days, and it all began with a Salon article: Outsourcing Rejection. I came across a snippet via Quixotical.org and I decided to read on. Being in the customer service industry myself, I found the article wildly amusing.
A few months before I left the Phone Center, one of our clients started an experiment: using us to screen for middle-management positions instead of just their blue-collar jobs. These applications were particularly fun. It wasn’t just that the interviews were more complex; it was the peculiar sadistic thrill that most of them provided. Like all of our callers, the aspiring middle managers dialed a number and were put directly through to a recruiter. But the middle managers were different in that many of them made two disastrous assumptions. The first was that anyone who answers the phone must be the receptionist, and the second was that it’s OK to be rude to the receptionist.
The fun started almost immediately. The first thing the middle managers had to do was give their basic information: name, contact numbers, things like that. Problem callers would already be impatient with this process. They rattled things off as quickly as possible, deeply resentful that they weren’t talking to the important person yet. Next I asked them for some basic résumé information. This was usually answered cryptically, accompanied by testy little exhalations and I’m pretty sure eye-rolling, though that’s only an educated guess.
When I launched into the actual interview, it really pissed them off. They’d get furious that the freaking receptionist had the audacity to waste their time by … And then round about question 5 it would dawn on them that this was the interview. I could hear the quick catch in their speech as it hit them, and the sick pause as they thought back over how they’d been behaving for the past several minutes. It was the attempts at damage control that I really found hilarious. Suddenly, we were best pals. They almost always thought that using my first name as much as possible might somehow make up for their earlier suggestion that I make it snappy. Too late, Mr. Jenkins. You were an F7 back at question 2.
Tell me that is not funny. I was rolling! Anyway, I enjoyed it so much that I felt the urge to share it with Brian. I click on the print button and after waiting a couple of minutes my computer tells me that I do not have access to this printer and to contact my “network administrator.” My first reaction, “What the hell?!” I had just printed something last week and the network was perfectly fine. The network was actually one of the things that I loved about our home office. Brian and I could share our My Pictures and My Music folders as well as any other files we want to share between us effortlessly. Not to mention I didn’t have to buy my own printer nor find space for it, which was awesome because I’m a real clutter-bug. But I digress.. Our first conclusion was that perhaps my IP address had been removed, albeit accidentally, from Brian’s trusted zones on his firewall. Checked that, no problem there. Then we thought maybe Felix, because he is such a little booger, had unplugged one or some of the cables but after examining the back of our computers for several minutes we came to the conclusion that wasn’t the problem either. So we inspected our network connections which seemed to be fine and redid them several times to no avail. Brian had me delete the printer and try to add it back, which was a really horrible idea as I couldn’t add it back because I couldn’t even connect to his computer. Now not only could I not print but I didn’t even have the cute little printer icon any more. On the upside, I can still access the internet. So I went to the Dell support website but even that was futile. I think they don’t expect you to call for help at two in the morning because the only people that are working during that time of day are morons. I seriously believe that they aren’t capable of free thinking, rather they just go by a list of questions and recite the prescribed set of answers. You might as well, click on the FAQ link becaues there’s no difference! Anyhow, this guy tells me that he is not experienced in this area and that I would need to speak with their “advanced OS department.” I’m thinking fine, whatever, but are they open right now? According to him they were and that he would transfer me but instead of reaching the party successfully after a few minutes of waiting I just end up getting this “Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please hang up and try again.” message, which could be the fault of T-Mobile and their magically disappearing signal. Whatever the case, I was aggravated that I had to call back. And you know when you call back you have to go through the same hassle of providing your express service tag, express service code, name, address and phone number only to realize that the person you’re speaking with can’t answer your questions and will just transfer you to another person who may or may not be able to help but who will probably waste your time just as the first person had done by asking for all of that information all over again. The second time that I called, after I provided the information I just politely explained to her that I was disconnected in the process of being transfered and would like to be transfered straight away. This person wen’t through the same process the guy did only this time I had to wait on hold even longer until eventually I just gave up and looked at my cellphone which shows that I wasn’t on a call any longer.. I was waiting for freaking nothing! I finally just gave up and said screw it. Brian and I had to wake up super early the following day and couldn’t afford to be up all night tinkering around with this shit. Brian and I concur that it could be a hardware problem (since we’ve practically exhausted all other possibilities). We had a major power outage on monday that lasted several hours (I actually had to take a shower and get dressed in the dark, plus I had to rush to work so I could microwave my breakfast there). He thinks his network card might have gotten fried. I don’t know if that is possible but it will have to do for now because we don’t want to think about it any further. So this morning we were supposed to wake up at seven but hit the snooze several times because we were both exhausted from the previous night’s fiasco. I get up to take a shower only to find out that there is no hot water. I made Brian get up, much to his dismay, to check the pilot light underneath the hot water heater and sure enought it was out. Brian thinks that we probably had really strong winds the night before, so strong that it blew the pilot light out. Anyway, it was too cold for a regular shower so I ended up taking a ghetto shower (just washing my face and brushing my teeth and wiping my body so I don’t completely stink) but I still feel dirty. With that out of the way, we head on over to the motor vehicles place only to find out that they are closed on Saturdays! Brian had mistaken them for the driver’s license place which is open on Saturday and closed on Mondays. Grrrr! I hate getting up early but I have no choice. I’m going to have to do it again on Monday. You’re probably wondering, as much time as I spend on the internet, why I just don’t do it online at KSwebtags.org — oh, but I tried — it didn’t offer the option of changing your last name and your address. I can change my address by mail but then it doesn’t give me the option of changing my last name. Plus I don’t trust the mail because it is so slow (and I’m quickly running out of time) so I’d rather do it in person. That is my “mission impossible” task for this month. On the upside, we were able to get each other’s Valentine’s Day gifts today. Brian got me the watch that I really, really wanted for Christmas (but didn’t get) at Kay Wiggins Jewelry and I purchased and scheduled a hot stone massage for him at Individually Yours (this place on Douglas and Oliver that Ashley recommended). We usually look to Sveta’s at Bradley Fair for our massage and relaxation needs but they don’t offer hot stone massage and every time Brian sees it on tv, he seems to really want it so I decided to get him something special and different this time around, something that he’s never experienced before. I just know that he’ll enjoy his hour and half of hot stone ecstacy and extreme pampering.
February 8, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Life, Web
This is what happens when Brian and I get bored.. Living with him is such a dream. I couldn’t imagine myself being with anyone else.
By the way, Brian found Confessions of a Dangerous Mind on Kazaa last night. We couldn’t figure out how to burn it to VCD without wasting CDRs with our mistakes so we just ended up watching it on his computer. At least his monitor is not as dinky as mine (which is 17 inches), but still 19 inches is pretty dinky compared to our regular tvs or the big screen in the BAT (big-ass tv) room (aka the family room). He ended up burning Formula 51 and it wouldn’t play in the bedroom — don’t even think of playing it in the family room! The Sony DVD player out there is a joke! It says on the outside that it plays Video CDs, but it can’t. Those liars! That was the whole reason why we got a Toshiba for the bedroom. The funny thing is that the Toshiba can’t play burned DVDs, but the Sony can. Isn’t that weird? But I digress, Brian also found The Recruit so we are watching that today. If we keep this up, we’ll save a ton of money. I mean, we’ll only have to go to the theater for the big action blockbusters (e.g. Daredevil). I really hope he finds a copy of How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days because I really want to see that. If he doesn’t find it, I’ll have to drag his butt up to 13th Avenue Warren and watch it with me! Hopefully they’ll show it in the balcony so we can drink (the mango daiquiris are yummy) and eat while we enjoy the show.
February 2, 2003 | Posted by Ching under Life, Movies
$180 would NOT put you in debt! Think about it in pesos, it’s not even P10k and...