He doesn’t read my blog, but oh well, HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRIS!

One more game and it’s on to round two. The Stones crushed the Bucks last night although the game was closer than the 109 to 92 score makes it look. Either way, the Pistons won, and Thursday they can close out the series and move on to face the Nets in round two. So Thursday we have the Pistons game, the Redwings game, Survivor and Kel’s birthday. Sheesh.

Back from the trailer.

Man, what a great weekend. We relaxed around the trailer for 3 days, and I didn’t end up in the emergency room, which is a plus. We got up to the trailer on Thursday night. Just as we were unpacking, Mimi showed up. We finished unpacking, turned everything on (water, heat, etc.) and that was it, it was all relaxing from there. We just kind of hung out on Thursday.

All of the days blended together. Which was great. Friday night we started to play some poker. We played until about 4:00am. Then Saturday we hung out, and played horse shoes at Bombers trailer until about 3:00 when Joey and I went golfing. It was freezing out, and extremely windy, but we had a great time. Some more poker Saturday night, while we watched SnL. Then Sunday we relaxed until we packed up and went home at 11:00.

We’re pretty sure the dog loved camping. She did great in the car, and fantastic at the trailer. We took her to the river, and she walked right in. She was just having a great time. Which was evident by the fact that she was a rug yesterday when we got home. Of course, the assholes at the border might have had something to do with that.

WARNING, HARSH LANGUAGE AHEAD

So we get stopped at the border. They say we were just randomly picked out, to get searched. I call shens on that bullshit. If that was the case, why the fuck do they even ask you questions? Random….yeah right. I think that’s just the excuse they came up with because they got sick of explaining why they were pulling people over, or they got sick of people saying they were racial profiling.

Up to this point, we were making great time coming home. Well, the retards at customs aren’t exactly speedy. As a matter of fact, the fat bitch that originally took our information, sat her fat ass at her computer for 10 minutes, then she went on break. That’s right, the fucking bitch went on break. We watch her grab her shit, and walk out the door. What the hell?

While were standing there, another poor soul walked in, up to the counter, and handed this midget his paperwork. The midget with a huge head, and bigger chip on his shoulder because the little bitch is only 4′2″, asked the gentlemen how many people are in the car. The guy said 3, and that little asshole behind the counter said “3? There is only one standing in front of me, where are the rest of the people?”. This is the thing. These pricks at customs apparently think we know what the fuck we’re supposed to do. But as I noticed while I was standing there waiting for the fat tub of shit to get off her break, and finish up with us, not many people know what to do when pulled over by customs. Like Joey said, they should have someone directing traffic outside. Hell, when we pulled up, we didn’t know what to do. We had to ask someone where to go. Oddly enough, it ended up being the big fat greasy piece of shit that ended up helping us. And I’m using the term “help” very loosely. Ok, so the bitch was fat, all I can say is that customs must not have a work out program.

Anyway, some other dude finally comes back with our paperwork. And asks for my keys. We tell him that we have a dog in the car, and he tells Kel to go get her out. She does, and they make her stand in this little quarantine room because they said, and I quote, “the dog looks vicious”.

So Kels standing in the little glass room with the dog. Joey and I are standing in the customs office. The guy comes back and says one of us must go with him back to the truck. He tells Joey to go, and tells me to stay. He’s asking Joey questions about the dog food while Joey just repeats “it’s not my dog, so I can’t really tell you” over and over again. Then they make Joe carry our bags to the X-ray machine. This is good, while they were walking to the machine is when they asked Joe if he had any weapons on him. They waited all that time. If we had weapons on us, and planned to start some shit, half of those dumbasses would have been dead by that point. We had already been there for a half hour. Dumb fucks.

Anyway, they scanned our shit, kept the dog treats because you can’t carry dog food over the border, and let us go. Funny thing, when they were explaining why we couldn’t bring dog treats over the border, we said “ok, so we’ll just throw them out then?” This red-headed retard tells us “no, we’ll send it off to a lab to be destroyed”. Heh. We just thought that was funny. Way to spend the resources.

We ended up being held up about an hour at the border. We were making great time until that hiccup. Most people will say, “hey, let them fuck with me if it makes me safer in the long run”. Well I say, they missed the boat. All these security tactics are great, had they been in place 2 years ago. Bringing in a hose after the house burnt down doesn’t make you a hero. We were pulled over at the border before 9/11, and they didn’t even search our car. Hell, the building we went into, didn’t even have windows. The customs agent seemed agitated that we interrupted his TV show. The security was shit, and we paid the price because of it. And obviously we’re still paying the price, with things like this. I wonder if everyone actually thinks that the terrorists didn’t expect this.

If someone breaks into your business on Tuesday, do you really think you should sit behind the counter with a shotgun on Wednesday?

I don’t know, maybe it was because I was inconvenienced this time. I certainly wouldn’t be ranting about customs had I not been pulled over. However, I don’t think it would change my opinion once I did find out how things work there. It took an hour of my time simply because they are unorganized, and generally because they are assholes. Evident by the fact that the fucking tub of goo that originally started helping us, went on break half way through. With some organization (notice I didn’t say some “more”, that would imply that they have some to begin with) I think that being stopped like that wouldn’t be a big deal. As it stands, I think the border patrol are a bunch of pricks that are trying to flex there muscles now to show how tough they are in an attempt to say “what happened wasn’t our fault”. When it’s extremely apparent that they still don’t have their shit together.

That little incident aside, it was a great weekend. And we all can’t wait to go back to the trailer. Let’s not let it be another 3 years.

At least I know I’m on the upswing. I do feel a little better today. Today being my Friday might help a little bit. Although my stomach is giving me a little grief. Just a little naseua, maybe it will go away after lunch.

It’s funny. I started taking blood pressure medication to help my health. And I started taking Welbutrin to quit smoking, also for my health. The funny thing is, since I started both of these pills, I have felt like crap everyday. I literally haven’t felt good in 3 weeks. It’s hard to explain, maybe the term I’m looking for is comfortable. I haven’t felt comfortable since I started taking my pills. I never felt like this before, when my blood pressure was high. I felt fine then. Now, I’m taking meds that are supposed to help me, and I feel like shit all the time. Go figure. I’ve kind of accepted the fact that I will have to take these pills forever. And chances are, I will never feel 100% ever again. I’m just hoping that a lot of the crappy feeling goes away after I stop the Welbrutin. If it doesn’t, I’ll tell my doc about it then.

Can’t chat with Kel like normal
Kel’s at her new place today. I wonder how it’s going for her. I don’t want to call her, because I don’t want to be that guy, I just want to make sure everythings going okay for her. Oh well, I’ll wait for her to call me.

Almost trailer time!
Leaving…on a jet plane..I don’t know when I’ll be back again…
Loading up the X and taking off tonight! W00t!

Did I quit smoking?
I’ve been taking my pills for a couple of weeks now. Originally I thought I was seeing progress. Packs of smokes would last me longer than before. I think that was all in my head though. Then I thought that I hadn’t slowed down at all, and that these pills don’t work for shit. M Doc told me to be patient and that the pills will work eventually. Well, 3 days ago, I lit up the first ciggerette for the day around 7:00pm. I immediately put it out, as I realised that I didn’t want it. I did that two more times that night. Then two days ago, I lit up a ciggerette in the car, and immediately threw it out the window. It tasted like crap. Right now, Thursday April 22nd 2004, is now the second day in a row that I haven’t touched a ciggerette. It’s just like everyone said, it creeps up on you. One day you wake up, and you don’t want smokes anymore.

This has apperantly happened to me. I just stopped craving them. Then it started to set in. This is it, I’m done smoking. All of a sudden, something strange happened. Something that I never would have guessed in a million years. I actually got nervous about quitting. I’ve been smoking for 14 years. It’s been a crutch for 14 years. Now, out of nowhere, my crutch is gone. Feeling of relief? Nope. Feeling of uncertainty and fear. Yup. These feelings took me by suprise. I’ve been saying for a while now, that I want to quit, I would just light up a smoke after I said that. Can’t do that anymore.

I don’t know where these feelings came from. I don’t understand the logic. But they’re here. There’s nothing I can do about them now. Am I stressed out? Not really. Am I pulling my hair out? Nope. Will these feelings affect anything that I have going on in my life? Probably not. Just something that suprised me, and I thought I would share.

Okay, Monday we went to Auburn Hills PD to watch Officer Brian Martin become Detective Brian Martin. Good times. He was introduced to the city counsil, and then they had cake and soda back at the PD. He took us on a tour of his office. It was pretty cool, and we’re very proud of him.

Good job B!

Other then that, nothing much new to update. I still feel like shit. Although, I need to work all day today. So I’ll be sitting here at work, feeling like shit. Also, we’re not going to Bonnie’s tomorrow night. Instead, and for the first time in like 3 years, we’re going to the trailer. Yea! Hopefully I won’t end up in the hospital on a breathing machine again.
But we’re totally excited about it. Joey’s going with us. We had decided that we wouldn’t go back to the trailer until he could go with us. So off we go. Also, and this is probably the first Joey’s hearing of this, but Mimi’s going with us! It’s going to be just like old times, except we’ll also have the dog. Should be a nice 3 day weekend.

I think I’m going home. I feel terrible. I can’t breath. My stomach hurts from coughing so much. And I generally just feel like shit. I wonder what my boss will say….

I got a couple of new things the past few days.

First, I got a new case for my computer. I was sick of my old mod, and I wanted something cleaner. I picked up this:

It’s a Kingwin KT-424. I love this case. It’s all aluminum, light as hell, and has some great features like a built in rheobus for the intake fans. I also bought this:

This is to control the other fans in the case. It’s pretty cool, it came with 5 different color faces. I use the black one. And with temp sensors for throughout the case. It reads the CPU, GPU, HDD and case temps. Good times.

Then, thanks to my wife Kelly, I got some badass new kicks! I had a haircut appointment on Friday, so Kel and I went to the mall. David, the guy that cuts my hair, was running late (as always). So Kel and I did a little shopping. I went to Express, and to Buckle trying to impulse shop, but didn’t find anything that jumped out at me. Kel found a dress for the F.O.P. Ball, and a shirt for her Dad. Then I went back to get my haircut and Kel went to do more shopping. After my haircut, we went to go look at shoes. I was actually planning to go to the store next to Aldo’s because they sell Deisel’s there. We stopped in Aldo’s because Kel saw a pair of shoes she wanted, while we were in there, I found these:

Seriously, how freaky fresh are those? I love those shoes. Kel bought them for me in celebration of her losing her job. Heh, for those of you that don’t know the story, that’s going to sound funny. Anyway, thanks baby!

I feel like crap today. It started coming on Saturday night. I felt like crap yesterday too. This sucks.

Ok, so Manny Legace wasn’t that good. Define depth at the goalie position. Legace out, and who’s there to replce him? CuJo. He he. The wings go into Nashville yesterday and finish off the series. They’re on to round two. W00t!

Then today, the Pistons played their first game of the first round against the Bucks. And they destroyed them 108 to 82. It was a blowout with an absolute clinic put on by Wallace squared. That would be Ben and Rasheed for those of you keeping score.

Then, to top off the Detroit sports weekend perfectly, the Tigers lost 9-7. Okay, I can see why this would look like a BAD thing for Detroit sports. But to be perfectly honest, I bet someone at work that the Tigers wouldn’t win 65 games this year. So I crack a smile whenever they lose.

For those of you that have never experienced a stress test, thank your lucky stars. That thing sucked. I did however find out what the difference between a stress test and a Cardiolyte Stress Test is.

The Cardiolyte test takes 10 times longer, and sucks that much worse. I get there around 11:45. Right on time. I’m thinking that I wll be in and out in an hour or two, and have the rest of the day to play. Not so much.

I go inside one of the rooms around 12:05. That’s where I find out that I will be getting an IV today. They put the IV in, and shoot some Cardiolyte into my system. (Cardiolyte test, get it now?)

Then, you have to wait 30 minutes before anything happens. So I’m back in the waiting room for a half hour. They bring me back in, and I go to get some pictures taken of the shit moving through my system. 26 fricken minutes in that damn thing. Who the hell invents a 26 minutes test process? WTF?

After that, I get to hop on the treadmill. After I get 9 million probes and shit stuck on me. The treadmill was fine. It never went that fast, but the god damn incline is what will get ya. They told me it would be 10 or 11 minutes on the treadmill. I went a little over 12. Then a cool down period. Then, guess what. Back to the god damn waiting room!

While I was on the treadmill, they shot some more Cardiolyte in my system. That’s why I had to go back to the waiting room. Another half hour before they can take pictures again. They get me out of the waiting room again, then it’s another 26 minutes in that stupid machine. After that’s over, the doctor tells me:
“Don’t be alarmed, but I would like to take another set of pictures with you laying on your stomach. It’s no big deal, sometimes when someone does well in the stress test, thier diaphragm, like any muscle, gets bigger and pushes on the bottom of the heart and makes it look thin.”

So now I get to flip over and take yet another photo shoot. This one only lasts 12.5 minutes though.

What a day. I must admit I’m a little tired after all that shit. I should probably just chill, but I need to wash my car. It’s going to be a great weekend, so I want my ride clean. Besides, my dog loves going out front with me.

On a funny note, I have a note that the doctor gave me. It’s in case I need to go to Canada, or on a plane. It’s to inform whomever, and this part is classic, that the reason I’m showing up as radioactive is because thats what Cardiolyte is. I probably should have turned and went home when I noticed that I was entering the “Nuclear Medicine” part of the facility. I’m going to turn out the lights to see if I’m glowing.