One Life.

I’ve meant to share this with the world ever since I got back from Romania at the end of this summer, and I kept forgetting, but not tonite!  Enjoy… this is Cleopatra Stratan, Romania’s cutest export!

Yeah, I admit it.  I’ve been a real nut lately about work.  Been missing gym sessions, missing dinner and eating at 10 or 11pm at nite, and just haven’t been doing much else other than focusing on work.  Tonight at least I got to unwind a bit, by watching the latest episode of “A Shot of Love” with Tila Tequila, and the latest Nip/Tuck.  I guess those are the two shows that I’ve somewhat committed to this season, and it does feel pretty good to get lost in another reality at times when work just can’t won’t end.  Guitar Hero 3 is pretty good for that too.  Anyway, just wanted to make a quick post to let everyone know I’m still alive.  :P  Cheers friends.

So Lauren’s been telling me that she’s had a suprise in the works for me for a few weeks now, and I’ve been on the edge of my seat about it.  Last night, we drive out, and she takes me to the House of Blues in Anaheim with 2 tickets to the Silverchair show!  I used to dig them quite a bit in the Frogstomp days (its the new Pearl Jam!), but didn’t really keep up with them after that album (about 10 years passed), and now I LOVE their new single “Walking in a Straight Line.”

So I didn’t know what to expect from the show, because last I saw of these guys, they were 16 year old, grungy long hair and their songs really sounded just like Pearl Jam. 

I was BLOWN AWAY.  The lead singer/guitarist is absolutely amazing, and the rest of the band was very tight.  I really gotta learn their names.  Anyway, the thing about the singer was that he had amazing stage presence, super cool rockstar moves, great on-stage banter and a 6-pack!  Dude was ripped.  And his voice is so strong… the dude just belts.  Anyway, if you get a chance to see them in concert, do it.  Pick up their new album Young Modern too while you’re at it.  Strong stuff.

So I’ve been away for about a week… and I’m sorry.  Ben called it, but I’m trying my darndest to not let my blogging outtages last too long.  So here’s a quick recap of last week.

 Halloween Party on 10/28

FANTASTIC PARTY… all thanks to Jean.  Some of the most creative costumes I’ve ever seen.  My favorite was a trio that played General Zod and his minions, Non and Ursa.  Unfortunately, the general was not quite as cool as his costume, his main pickup lines being “i’m unemployed, and i tell chicks that because i don’t want to fight them off when i tell them i’m a stuntman.”  He made a last ditch effort to pick up on Lauren and Courtney at the end of the night, and when Lauren pulled out the fig “I’m waiting for my husband Kurt…” he came back with “Husbands are such a disease.”  What a character.  :-\  Here’s the link to pics.

On Halloween, The Action Item played at Gallagher’s in Huntington Beach.  It was a fun show, with tons of people in costume.  The band before us, Jonah’s Complex was a Tool and Deftones influenced band but the best part was that each member of the band perfectly represented a cast of the Anchorman and the Action News team.  Terrific.

On Friday, Lauren and I celebrated our 1.5 year anniversary, and had a wonderful dinner at Las Brisas.  We looked good.

Saturday was mellow, and Ryan and Lisa helped us discover a love for the game Scattergories.  Beers and shots of $80/bottle Tequila ensued.

On Sunday, Lauren and I headed up to LA with Dave, and met his girlfriend Alice.  Sushi and Sake ensued.

So now we’re pretty much all caught up.  I really wish these had been independent entries though, throughout the week.  Boo for me.

So tonite I hung out with Shali and Sanam, and since I hadn’t seen them in a while, I figured I’d get them something special.

Jay kay … its almost Halloween, and that was my costume that I threw together in 20 minutes.  Shali and Sanam looked very cute in their Nurse and “Mile High Captain” costumes, respectively, and we had a great dinner at Yard House.  Then the girls went to some crazy Persian club, and I peaced out … cuz I know whats good for me. 

Dude, I don’t even know what this means, but its exactly why you need to start writing TEXT along with your blog posts.  Images uploaded from your phone don’t count, buddy. 

Thank you.

I’m sure everyone been following this on the news, and everyone knows about the evacuations, the relocation of loved ones and the overall chaos that the current fires have caused.  But nothing really drives it home until you know someone personally thats been affected by this.

BILLY HAD TO CANCEL HIS HALLOWEEN PARTY BECAUSE OF THE FIRE!

Photo Credit: Bryan Ventura

That’s when you know its really serious. 

But honestly, not to make light of the issue… when you see your friend’s house that close to those raging flames, it really acts as a wake up call that its really happening and his house could actually burn down.  Never mind the smoke in the air, the ash on my car and the orange hue to the sun.  That picture really did it for me, so I had to share.

Yes! Its true!!  The Action Item is back and now we’re going to kick some serious ass. We’re playing at good ol’ Back Alley this Saturday nite, so here’s the details:The Back Alley this Saturday, October 20th at 10pm:

I’ve answered the call of the community!  I am now a Director in the Long Beach Junior Chamber or “LB Jaycees,” which is kind of a community service type group.  Here’s a little excerpt from the LB Jaycees website:

Your Long Beach Junior Chamber is empowered by ambitious young professionals, educated and motivated to make change in their lives, careers, and community. Since 1932, our members, aged 21 through 40, have been dedicated producers of networking, training, community, and social opportunity

Our work with Long Beach City, Area Chamber of Commerce, local colleges and universities, Relay-for-Life, sports teams, business, charities, and numerous other community groups provide our members with a tremendous amount of local opportunity. Affiliated with the California, United States, and Junior Chamber International, members affect millions of lives, in thousands of communities, in more than 100 nations and territories worldwide.

I’m not too sure what my role as a “Director” will exactly deal with, but I have a feeling I’ll be helping them with their technology needs, like setting up sweet blogs.  ;)  But in all honesty, I’m really looking forward to working with the Jaycees.  They’re a really great group of young people — ambitious, smart, motivated — and they know how to party!  So this should be an interesting year with lots of new people and new activities, and I want to thank Andrew for bringing me on board.  Thanks bud!

PS - Congratulations Mr. Michael Clemens!

So I left it off with the internet working as of Oct. 10th after that whole debacle described in the previous Verizon rant post.  I’m going to try to keep this as short as possible, I promise, but I don’t want to leave any details out. 

Next day, Oct. 11, I go into the office, and the DSL is DOWN, and my voice line #2 is DOWN!  We put a call in, and get the voice line back up after maybe 4 hours.  The DSL however is a completely different story.  DSL was down the whole day, and I talked to a lot of reps who had no answers.  They keep telling me about LOAD COILS!  On Friday, the 12th, some techs came in, checked it out, and finally tell me that someone UNPLUGGED OUR CABLE from the central office, FOR NO REASON AT ALL.  They plugged us back in and said we’d be back up in about an hour.  The weekend came, and we weren’t back up yet.  Monday morning, I talk to support for about an hour, and after sending me to a bunch of different departments, I finally get someone to help me set it up and get it going.  So by Monday at noon, I have DSL.

This morning, Oct. 16, 11:30am, DSL goes down again.  I got on the phone, and got sent to several different departments, when I finally get a supervisor on the line.  Basically, what they tell me is that my DSL account that has been active since Oct 8, is actually pending, and the engineering dept. has it on lockdown because they are “reconditioning” the line, because of LOAD COILS.  I’m just about to lose it with the LOAD COILS, because I know there are none.  I keep pressing the supervisor for help, making her be accountable for all of Verizon’s failures, and sure enough, she hangs up on me.  UNBELIEVABLE.  Luckly, before she hung up on me, she put me in touch with some local engineer, and he was able to help me out.  He basically said that this morning my line was just disconnected FOR NO REASON, AGAIN!!  

Anyway, here’s the summary:

• Oct. 10, my DSL is activated and works great.
• Oct. 11, DSL goes down.  It takes 2 days to get it back up, and it went down because, and I’m quoting a Verizon technician, “some idiot at the switch unplugged you for no reason.”
• I finally get it set up again on the 15th.
• Oct. 16th, DSL goes down again.  After being on the phone for 3 hours, about 4 different reps, 1 supervisor hang-up, and finally getting in touch with a local engineer, I’m finally back up… for now.
• I think by now, I can safely say about 20 hours of productivity have been lost to Verizon.  Do you think I can send them the bill?
• Oh, and the supervisor’s name was CAROL, and she was in the DSL ORDER STATUS DEPARTMENT, ESCALATIONS.  There will be letters.

UGH!