Jared’s Blog

I caught up posting what I had done for reviews and a few albums I’ve gotten the last couple of months. Hit the music section to see what’s new.

Over the weekend, I was up near Duluth for my cousin’s wedding. I’ve dubbed it “the most redneck wedding I’ve ever attended.”

I should have known when I had to drive 20 miles out in the middle of nowhere just to get to the grooms’ parents house where the ceremonies and reception were being held. I was running a little late and as such, arrived just in time to see the groomsmen helping their ladies off the ATV’s they rode up on. 4-Wheelers!

During one of the several country ballads played during the ceremony, I realized that the groomsmens’ vests were camo. Not like army camo, more like the type you’d see on a hunting vest. Fitting. To compliment their “rustic” (read: tacky) vests, they couldn’t be seen wearing the traditional corsage. Instead, it was what looked like a felt deer head. I didn’t bother to investigate any further, but the redneck theme didn’t stop there, oh no, not by a long shot. After a short ceremony, the bride (my cousin), made an announcement. “Please take your chairs with you into the polebarn for the reception.” That’s the first time I’ve had to do manual labor for a wedding that I was a guest at.

After getting into the polebar and sitting down, I noticed an abnormal amount of denim being worn in the crowd. There were also a few cowboy hats.

Aside from the ridiculousness of the situation, the food was pretty good. That was, until I saw the cake topped with pinecones. There were also a number of coolers set up, most of which contained beer. The beer to other beverage ratio was about 1:1.

The icing on the cake, though, was when my cousin, called all the “Cooke boys,” referring to her new brothers-in-law, into the barn and proclaimed she was now one of the family by downing an “Old Style.”

I’m not sure when my cousin became such a hick. I never remember her being that way when we were growing up. I guess all that matters is that she’s happy with her new husband.

In case you haven’t heard the news, the former 9th and sometimes 8th planet in the solar system, Pluto, is no longer considered a planet. Scientists decided yesterday to change what constitutes a planet and Pluto didn’t make the cut.

In what I swear was a related incident, the heavens opened for a flash flood yesterday around 6:30PM. Well, unknown to me, our street floods during heavy rain, but only right in front of our house. Something about the storm drain in front of the neighbors. Yesterday after work, I drove home and parked as usual. It wasn’t even raining at the time. All of a sudden it started pouring. I love storms, so I was standing at various windows watching it come down. As I gazed out the front window, I noticed the water rising up near my car. Within minutes it was halfway up the wheels and a few moments later, up to the bumper.

At this point I realized that I better move my car. I quickly put on a jacket and ran outside, only to be halted by the ankle deep water at the end of the driveway. “This is going to need some heavier duty boots,” I thought. I ran inside, but was only able to find my winter boots which turned out to be no help anyway. Right next to the car, the water was up to my mid-calf! In a panic, I flung open the passenger door and hopped in. The only problem was I was followed by a whole lot of water. As I slammed the door, the water was just high enough to start coming in. In the what seemed like no time, I had half an inch to an inch of water on the passenger side of the car. That all, of course, from when I opened the door.

I drove around the block and parked my car on higher ground in the driveway. Then came the task of drying my car up. About a dozen completely soaked towels later, the water was mostly gone and the rain gave way to sunshine.

This morning as I got in my car to go to work, the floor mats were still pretty wet. I’m going to have to try and sop up the rest when I get home. I did also manage to grab a few shots with my camera both during and after the storm which I’ve posted to Flickr. I apologize for the blurriness of the first couple of shots. They were taken from inside the house through the window.

I’ve been all moved in to my new place for about a month now. Being that it’s a house, there’s a little more upkeep that we need to do than there was at the old townhouse. Namely, cutting the grass.

So on Saturday, I pulled out the mower, threw on my iPod, and fired her up. I got about 3 pulls on the starter cord before it snapped. Shit! It’s not like I really wanted to mow that much. I was more pissed because it’s not our mower.

See, the owner of the house left it here after he moved out. I’m not sure if he left it intending to just toss it out (they did leave a bunch of other junk) or if he left it intending it to stay with the house. Either way, it wasn’t mine and I just broke it.

After I got over the initial panic, I started to look things up on the internet. It turns out, it’s only a $3 part and a little work to replace. I called my dad to ask for some advice. He really couldn’t give me much, but I don’t blame him. He’s not a mechanic.

After giving things a look over, I disconnected the spark plug and started unscrewing. I only got 1 screw undone before I ran into another snag. I needed a socket set and we don’t have one. My dad’s was is still up in Virginia with him, so I couldn’t use his. I had a thought to buy one, but didn’t feel like running out and getting it. So I just wheeled the thing back in the garage for another day. I’d have to buy the cord anyway before I could do anything.

Fast forward to tonight. I had myself a cord, but still no socket set. During our weekly poker game (which I knocked 6 people out of and made $30, YES!), I just threw it out there and it turned out John had one in his car. Bingo! So after the game, we decided to tackle it.

It probably wasn’t the best idea to start on it at 10PM, but after fiddling for about 45 min, I got it running again. Go me! It gives me some hope that I won’t be a totally useless husband someday.

This is really sad. I don’t remember exactly when it was that I installed Wordpress 2 (which is when Askimet was added to Wordpress), but that’s a lot of junk it’s caught. Go Askimet!

USB: Universal Serial Bus

Last night I was sitting on my computer (what’s new) when I looked down at my phone. The data port on my new RAZR looked suspiciously like a standard mini-USB port. I wondered if my digicam’s USB cable would work with that. Sure enough, it does.

Let me back up to last Friday. My old cell phone plan was up and it was time to get a new one. I found a RAZR on Amazon.com for only a penny. And hell, if I can figure out the rebate, they’ll give me another $50 back on top of that. Shipping was free, but I had to pay for activation and of course the new plan. I went with T-mobile because, well, I don’t know. I knew I was pretty much getting a RAZR and I didn’t want to be on Cingular and the Verizon RAZR’s were more expensive.
I order the phone choosing the least expensive shipping option (this was before I knew it was free) which entailed a 3-5 day trip from the warehouse to my house. This was at about 7PM or 8PM on Friday night. By Saturday afternoon, my order was confirmed and shipped. I was also notified the activation had gone through and my new number was active. Monday after I got home from work, the box was waiting for me. That’s the fastest turnaround I’ve ever experienced for an ecommerce site and over a weekend at that! Bravo Amazon.

Back to the hacking goods. A few searches on Google turned up a massive amount of information on cell phone hacking. Not surprisingly, there is a ton about the RAZR because it is so common. Now, about all I got into last night was uploading a couple of images to use as backgrounds, but I can tell you the thing is getting thoroughly examined when I get the time.