d'oh

We're getting close to the end of the year, and we've only been to Universal once so far this year, so Alfred and Ilya decided we needed to take advantage of my other four free tickets before it was too late. So off we went yesterday. It was much less crowded than when we went last month; this is totally when we should go every year. It was great, the longest we waited for any ride was maybe 15 minutes. Also, I have a new favorite ride there: the Simpsons ride! It was so fun! It's a motion simulator ride that makes you feel like you're on all these different types of rides in Krustyland. The ride itself is really cool, a lot like Spiderman, but there's a lot of little jokes in there too that makes it better than Spiderman, at least in my opinion. We actually went on it twice. So fun. I didn't even really mind waiting in line because they show clips of Simpsons episodes while you wait.

Later, when we were on our way to go on Spiderman, a couple of Universal employees came up to us and asked if we wanted to go on Spiderman. They took us in through the exit and got on and rode with us, so we didn't have to wait in line. Then after we got off, they gave us 4 free express passes to skip another line later in the day. It was awesome! We used them for the Jurassic Park ride, although we should have saved them for the Dr. Seuss trolley thing. We tried to go on it 2 or 3 times, but decided not to wait in the line each time. Oh yeah, and we were drunk by then. Because, you know, Universal has 2 bars that have Happy Hour. I had at least 1 too many drinks. We rode the Dr. Seuss carousel like 5 times. We apparently sat in traffic for an hour and a half on our drive through Orlando, but luckily I kept falling asleep. I slept through most of the drive back, which is probably really good because I kept feeling nauseous. Anyway, good times were had all around. Thank you for driving us back, Mercedes!

Quote of the day

Alfred (to me): and you wonder why you're old and fat

let's be serious

Yes, a serious post. I had a meeting today with the state attorney's office that's prosecuting the guy who tried to break into our house. I got to leave work early, which is always a plus, and got searched and wanded by security at the courthouse. They confiscated my camera and nail clippers. For realsies. Because I might have used the metal file on the nail clippers to shank a judge or something and then taken a picture of it as a souvenir. I got a little ticket to reclaim my goods on my way out. My meeting went well, it didn't last that long. I basically corroborated the statement I gave the police the night of the incident and answered a couple of additional questions. Apparently the guy our thief tried to rob earlier in the day hired the guys who beat the crap out of him later that day. They cut his neck so deep it looked like they tried to cut his head off, and then tried to cut off his genitals. Somehow he was able to kick enough to keep them away from his goods. He has enough of a prior record that he may go to jail even with the attack. I may have to go in again at some point, so we'll see. Neat.

I was reflecting the other day on how much that guy has effected (affected? I'm drunk) me. I used to feel like I was basically safe. Like I could walk around outside after dark, or just be in the house with the door unlocked, and feel like I was ok. Now I don't go outside after I get home from work if I'm by myself unless I really need to for some reason. I lock my car doors the second I get in, whether I'm at home, at work, wherever. The other evening I walked from the house we were staying at to the restaurant where I was meeting Alfred. It took me about half an hour, and for all but the first 3 minutes or so I was on a well lit, busy road. I not only brought my pepper spray, I carried it the entire way with my thumb on the trigger, ready for action. It's kind of sad that my basic sense of security and really, my underlying feeling of trust in the world at large, is pretty much gone. Some guy randomly tried to break into my house while I was inside. It was totally random, had nothing to do with me, and if it happened once, who's to say it won't happen again? It's probably good that I'm safer now, but it's not like I was picking up hitchhikers and behaving in an unsafe manner before. I'm sad that I feel unsafe. It sucks.

p.s. Alfred made some hard apple cider the other day and we sampled it tonight. 3 sips in, we were both tipsy. Craziness.

we're hip. we're with it.

Yes, I totally used that title today simply so I could photoshop a picture like this. I'm awesome. Anyway, the "we" I'm refering to in the title is really the museum in general. We've apparently become the cool hangout for a bunch of the kids who live in the neighborhood. Somehow they never saw us before we moved across the street. Now they come hang out a lot. There's a couple in particular that come and talk to us a bunch, but there's a whole little gang that apparently comes around once in awhile at night too. They're probably in middle school if I had to guess. A bunch of them came in today just before I closed and wandered around for awhile. One of them tried to get me to let her volunteer for 15 minutes so she could go inside by herself. Yeah, it totally worked. Another one harasses me for free candy. It makes me feel kind of bad for being so annoying like that when I was that age. In other words, I do not enjoy the museum being a hangout.

Speaking of the museum, we had a little boy there today whose name was Cullen. For those of you who have been living in a cave, or are over the age of 17, that's the last name of the vampire family in the Twilight books. The kid was about 5, so it's possible his parents (mom) liked the books, but probably more likely that they now hate the books for making their kid's name so popular among teeny bopper vampire loving weirdos. And speaking of vampires, I'm totally into this new show in the CW, The Vampire Diaries. I read the books when I was in high school or so and really liked them, so when I saw they were making them into a show (since vampires are sort of hip right now, in case you haven't noticed) I recorded the first one to see how it was. It started out kind of cheesy but has actually gotten really good. I'm hooked. I have one still on the DVR and can't wait to watch it when I exercise tomorrow. Part of the appeal, I must admit, is the super hot vampires. Like Ian Somerhalder (on the right in this picture). The other one's not bad either (neither is the lead actress, actually). Maybe women wouldn't be so into vampires if they didn't cast such freaking hot guys in those roles. (disclaimer: I do not find the twilight guy attractive. I'm not that much of a loser.)

us? house sitting? weird!

We've expanded our client base: we spent the weekend house and dog sitting for one of my co workers. We did our best to take advantage of being in a different place. We went out for sangria and appetizers for dinner on Friday, then got some tacos afterwards when we were still a little hungry. Saturday morning I had to go into work for a couple hours, then we met up with Charles, a friend of Alfred's from high school. For those of you who were at our wedding, he was one of our groomsmen, the one with the Superman belt. He was in a bodybuilding competition that day and came to have lunch with us during the break between shows. He hung out with us for the afternoon (and took a nap) before heading back for his evening show. This picture is from his show. He came in fourth in his division. The dog kept licking his feet. Apparently the paint-on tan stuff tastes good to dogs.

Ilya and Mercedes came to join us later in the afternoon, so we drank and played Uno for a couple of hours. The two of them were dominating, especially Mercedes, but I managed to win twice, and Alfred once. After he won his game he decided we were done, so he ended up as the final winner. After Charles left for his competition, we went back to the sangria place for some more drinking and food, and ended up getting pizza and wings for dinner. Pretty healthy stuff. Charles came back to the house after his competition and was attempting to drink a gallon of milk in an hour, but apparently his body was sick and tired of abuse (he hadn't been drinking anything for a few days so that his muscles popped out better or something) and he didn't get very far. Thank God. I was not looking forward to a gallon of white vomit.

Today we headed back home after feeding and walking the dog one last time. This dog, by the way, was pretty weird. This dog was a poop machine, loves car rides to the point of insanity, and searches for cigarette butts to eat when on a walk. There are no sidewalks in their neighborhood, so you have to walk in the street. Twice when I was walking him after dark I totally left his poop in the middle of the road. I'm not touching that. Alfred was a good person and picked up after him. Anyway, we just got finished watching the Jaguars game and eating leftover pizza and wings from last night. We also made beer floats to go with the meal. The game, food, and floats were all good. In fact, a pretty good weekend overall.

It's weird

60 degrees feels so much colder in Florida than it does in New York.

we've found a better maid

This maid only comes once a week, and the day he comes tends to change from one week to the next, but today when I came home from work all the dishes were done and a delicious dinner of fish ceviche was waiting for me! Someone's laundry hasn't been put away yet, but the ceviche made up for it. Plus he watched last night's So You Think You Can Dance with me (which was not great, by the way). What a guy.

In other news, it's Veteran's Day. Here's a picture to dispel the solemn, honorable mental image that phrase might conjure up for you. Yes, this fine young knight is off defending our country. Go visit Mike's blog for a up close and personal view of his life in the army. This picture makes me want a beer.

On another totally unrelated note... one of the reasons we live in Florida is no longer alive. Back in summer 2002, Alfred moved to Washington DC after he graduated college. I was all psyched to join him after I graduated the next year. And then the sniper thing started. You may remember the month or so that fall when people living in the DC area were basically terrified to go outside because of the random sniper attacks taking place. It was one of the things that made Alfred decide to move back to Florida. Well, last night one of the snipers was executed. The other one is serving a life sentence. And I didn't get to move to DC. Jerks.