Oddball Update

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone — albeit slightly belated, particularly if you’re in the eastern hemisphere. Ironically, 2008 is the year of the rat. Well, we’ve certainly welcomed plenty of them into our attic already, so that’s apropos.

Fortunately, as of this week, there should no longer be any more rats up there. A complete exclusion was done on Tuesday, with every opening into our attic sealed up or screened over. The guy who did the work was even able to spot the places where the rodents were definitely coming in, and sealed them up good. Since the exclusion, nothing else has been caught in the traps, but we continue to check them. Another few days of this, though, and we can be pretty well assured that our own personal “year of the rat” has ended. Thankfully.

I also got my bike back from the repair shop today, with a new lower bracket bearing and full tune-up. I’d take it for a celebratory workout tomorrow morning, except that I have to get up early and take Apple’s car to the dealer for a tune-up of its own. At first I was stressing over whether to leave the car there or sit and wait for it, and how much work I’d miss during the whole process. In the end, though, I killed two birds with one stone — I bought a book about online advertising strategies to study while I wait for the car, so I can claim it as work time. Win/win.

For our Chinese New Year celebration today, Apple and I picked up a big meal from our favorite Chinese restaurant and giggled at the political commentators having meltdowns about the economy on CNN HD. I swear, CNN needs to put up a little graphic with a real-time readout of Lou Dobbs’ blood pressure and heart rate. The way that guy goes off on everything, it would be like a cage match.

With my work complete for the night, it’s back to Forza on the Xbox 360. After Reaper and I enjoyed some competitive online racing last weekend, I’ve gone back to that game with renewed interest and have been building up some more customized performance cars in my stable. One thing I’m finding out is that all-wheel drive really does rock, especially when you’re putting down a ridiculous 700 or 800 horsepower and you need grip, precious grip…

Also, I really need to pretty up the “tag cloud” on my sidebar. It’s all kinds of ugly.

More later!

Tagged as Life, rats, video games, Xbox + Categorized as Life