Kodie had diarrhea so I took her to the vet. She seems fine now. I can hear her from here banging on her bowl for food and she didn't eat when she was sick. That's her way of telling me something's not right. And banging on her bowl is her way of telling me "I'm effing hungry you ignorant clod!"

She got a haircut while she was there too. They gave her the "lion cut". She's had it before, and I wanted to take a picture of her when she had it because it's F#@$#@ing hilarious! Not just how she looks, but because her hair is so short, she freaks out because she's not used to feeling her tail on her back. Her tail curls up. I have to remember to take a picture.

I always feel like I accomplished something when I pay bills, so I have to write a post about it. But this time is extra special.

One check, which happened to be almost precisely covered by a combination of two checks I received recently, including my tax refund and a refund for homeowners insurance, with $8 remaining after the fact, will guarantee a great time for me and Zatko and a bunch of our friends, Zatko's fiancee Amanda, her friends, some family, and loads of unsuspecting resort occupants, as we embark on our trip to Jamaica!!! Zatko and Amanda are getting married down there.

It's at the end of June, we'll be departing Philadelphia on my Dad's birthday, June 25th, and heading back on July 2nd. I figure I'll take off the 3rd as well and be back in work that following Monday, since July 4th falls on a Friday. Woohoo. I'll use jet lag as an excuse even though Jamaica is in the same time zone. Not much to say about it now, though. I will have TONS of pictures and stories when we get back. I really can't wait.

I also mailed in some checks for things like mortgage and the oil bill, and mailed in my latest netflix movies, two John Grisham movies and a documentary. Good stuff. I have to get to mailing them in quicker so I can actually not waste all that money.

The postage price goes up tomorrow so I just put two $0.41 stamps on each envelope. The trip payment and the mortgage are close to due so I don't want them coming back to me.

Mother's Day was nice, even though the Flyers lost again. Not sure how the Phillies did but we watched for a while. It was 4-3 Giants last I saw. Then the golfer we were cheering for (Goydos) lost to Sergio Garcia in the playoff. I had to have some happy news to write about.

That's right. My brother Scott and I were talking about the shit our family's been through, and he said "When I get to heaven there's gonna be some words between God and me." Then he did a pretend dialogue, and said "You know what, God..." and I interjected, and said "You're an asshole". HA. It was funny.

My brothers and I have been working on the new patio for my house. Yesterday we laid the brick. I have video of the process. Contrary to the video, I wasn't standing around the whole time :P I actually moved about 350 bricks from the sidewalk to the patio, at about 25 bricks per barrel load, probably 50 pounds a pop. Here's the Kodie head tilt video:

My living room's a mess, and I'm not cleaning it until later today since we're not done for the weekend yet.

And here's the patio video so far. Next we'll be working on the lawn, putting in trees and a rock garden, and getting rid of all the grass and replacing it with mulch or rock or something.




I have to say, thank you to my brothers, Pat, Bean, and Scott, for their help / doing it all :)

I also have to say, I am glad that Google is around to upload my videos to for free and embed them in my website. And to Apple for iMovie '08, and Sony for the 30 GB HDD on my camera, and USB hookup, so I can record crap without worrying about tape and digitizing. Thanks.

On Saturday, we had to go over our grandmom's house and empty it out so they can sell it. They moved in there in December of 1966, and lived there until my grandmom's untimely death in 2007. My grandfather had passed over the summer of 96. They've saved tons of stuff in their 83 (Pop-pop) and 86 ("Nanny") years. Clearing all that stuff out was a history lesson, as well as a lot of good memories.

Pop-pop had a close-knit group of friends, and he was actually the last one of all of them to go. They were all drinkers and cigar smokers. He had actually built a bar in his basement, decorated with posters and little gag things he'd gathered over the years. He was the musician in the family, and he also had a piano down there, and he'd play and sing, all from memory. He sang for us a few times. A lot of the stuff he collected was just hilarious little things, maybe a little bit bigger than a post card, but with hilarious sayings. Like the one, which is definitely my favorite... no drawings, just some text: "Put it off until tomorrow, you've made enough mistakes for one day" !! That's just marvelous.

Of course, there were plenty of newspaper clippings, and whole newspapers. One from 1970, which looking through it, I found ads for technicians wanted to go over to Vietnam to assist. A newspaper from 1963, which headlined "Kennedy Shot to Death", and one from 1969, "MAN WALKS ON THE MOON". Yes, actual papers, some almost 40 years old, others a bit older. Yellow with age, but the ink on them still brightly showing historical events. Steve was going to take them and get them framed, and let the kids take them to school when they study about those things. Kira's eight now, so she's learning history (or will be soon) and other fun stuff.

There were a ton of unopened bottles of stuff by the bar. Wines, liquors, carbonated water. My Dad was like "should we keep these", and my brother and uncle were like "I don't think they're good anymore." And I said "there's only one way to find out." Scott got a kick out of that :) Also, in the back, there were cans of beer unopened. A pounder can of Foster's... we couldn't tell what year it was from, but it was definitely really old. They just don't make cans like that anymore, and you could tell it was really old too, because of the tab that came off, rather than pushing it in like today's aluminum cans. I dumped that one out, and it just didn't look too appetizing. Foggy, disgusting, old beer. I remember my dad had cans like that, where the tab comes off, but that was back in the late eighties.

After about four hours of work, we almost got the whole house empty. There were eight of us working. The front of the house was lined with garbage, as was the entire side of the house. It'll definitely take the garbage truck two or three visits, but we're not even done yet. We were allowed to take anything we wanted, because there is just a ton of history there, and anything that can't be considered trash could be considered treasure. I got two things out of it. Pop-pop had a collection of canes, but I really don't remember him using one. Ever. There was this cool one that I decided I needed. I'll never use it either, but canes are sweet. Also, there was this old coffee mug that was with the bar. Hand made similar to that of pottery. And in a kiln. Glazed or whatever. I'm bringing it into work with me. Work complains that I use too big a mug, and this one probably holds a little bit less. Plus it's brown, so it can't be stained :D

After all of that, we all went to the Ivy Inn, drank, played shuffleboard. I had some awesome shots.

Today, I got a pair of really comfortable slippers that can also be worn outside, so I don't have to put my shoes on to take Kodie out. Also, I got a sweater, a zipper up sweater, a manger scene for my house because I have no Christmas decorations, and I made a funny today! I was getting my hair cut (Christmas present!) by my Mom, and she says that my brother Pat has turned into an ironing maniac! I said "That's ironic" :P You love it.

Today we're going to the 12:00 mass at St. Bernadette's, the school I went to all my life, until High School... which, it turned out, taught me nothing. Then my Mom's family is having something way up in the Warminster part of the country. Should be a good time. My parents are driving me so I can drink all I want. w00t.

I got my brother Pat, for a Pollyanna gift, a money clip. It's a nice one that has a diamond on it. I gave him the bag with it in it, and he read it with a big question mark on the end, like "Jeweler's?!??" I said "It's your bling" having no knowledge of what bling is :P It's sharp looking.

I also got floss, Scott gave me $50 and a 12 pack of Pepsi for a Pollyanna gift, I got a $20 gift card to Wawa, a zipper down hoodie sweatshirt (awesome), and socks, a belt... I forget everything else, but it was a productive Christmas as always. Of course, I bought myself the Gretsch earlier this month :)

Merry Christmas!

So, some big weeks lately... This week:

Monday: Paid off my car on Friday and got the title on today!

Tuesday: Received second iPod Touch that I didn't order, and assumed I'm on some sort of iPod touch weekly subscription, for only $400 a week! I sent it back. (It was Amazon's fault, not Apple's :P )

The rest of the week... I will finally be buying my house! My parents sold their house and move on Halloween. They are hiring movers.

My keyboard's kinda screwed up because soda was spilled on it (not me!!). The keys were really sticky, so I pulled a bunch of them off and wiped behind them with a wet paper towel, but my "I" key will never be the same (although it works fine, it just sticks up a little more than the others), and my "0" (zero) key (and hence, my "close parentheses" key) makes some weird noise when pressed.

This month and next are big months for gamers:

Crysis Collector's Edition DVD-ROM with Bonus! PC Pre-Release
Ships 11/13/07 $59.99
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men with Bonus! PC Pre-Release
Ships 11/20/07 $49.99
Sim City Societies with Bonus! PC Pre-Release
Ships 11/13/07 $49.99
Super Mario Galaxy Wii Pre-Release
Ships 11/12/07 $49.99
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune PS3 Pre-Release
Ships 11/20/07 $59.99
Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure Wii Pre-Release
Ships 10/23/07 $39.99


That's my shopping cart at EB games.

This Friday will be the first time all of us from work head out to the bar since we hired a bunch of new people, including me! We're gonna get wasted.

I'm 3-3 in Fantasy Football this year, winning the last game by 2 points! Tony Gonzalez had a huge game, and Muhsin Muhammad has finally started scoring for me. My team stinks, though. It will be miraculous if I finish over .500. I only had 76 points, and really only got points from those two and the Eagles D. No one else contributes. This week I play my brother Scott. He'll be at the Eagles game so I'll have to call him and tell him I'm whooping his ass.

I joined Netflix finally. It's gonna be a great way to finally watch all those movies I haven't seen yet.

I'm also trying to quit smoking. It's rough, and I know drinking will make it really hard, but the trick would be to go back to quitting after a long night of drinking with a few smokes here or there. Drinking in Philly is a lot easier than in the suburbs.

This post has a little of everything.

I know, it's pathetic, but when all I do is get it buzzed, there's no reason to pay anyone to do it, especially when my Mom spent all that money on the equipment, and has been cutting hair for years! I would still have her cut it if I was looking for a particular style, back when that sort of thing was important to me. Luckily, I worked at a job that basically had a mirror for an elevator, so I'd be looking at myself on the way up, and thinking "Man, I look ridiculous with longer hair..." A day I will never regret.

So, Philly, this afternoon, gets a mild dusting of snow, probably like 2 inches. Worse, though, is afterwards, it starts to rain, but it's still only 29 degrees Fahrenheit. Mom calls and asks if I'd like to have dinner over there. Pork chops, yummy. I check the fridge, and quickly respond with "I'm hellathere."

I'm driving over, and of course none of the roads are in any kind of shape to be driving on. I head down this one hill and I felt like I might as well have been riding on top of the car in mittens and a scarf, hoping my brother doesn't white wash me when I get to the bottom. Like in the old days of sledding at the elementary school, or the even older days on Llanerch Country Club where a little bit of momentum would drop you into the water hazard in the middle of the 8th fairway. The final road to the house off of the main road consists of 3 stop signs right before inclines on back roads. I'm sure any cops would realize why I didn't even give a slight pause as I zipped past all of them.

We eat, Mom cuts my hair (I look fantastic, BTW), and after two hours and an old Country Crock container full of leftovers from the OTHER night (I actually have no idea when it's from, but it looks delicious), I head out to my car to go home. I should have spent at least some time to clear my wiper blades from ice. I had them so clear for the ride over that they'd allow for full visibility with a single go. When I got in my car and the heated seats started kicking in, I just figured I could get home fine with the limited amount of traffic that should be out on the street.

Turns out I was right... barely any cars were on the road. But that didn't mean that I could see at all. With each wiper motion, the road became a distorted image, and my windshield, a kaleidoscope. One with less colors, mainly black and white, and instead of amazement, fear. The tricky part was pulling into my alley against traffic. There were 3 cars (or rather, blobs of white on a black background) back to back that I had to wait for to pass me before I could pull in. If there was a car behind them with their headlights off, pure disaster would surely follow. That wasn't the case. I made it home safe and didn't even have to change my pants.

They also did the "Power Throws" Bowling mini-game (training). It was a heated competition that rivals what I expect of the Eagles - Giants on Sunday.

So close. Tonight I ordered a bunch of stuff from Amazon.com and J&R Music World. Christmas is funny... You almost always know what you're going to get, you just have to wait until Christmas to get it. For instance...

My Mom likes to make sure that stuff she buys actually fits before she gives it to us. So, I tried on one of my Christmas presents last week.

I mentioned to my Dad that he should get an iPod, and he confirmed that he'd like one for when he works out. So, I said "Well, don't buy it, Santa might bring you one." So my Dad knows what he's getting.

Zatko's girlfriend told him she ordered a Wii, but days later, way after it was already supposed to have been there, I ask... "How's the Wii?!" He says "I don't have it yet." Well, the exact words are below in the Quote of the Year post. It seemed suspicious, but then he told me his girlfriend probably hid it and decided to give it to him for Christmas instead. So I called him a sucker.

However, my bro-.... errr... Pollyanna.... has NO IDEA what he's getting. Heh. I can say "My brother is my pollyanna" since I have 5. Brothers, not pollyannas. It's awesomely hilariously funny.

And, of course, my Mom has no idea what she's getting from me, for the simple logical fact that I have no idea what I'm getting her. I searched the internet far and wide with no luck yet. I think I only got to page 2 anyway. Definitely didn't make a dent.

Kira, my neice, turned 7 today! I headed over to my parents house today after work because we had a little party for her, and they were all going to see the Monsters Inc on Ice at 7pm. We colored, drew Halloween stuff, and ate cupcakes and brownies after dinner. Then I came home and napped while watching game 7 of the NLCS, which is still on and in the 7th inning.

While we would love to get the whole fan-damily down to the Phillies game today, only four of six brothers will be there. Scott, Jeff, Me, and Pat. That's a recipe for disaster, still. We'll be getting there between 11 and 11:30, and the game starts at 1:20 PM. However many Connell brothers go, there's always a chance for a 100% violent removal from the stadium. Either from something that we're all doing wrong, or if one of us gets kicked out, the others will quickly become the judge and jury, prove the guilty party's innocence with violent resolve, and thus be kicked out on their own right. There are only a limited number of chances to see them in the wild, in their natural habitat, doing completely crazy sh@%, it should surely not disappoint this time, simply because it never ever does :)

After the game, it's block party time!! Lots more drinking, celebrating a Phillies' win (or mourning a loss), talking about Howard's home run last night, and hopefully one today, and loads of laughing, live music, and love!! Ok, that sounds Woodstock'ish. Loads of laughing, live music, being wasted, and having a great time! That's better. Tune in tomorrow (God help the internet if I decide to make a post tonight!) for an update on random recollections and hopefully some actual occurrences during the day, and possibly in the order of which they happened, and if all goes well, it won't be memories from other times or lives mixed in with today's story.

It's been a while since I've been at a computer... I went down to Delaware on Wednesday and didn't get back until today, Sunday or something, 13 Aug 06 @ 10:20 PM. My "Check Engine" light came on during the 1.5 hour ride home, which serves me right... I haven't done anything to that car but put 8000 miles on it since my last oil change. I'm taking it in this week. I need it to last me a while. It smells funny.

I went golfing with my Dad and my brother Steve on Thursday. I sucked. It was funny. I blame the course. See, the fairway was pristine, and so unbelievably soft. I'd take a regular swing at it and take out a divot the size of my foot each time (I'm a size 12). This wasn't good because I wasn't planning on it, and my ball would go half the distance I would have expected. I bought a new golf bag. The label read "$99.95" and I paid "$99.95" for it, thanks to Delaware's tax laws leading to a lack of sales tax. I saved $6 compared to buying it in PA. PA could learn something from Delaware... like.... hmmm.... no sales tax might be the only thing. Although, I think their liquor regulations might also be a bit light compared to PA, like they could sell beer in gas stations, but I don't know for sure.

My trip down was exciting. I decided to go Route 9 which runs along the bay. I wrongly assumed that there'd be civilization down that road, and I'd be able to get gas on it. Boy was that a mistake. I went on "E" with a corn field on the right of me, a bay on the left, and hadn't passed anything, not a telephone pole, or a street light, or even a f@#%@$@#ing stop sign in 10 miles. I was pretty sure I would not make it to golf the next day at this point. I kept going, passed a random farm house here and there, then when I'd been on E for about 10 minutes, I decided that I would die if I didn't just turn right in search of civilization. Luckily, about 2 miles up the road was the quaint little town of Smyrna, Delaware. I passed a bar on the way and was so tempted to go in, but decided against it because it was cut out of a corn field, I swear to God. There were 3 pickup trucks in the parking lot. I'm a city boy, I would be either laughed or kicked out of that bar. Anyway, found Smyrna, got gas, got on Rt. 1 and said F@#%$ 9. 9 sucked. I travel at night, in case you're wondering. It was about 9:40 PM when I found civilization. I had gone 40 miles down a lonely and dark country road and about 20 of them on E. It was an adventure, and if I had it to do all over again, I would have done the same thing.

Nothing like spending the weekend with Kira, Caden and Ethan, too. They're so cute. Today we went to the arcade and fun place... rides and stuff. And on the beach. During one 10 minute stint, I was in charge of Caden. He's four. I point to this one ride, and asked him if he wanted to go on it. I hadn't seen it in motion, but it looked like a normal kiddie ride; one that goes in endless circles and relatively low speeds... very predictable and boring. He goes on, in a car all by himself, and this thing takes off. It's not the Himalayas or something, but it's like that in that it changes elevation while it goes in a circle. It's moving pretty fast, and I'm watching Caden for tears, and hoping his parents didn't see what I did! Phew, it's coming to a stop... wait a second, the operator says something about "reverse"!! Oh f@#$@!! It goes at the same exact speed in reverse. This time, I'm panicking. However, no sign of tears or parents made me relax a bit. The ride stopped... finally. He comes off, and we go find Patty who's with the other kids. I'm like "I'm sorry, I put him on that ride not knowing what it was like." At which point Caden interjects with "That was THE BEST!!!" HAHA!! Huge sigh of relief. But Caden, if no one else, could handle that ride, and he's been on a rollercoaster with his dad, my brother, Steve. Thinking back, he was absolutely bored to tears on the other kiddie rides.

Not much else happened. I'm still looking for a job, but that will be coming to an end soon. I lost only a few hours being down in Delaware for four days though, so that's pretty good.

Awesome. I left around 7pm on Sunday night. As I pointed out before, my tape adapter(s) for my iPod is/are broken. I had no coffee, and no smokes, so I had to make three stops on the way. It would have been two but the stupid drug store I stopped at didn't have tape adapters... well, unless I wanted to pay $40 and also purchase a portable CD player that I would probably throw in the garbage on the way out of the store. I didn't want to do that. So, I got smokes at the first drug store. Luckily, directly down the road, on the way to Dunkin Donuts, there's a competing drug store that does much better business. I stopped there. They had it but it was locked up in the audio glass. I got the girl, who has been working there for three days, to come unlock it for me. She had no idea. I helped her though. $10. And it's a nice one too! My car would have spit out the other ones at least 6 times on the way to Lewes (a 2 hour trip) but it didn't spit this one out at all.

So, I made my way to Dunkin Donuts and got a huge coffee and left for Delaware.

As what always happens when I leave the house, it started to rain. Like, terrential downpour. I'm on 95, heading south, and I can't see a damn thing. I can't find my glasses either. I keep them around for such an occasion. It's getting dark out, and my windshield wipers just can't keep up with the rain and water from the cars in front of me hitting the windshield. I just kept an eye on the car's tail lights in front of me, since it was all I could see, and was well on my way. Almost. Having literally no view of anything except tail lights, I missed the exit. By like 20 miles. I damn near made it to Maryland before realizing it. SOB!! It's one of those weird things where I figured 95 South heads SOUTH, but here it twists west on route to Maryland before heading south through Baltimore. I figured I was fine just trucking along. Oh well. I got there at 10:30, also, since the traffic was thick due to no one being able to see anything but the tail lights in front of them. If an alien race came along and looked like tail lights, we all would have followed them into the bottom of a lake somewhere. Or to their space ship.

When I got to my parents' spaceship... I mean... condo in Lewes, everyone was ready for bed. Jeff and Bean came back and brought ice cream, ate it, then watched tv until they dozed off. They were surfing all day, that's one of the most exhausting activities anyone can partake in. I tried, it's much too intense. When everyone went to bed, I figured I better try also. I went into the bedroom, grabbed a book (The Bleachers by John Grisham), and would read it until I fell asleep. Problem is, I didn't fall asleep! I started it after watching a movie and a few shows, probably around 1:30 - 2:00. I finished the book at 5 in the morning! I might be tired the next day for golf.

I was tired for golf. Although I had about 6 hours of sleep, it was about 130 F and humid. The sun was beating down. We had carts luckily. The course we went to was normally a 9 hole course, but it was under construction, so there were only 7 holes available. We played around once and then played 4 more for 11 total. I played pretty well. It came down to me vs. my Dad again, and he won because I choked. I can't beat him ever! It was good, though, because I started off pulling the ball to the left. When that happens, I usually quit because I never have a way to cure it. But it was different yesterday. I figured out what causes me to pull the ball, and I fixed it by the 3rd hole. Then it was on.

This one hole was a ripoff. The hole was shortened, due to construction, from about 400 yards, to... I swear to God... 80 yards. The green was awful. I took out a pitching wedge and totally skied this thing. About 4 minutes later, it came down onto the green. I figured it would just plop and stick, but this thing bounced like it hit concrete and flew over the green. I was like "You bastard".

Later, we all sat on the back porch and I played guitar and everyone sang. Good times.