Dad Update and my Jeep

Planned to see my Dad today but my Jeep is still not done. I was promised it would be done by 2pm today.. will at 3;30pm (they close at 4pm) I called to find out what is going on and they said it would be ready by closing so Harry and I headed over to the dealer. Of course we get there and it's still not done.. we waited another 15 minutes before it was complete. Total cost of repairs was $1600.00. If I still wasn't making payment on it I don't think I would have done the repairs.. but I still have two years of payments before it's paid off, gotta keep driving it.

As for Dad, Mom and Grandma (her mom) visited him today along with Michael and one of Dad's friends.. Harry and I plan on visiting tomorrow.

Dad's in the Hospital

Dad indeed had a heart attack last night. The doctors were able to prevent it from becoming a major heart attack. He is in stable condition at the moment.

He was feeling pain in his chest and left arm. He took some Bayer and went to lie down hoping it was pass.. well half hour later he told my brother that he need to go to the hospital. My brother said he was sweating up storm and looked horrible. That's when he called me and told me that he thinks Dad is having a heart attack. The doctors said he could have been a massive heart attack but it was caught in time. They will be doing a test on Monday to find out if he need a bypass surgery or not. I'll keep everyone posted. Think good thoughts...

Dad has a Heart Attack

Man.. this has not been a good day. I lost my Grandma six hour prior and I just got a call from my Brother, he thinks Dad is having a heart attack and is rushing him to emergency.

My Grandma Died

Today while on lunch my Dad called me to inform me that my grandmother (his mom) died. She has been ill for several years and recently was put into a hospice as she was no longer able to take care of herself. This is my Dad's biological mother, the one I found a few years ago. Luckily my Dad was able to met her in person and spend several days with her. My brother and I were never able to meet her but did talk to her on the phone. The death didn't effect me as much as it would have if I would have known her all my life. It was harder to hear the sadness in my Dad's voice. I told him at least we found her and you were able to see her and she see you after 58 years of being apart. Rest in Peace Grandma Bega

Work Stress

Seems like my job is getting more and more stressful. I'm working later and later hours. I try not to let the stress get to me but sometimes it's just too hard to ignore. Currently I'm in a battle with Production up north. We got our first batch of tapes and they were completely unorginaized and mis-labeled if labeled at all. Of course I know that production is going crazy up in Alaska so I sent them a very nice email reminding them how to organize and label tapes that it will help post in the long run. Well that was a mistake I got several nasty emails from Production folks, pretty much saying that they really don't care about post and we are lucky we got tapes at all. It's times like that, that I'm thankful that I'm a calm person by nature. Hopefully once things are up a running 100% the craziness will calm down a bit.. wishful thinking.. but you never know. If it doesn't get any better I'll just have to let things flow off my back more often as the stress will kill me.

More Repairs

I get a call from my Jeep dealer today and I expected that they were going to tell me that everything is done.. but of course not.. they found more problems and wanted to add another $1000 to my bill. I had had enough and told them there is no way I could afford all these fixes that I must be able to get by without fixing everything they are suggesting. I know a little bit about cars and picked the stuff that sounded like it had to be done to keep the jeep running.. so now it's the waiting game again. It's costing me $500 just for them to check and see if I need more repairs. Luckily all these fees go towards the actual repair costs.

Quote for Jeep Repairs

My worse fears have come true.. I just got a call from the Jeep dealer and he listed about ten things wrong with my jeep. All repairs totaled about $2500.00. I almost died and informed him I couldn't do all those so we narrowed it down to only stuff that I must do to keep my jeep running and the final cost is $1350.00, which is horrible but not as bad as $2500.00. One very costly thing was replacing the gauge bundle that controls my dashboard, that alone was 1100.00. I opted to live with my funky dashboard gauges. I gave them the go ahead with the repairs and hopefully I'll get my jeep back in a few days better then new. I hate spending so much money but since this is our one and only vehicle and I still have two years of payments on it I figure I had to do what I had to do. And I wonder why I can't save any money.. if it's not one thing it's another.

Happy Birthday Bro

Today is my brother's birthday.. he is turning 33 years old today.. WOW.. now that makes me feel old. I hope you have a great day today Michael.

Ironman

Today Harry and I went to an Ironman screening at the PGA. This is the first movie screening that I have gone too since becoming a member of the PGA. The theater was okay, seating was not slanted enough so if you had someone farily tall sit in front of your they blocked part of the screen and the sound was okay but I can't complain it was free.

The movie itself was exactly what I was expecting.. a fun rollercoaster ride. Great SFX, nice acting and a cool story. I'm not into Ironman comics so I didn't know what to expect but it was a good first movie setting up who and how he became Ironman. Another great addition to the superhero movies.

Vet Visit

Today we Daisy bi-annual Vet visit. She loves going for drives but as soon as we get to the Vet she starts to panic and wine. We take her in and everytime you move she tries and escapes through the front doors. Doc checked her out and everything was great. They gave her a canine cough vaccine and we were on our way. She has a whole six months before she has to worry about going back again.

Renting a car/ Repairing the Jeep

My Jeep has been acting up for the past few months. My transmission has been slipping, the engine dies while idle, and my dashboard gauges go haywire once in a while and all three problems have been getting progressively worse. I finally made an appointment with my local Jeep dealer. Because of work I had to turn it in on a Saturday but they wouldn't be able to look at it till Monday so I had to rent a car. I reserved a economy class car (which was the cheapest) and I booked it for an etire week, just in case. So Harry and I got up early on Saturday and went to Enterprise rent a car to pick up the rental before dropping off my Jeep. When we got to Enterprise I found out that they didn't have any economy cars and I was getting a free upgrade. They gave me four cars to choose from and three of looked the same, like Ford focus and in my opinion very boring then there was this white one.. a Dodge Caliber and I took one look and knew it was the one I wanted.. it's funky looking inside and out and I loved it.

After we rented the car Harry drove it and I drove the jeep to the jeep dealer and dropped off my jeep. They said they would call my Monday with an estimate.. doesn't look like it's going to be very cheap.

Dinner with Craig

Today we had dinner with a friend of mine that I haven't seen in over three years. It's funny how time just seems to get away from you. We had a very nice dinner then went back to our place and visited a bit more. It was a fun night.

Three Months to Go

Three months to the day is our ceremony.. things are moving along nicely. It's alot of work putting something like this together. We have choosen our caterers, photographer, where we are having it, what kind of cake we are having and invites have been sent out. Still have to figure out music, decorations, what we are wearing and so much more. It's going to be a very laid back kind of event. I want it to be fun and causal. Just a bunch of friends hanging out.

Finding Rings

Harry and I bought rings way back when we first got together and now that we are actually "getting married" we decided that these are our engagment rings and we need new "wedding" rings. Today Harry and I looked at a bunch of different rings trying to find just the right ones. They have to be perfect, so we're taking our time in finding ones we both just love.

Our First RSVP

Today we got our first RSVP from grandmother... so it's one yes so far :)

The Last of the Invites

Today we mailed out the last of the Invites. These were the ones that were going to Harry's family in Austria and a friend in England. I had to take them to the post office to get exact postage so they went out a few days after the everyone elses.. now we wait for the RSVP's.

Manic Monday

I know today was going to be a rough day.. and it didn't disappoint. Well the day started off nice enough. I got to mail about 2/3's of our ceremony invites. But everything changed when I got to work. I won't go into details needless to say it was a very busy and stressful day that didn't end until 10:30pm.

It's kind of scary if this is what's to come of this job. On top of planning our commitment ceremony, planning Harry's family arrival for three weeks during the ceremony, working on a network show, dealing with car issues and to top it off health issues.

Just gotta keep telling myself to breath and enjoy every free moment of stress-free down time I get.

Ceremony Invites

Today while we watched TV Harry and I prepared the 50 + invites to our commitment ceremony. We stamped the RSVP, printed address labels and licked over 50 envelopes. We plan on mailing out the majority of them on Monday. We are still trying to get address of some folks.

You don't realize how fast your list of invites grows. You want to invite everyone you know but since we are having it in our backyard we are limited on space.

Torchwood

Harry and I were finally able to sit down and watch some more Torchwood. I have all 13 episodes of the second season but so far we have only been able to watch up to episode 5. Today we watched episodes 6 through 10. All I have to say is WOW... first of all they added Martha from the third season of Doctor Who to Torchwood (episodes 6, 7 & 8) and she was a great addition. There is a OMG moment at the end of episode six and kind of sets ups a major story plot in the next few episodes. I enjoyed episodes here and there from season one of Torchwood, but this season two has been nothing but the best. I can't wait to finish up the series. And I look forward to season three.

More Wedding Stuff

Today I picked up address labels and stamps (100) for the invitations. Not only did I have to get stamps for the invitations but also for the RSVP post cards that hopefully everyone will return to us letting us know they will be joining us. We have to get these cards out this weekend to hit our three-month mark. Lots of work getting all this together but it's fun at the same time.

So we have our invitations/RSVP cards done, we have chosen a caterer, we know what kind of cake we are getting, we mapped out the backyard and figured out how many table and chairs we can get back there and we have a photographer. So far so good.. a few more details to work out and three months to do it in.

Working Out at Night

It's sooooo hard working out. Getting up everyday and doing 45 minutes of cardio on the elliptical is tough. I know it's good for me and I need to really try and lose some weight but man I dread it every morning.

Well I woke up today and wasn't feeling so hot so I decided to work out at night right before I go to bed. Wasn't sure I would have the energy after the long day at work but surprising it was a pretty good workout and man I fell right to sleep afterwards. I'm going to try it this way for a while and see how it works..

Doctor Who

Just watched the third episode of the fourth season of the New Doctor Who and I am loving this season so far.. three really AWESOME episodes. The latest was The Planet of the Ood. Again Catherine Tate continues to impress me. She is the heart of the new season. I'm really looking forward to more of this season.

Aunt Joyce's Birthday

Today is the birthday of one of my favorite Aunts. Joyce and I grew up together and we have always been very close. Hope you have a great Birthday Aunt Joyce. Hugs

Working out

It's so tough getting up and working out on the Elliptical machine. I decided that I would do 45 minutes everyday. I did plan on doing it twice a day once in the morning nad once at night but that might be a bit much to start with. I have found that if I watch Star Trek or Firefly it makes my time go back faster. Each hour long episode runs about 45 minutes so it's perfect. It's been three days and so far so good.

New Job

Well today I started my new job. I'm the Post Production Supervisor for a new NBC reality/game show called "America's Toughest Jobs". It's currently set to air in the summer of 09' but that can always change.

The first day was fairly quiet. I spent about six hours just trying to get my computer up and running. In the end we got it up and everything seems to be in order. It's always kind of crazy at the beginning of the shows. We are still setting up edit bays and such. Hopefully in a few weeks things will be running smooth.

Getting Healthy

After a few months of wanting to get one of these I finally bit the bullet and bought one. Harry and I went to about four different stores previously and looked at a whole bunch of different Elliptical machines. Of course you could tell the difference between the low price ones ($299) and the high price ones ($1000+). I knew I wanted something fairly cheap as we are not rich but I wanted something that would work and felt smooth, as my knees aren't what they use to be.

The ProForm 500 F Elliptical machine was the second elliptical we tried. After that we kept comparing it this one. So today Harry and I went to Sports Authority to buy it. It was originally $999.99, but was marked down to $799.99 and on sale for $499.99. Of course the sales person wanted to sell us an extended warranty and after talking it over with Harry we thought it would be a good idea since we plan on using this a lot and to pay that much money for something, we got the two year extended warranty. Of course it was another $150 for that but I think in the end it's well worth it.

Now the fun part was getting it home and putting it together. The salesman said he wasn't hard just time consuming and he wasn't kidding. It took both Harry and I several hours to put this thing together. But in the end we got a really nice machine. Now I just have to force myself to work out everyday as planned.

Wedding Invitations

Today we ordered our Wedding invitations and RSVP cards. We created our own wedding invitations with apple.com and I think they turned out pretty nice. When we put in the order we requested 100 cards and an hour later I realized that we plan on having 100 guests but most were couples and we only need one card per household. I figured we screwed up ($$$) and there wasn't much we could do since we already placed the order.. but I was reading the confirmation email and it stated that we had 90 minutes to cancel the order so we quickly did so and placed the order again and as we were sending the second order I asked Harry if we double checked all the spelling as we know what it should say so you tend to just read over mistakes and sure enough there was a typo that Harry caught. So guess what we had to cancel that order only a few minutes after we sent it. So we tripled checked the spelling and quantity and sent the order in once again. Everything looked to be good so this order should be perfect.

As for RSVP cards we found a customizable order on Ebay for 100 cards (that is why we initially ordered 100 wedding cards). So for about $175 we manage to finally get our Wedding invitations and RSVP cards created. Now we just have to get them, address them and mail them out before May 2nd (which will be three months before.) Where does the time fly.

Last Day at Big Medicine

After nine months of work.. a pretty long run...today is my last day on the TLC show Big Medicine. There have been some ups and downs as with most shows but I feel like I did a pretty good job with this one. I have gained tons of confedense in myself which is always nice. I met alot of nice people and some not so nice. :) but all in all a great experience. Now it's time to move up to bigger and better... NBC here I come.

Doctor's Visit

Just got back from my third doctors visit in the last month. This was just a follow up to my previous visit. I have to thank Bruce for introducing me to Dr. Mills. He's a very sweet and caring doctor. When I had to choose a doctor I knew I wanted someone who was gay, even though Dr. Mills is in West Hollywood he will well worth the drive... thanks Bruce.

Anyway everything went well. My EKG was normal, my cholesterol is too high 238 (200 is max), but this was expected. He's giving me two months to get my weight and cholesterol down. So all in all a good visit.. now I just need to workout and eat better. :)

Missing TV Night

For a second week in a row I got stuck working later then expected and missing TV night. Every Thursday I try my best to get home in time for TV night and enjoy the company of friends and good sci fi but tonight wasn't going to happen. I was asked to help out another show that the current company that I am working for is doing. I am proud that I did what they asked as I had never done it before and manage to figure it out in a timely manner but I was upset that I didn't get home till a little after 9 and only got to spend about 15 minutes with my friends... oh well this is the last week on this job.. hopefully I can get away on Thursdays for future TV nights.

Cleaning out the Garage

Today I was finally able to clean and organize the Garage. I have been wanting to do this since we moved in back in October. Well I took off a day of work and figured I would put this day off to good use. With the help of Harry we worked on the garage all day only taking a break for lunch. By the end of the day it looks AWESOME. We also manage to clean out and throw away a few things. It's now organized so when I have more free time I can go through the boxes and thin out some of my things (ie toys, magazine, VHS tapes.)

It feels great getting a big project completed.

Backing Up The Computer

Today Harry and I went to the Apple store because Harry wanted to buy a 1 terrabyte hard drive. He got an Apple card for Xmas and with his Birthday money he managed to only spend around 8 bucks of his own money. So he got is new external hard drive and I got his old 500 gigibyte hard drive.

So I spent today backing up my entire computer. I know it's going ot die, it's just a matter of time and I wanted to make sure I have everything backed up. It took over 14 hours to back up my computer... I have about 350 gigibytes of stuff. So now if my computer crashed, I won't lose much of the info.

More Computer Woes

I just have not luck with Computers (PC). Today I got home and Harry informed me that one of my Hard Drives is saying it has errors. I have a dual RAID hard drive system. So if one goes out they both are gone. The first time this happened, about three years ago, I lost four months worth of stuff because I didn't back up all the time. The second time it happened, about a year ago, the computer didn't die instantly it's slowly died and I was able to save everything. So when it happened again today I paniced since I haven't backed up in a month or so. But like the second time the computer is still working but still says it has errors so that means the drives can go at anytime. It's upsetting because the drives is less then a year old. I'm hoping it's not the drive and just some bad files or data on the drive that's causing the error but I won't know until it completely crashed and we have to re-build my computer for the third time in the past three years.

Visiting Family

Today we had lunch with my Dad out in Corona, we visit him every other week. For lunch we went to one of the best Chinese foods in town Hong Kong Restaurant.

After visiting Dad we drove to Newport Beach to have dinner with Mom and Chuck. They wanted to take Harry out for his birthday. Of course Harry choose Outback Steak house which was great since everyone loves it. We had a nice dinner.

It's great seeing everyone but all the driving is very tiring. We were happy to get home and relax the rest of the evening.

Penelope

I wanted to see this movie when it was out in the theater but it kind of disappeared quickly. I did manage to find a copy and burned it to DVD and watched it today. It was exactly as I expected, it was a cute romantic comedy, and a very sweet movie.

Synopsis:

Penelope is a magical modern-day fairytale about love and self-acceptance. PENELOPE WILHERN (Christina Ricci), born to wealthy socialites (Catherine O'Hara and Richard E. Grant), is afflicted by a secret family curse that can only be broken when she is "loved by one of her own kind." Hidden away in her family's estate, the lonely girl is subjected to meeting a string of blue-bloods through her parent's futile attempts to break the curse. Each suitor is enamored with Penelope (and her sizable dowry)… until the curse is revealed. LEMON (Peter Dinklage), a mischievous tabloid reporter, wants a photograph of the mysterious Penelope and hires MAX (James McAvoy) to pose as a prospective suitor and get the shot. The handsome down-on-his-luck gambler finds himself falling for Penelope, but not wanting to disappoint her, he disappears. Fed up by this latest betrayal, and determined to live life on her own terms, Penelope breaks free from her family and ventures into the world alone. She finds friendship (Reese Witherspoon), adventure, and becomes the person she was meant to be.

Doctor Who Season Four

The fourth season of Doctor Who started in the UK yesterday and won't be starting here for another three weeks, but with my connections I managed to obtain a copy of the first episode. Martha is gone (for now) and we got back Donna from the 2006 Christmas speical Runaway Bride. Alot of people really didn't like Donna in that speical but I thought she was cool. Totally different then Rose as we didn't see Martha yet.

The episode was good.. not the best, but a good solid episode. I laughed out loud alot. Donna's character though still loud, has changed and I like her alot better. Also at the end of the episode there was a HUGE surprise which made me say out load.. OMG!!!! can't wait for the second episode.

Renee's Birthday

Today is the birthday of one of my ex-roommates Renee. She was the first person I every came out too and for that she will always have a special place in my heart. Happy Birthday Renee

Galactica Returns

Well after a year of waiting we finally got the first episode of the fourth and final season of Battlestar Galactica. And I have to say it was worth the wait. I was a huge fan of the original series and came to the New Battlestart Galactica late. But one summer I watched all of season one and two before season three started and just fell in love with it.. it's much more grittier and darker then the original but a very cool series. So I was exited to see it come back and it was a great start to the season.. can't wait for the next episode.

New Coffee Table

Today Harry and I went to Ikea to try and find a coffee table that would work with our new couch. Since our couch has a chaise section our current coffee table was to long so we needed something that would fit in the niche. Well we get to Ikea and I think it was about a minute and we found the perfect coffee table. We continued to look at other tables but we kept coming back to the first one we saw and that is the one we got. We got home built it and it fits perfectly with our couch.

Taking the Day Off.. well sort of.

I decided to take the day off work today since things have slowed down a bit at my current job and I start my new job with no down time between. I didn't plan on going in but of course things change and I get a call at 6pm and they need 20 hours of tapes digitized in tonight. They did find a AE to do the actual digitizing but of course I had to go into the office and explain how to do it. So in the middle of TV night with several friends over I had to leave and go into work. Sometimes I'm just too nice. I spent a little over an hour there but by the time I got back I missed TV night and everyone was leaving. :(

John's Birthday

Today is one of my dearest friends birthday. John and I met many many years ago and became really close friends. Over the years we haven't spent as much time together or talk much but when we do it's like no time has passed and we pick up from where we left off. I wish you a very Happy Birthday John.. hope to see you soon.

Final Episode

Today I onlined the final episode of Big Medicine 213. It was a fairly smooth online but I'm glad it's over for now. Only have a few weeks left on this job before starting my next.

Kevin's Birthday

Today is the birthday of our friend Kevin. And it seem appropriate that Kevin is born on April Fools Day as he is one of the funniest guys I know. He and his partner moved several years ago to Florida but we think of them often. Happy Birthday Kevin.

Buying a New Monitor

Today Harry and I went out looking for a new monitor. We had gone out Friday to Best Buy and Circuit City but didn't really find anything and I didn't want buy one just to buy one. I wanted a good monitor but at a decent price. Well we went to Fry's Electronics today and we found this really nice and decently priced monitor right off the bat.

LG W2252TQ-TF 22"W LCD Monitor (10000:1 DFC, 2ms, 1680 x 1050) On Sale $279.95

With an ultrafast 2 ms response time and Digital Fine Contrast ratio of 10,000:1 contrast for sharp image detail, this 22" widescreen flat-panel LCD monitor delivers the stunning visuals you need for gaming and video viewing.

Got it home and hooked it up digitally but kept having issues and finally decided to hook it up analog just so I could use it and I would attempt to figure out why it didn't work digitally for me. It's a beautiful and big monitor.. I love it.

Harry's Birthday Party

Today we celebrated Harry's Birthday. We had a nice little get together at our house and BBQ. It's been an on going joke that Harry's love war.. I mentioned it at one of his birthday’s years ago and everyone always brings it up.. so for this party we decided to decorate the backyard with camouflage and war items. We went to a party story and bought army men, army plates, cups, table clothes, hats and even a blow up machine gun. Of course those who were in on the joke got it right away and others we had to explain it.

It was good food and great company and everyone seemed to have a good time. Right before everyone started to leave our good friends Tara and Jack showed up with their little girl Bella. We had expected them at the party but they missed the whole thing.

After everyone left we hung out with them for a while and caught up. It was really good seeing them as it had been over a year since we had seen them last. We decided that we would all go out to dinner and hang out a bit more. We went to Sizzler and had a nice dinner and conversation.

It was a long but fun day.

Computer Monitor is Dead

Today when I got home and entered the house and could smell burning plastic. I asked Harry what that smell was and he took me to our office and showed me my computer. The monitor picture was squeezed together and you can smell burnt plastic coming from it. Harry said he had heard a loud pop moments before and then the smell came. So my monitor is dead.

Harry's Birthday

Today is my special guys 37th birthday. We are the same age for the next six months :) I had to be in Online all day today but when I got home I took him out to his favorite Steak house, Outback Steak House. We have gone there for his birthday ever since he has been in the U.S.. We normally go with friends and family but this year we are having a BBQ get together this weekend at our house so this time it was just Harry and I. It was a very nice dinner. Kind of a quiet birthday but he likes it that way. Here's to many more dinners at Outback Steak House with my honey.

Love you

New Job

Well as some of you may know my current job will be ending in the next few weeks. I had an interview today with a former co-worker and a former company that I had worked with previously. It's for a new 10 episode Reality Game Show for NBC. They need a Post Super to start the Monday after my last Friday so it seems to work out great. I went in for the interview but it was more of a "here's is what we need to do" meeting. It seemed that the job was mine before I had even gotten there. The job sounded good and it lasted till mid September.

I didn't want to accept until I had a chance to go back to my old job and ask them if there was anything coming up. My current company has a lot of things happening just not soon enough and they couldn't match my pay rate, so I accepted the position at the new job. I start officially on April 14th but will be going in the week prior to work on starting up post.

I would have preferred to take some time off in between jobs as I really do need a break but when something like this comes along you can say no.. this will be my first Network show that I will be working on.. I'm very excited.

Another Doctor's Visit

Today I had an appointment with my Colon specialist, Dr. Madsen. This was the person that Doctor Mills referred me to for my hemorrhoid problem. I figure I would go in and she would do the examination and I would set up a time for surgery. Well we talked for a few minutes, and I have to say she was very sweet and kind, which was very nice and she informed me that it could be a number of things and she would know more once she examined me. Well the next thing I knew I had my pants down around my ankle and I was lying on my side exposing my butt to this complete stranger. I won't go into super details so let's just say she inserted a probe and took a look around. She did find several hemorrhoids and to my surprise she said she was going to inject medicine directly into them and sure enough I could feel the medicine being injected in.. it was very discomforting to say the least... after she infected three times she told me she was done and to come back in two months.. I asked her if that's it and she said yes.. that in a few days I'll feel great and everything should be fine. I guess I don't need surgery, at least not at this time.

Gerda's Birthday

Today is Harry's sister's Birthday.

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag! Gerda