06-02-02 Sunday
Hey look at that! A new month has snuck up on me. Yes as I always say at the start of a new month: "THIS IS GOING TO BE THE BEST MONTH EVER!". I don't know, maybe it will, maybe it won't. Hopefully June will have some sort of change or spark of excitement. These last few months have been monotonous piles of dog shit with a rare spark of excitement here and there. Well I guess last crappy month was made better by the addition of our lovely baby boy Phillip, but other than that it sucked armpit man!
ARGH!

WHEW! I'm sorry friends. I'm just tired. I think I am also done with being unemployed. You can only go on so many Freedom Walks before it turns into the March of Shame. I'm not really this much of a loser normally, I swear. Okay ha ha I get it. Your experiment is over, you win. I'll take a job now please.

Oh my goodness. We saw the movie "Novocaine" starring Steve Martin. What a weird flick. It was good. It was awfully strange and went pretty crazy at the end. Who knows though maybe I was feeling crazy and weird last night when we watched it. Oh man, one thing I don't like though is painful tooth things. I don't like thinking about teeth getting pulled out of heads either. Being the owner of two chipped teeth, I know that pain well. Cold burning pain. Oh I kind of went off on a tangent there... anyway, go rent "Novocaine". It was good.

06-03-02 Monday
Yesterday was a lovely day weather wise. We went out to Mr. Baptist's house for some barbecue. Pretty tasty! Phillip came out with us and got to see his Oregon City roots. Unfortunately for me, I think Phillip liked Mr. Baptist's lawn more than he likes ours. Okay I admit it, Mr. Baptist has a nicer, healthier lawn than I do. I'm still working on it. It looks like today is going to be a nice day outside also.

What to do, what to do. We are going to have a yard sale at the end of this week. You should all come and support the Noodles. Maybe I could sell my James Madison painting at the yard sale. Yard / garage sales are fun to have. We had a few a couple of years back at our friends house. It was a good time. You sit around, drink beer all day and work on your suntan. We have a pretty good load of stuff so far. We're trying to get our buddies to join in and sell their stuff also so we can have a giant, department store yard sale.

I hope my friend Eugene had a good time on his trip to Arizona. I trust that the mission to spread the Freedom has gone as planned?

Well let me see... I'm feeling a bit better this morning compared to the last few mornings. I think the puppy is mellowing out more at night and we are all fitting into a nice functioning family unit now. Maybe now I can get back into a creative route huh?

06-05-02 Wednesday
We have had some nice summer weather these last few days. I love it. Hopefully the weather stays nice for the Noodle and friends backyard sale this weekend. I think they are saying that it should be. I need to get some of my treasures together to sell. K has already went through her stuff and priced it. I've got to go through my stuff today or tomorrow. K thinks I should get rid of some of my clothes. What would I wear then? I am NOT getting rid of my skate shirts from the 8th grade.

Yesterday I started the war against the shrubs in the back. They have taken control of some areas that I am going to get back. Ivy is public enemy number 1. Man that stuff is everywhere. I may have cut too much back in one area because it kind of looks bald now, but it will grow back. I actually found a fence buried under the bushes. There's the ivy, a laurel, some other tree thing, and a walnut tree, that I am cutting back. Well, I guess "war" is being a little dramatic. I'm just trimming the hedges really. The backyard isn't over run with giant out of control weeds.

Well as you can see, it is Wednesday again. The best day of the week. Boy do I repeat myself every week or what? I should just go to last Wednesday's entry and cut and paste it in here. I would like to go out on the Freedom Walk today, but might not. I haven't been actually doing the "Keeping it Real" tours in the traditional sense. These last few weeks could probably be called "Freedom Drives". I need to get back to the walking, and I would also like to get back to the biking.

I've been listening to the CD: "OUI" by the band "The Sea and Cake". Man it's good. Nice and mellow loungey tunes. It's an older album so it may be old news to some of you kids.

TOP^

06-06-02 Thursday
Hey all! Mommy Noodle here.
How's it going everybody? It's going alright here. I've got my coffee and I'm feeling pretty awake right now. You know it feels like I haven't seen some of you in a while. I am kind of out of it here in the laboratory now, teaching the young Phillip in the ways of the Force. He's an alright kid and a quick learner I think. He does need to get over this mid-morning cuddle thing. Poppa has work to do and can't stay and hug all morning. He's just a baby though, what does he know. Phillip did mention to me yesterday that he would like to have a web page. Maybe I can help him put something up here for you guys to see.

So I kind of got some of my treasures together for the yard sale. Well not really. I got my comic books in order to sell. What do you guys think? 50 cents a book? What about 75 cents? Nobody bought any comic books last time we had a yard sale. Come on, there's a few good comics in there.

So tell me. Do I have yet another enemy to add to my ever growing list? What's up with mildew? Does our house smell musty? Is the basement a pit of mold and rot? Could it be that smells from the basement are sneaking up through the vents? Maybe it's because we have been walking around down there moving stuff around and storing the yard sale stuff. How does one combat this evil foe? Gosh I have enough to worry about.

K says we are starting the yard sale tomorrow morning. Everybody come and check the early bird sale items. I think I probably should make some signs today huh? Don't forget to tell Mr. Baptist to bring the good stapler.

06-08-02 Saturday
The yard sale is rained out! Dang it! We should have known though, this is Portland Oregon. Man! Yesterday we got rained on about 3 different stopping times where we had to put the tarps up over the stuff. Stinks! Amazingly we did manage to sell a few things. Well today I'm not sure what we are going to do. It's sunny now but I'm not sure how long that will last. The weather forecasters aren't any help at all. I thought that it would rain in the morning and then clear in the afternoon but I think it's going to be the reverse now. I was going to get out there at about 12:00 today, thinking it would be sunny then but now I'm not sure. Maybe Sunday will clear up for us?

Gosh what a frustrating morning! The coffee maker isn't working, the furnace is clogged again, the yard sale is all wet and the dog won't eat his food. I think I may make some coffee with the French press, because I won't make it today without my cups of joe.

K is out taking another test today for her schooling. Good luck baby! The kids and I are crossing our paws for you. Hopefully she will be back before too long.

This morning the Grand Floral Parade is happening today in town as part of the Rose Festival. The Rose Festival? Yeah, bah humbug. I'm a native Oregonian and I think that I have only been once. It's a time for all the people in the surrounding suburbs to come in to town and get rowdy and drunk on the waterfront.

06-10-02 Monday
Monday, Monday, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah.
How goes it friends? Pretty good here. Well the yard sale went just okay. I think competing with the Rose Festival and the bad weather hurt us. We did okay though. 150 bucks isn't that bad is it? We will pull in more cash and customers with the next sale we have. Maybe this weekend again? It was kind of cool though, because we met quite a few of our neighbors. There are some interesting folks wandering around this hood. Hey thanks to G and S and the Wagners for joining in on the fun. You guys rock.

Well let's see, start of a new week. Boy what should I do today. Well I think for starters I am going to scan every page of the Sunday newspaper classifieds and find the perfect job. It doesn't necessarily have to be a graphics job, some warehouse work or office job would be fine. Hey, have you guys heard of any openings? God Noodle, you are starting to sound a little desperate. Cut that out boy!

After the Newspaper search I think that I may actually do some drawing and writing. Yeah that's right, believe it or not I still draw and write. A drunken conversation last weekend with my friend Nick about my top secret project got me to thinking that I should really get to work on that puppy. It's a good idea man. I have all the time in the World to work on it now! I can't squander this free time! Argh! I'm going to be so mad at myself in a few months for wasting time!

I think that my friend Martin and I may go out and see Star Wars again today. Hmmm yes, there's a plan. Maybe we could go see Star Wars and sneak into something else after that.

TOP^

06-11-02 Tuesday
Well we went and saw Star Wars, Episode 2, Attack of the Clones for the second time. Actually it was Martin's third time and my second time. Pretty good again. This time I was more relaxed because I knew what was coming. That allowed me more time to look at the backgrounds and admire some of the finer details. I can say that the things I liked about the movie the first time through, I really liked a whole lot more the second time. Man, some of that stuff is cool. On the other hand, the things I didn't like the first time through, I really hated to the point of rage the second time through. God some of that acting is bad! Maybe it was poor dialog written into the script. The bad things in the movie so soured me that I don't think I will see it again a third time in the theater. Maybe I will wait for the DVD so I can skip forward to the good parts. That stinks though, because the good parts are SO good. Holy Hell man, the sonic charges in the asteroid field? Unbelievable. Oh well.

I did some writing like I said I would yesterday. Felt great. I did one little sketch of a logo also. During the yard sale while I was sitting around, I read quite a few of the comics that I had for sale. That has sparked up my desire to do a comic book again. It seems like that desire keeps popping up every 9 months or so. My current secret project would make a pretty good comic book, so I will add that to the current list of things to do. I think I've come to a realistic goal with the project. I am going to get the whole idea down on paper and screen, and package it in a form that I could take around and sell somebody on. Yes, I think that presentation will be the first step for the project.

06-13-02 Thursday
Woe Nelly! It was hot yesterday! 90 plus degrees. It could get to 100 today. See, now that is Summer weather! Where was that weather when we needed it during the yard sale? Don't complain Noodle, don't complain. I guess it hasn't reached 100 here in town for the last 3 years. I was so confused by the heat yesterday that I forgot to open the windows and get the fan out until like 5 PM. I've got the fan going now though.

So Phillip and I went to the vet yesterday because of a cold that Phillip has. He has been pretty congested. We got some medicine for him. Looks like young Phillip has stenotic nares, extremely narrow nostrils. Don't worry it's not life threatening. I guess it is pretty common in flat faced dogs. We're going to have to drill his nose holes when he gets a little bit older.

I'm watching a morning show now and they just said it was already 73 degrees. I'm going to have to make sure the animals and I stay hydrated. Maybe I will take the boys down to the river and go swimming.

We've got baby sitting duties again over at my brother's house tomorrow evening. That should be fun to see those little guys. We'll be doing a bit of juggling. K has to study for another test she's taking on Saturday, so I may be paying attention to the kids while she studies.

Today I may just stay inside and draw and write.

06-15-02 Saturday
Oh man, I am so tired this morning. I stayed up late last night over at my brother's house watching the nephews and trying not to fall asleep during the Conan O'Brian show. Then in the wee hours of the morning we had some puppy strangeness. Now I am trying to fall asleep while watching Saturday morning cartoons. Boy you know Saturday morning cartoons were a bigger deal when I was a kid. There's barely anything on now days. Maybe we need to get cable again to get the full menu of quality cartoon viewing. I can barely keep my peepers open. We're out of coffee! Can you believe it? Well there is some coffee left overs in the pot maybe I will microwave that.

Hey I'm back. I fell asleep for a little bit there. I'm watching Power Puff Girls right now. They have a movie coming out pretty soon? That's cool.

K is out taking another test for school right now. Everyone send her positive energy now and magical wisdom powers. Man there sure is a lot of test taking for that school stuff.

I'm really getting tired of sending out thousands of resumes and not hearing back from anyone. This sucks! I think I'm going to have to take matters in my own hands and make my own jobs! You know I guess that has been the answer all along. I have been working on the experiments but I think I'm going to have to step it up a few notches and really give it my all. I'm going to have to get some sleep to get to my full potential.

I started a new secret project on Friday. No, not that original secret project, a new one. This project came to me while I was trying to fight the 90 degree heat on Friday. It's not as large or as complicated as the first secret project, so that makes it easier for me to complete. Don't worry though, I'm still going to finish the first one.

TOP^

06-16-02 Sunday
Amazing 2 entries in a row! It's been tough to get good, solid journal time with Phillip bouncing around everywhere. The time that I set aside for journal time just happens to be one of his play times. K has got the little piggy right now, so I can devote some time to you, the valuable reader, my lone confidant. My candle in the wind.

Hey, happy Father's Day everybody! I hope everyone wishes their old man a happy one. I should be hooking up with me Pa Pa sooner or later today. We've also got to go out and see Mr. Baptist today. I'm not exactly sure how we're going to be juggling all that fun.

Thank goodness, we have coffee in the house again. I had a pretty annoying headache yesterday and an overall grumpiness due to the lack of coffee. I'm addicted people. Hold on one second let me go and pour a cup. There that's good.

I plan on doing some good work on the secret project. I shared my idea with Eugene last night and he seemed to think it was a pretty good idea. I've got to hammer it out, and get this puppy finished. I've got to do some research and get some information on Australia, and get some pictures of kangaroos. Woe Noodle, don't give away too much or it won't be a "secret" project.

06-18-02 Tuesday
Okay. Is Summer over now or what? It is rainy, wet and cold out there right now. Last week at this time it was the exact opposite. I wish it would just pick something and go with it for more than a couple of days. It's stupid! Being burning hot and then icy cold in 48 hours time can't be good for ones constitution can it? I try to not complain about the weather. No I really do try, hey, stop laughing.
All that and the furnace isn't working again!

We saw a couple of movies in the last few days. We saw "The Princess and the Warrior" by the director that did "Run Lola Run". It was just alright. The actress who played Lola was the star of this one also. Her name is Franka Potente. She's cute. The movie had some okay moments. Some of the cinematography was good. The music was excellent. It got pretty boring at the end.

The other movie we saw was "Sexy Beast". That puppy was awesome. I was in the mood to see a tough guy, thug movie last night, so that had a lot to do with my enjoyment of the movie. That Ben Kingsley did a splendid job. Man he played one bad dude. His cursing and ripping people new ones with his words was crazy fast. You could barely catch what he was saying. "Your middle name is ungrateful". There was another evil bunny character in that movie, just like Donnie Darko and Novocaine. A lot of director types must have been haunted by rabbits during their childhoods.

Well, K's last day of work is today. Next week she's back to school. I am so very happy for her. She is really excited about hitting the books again. "Wait," You say, "Noodle, you're not working and now K's not working? How does the math on that work?" Let me tell you friends, I am not sure. Maybe it's magic? I'm definitely a little concerned with the situation. I need to get back into the work force pronto!

06-19-02 Wednesday
It looks like my moaning and groaning about the weather yesterday brought about the sunshine this morning. Woo Hoo! I have got to get out there and do some yard maintenance. The lawn is in dire need of a mowing. Man that lawn looks bad. How did it get away from me so quickly? I had such high hopes for that lawn this year! I also need to get that big pile of dirt out of the middle of the lawn. I bet that dirt is a solid brick. K is home today so she can watch the children while I go out and get some work done. I think the first job I need to complete is making some coffee.

I think when I'm done doing that stuff, I'm going to continue work on my project. I need to find a pencil and start drawing some things. I think the more I can draw out with pencil and paper before I get it on the computer, the better it will be. Mr. Noodle that is going to require you to sit down and spend some time with it you know. Get on that!

Look at that! It's Wednesday again the best day of the week. That's right you guessed it! Time for another Freedom Walk. I have really let the people down these last few weeks with the tour. I haven't been out. I'm sorry kids. I will have to get out there and spread the Noodle love soon. I'm sure that you all have been keeping it real in my absence though, haven't you?

TOP^

06-21-02 Friday
Good morning all. How are you doing? Me? Oh I'm alright I guess. Today is the longest day of the year. That would be Summer solstice right? Hmm maybe I should start a new tradition this year and celebrate the day somehow. Gosh! Do you people know how hard it is to type with a puppy jumping all over you, nipping you here and there with his razor sharp teeth? Come on boy. Let daddy talk to the nice people for a minute.

The weather has been pretty nice the last few days. Hopefully it can continue through most of the weekend. That would be cool. Now what should I do to celebrate Summer solstice? Maybe I could do some crazy pagan dance out in the backyard. Get all painted up, have burning torches in a circle, and spray the audience with goat's blood. I think that may be a good start. I'll try to come up with something else today. I've got time since it is the longest day and all.

You all remember that I declared that this is going to be the best Summer of our lives so far, right? I'm still sticking with that. We do need to get back on track and plan some sort of camping trip pretty soon here. That would be a good start. We've already got a few beach trips in the works. One thing we need to get back to is the bike riding. I haven't been on my bike for a while now. I'll probably have to pump the tires back up.

We watched the "Mothman Prophecies" last night. It was pretty good. It's a creepy thriller type movie starring Richard Gere. He did an okay job this time around. Actually, last night was the 2nd time we watched it, because the night before we watched it and fell asleep 2 minutes after the opening credits, missing the whole movie. It definitely had some scary moments I thought. It was that good "someone's looking in my window" type of scary.

I've got to go wash some dishes now and try to finish some chores. The puppy spun around in circles, with crazy energy and just finally passed out into a nap. Now's my chance...

06-23-02 Sunday 10:00AM
Ah, good, good, good, sunshine filled morning! I really should go out and sit in it with a cup of coffee. Today would probably be a good day for a bike ride.

K and I went to the beach yesterday. Depot Bay. It was very nice over there. We were visiting my grandparents who are staying at a resort there this week. It was a little overcast there but the Sun poked out every once and a while. My brother and his family, and my aunt and uncle were there also. It was a pretty good time. The place where they were staying was pretty cool. Right on the ocean.

There was some questioning of jobs, and do you have a job yet, but it wasn't too bad. I am kind of tired of hearing myself talk about it. It sure would be nice to have some sort of work. My grandfather keeps wanting me to draw some illustrations of the beasts from Revelations in the Bible. I politely nod, but that doesn't sound very fun to me. He did say that he would pay me to do it, so maybe I should suck it up and get some cash huh?

Martin and Lori watched Pierre and Phillip while we were out wandering around on the coast. Gosh thanks guys! They did a great job. Phillip didn't even notice we were gone. Hopefully next time we will be able to take Phillip with us. Sorry Pierre you're going to have to stay home.

06-24-02 Monday
K is off on her first day of school today! I was like the loving mother who watches their little children leave on the school bus for the first day of kindergarten. I got a few emails from curious students wondering what sort of schooling K was getting involved with. She is going to an accelerated program at a university to get her masters in teaching. Yep good for her. What a smart girl. I think she will be in for some fun this week.

Maybe when she gets done with this round of schooling, I could head back and get educated. I'm actually warming up to the idea. I don't feel like much of a student most of the time though. Getting some more smarts stuffed into my head probably would beat this lame sitting around with the pets and waiting for employers to call funk that I am currently in.

According to my friend Geoffrey, the market is starting to pick up. I may be helping him move later this week. Yeah hey, wait a second. If Portland is starting to turn around then why are you leaving town Geoffrey? Actually the young lad just landed a pretty sweet gig in Seattle. He's working for a pretty cool video game company. Some sort of adventure game with swords and race cars I think. He got hired to do some story boards and character and background designs. I am very jealous. Well, keep me in mind when you are up there. I would love to work on a video game. Yes a video game company, a record label, skate and snowboard company or a porn company would all be pretty cool places to do art and graphics for.

TOP^

06-26-02 Wednesday
Loads and loads of Sun shiny weather for you all! What has yours truly been doing while all of this good weather is here? I have been locked away in my laboratory playing the video game "Myst 3, Exile". Man oh man what a gorgeous game. The artistry is spectacular. It's not the most exciting game out there but the eye candy is great. I have been putting on my headphones, tuning in and blowing the last few mornings. Thanks for bringing that over Geoffrey! Oh the hours I could have spent doing something else!

Speaking of... I thought we were going to Seattle, Geoffrey? Gosh, you don't hear from the guy for a couple of years, he comes knocking on your door asking you to help move his crap to a far off land, and then when you finally warm to the idea, he doesn't call back. Argh! Ha ha no, just kidding. Maybe we go tomorrow or the next day eh?

I've got to get to work today! I think today I will go on a Freedom Bike Ride. It's Wednesday as you can see, and that's getting back to a kind of Freedom Walk, huh? I need to head out to the post office and mail some more CD mailers to you cats. I'm actually out of CDs now. I need to burn some more. I think I'm going to rework the disc so that the squirrel movie is incorporated into that Director portfolio thing I made, and get it all on one disc. Yes I think a bike ride will be great today. I hope I can get Phillip to lay down for a nap later. That dude is filled to the brim with crazy energy!

Hey if any of you want a puppy photo of Phillip from about a week ago, send me an email and I'll email you one. He's a lot bigger now than he is in the photo. I need to take some more pictures of the lad.

06-27-02 Thursday
Howdy all! Good morning to you. How you doing? It looks like it's not going to be as hot as it was yesterday. Man, it is nice outside now. I felt a cool breeze blow through the room a few minutes earlier.

Last night K and I went to the first night of Puppy Kindergarten. Phillip didn't go last night because the first night is an introductory time for the parents. I think it will be pretty good. We've got to teach that boy some tricks and manners! Our friends John and Lisa own the doggy day care where the class was taking place. It was really cool to be sitting in the middle of the empire that they have created with their own two hands. Good job guys, you rock.

I had an excellent bike ride yesterday. I really need to ride every day. I went and visited Eugene and company at the shop. Those folks are quite busy. That's great. The more work the better! They think that moving the shop to the new location has helped bring in the business. After that I went to the post office.

I get so annoyed with the people waiting in line there. When I go to this particular post office, I come knowing that I am going to have to wait in line. Is it everyone else's first time at this post office? They act like a line at the post office is the craziest thing they have ever seen. People! Just wait quietly in line! Man! They complain all the way through the line. Shut up! Please don't turn around in line and try to talk to me about how lame the line is. Face forward. I just want to stand quietly in line and then continue about my day. Boy you know, I was in a bad mood all day yesterday. I don't think the post office was the whole reason for it.

I need to get some coffee in me pronto!

06-28-02 Friday
Happy birthday to my one and only! K turns twenty seven today. Girl you are getting up there! That's okay for me to say because she isn't self-conscious about her age yet right? There's all kinds of fun in store for today and probably through the next week. Everybody loves K and she always gets the royal treatment on her special day. When you're a nice, caring, happy person during the rest of the year, it really pays off. I should drop this curmudgeon routine and hop aboard the happy presents train. I still have it good though because I'm the guy who gets to hang from her arm.

First up for birthday fun, the handsome Eugene is taking the beautiful K to breakfast. I hope I can go too because I'm hungry right now. She then has some crazy notion about shopping. I'm not sure about that one. Later this evening we will be going to this Japanese restaurant downtown with the always dapper Mr. Baptist, the pretty Ms. B and some of the other usual suspects. The restaurant gives the birthday girl a free meal. We'll have to show K around town and see how many other things she can get for free today.

For her birthday I got her a trip to the salon where she got the hair cut that she has been wanting for over a year. I would have liked to have gotten more. Next year I will drown her in gifts. Oh shoot! The least I can do now is draw her a card. What the heck is wrong with me? I had all week to make a card! I'm on it now before she wakes up.

TOP^

JULY 2002

07-01-02 Monday
What in the World? Is it July already? Man! Was I not paying attention to the time last month or what? Where did June go? It seems like It had just barely started. Oh well, good riddance! Have you guys been outside yet this morning? The Sun looks kind of strange. It looks like it didn't rise in the correct spot. It's a little bit higher or something. Something is off about it. Maybe I slept all the way through the rest of the Summer and woke up in the Fall.

Well the weekend was pretty fun. I think that the Friday K birthday celebration was a success. We had some birthday fun ready for Beth who's birthday was on Saturday as well. Birthday parties all over town. Sunday was a nice, mellow recovery day.

Gosh people, I've got a lot of work to do today. There's things I could do, things I should do, and things I would do if the mood was right. I probably won't do any of them and just play Myst 3 all day. No I can't. Come on Noodle! Get yourself together man! I'm pretty tired. Maybe I'll just nap with Phillip all day.

One thing that needs major attention is that lawn. It needs to be mowed. Dang it! It looks like crap now! What happened? It's a field of weeds and funky plants. You could probably spend a whole day weeding our yard. The stuff that we planted on purpose is doing really well but the crazy weeds are doing super well. It is a jungle out there! Oh geeze, did I just say It's a jungle out there?

07-03-02 Wednesday
Hey tomorrow is the 4th of July! Do you all have big plans in store for your Independence Day celebrating? Yeah, neither do we. It seems like nothing was planned all the way to the 4th last year also. When every day is a celebration, it's hard to remember some of them.

My friend Mat and his girlfriend Niki are flying in on the 4th from Chicago. He's the Matt friend with one T. Mat and Niki will be staying with us through the weekend. They are here to go to his step brother's wedding. It should be fun. We haven't seen them since our wedding. I went to K thru 12 with Mr. Mat. Boy, I should get together an itinerary of fun adventures for us to participate in.

Young Phillip and I went on a field trip yesterday to K's college campus. Pretty fun times for the boy. Yesterday was a nice day for dog walking. It was crazy, Phillip ran up to a statue of a little boy sitting out in the grass and totally started wagging his tale and licking him.
I kept saying, "He's not real buddy. It's a statue, it's not a real boy."
Phillip was like (in his high little boy voice): "Daddy, why isn't the little boy moving? Why isn't the little boy moving? Daddy, I'm a real boy aren't I?"
I knelt down and patted his head, "You are to me, son. You are to me.."
School had ended then and K came out and joined us. In the car on the way back home, I looked back at Phillip and watched as he looked out the window. I could tell that he was still thinking about the statue boy.

Gosh darn it! I've still got a lot of work to do today. I didn't do any of the chores that I said I was going to do yesterday. People, those dishes in the sink are rank! Squalor! We live in squalor! As soon as Phillip goes down for his nap, I am going to get this show on the road. If I don't, K will thrash me within inches of my life when she gets home. We've got to get this house in order for guests.

07-04-02 Thursday
Merry Independence! Ho! Ho! Ho! Happy 4th of July! May God bless America and apple pie. I woke up this morning and drove Martin and Lori to the airport at 5:30 AM. They are going back to Martin's homeland of Texas. On the way back home I was listening to NPR and a whole bunch of different reporters were taking turns and reading the Declaration of Independence. I remember the "We hold these truths to be self-evident," part but I don't remember or hadn't heard the rest of it before. Wow what a great document. I can just picture those early Americans thumbing their noses at England. I'm a little curious though about the part where they are listing off all of the grievances they had with the king of England. Some of those same things sound like things the modern United States is guilty of. Anyway, good way to start off the holiday before the drinking begins. Quite moving I thought. It could be the excellent production quality, dynamic readers, powerful background music, or the fact that it was 5:30 in the morning, that was moving me.

Still no plans for 4th fun yet. We should probably figure something out. We had a couple of calls on the answering machine inquiring about the plans. Our house guests should be here by 3 this afternoon. Maybe we'll find out their intentions and go from there. Mr. Baptist and company are up in Washington this afternoon I think. Maybe we'll end up there? Ah driving sounds lame to me today, hopefully we can find something in town.

I thought it was suppose to be rainy today? So far it looks pretty alright out there. I got the lawn mowed yesterday, so bring on the rain.

TOP^

07-06-02 Saturday
Hey everybody. How's it going? Going pretty good here. We have been enjoying our house guests. They are off visiting friends and family now. The wedding they are here to see is this afternoon. They are very good house guests. They have their own rental car, are in and out most of the day, and are good at entertaining themselves. We've been having a good time.

The 4th of July was okay. We didn't really do anything after all. We hung out around here and lit some sparklers and fireworks that K got at the grocery store. Phillip did well with all of the explosions and loud noises. He wasn't scared at all. Pierre was a little weirded out.

We went to Powell's City of Books yesterday. Gosh that's a cool book store. We did lots of browsing. I saw a few things that I wouldn't mind buying once this job and money fast is over.

Yesterday was a gorgeous Sun shiny day. It looks like today is going to be just as lovely. Perfect summer weather my friends!

Last night the gang went on a mission to locate Mat and I's friend from school, Marcus, who we haven't seen or heard from in a couple of years. Mat had gotten a picture from his dad yesterday of him on the soccer team as a kid and Marcus was also in the picture, so we wanted to show him. We didn't have his phone number but we did have his last address, so we all jumped into the car and drove to his house. The house was dark but we could see some Edward Gorey pictures up in the windows so we knew we were at the right place.

Mat and I knocked on the door and it started to look like no one was home. Finally a lady answered the door. It took a bit of explaining as to why two weirdos were knocking on her door. ANYWAYS the point of the story is that we find out eventually that Marcus wasn't there anymore, but was actually in basic training down in California for the Air National Guard. It was all quite strange. That doesn't sound like something Marcus was planing on doing 2 years ago. I guess if you all knew him you would know that military service is a strange match. How did he end up down there? Well Marcus, if you are reading this now, please give us a call and let us know what you are up to and why. We've got a picture of you in soccer.

07-07-02 Sunday
Happy Sunday to you all. It's kind of muggy out there this morning isn't it? Gosh this weekend seems like it has been going on forever. That's okay I guess. It's been a pretty relaxed weekend. I've thought that it was Sunday every day since Thursday so maybe that is what is slowing it down. Now that it is actually Sunday today, it feels more like a Saturday.

Today our house guests will be leaving us. They are heading off to the Oregon coast this morning, staying there for one evening and then getting back on the plane and heading back to Chicago on Monday. It was very fun hanging out with those two. They are a couple of good kids.

Last night everybody was pretty tired so we decided to stay in and watch some movies. Mat and Niki said we should watch the movie "Mystery Train" by Jim Jarmusch. You know, the guy who did "Dead Man" and "Ghost Dog". It was pretty good. I thought the Japanese couple visiting Memphis was really good. It had some good camera work. There was an overall strangeness to it that I thought worked well.

K and I said that they should see "Donnie Darko" so we watched that one also. Man, that's a good movie! We went to a different video store than Movie Madness to get the Donnie Darko DVD because I thought it would be rented out at Movie Madness. I was hoping for the DVD this time so that I could hear the director's commentary. The stupid video store didn't have it on DVD! We rented the video and then went to Movie Madness, where we got the Mystery Train DVD. Low and behold they had the Donnie Darko DVD after all. Oh well. I'll borrow Mr. Wagner's DVD one of these days.

We might go down and meet Mr. Baptist and Ms. B at the blues festival later today, downtown on the waterfront. "Blues festival? That doesn't sound like something you would do Noodle?" Hey come on now. It will probably be pretty fun down there. I should put some Sun block on my forehead though for sure.

07-09-02 Tuesday
Howdy partners! Well they are saying that it is suppose to be in the 90's today. That's some warm Summer weather in a hurry. Yesterday it was in the 60's. Really now, hasn't there been a test? Rapidly changing temperature does have some negative effects on a person, doesn't it? The weather needs to gradually change I think. Be it negative effects from the weather or something else, I'm not sure, but boy I have been so tired these last few days. I am totally out of energy. I'm sporting some coffee now, so hopefully that will help. I didn't have a drop of coffee yesterday.

I just took the puppy out, and yes people, it's already getting warm out there. There may be some river swimming in the works for later this week. Let me know if any of you want to get in on that action.

So for my Summer reading I have started reading this book called "House of Leaves" by Mark Z. Danielewski. Mat and Niki got it for me when we were at Powell's and they said it was a must read. So far so good. It's a pretty crazy novel. There are all kinds of different type faces, paragraphs are jumbled, columns are different sizes. Those devises actually do work pretty well with the story. I guess it is suppose to be a really frightening read. I've just started reading it and I can see what they are saying. It's starting to get spooky. I'll write more about it here when I get further into it I'm sure.

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07-10-02 Wednesday
Hey there, I'm getting to the journal a little bit later this morning. I over slept a wee bit, and stood around a good portion of the morning waiting for the puppy to go potty. Once again I am Mr. Groggy. Man I just can't wake up. Maybe I need more fluids. I should drink more water? Drinking only coffee and alcohol doesn't count. Perhaps I am dehydrated, and that is making me sleepy? Well that's a good place to start. I haven't had any coffee yet today so maybe I'll start with that and then go to the water.

It is Wednesday once again. The best day of the week! It is so time to let freedom ring. I am heading out today on the Freedom Walk once again. I've got to get out there to my brothers and sisters and keep it on a real tip. The Sun is brighter than ever and the weather is beautiful!

Last night I went out with Eugene, Benny, and Rebecca. We went the Laurelhurst Movie Pub and saw the movie, "Dogtown and Z-Boys". It was pretty sweet. It's a documentary film on a group of kids that were the pioneers of what we now know as modern skateboarding. It was set mostly in the 70's. There was some awesome surfing and skateboarding. The Z-Boys were the first kids to start emptying swimming pools and skating in them. It was really good at the beginning and then got kind of slow at the end. We all enjoyed it but actually kind of wanted to see more of the 80's skaters. Ha ha! 70's, 80's, I'm getting so old.

Tonight Phillip has his puppy kindergarten class. That guy is doing great. He loves his class. He is the smallest puppy in the class but he gets in there and does some cool kid playing. I think he might be one of the popular kids in the class, and of course the smartest.

Hey folks, I finally added my Bubble Factory script to the Library section. I know you all have been waiting anxiously for it's arrival. I wrote it back in '96. Can you even believe that '96 was 6 years ago? Well I think the script is alright. I went back and read it again yesterday. Some of the stuff in it is a little silly, I can tell I was younger then, but some of the ideas were pretty good. I think it was a good start for something. I can remember some of the other things I was going to do with it. It seems like maybe I have some pretty extensive notes scribbled out somewhere. Maybe I should revisit the Bubble Factory and continue on with it's writing? Boy I sure do enjoy writing. I need to start a novel, I really do. I wish I could type faster!

07-12-02 Friday
Are you ready for the weekend!?!
I sure am. Let me tell you, I need a break. It's been nothing but work, work, work around here this week. Ha ha, just kidding. It has been a warm one for sure. We're at the tail end of a heat wave. I think it's reached 90 for 2 days in a row. You people in Arizona or Texas are reading this and thinking I'm crazy. 90 is a cold spell for you, I would imagine. Well it's hot for us.

Phillip gave us a start on Wednesday night. We think he got over heated. The little guy kept running around the house in the sweltering heat. I kept telling him to slow down because it was too hot to run, but he wouldn't listen. He had trouble breathing, did some weird things and zonked out to sleep eventually. Last night we didn't let him run around as much and stayed outside with him longer, where the temperature was cooler. He seemed to do better. I hope we didn't cook him too badly.

I received some free finance, book keeping software in the mail the other day. Let me tell you I am hooked. For some reason I am totally finding this stuff interesting. I've been entering our finances in, plugging in our visa debt, and balancing my checkbook. You can put your expenses into different categories, and work at building a monthly budget. I have McMenamin's visits, alcohol purchases, and pet expenses as some of my categories. I am obsessed now for at least a few more days, about entering in all of our receipts. Zero plus zero is still zero but for some reason it's easier and more entertaining to look at when it's represented in a chart or graph.

07-15-02 Monday
Hey, what up? It's stinky Monday once again. Time for everybody to head back to the office. It is beautiful day out there. The weather has been absolutely marvelous these last few days. Gosh, I'm having a bit of trouble focusing on writing this morning. Come on Noodle, concentrate! There's no coffee in the house again this morning. ARGH! I think we need to grow coffee beans in our garden so that we won't run out of coffee.

How was your weekend? Ours was pretty good. We had a fun day yesterday, driving out to Banks Oregon and helping our friends John and Lisa move into their new house. They have got the heck out of the city and are trying out country life. Banks is about 35 minutes out of Portland heading west towards the coast. They've got a nice piece of property out there. Their new yard is huge. A great place for their 3 dogs to run around. We totally should have brought Phillip, but didn't. Their dogs are bigger than young muscle man Phillip. We tromped around in the back woods and found the creek in the back. Matt says I was walking through some poison oak. I hope not. That would stink. I do feel kind of itchy this morning. Maybe it's just in my head.

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07-16-02 Tuesday
Gosh did you ever have a day when you found yourself getting increasingly annoyed as the hours went by? Yesterday was like that for me. I was so perturbed the whole day. I don't know what my problem was. I was getting bothered by every little thing. I was a big grumpy baby all day long. I think I'm just tired of all of these little headaches joined together forming a tree of anguish, next to my cabin on Mount Pile O Crap. Oh well, today will be better I'm sure. I'm just so tired. Maybe it's from sleeping too much.

What's in store for today huh? Well hmm I don't know. I started the dishes yesterday but didn't finish them, so maybe I should do that. I have to head down to G's house and deliver some dirty pictures I drew. Maybe I'll take young Phillip with me for the walk. It might be a little warm now for puppy walking though.

The lawn looks like crap again so I think that will need a mow. Boy oh boy you should see the plants in our garden. Everything is growing so well throughout the yard (including weeds). The sunflowers and corn on the side of the house that the laboratory is on, are growing up to the windows.

I sure have been enjoying my Summer reading, "House of Leaves". Gosh, what a good book so far. Any second now I think that I will get to a spot in the book and not put it down until it is finished.

07-17-02 Wednesday
At last! Coffee is in the house! Ah... fresh life giving coffee. Everything is going to work out fine now that I have coffee in me.
Wow, it's looking a little cloudy out there this morning. That's actually kind of nice. The lawn needs some major watering so if it rained today that would be perfect.

It's Wednesday once again. As I say every Wednesday: "Best day of the week!" Is it still the best? I don't know, but it's got to be better than that sucky Monday we've just been through. Yes friends, it's the day of the week that we let freedom ring and keep it real for all of our brothers and sisters.

Mr. Phillip C. Noodle has his kindergarten class tonight. He is doing very well. His parents are the ones that need a little work. We haven't been doing his homework assignments like we should be. I misplaced last week's sheet. Don't tell his teacher. I think she already knows though. "You haven't been training your puppy at all! F for you! You have now condemned your son to forever ride the short bus!"

Don't let me forget tonight to return the DVDs we rented. "The Royal Tenenbaums" and "13 ghosts". The Royal Tenenbaums was good. I thought it was pretty entertaining. Gene Hackman did a good job. I would have liked to have seen more of Ben Stiller in it.
13 Ghosts was stinky. We had the desire to see a scary movie and were sorely disappointed. The set was awesome and some of the effects were cool, but it just didn't deliver. One of those kind of flicks that had great potential but got lost somewhere.

07-18-02 Thursday
YAWN! YAWN! YAWN! Sleepy boy here once again. I think I'm sleepy this morning because I stayed out late last night. Young Martin's band, Fake Fake played last night at the Ash Street Saloon, downtown. For some reason the guys are constantly getting bumped in the line up to the last ones playing. They started at 12:00 AM. There wasn't many people at the Ash Street but there were quite a few people out for a Wednesday night. We went to the Shanghai Tunnel after that and there seemed to be a medium sized crowd there. Matt, Eugene and I finished up there. Hey good job with the rocking, Fake Fake. Martin, it's always quite pleasurable to see you beat those drums. People, go check out Fake Fake when you get a chance!

Gosh well what should I do today? God, I really am starting to get tired of this routine. Have I mentioned that yet this week? I need a vacation from my vacation. We might be heading off to the beach this weekend, maybe that will help. I need to get back to working strongly on the experiments. I definitely have been uninspired this week, and most of last. I have acquired so many good starts to projects these last few months but no finishes. I need to gather up all of my starts, write out a list of them, and take some more stabs at those puppies. You know, I think I'm going to get my hair buzzed today. That will make me feel better, a nice haircut.

Mr. Baptist and Ms. B got 4 tickets to go see "The Phantom of the Opera" tonight. They invited K and I to go. I think that will be pretty fun. I haven't seen an Opera yet in person. Would that be considered a real opera though or is that a play? It's a Broadway Musical? I think it will be pretty cool. Maybe there will be some inspiration there?

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07-19-02 Friday
Hey everybody! How is it going?
Well "The Phantom of the Opera" was excellent. So good. I was very impressed. The sets and costumes really blew me away. When the show first started out, my jaw dropped a couple of times at how cool the sets were and how fast they changed. I think the first half moved me the most because you are struggling to take it all in at first and by the end you grow accustom to the spectacle. I can't believe how fast some of those performers changed out of costume. One guy went out one side of the stage, walked around, came back in on the opposite side wearing a totally different outfit with a white makeup on. The singing was magnificent. They could really do some amazing things with their voices. It's funny how many of the songs I already knew, but wasn't sure where I had heard them. The man who played the phantom had an amazing range. He could really thunder it out.

Oh man crowd watching there was another show in it's self. Boy, our fair town of Portland can really give birth to some weird audiences. I think there was a little bit of everybody in the crowd. I can't believe some of the ass holes that were there. During the intermission a group of sleazy men who thought they were at an NBA game cut in front of us in the drink line. They talked bad about women, then gave the bartender lady a bad time and held the line up the entire break, buying drinks for the rest of their sleazy group, not allowing anyone behind them to get in an order. I think they were more suited for a sports bar. The thing that bugs me about those jerks is that they probably have jobs. Thankfully the show was so good that it drew you into the music of the night and made you forget about all of the nonsense in the world.

Oh yes, I did get my hair buzzed yesterday. I feel a whole lot better now. Getting the old hair cut is really good for the health. I am all nice and clean now. I think this is going to be a good weekend. I'm going on a mental retreat, revisit my battle plan and hopefully get some new strategies going to get this train back on it's tracks. I'm going to do some writing, reading, and drawing. Part of the new strategy could be a redesign of this very website. I know, I know, that's crazy talk.

07-22-02 Monday
Looks like we are in for a HOT Monday once again my friends. Temperatures could get to be 100 today! Bring it on, we love the SUN!

We were living it up at the beach these last few days. It was SO beautiful... Gosh, hold on here, I'm getting distracted...

The Beach was great. We went to the lovely town of Rockaway Beach, Oregon. Good town, nice people. There was a Harley convention there this weekend. Hogs everywhere. It was great.
Oh, hold on... got to go take the dog out.

Oh my goodness the puppy at the beach was an awesome thing to behold. Phillip was running around everywhere. He loved it. Man we really wore him out running up and down the beach. He went into the water a little bit. We showed him how to run away from the waves coming up the beach. As I was fond of telling K over and over again, "Everyone should at least once in life experience the joy of introducing a puppy to the ocean."

One of the bikers walking down the beach had another Boston running circles around him. We introduced Phillip to "Rebel" and the two ran around and played like crazy. Rebel was a year old and huge with tons of muscle. Rebel had a studded collar. Those Boston Terriers look kind of scary when they're bigger. Is Phillip going to be that scary looking in only 9 more months? Maybe it was Rebel's biker daddy and biker mommy that added to his look of toughness.

We stayed with K's old friends from high school at the grandparent beach house. There was lots of good talk, lots of bad talk, lots of drink, some board game heated competitions, and not much sleeping. Thank goodness the work week has started so that I can get some napping in.

07-24-02 Wednesday
Well this month is nearly over. You know, it didn't seem to go quite as fast as the last few have. It's been the longest month of the year so far.

How have you all been doing? I feel very out of touch. I feel like I am in another funky fog this week. Some of you are missing in action. Maybe we should have a get together soon so everybody can get updates on how the Summer has been so far. Jeeze Noodle, it hasn't been that long since you have seen people! Yeah I guess I saw people last week. I don't know for some reason these last few days have been a Jello space / time force field in which I have been trapped.

Hey! My mom is coming to town! They should be arriving tomorrow afternoon. Gosh I haven't seen her in so long. It will be very nice. She needs to the heck out of Idaho and move back here. That's too far away. The school that she works at is a year round school and their Summer break is almost over. She wanted to get out here for visiting before she had to go to work again.

Believe it or not I actually have been pretty busy with some projects these last couple of days. There has been some interesting developments in Seattle with Geoffrey, and some strategies with the 62nd & Radish posse. Hey, there's even a few paying gigs now in the hopper. Maybe this bad economy thing is all over with. We'll be back to showering in gold before too long!

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07-27-02 Saturday
Happy, good, Saturday morning to all of you beautiful people! You guys are really the best. Thanks for stopping by this lovely morning. BLECH! I haven't tuned in for a couple of days. This week was pretty sparse on the entries here. I didn't have anything to say for a day or so, and I took a break from the journal. During the days off, I thought of a lot of things to write, and of course when I get back to the journal, I'm not sure where to begin. Maybe I should take a tape recorder around with me everywhere I go so that I can remember thoughts. "Note to self: On July 25, K laughed at me in such a way that, just for a few brief seconds, I could tell that she was utterly insane."

I have been doing a couple of things over the last few days. I've been working on a few secret experiments that have been giving me such joy. I got hooked up this week to a pretty cool crew that I'm hoping I can continue dancing with. Gosh it doesn't take much to make me happy. All I need is one or two graphics projects a week and I am like a pig in poop. See people, one or two, that's not too much! Get a hold of me and cough up one or two of your projects! I'm not asking for your first born for crying out loud!

We spent the last couple of evenings visiting with my mother and step dad. On Thursday we went over to Grandma and Grandpa Rumpleton's house for dinner and last night Mr. Baptist had the parents over for a barbecue. It sure has been nice to see those 2. It's been too long. I guess we're going to have to go over to Idaho for a visit before too long.

Young Phillip has gone with us both days. He is such a good traveler. He has been playing and running around like mad. He met my mom's German Shepherd, "Cali" and the two were instant friends. Cali is quite a bit bigger than Phillip so it was a little nerve racking seeing them run around at first. It seemed like Phillip was going to get squashed at any second. He held his own though. Last night Mr. Baptist's cat "Momma Peterson" attacked Phillip and I. Phillip was sniffing too close to her 4 kittens and she went after him. Luckily I was in the middle of the 2 and could throw Phillip up onto the table before Mamma Peterson could do too much damage. I got a little scratched.

I REALLY need to get that lawn mowed today! It looks SO bad. Oh man, it makes me sick just thinking about it. I had such hope for that lawn, and now nothing but disgust. I need to pull up some serious weeds today also. What a mess. The stuff we planted looks really good though. The sunflowers on the side of the house are almost up to the roof. Oh yeah there's a couple of days worth of dishes I need to do also. Chores, chores, chores...

07-29-02 Monday
Ah Monday, the lamest day of the week. How you doing? The weekend we just finished off sure was short wasn't it? Oh well maybe this week will go by fast and we'll be able to make the next weekend longer.

Well I think this week will be pretty cool. At least I hope it will be. I need to keep up with the projects I started last week and keep this train moving down the tracks. You know, things may work out after all! I just have to keep my nose to ground and keep on rocking it! I think as long as I keep reminding myself that I'll have to keep working hard to keep this job stuff going, I'll be okay. K and I went to a crazy party on Saturday and I got a few leads that I need to check up on this week.

Hey, our friends Seth and Alicia are finally coming home this Thursday! They have been away in Japan for way too long. I can't believe it is almost August. The year is almost half over. What the Hell have I been doing for 6 months? Well, I guess I can look over the last 6 months of journal entries to find out.

We are out of coffee again! That keeps happening to me! ARGH! I am drinking some coffee that I microwaved that was still in the pot from yesterday. We totally need to add a coffee plant to the garden.

Okay Noodle, quit screwing around and get to work!

07-31-02 Wednesday
Here we are folks. The last day of July. Yep, now on to August. The last month of Summer. Well, since this was suppose to be the best Summer of our lives, this August must really have some cool things in store to pull us out.

Well I am going to head out on the Freedom Walk today. The weather is just the right temperature for keeping it real. Man. I sure haven't been much of a consumer these last few months. I would totally love to go spend money in the book store, the record store, and the comic book shop. I am so out of it in those arenas. I used to be so in. No, really... I was. I don't have a clue about what the kids think is cool now days. I don't even have cable anymore to tell me that. Well, anyway, enough of the boo-hoo. I'm going to have an awesome walk today and I will be visiting those stores and window shopping.

Gosh I need some coffee. I can't continue on coffeeless like this. We need to get some coffee in this house pronto.

Hey we went and saw "Austin Powers 3, Goldmember" the other evening. I thought it was excellent. I liked the other movies though. If you didn't like the other ones you won't like this one. Man I felt like such a tool laughing as hard as I did. Something about it just struck me as SO wacky. I was in tears during a couple of scenes. That Mini Me is my favorite. It felt good to laugh my ass off. I was in need of some comedy.

Okay after my chores, I've got to get back to some serious work on the secret experiments today. I'm slowly gathering together a direction to head in and I think it will be a good one. Well if not a good one, then at least entertaining. I have to keep the fire burning!

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AUGUST 2002

08-01-02 Thursday
Here we have it folks! Believe it or not, August is upon us! Hello August, how are you this morning. Well August, bring me some good fortune won't you? Well so far this August I have already gone through the paper trash to see if I could tape together a loan check that I so callously ripped up the other day. After that I was informed by phone that I would be given a free round trip all expenses paid vacation to Las Vegas. Then after listening to the pitch and answering a few questions it was discovered that we don't make enough to be given the free prize. Wait a second... Sucks man! God what annoying year it has been so far. Ah who cares. It will work out.

Mr. Phillip C. Noodle has passed his kindergarten class! Last night was the final night of this class. He got a certificate and everything. Good work Phillip! I think he learned quite a few things. He can sit, lay down, sort of stay and sort of leave it. I'm teaching him to speak right now. I need someone to talk to while K is away during the day at school.

You know, I haven't mentioned how much I hate doing dishes in quite a while. Man, I sure hate doing dishes! There is a whole sink waiting in there for me right now. Sucks! Maybe I should just get it over with first thing this morning so that I can have the rest of the day to myself. I just don't want K to beat me up again, so they MUST be done before she gets home. Yes, I think I'll do them right after I post this so that I can work on more important things.

08-04-02 Sunday
Holy crap. How did this morning come so fast? I was suppose to be up right now, out in the back yard having a yard sale. I guess that's not happening for now. It's a good day for it too. We should totally get on that. Young Seth and pretty Alicia stayed with us over the evening. They brought some things that they were going to try to sell in the yard sale. No Yard sale yet though. It is very nice to see A & S again. They were in Japan for way too long. 2 more weeks and then they are living in Hawaii. Gosh kids! Settle! Portland is much better than Hawaii or Japan.

So we have been doing quite a bit of catching up over the last few days. I am quite tired and hung over from the whole experience this morning. Lots of fun though for sure. Last night I was doing some punk rock singing over at the Rock Kats house. I yelled it up pretty good and am mildly horse this morning. So fun, yes. That is one of my things I'm threatening to do - be in a rock and roll band. Watch out!

So anyway... We should totally get a yard sale up and running. Have I already said that? We SO need the money. God I think I really need some coffee first. I feel mildly dead this morning and I think that coffee is the only cure.

Oh crap. K's Brother in dating, Michael is coming over this morning in 1 minute to do a kitten exchange with one of K's friends that is also suppose to be here at 10. HOW DID THIS MORNING SNEAK UP SO FAST?!

08-06-02 Tuesday
Oh I am getting so tired of sleeping in. K has been having a break from school this week, and it has thrown my whole getting up at a proper early hour out the window. She would sleep until 3 in the afternoon if it was more socially acceptable. Waking up later makes me feel all groggy and by the time you get all cleaned up, post a journal entry, and have some coffee, your day is almost already over. I like to pretend I have a job to go to by getting up at 6 in the morning. Sometimes I even sit at the kitchen table and make engine noises pretending that I am driving in crowded traffic on my commute to the office.

We saw a couple of movies last night. We saw "The Time Machine" and another one that I fell asleep on right when it started. The Time Machine was better than I thought it would be. It was the newer one with Guy Pearce playing the lead. You know, the guy from "Memento". It was pretty good. Some of the effects were extremely obvious computer renderings. The time lapse photography shots looked fake but were still impressive. The Morlocks were actually really frightening. I was a little scared while they were being chased. The movie had some similar scenes as the original 1960 Time Machine, but I think the original was better. I loved that movie as a kid. The effects might even be better in that first one now that I think of it.

The other movie we rented was "New Waterford Girl". Like I said though, I fell asleep pretty much when it started, so I can't comment on it here.

Well we are getting geared up to have another yard sale this weekend. Last weekend's yard sale was only a test run. We made some money on Sunday but weren't really being serious about the whole thing. This weekend we are going full force! I hope the weather gets a little bit better. It's been kind of cold and drizzly the last couple of days.

It would be nice to get another beach trip in one of these days also. I think we're going to head back to the beach house with A & S sooner or later. Maybe we can head down after the yard sale and spend all of our earnings on drift wood sculptures and oysters.

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08-07-02 Wednesday
See there I go again! No more sleeping in Noodle! You're wasting your life away! Okay, alright. I'm awake now. Hmm, now what. I need to take an aspirin and make some coffee, then poppa will feel better, hold on one second... There, much better.

Looks like we've got the Sun back. That's good. Hopefully the Sun will stick around for our yard sale on Friday. Hopefully we'll have hundreds of customers that will stick around also.

Have I said it yet this month? What a crazy life I lead. Maybe it's not the life that is crazy, maybe it's the owner of the life that is crazy. I don't mean crazy as in screaming, laughing, out of control, straight jacket crazy. More of a camouflage baseball cap, sunglasses too big for head, dirty green shirt, light blue polyester cut off shorts, one brown sock, one black sock, white tennis shoes, humming songs in the spice section of the grocery store sort of crazy.

I think today will be a good day for me to get quite a bit of reading and writing done, Yes, now there's a plan. I need to get going on some 62nd and Radish stuff also. There's some interesting things happening in that arena. Oh man. I should probably wash those dang dishes in the sink too. First, before everything else, comes the coffee. For sure.

08-10-02 Saturday
Gosh, weeks go by pretty fast when you don't add very many journal entries. I'm sorry people, I'll do better soon I promise.

The beach was fantastic. We were there Wednesday evening to Friday afternoon. The weather was perfect. The ocean was quite beautiful. We stayed at our friends beach house again. You know, a beach house is quite a nice thing to have at your disposal. Oh, and another thing that is great is mid-week coastal trip. There wasn't anyone around most of the time, so you have the beach all to yourself. Phillip had a great time again. He ran his little butt off and had some good sand play time.

While at the beach, I bought the new Red Hot Chili Peppers CD, "By the Way". It's quite enjoyable. I was looking for a Summer of 2002 CD and I think that will be a pretty sound choice. It's quite a bit mellower than some of the past Chili Pepper albums. It's a good sitting in the Sun and hanging out album. It's funny how quick a band can grow out of favor with the public. Some people thought that wanting to get the new Chili Peppers CD was the craziest thing they had ever heard, I don't know, I liked it? They use to be cool? Ah, I'm getting old and uncool also, so who cares really?

Well once again, I should be out there setting up another yard sale. Daylight is wasting Noodle, get to it man! I don't think there were too many customers out there earlier this morning anyway, it was pretty quiet. The weather is going to be perfect today for our sale. Come on down people! This is going to be our biggest yard sale yet.

Oh great! Once again there is NO COFFEE in the house! ARGH!

08-13-02 Tuesday
Good morning all you pretty things! How is everybody doing out there? Me? I'm hanging in there. It's suppose to reach 100 degrees here today. That's hot. It was 93 degrees yesterday. I think everybody has been laying low during this hot spell. You know, today would be a good day to go to the river. An even better day to go to the beach.

This week has been pretty mellow compared to last week so far. We really tied one on last week. I have been trying to recover since Sunday. I feel pretty good right now, but am in need of some coffee. I am also in need of a job. That pesky little fact has been turning the screws to yours truly the last few days. Actually a wad of cash would work right about now also. I've got an idea folks, everybody click HERE and buy a "Bubble Boy" tee-shirt. That would really help. If the 3,523 people that are reading this right now did that, it would be just great.

So yeah, K and I have been laying low these last few days. A bunch of the crew went and saw Star Wars again last night, but we stayed home and ate salmon. I already saw Episode 2 enough times I think. I should save my pennies for something else.

Creatively I did some more planning and work yesterday on the 62nd & Radish battle plan. If you can't find work, start making your own work is what I am thinking once again. It would be really cool to get everything up and running full force. I am really going to have to get into the salesman role, get out there and pound the pavement. I talked to Geoffrey on the phone yesterday and he thought it was a perfect idea and didn't know why I hadn't started getting more freelance sooner. We also talked about me doing some story boards for the video game again. That would be sweet.

Okay here's what we will do. We'll go to the river today, have some adventures and I'll have a more exciting entry tomorrow.

TOP^

08-14-02 Wednesday
Well folks, we hit 101 here yesterday. Pretty cool, pretty cool. No wait, not cool, hot. Some places around the area got to around 110. Those are definitely not normal Oregon temperatures.

We did it for you yesterday, kids. K and I went to the river. We drove about 40 minutes out to Estacada and found a spot. Once there the water was ice cold and felt so nice. The spot we picked wasn't very good though. It wasn't deep enough for real swimming. We waded in a few feet and sat down on some rocks. I was getting totally bitten by these crazy flies, and that was a little annoying. We ended up staying there for about 5 minutes before getting back into the car.

We then decided that it would be a good idea to get a kiddie pool for our back yard that K, Phillip and I could play in. We went to 4 different stores that were all sold out. When we finally got home we hid in the front room with a fan and all of the blinds blocking out the sun.

Later in the evening we went to a dinner engagement and met up with K's old friends. A number of people asked us how the river was. We thought that was strange because we hadn't said anything about the river. Then of course it all made sense. They had been tuning into these very pages and reading about our adventures here in this journal! Awesome. I love it. Keep tuning in and I will try to keep you entertained. Hey, shout out to Officer Steven! So nice to see you last night. It had been way to long. Yes, let's get together and hang. We can play Grand Theft Auto 3. The name of that program was Final Cut Pro, I think.

Have you ever had an idea that you thought was really great and original, and then stumble upon your idea later at the store? It makes you question if it was really that original, or maybe if someone even heard you thinking it and stole it from you. It makes you wonder if maybe you had subconsciously seen the item already before you thought of the idea.

Anyway, that happened to me again yesterday. I saw a certain item in the toy section at Fred Meyers. I went to the connecting website later and saw more of what I thought was a good idea. My idea wasn't that original I don't think, kind of a common sense thing. It may even be pretentious of me to think of my scribbled down notes as something that even compares. The item I saw yesterday was a bit different than what I had thought, but a lot of the concepts were similar. One of the major points of my idea hadn't been touched on though, which still leaves me with some hope. I should probably continue on with my idea. Unfortunately the company that already did what I was thinking is huge. One of the majors. Me putting something together for one of the other majors, would look like a copy cat thing. My Pearl Jam to their Nirvana. Back to the drawing board Noodle! One of your crazy schemes will hit one of these days!

08-15-02 Thursday
It's not as hot this morning as it was yesterday. Perhaps this heat wave is over now. It didn't last very long did it? Boy, I am awfully sleepy this morning. I don't know why. I didn't stay up that late. I'll get some coffee and see if that helps. Maybe I'll go back to bed.

I've got quite a few dishes to wash this morning. I better get to those soon or K is really going to give me a thrashing. I'll start those as soon as I hang up here, I swear.

I've been having bad dreams again this week. Last night I dreamt that our friend Alicia, or it could have been Lisa, went on a shooting spree. She shot her dad and then shot her mom in the face. Somebody got pushed down some stairs also. Horrible. The dreams have been gritty and violent lately.

So do you all have plans for the weekend yet? We kind of do. I think we may have to roll a dice or flip a coin to see what we are going to do. We have 2 possibilities that would be equally fun, we just have to settle for one or the other. Hey are the soap box races this weekend also? Well we will have to see those for sure.

One thing we haven't done enough of this Summer is ride our bikes. I think that as soon as my dish washing is done, I am going to get my lady friend and take a bike ride.

08-19-02 Monday
Oh man. Hey guys remember me? I kind of disappeared there for a few days eh? How has it been going? It's been about the same here. It's a little bit overcast out there today. It's pretty chilly also.
Sweet wonderful Monday. What to do?

We had a good wrap up to the week last weekend. We went back to the beach and did some camping with Mr. Baptist, and Ms. Bee. That was pretty fun. We were down by Newport this time. It was so pretty down there. We have been going to Rockaway Beach the majority of our time recently, and that makes you forget how nice the Oregon Coast really is. Rockaway really isn't that pretty is it? I think next time we go to the beach again, we will probably go back to Newport or Lincoln City. It does take almost 3 hours to get there which is the lame part. Once again the young Phillip had a ball.

When we got back from camping at 9:00 Saturday night, K decided she wanted to drive another hour and a half to meet up with the rest of the crew that were camping up by Mt. Hood. From the beach, to the mountains. With the lame directions and the time of night, I didn't think it was the best idea in the World, but she would hear nothing of it. She raced off and I stayed in town here where I went out with my charming friend Eugene.

We pretty much laid low on Sunday. Eugene came over and we watched "Zoolander". I'm really enjoying stupid comedies now days for some reason. Zoolander was pretty good. I had some good hearty laughs.

Well I should get to work. I think I may have a busy week ahead of me, believe it or not. I've got a few projects to do for some people at the beginning of the week here.

TOP^

08-20-02 Tuesday
Alright! Two in a row! Back on track yeah? Gosh, I am tired this morning. Hold on one second, let me go and get some of the fresh coffee I just made. That should help. Gosh It always seems like I'm tired when I write in this journal. I got my coffee now, so I will quit whining.

We went to dinner out at Mr. Baptist's house last night, We had a yummy chicken dinner there. When we got back home we went to Colosso where we met Seth and Alicia and their friends Michael and Sarah for drinks. Seth and Alicia are out of here tomorrow morning. Back to Hawaii. We had quite a fun time seeing them again. My liver will be glad to see them go. I think I already said it here, but they need to quit traveling around and stay put here in Portland.

I did some cleaning up a bit here in the laboratory yesterday. Man, what a pig sty. I went through quite a few stacks of my papers and now there are new stacks of organized papers sitting in the middle of the floor. I threw away some stuff but most of the things in here are valuable treasures. Like the envelope that I have saved that has a phone number on it for a person named Cathy. I don't know anyone named Cathy. I have acquired quite a few rough sketches that were stacking up under the scanner. Partial ink drawings on ripped scraps of paper that I scan in, finish and make pretty on the computer. I found several pay stubs from the Group, which were out numbered by the pay stubs from unemployment checks. One thing that is sometimes fun to find is the occasional web address that you jotted down a long time ago and then forgot about. I found a stack of all of my notes and research from a couple of years ago, when I was studying and thinking about starting a cult.

Gosh, I need to get back to work. It's easy for me to get side tracked when cleaning. I noticed 30 minutes fly by yesterday when I was reading a magazine I found. I have some pressing matters I need to get going on today. So cool. If I had pressing matters everyday then 62nd & Radish would be off the ground and I wouldn't have to work for anybody but myself.

One of the things I finished up last week was a poster for my friends in the band Fantastic Idea Project. If you are around town you should look for it. It is quite handsome. Eugene did an excellent job printing it. It's advertising the first ever FIP show, which is at the Red and Black Cafe this Saturday evening at 8. You all should attend. It will be a good show.

08-22-02 Thursday 10:23 AM
I was trying to sleep in a bit this morning, but really didn't sleep in much later did I? I'm trying to catch up on my sleep so that I won't feel so tired. I kind of felt like I was getting a cold yesterday. We've been pretty active and busy as of late so maybe my body is slowing it down so I can get some energy back.

Well Seth and Alicia are off! We saw them to the plane yesterday morning. We all looked groggy at the airport due to the bon voyage party the night before. I was a little upset that I couldn't hug Seth goodbye. We arrived a little bit later and he was already past the security check points waiting with the luggage. I got to hug Alicia but it just wasn't the same. Good luck in Hawaii kids! Hopefully K and I will be able to visit you before to long. Poppa will have to get a job first though.

Later in the morning, after the airport, K, our friend Matt, and me went and saw the advanced Portland screening of the movie "24 Hour Party People". It was pretty cool. It was about the new wave and club scene in Manchester, England in the late 70's and 80's. It showed quite a bit of the Joy Division, Happy Mondays, and New Order stories. If you like those bands then you will really dig the movie. The Ian Curtis stuff was gut wrenching. Ian Curtis was the lead singer of Joy Division who hung himself. The actor that played him did an excellent job I thought.

Last night we also rented and saw "Ali". That was a pretty good movie also. Will Smith did a really good job as Mohammad Ali. Man, he really buffed up for that part. I only knew bits and pieces of the Ali story before. Some of that history and how he was involved with it was interesting. The movie was beautifully filmed. I really like Michael Mann as a director. Some of the shots and angles he gets are incredible.

I think today will probably be a pretty mellow Thursday. I don't really have anything planned for today. Perhaps I will continue cleaning up this laboratory. Hey, can you even believe that August is nearly over? What the heck?

08-24-02 Saturday
Once again, another late morning. I need to start getting up earlier. To do that though I'm just going to have to go to sleep earlier the night before I guess. This morning I have a headache and there is no coffee in the house. I am such a cry baby.

We started watching the "Sopranos" Season 1 last night on DVD. We've got 5 days before we have to return it. There's 4 discs. We got about half way through the first episode before we fell asleep. It's a really good show. We haven't had cable for a year or two now, so we've missed a couple of good shows.

Boy oh boy we've got a busy weekend still ahead of us. Tonight is the Fantastic Idea Project concert at the Red and Black, and tomorrow is the soap box derby up on Mt. Tabor. K says we may be going to the Italian festival today? I'm not sure what that entails. Oh yeah, not this weekend but one of these days we are talking about going out on a road trip to go see my mother in Idaho. Mr. Baptist and Ms. Bee may go with us. That would be fun.

You know, this Summer was alright. I know that I declared that this Summer would be the best Summer of our lives. I don't think it quite made it to that level, but you know, it wasn't that bad, we did some fun things. There was quite a bit of worry with money issues but for the most part things were gravy. Hey Noodle! Summer isn't over yet man! We've got a lot more adventures ahead of us before we talk about end of Summer crap.

TOP^

08-26-02 Monday
Good Monday morning to you all. How goes it? Well the weekend wrapped up nicely. The Fantastic Idea Project concert on Saturday evening was Fantastic. As was the after show party. You FIP kids are quite talented. I can't wait to see your next gig. The soapbox derby on Sunday morning was excellent also. There were some wacky vehicles. My favorite one was the giant boom box.

We are deep into the first season of "The Sopranos" now. We saw quite a few episodes yesterday. Good show. I dig that James Gandolfini. I think that the writing is really good on that puppy. I guess season 3 comes out tomorrow on DVD. That means the TV season is season 4? Geeze we've got a lot of catching up to do.

Did you all hear about the grim tale coming from Oregon City this weekend? They found one of the missing girls bodies and another body that more than likely is the second girl. Buried in their neighbors yard. Ashley Pond and Miranda Gaddis. Quite bizarre, evil and sad eh? There has been quite a bit of coverage of it this weekend on the news. I tuned in a time or two. They found one of the bodies on Saturday evening and the other one on Sunday. They're still searching the property. Wouldn't that be crazy if they found another body or two? When I was a little kid my parents were friends with the people who lived in that house at that time. I think we actually had dinner there a time or two. That Weaver bastard didn't live there then.

Well what to do today? I think we may take the golf in to get worked on today or tomorrow. K heads back to school this week. Looks like it's going to be just me and the animals again during the day.

08-28-02 Wednesday
Skipping every other day is starting to be a trend here Noodle, and I don't like it. I need to get back to my daily journal routine. You guys need to be in the know, and that can only truly be achieved with the frequent daily posts. Maybe one of these days I should do hourly posts. No, that's silly. The only thing hourly posts would be about is how I've been writing all day instead of being outside bike riding.

I just heard that it is suppose to be 92 degrees today. For some reason I thought that we were done with the warmer weather. There I go again, ending Summer prematurely. You know yesterday seemed pretty hot also. I was outside doing yard work yesterday and got quite sweaty. Some guys were trimming the Laurel hedge behind the house, and were kind enough to come around to my side and trim it. Man, that bush was out of control. Now the sunlight can actually come through to the back yard.

We finished the first season of the Sopranos last night. 13 episodes. Very good. We are totally into the story and love the characters now. It stinks though because now we are jonesing for season two. Of course the season finale left a lot of cliff hangers. We'll have to keep going with those pretty soon here.

I don't have anything planned for today. Maybe I will read and write today. That might be kind of fun. Maybe I'll do some drawing. Remember when I use to go on the Freedom Walk every Wednesday? Maybe I should start that up again. That always made me feel pretty good. I've kind of been out of focus these last few weeks. I need to regroup and figure out what the heck I'm going to do. I've got to get some sort of plan going. This floating around crap is getting SO old. This sure has been a strange 9 months.

08-29-02 Thursday
The end of August and yes, the end of Summer, is fast approaching. It sure did zoom by. Oh man, I've got to mail some bills in that I have been putting off.

It was pretty warm here yesterday. K and I drove out to the Joy Creek Nursery in Scappoose and looked around. I was getting quite heated and sweaty while looking at the gardens. I still sort of feel like I'm on the verge of getting a cold or something. Perhaps it is in my head. The nursery though was gorgeous. The view and woods out there were quite pretty. K bought a couple of plants to add to our yard. I wish it would rain here soon. Our yard totally needs some liquids. The sunflowers are starting to tip over.

I've got to clean this place up. The laboratory is a mess. I cleaned up half way last week like I said, but never finished it. Now it's worse than if I would have never have started. God what a mess. I may just clean the rest of this house up while I'm at it. I think of course there are also dishes in the sink that need clean. Man! Sucks! Come on Noodle, take a deep breath, relax, take one chore at a time.

Hey what kind of plans do you kids have for Labor Day? I'm not sure if we have anything going yet or not. We all should get together and have an end of Summer party. There's some of you out there who I haven't seen in a while and miss. We all need to get back together, regroup and start laying out plans for the Fall. K has been threatening to have a harvest party where everyone brings the bounty from there gardens. That traditionally is closer to the Fall though isn't it?

Oh yeah, I just remembered something. Geoffrey and I were talking last night and we were thinking that it would be cool to do a multimedia music project. Something to help spread the 62nd & Radish name around town. Music CD with multimedia content, website, packaging, booklets, the whole works. We kind of tossed around a few story ideas. We are hooked up with quite a few band kids, but if you guys out there hear of a person or band who would be into that kind of collaborative art project, let me know. Keep your ears open for Uncle Noodle kids. We were thinking it would be an electronic type band, but a combination of different styles would of course be cool.

Uh oh the puppy is sniffing around. That means he's looking to go potty. Got to run.

TOP^

08-31-02 Saturday
Hello all! I am writing this entry from the beautiful state of Idaho. Actually it doesn't seem that beautiful yet but supposedly we are going somewhere today that is pretty. Wait a second, they said it was on the Oregon border. No Idaho is pretty. Sucker Creek and Leslie gulch is where we're going. Yesterday we went to the Old Boise Penitentiary. That was pretty cool. I can't imagine being locked up in that place. I'm so stupid I forgot to take my camera. I missed some good pictures. There was interesting pictures and stories about the prisoners. There was some cool things there like old cars and letter presses that were being stored at the prison by the Idaho historical society.

We are having a good visit with the folks. Today I quizzed my mom on what she was thinking about during "THE" Car wreck. When we were all younger, like 25 years ago, my family was in a really bad car wreck. A lady ran a red light and smashed into the side of our car. My brother who was practically a baby at the time, was thrown from the car and almost died. Memory is an interesting thing at times isn't it? I remember that I was taking a nap in the back seat and woke up suddenly in the floor and my nose was all bloody. I remember some lady helping me and I sat down on the sidewalk. Everyone was so scared for my brother. Being a kid at the time I only had a limited understanding of the happenings. Being an adult now, I was trying to imagine what it would be like for me if I was my mom or dad in that situation. It was kind of interesting to think about what in the World she might have been thinking after seeing her baby fly through the passenger side window and landing on the sidewalk. How scary that must have been. She was like 24 or 25 when that happened. That's almost 6 years younger than I am right now. She of course said it was horrible. She had knocked her head on the dashboard so everything was foggy for her at the time. She had stories though mostly about after the wreck and the people that helped in the family and such.

SEPTEMBER 2002

09-02-02 Monday
As I write this, we are traveling back to Oregon after having a lovely time in Idaho. Happy Labor Day to you all. Labor Day doesn't have much of an impact for me this year, being unemployed and all. Everyday has been Labor Day for me for 9 months now.

What a nice and relaxing weekend. We toured around Boise and surrounding areas. We ate a lot of food and watched quite a few movies. My mom is very organized and likes to have 3 meals at exact times during the day. We all made a little fun of her schedule but I think having things orderly, scheduled, on time and how you like them is a good way to go. We seemed to have gotten up earlier and went to bed sooner also. I like that early to bed, early to rise stuff

We had quite the tour of Boise yesterday. We went on a trolley ride around the historical parts of downtown and had a tour guide that told us about some of the history. Boise is a pretty nice little town. We walked around a bit and saw some of the shops downtown. I picked up the "Boise Weekly" which looked like a version of our "Willamette Week", a little hipster alternative newspaper. I wonder if they need any Noodle artwork? I would have liked to have seen a few of the galleries but didn't get to.

My Mom and Greg have a satellite dish that we were hypnotized by every evening. We saw several movies and parts of movies, none of which were that great. It was also funny that there were so many channels and still nothing on. We saw: "Don't Say a Word", "Heartbreakers", "15 minutes", "Shanghai Noon", Steal This Movie", "Me Myself and Irene", "Animal House", "O Brother Where Art Thou" and others that I can't remember. There was part of some crazy one that I woke up to before going to my bedroom last night. It was called "Gothic". I couldn't figure out what was going on but it was crazy. Weird people dressed in robes running around, with this lady trapped in some kind of weird castle. It was very strange and psychedelic. I may have to check it out when I'm not half asleep.

We had a nice visit for sure. It was good to see them again. I think they were feeling a bit lonely without any family members around. A whole mess of good conversation and getting up to date with the happenings or lack of happenings. Now it's time to buckle down and ride out the 7 hours until Portland.

Oh my goodness! Phillip had the time of his life! He's sitting on my lap now as I write this. He ran around like an absolute mad man! He played from dusk til dawn with my mom's dog Cali and cat Spunky. Cali is a big German shepherd. It was a little stressful watching the two rough housing. Cali is so much bigger than Phillip and he was knocked around quite a bit. They played nicely though and no one got hurt. I think we really need to build a fence here in our backyard.

09-03-02 Tuesday
Howdy all! I'm back. Did you miss me? I was away in Idaho for the last few days. I made a few entries while there, but didn't get them into the computer until today. How is everything going for you guys and gals? When I was away I was mildly curious to see the email and mail that was piling up here. Boy, I'm going to stop wondering about that. I did get a few things, but not anything that would constitute excitement. I guess I wasn't gone for that long. The thing that bugs me the most is these thousands of resumes I'm sending out that don't get any response. Not even a hint of recognition. Oh screw it. Hey Noodle, enough of that talk. It's going to be a good week.

I can't believe that it is already September. Can you kids believe that we are almost to the one year anniversary of the terrorist attacks? It seems like it was longer than a year ago, but then again just like yesterday. I have been diligently writing in this journal for almost a year now. I think that the official start date of this website in it's current form was October 1st, so I have a few more weeks before that anniversary. It being a year and all, maybe I should start thinking about redesigning this site and updating it a bit huh? Are you kids getting bored of my ramblings? Do you need more exciting works and flashy designs? Did any of you actually stick around for a whole year? Yes, I think I'll add the redo to my things to do list.

Today I'm going to work at getting this laboratory up and running again. Now that I am back from the other lands, I need to pick up where I left off and get some of this shit in order. The trip to Idaho was nice and it was good to see my parents, but I didn't have too many creative ideas while there. Some sort of creative mental block took a hold of me. I need to find some inspiration today and for the rest of the week.

TOP^

09-04-02 Wednesday
Back to school and work everybody! No more screwing around, Summer is almost all officially gone! It was a little bit cooler outside this morning. I'm actually kind of wondering where my slippers are. That's one thing I have to remember to call about, the furnace. They need to come back here and re-fix what they were suppose to fix. Speaking of fixing, the Golf is in the shop today getting worked on. Let's all put our hands together and pray that they don't gut us with a crippling bill.

I feel pretty good today. I think yesterday kind of stunk because it was taking the shape of a Monday since the real Monday was a holiday. Today is good. I'm caught up now, it's Wednesday for real now. Oh and hey that means the weekend is right around the corner. Yes, it is going to be a great rest of the week.

I am still continuing on with the cleaning and organizing of the laboratory. I think that if I just think of the laboratory as an on going cleaning project with no end, then I will be fine. Today I am also going to clean out my computers and archive my work. I need to borrow my buddy G's CD burner for that. Gosh I wish I had my own CD burner. For a regular archive job I just take every single folder and file and dump it onto the CD. What I'm kind of working on now is the "Ultimate Archive". It will be a highly organized series of CDs that have only finished projects and work I have been using over the years for portfolio pieces. No clutter.

Speaking of clutter, I really need to get a handle on all of the MP3s clogging up this computer. I think I may just throw them all away and start over. I'm going to update the Transmission some time soon here also. I'm going to beef that puppy back up to a T1 DSL connection. Having it at 56k wasn't bringing me more listeners.

09-06-02 Friday
It's cloudy and crisp out there this morning folks. The air is quite fresh and it has that Fall walking to the school bus stop smell. Oh the memories. It's all very invigorating. I've got a nice cup of coffee going and some good tunes in the radio. It's a pretty good morning so far.

Are you all as excited as I am about the new "Underworld" album that is coming out? Nope, I didn't think you would be. I am so ready for some new Underworld tunes. I watched the new video for the single on their website this morning. They are truly the best electronic band in the World.

We got the golf back from the shop. Holy crap did they stick it to us! We don't have any money people! We can't pay your ridiculous bill. I was enraged when the car came back and they hadn't even washed it. I tried to keep my face calm but I think the guy noticed my eye and lip twitching so he gave me a free pass to a car wash. We sure have done some irresponsible money things these past 10 months and I think the golf will be one to add to the list. Well at least it works now I guess. Maybe we should have waited a while though. I'm going to drive it around today and make good use of it.

I had a whopper of a dream last night. One of those kind where you are totally screaming and when you finally wake up you wonder if you had been actually screaming in your sleep. Man oh man. It involved like a circus S & M show with crazy pierced up, tattooed, scarified, future primitive, muscle men and women. There was a crazy sex thing to the dream, in front of a live audience that I won't get into here. The dream ended up with me being held down and poked with needles full of drugs and poison. I kept screaming for K to save me. It was scary!

We have been trying to rent The Sopranos Season 2 but it has been checked out at both of the video stores that we go to. We have been anxious to continue on with the series. I'll check around again today.

I think that will be my plan for this morning. Finish up my cup of coffee, take a shower, jump into the car and drive around. I think I'll stop by a few places and say hello to my peoples. I need to go to the bank also. Maybe I'll go to the comic book shop and window shop at a few other stores.

09-07-02 Saturday
Happy weekend to you all. Ah! Hold on I better get some coffee. I had a topic to open with but I forgot what it was. One second...
There, that's better. mmmm Good coffee. Hey it's kind of sunny out there this morning. It's a little chilly though.

So yesterday I did some good work emptying this computer, That gets to be a little addictive after awhile. I kept looking for more and more things to delete. I'm still not done deleting those MP3s. Those little buggers are like weeds. They are everywhere! I think that I have a bunch of them saved already on another disk, so there is no reason to save those again.

Okay here's one for you. Remember me complaining about paying to get the golf fixed? Well I'm driving the little darling around yesterday like I said I was going to, and the damn check engine like comes back on! Needless to say I was beside myself with rage. What the Hell? I called the shop and politely informed them that I had paid quite a bit of money to them not to just drive the car 3 miles and get the check engine light back. They said they would get the guy was heading up my car repair to give me a call back. He hasn't yet. Don't worry though kids, we'll get to the bottom of this!

K's Grandpa, Garth is in town this weekend. I think we are going to try to have breakfast with those cats this morning. Good thing too, because I am starving. Garth is one cool dude. We haven't seen him for quite a while. Geeze well not since the wedding I guess.

Now that I have this extra room on the computer I feel like filling it up again with files. Gosh I have so many projects and ideas to choose from, where should I start? ARGH! I want so much to get this stuff going! I heard from Geoffrey last night. He has really been pounding the pavement looking for some bands to work on that collaboration, CD, multimedia thing that I was talking about the other day. I guess he's got a few responses to the casting call. I'm glad he's out drumming up excitement. God, that guy. He is an excellent salesman. I need to be more like that. Yo Geoffrey, please don't be mad at me for sitting on my butt and waiting to jump in until after all the left brained business and paperwork is done. I have issues you know.

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09-09-02 Monday 10:32 AM
ARGH! Another late morning. Hello all. Have I mentioned yet that Mondays are the worst days of the week? This coffee I microwaved this morning isn't doing the trick yet. I feel tired. I just called the car people again and got an answering machine. How annoying. They are going to get a bad score on the customer satisfaction card I have. I should call the furnace people and get all of my annoying things out of the way at once.

How was your weekend? Ours was pretty mellow and fun in a relaxing sense. We spent most of the time Saturday and Sunday out at Mr. Baptist's house in Oregon City. Boy, we had some good eats out there. We saw a few movies while we were there. They were alright. One of the movies we saw was "In the Bedroom", Starring Sissy Spacek. She did an excellent job acting. Most of the movies we saw were complete sad ending, downers. We watched "Dahmer", a movie about Jeffrey Dahmer. That was pretty lame. What a wacko though. We also saw some other movies but I am getting tired of talking about movies.

Hey the dealership called back. They won't be able to look at the car until next week. According to this guy though, you can drive the car around with the check engine light on all you want just as long as it's not flashing. Huh? I was always told that as soon as you see a check engine light you should pull over and stop driving as fast as you can. Ah who knows. Who cares.

I spent quite a bit of time getting some tunes ready for the Transmission yesterday. I'm still adding some songs and will set it back as a T1 / DSL broadcast later today. I think this batch will be pretty good. You can't have as many songs with a higher connection but I'll just swap out the songs more often than I have been. It's kind of fun going through my CDs and listen to music I haven't heard in a while.

09-10-02 Tuesday
I just remembered telling everyone that I was looking for a patron a while ago. Well kids I still am. Does anyone want to fund my current existence? I mean you wouldn't be paying me to be sitting around like I have been for the last few weeks. No, I would actually change out of my pajamas and do some work. Man! This money thing really sucks now days.

I put up some new tunes on the Transmission for you guys. It's all electronic music right but be patient I'll add different styles a little bit later. I also put together a CD of songs from different bands that would be a CD I would want to make if I was in a band or producing an album. I carefully placed the songs in an interesting order and picked the songs for there specific sounds. I tried to make it an album that you'd think was just one band. It's pretty cool because the songs do go together pretty well. I don't know, it made sense yesterday. See now if I ever got some people together I could say "Here, I want to make an album like this one". I'm listening to it now.

Yeah so that pretty much was my day yesterday. See now, it would be cool to get paid for that. Patrons give me a call! Damn, I need a job. I've been pretty good about not being a cry baby about it here in the journal for the most part huh?

Today I'm going to try to do something more productive. Not that the whole music thing yesterday wasn't productive. It just kind of sucked me into the headphones and turned me into a zombie. Today I may try to get out of the house for a while.

09-11-02 Wednesday
Well here we are. The one year anniversary of the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks. This morning, before I came in here, I turned on the TV to make sure another one wasn't happening. I just can't believe that a year has gone by already! Hold on one second, I'm going to thumb back through the archives and see what I wrote here a year ago... Boy, not much. I remember that I wanted to write more but didn't have the words or energy. I had a pretty good run down of the events a few days later I think. What a weird week that was last year.

How quickly everything changes. It's hard to imagine what it was like before you heard the term 9-11 everywhere. The news media just seemed to be slowing down on saying it every other sentence before last week. Now they are back at it, being vultures again. Gosh they make me sick. When it happened last year they just played it over and over again and talked it to death and now once again they are back at it. Going for the highest ratings. I hope this much hoopla doesn't happen every year from now on. I wonder if this much media attention is making family members of the victims sick?

Well I don't know what to say. Lots of things I've read in the past few days are contemplating how much America has changed over the year. Has it? I don't know. There sure was a different feel to the air this day last year. Everyone was frightened and didn't know what was coming next. Now this September 11th it almost seems like things are back to normal for most people. Things like the economy and being jobless has made for a sucky year for me, but maybe that would have been my fate even without a terrorist attack. I'm a different person now for sure but probably not much more of a change than would have happen with any passage of a year. I was definitely thinking of others more then at the time. Feeling sorry for the victims and there families. This year I am back to thinking of myself and feeling sorry for me.

After the attacks last year, probably the same week though, K and I were in a store check out line and we both zoomed in on the same thing. This guy had a gigantic freshly made tattoo on his arm of an American flag and something underneath that said "9-11-01 We Will Never Forget!". I wonder where that guy is today? I wonder if he still likes his tattoo? Geeze...

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09-12-02 Thursday
The last few days have been really sunny and warm. Summer just doesn't want to give up I guess. I should go and take advantage of the nice weather while I still have the chance. Maybe one more trip to the beach or at least a bike ride. Hold on, I need to go start a pot of coffee.

So we finally rented season 2 of the Sopranos. GOOD STUFF. I think we are almost half way through it. What are we going to do when we finish this season and then season 3? Season 4 isn't even on television yet. Dang it. We'll have to get HBO then. That is the only answer.

Today feels like it may have the makings of being a good day. Hmmm, yes. I think something good may just come your way today, Mr. Noodle. I predict today that some sort of good will befall you lovely readers also. Oh gosh that's silly. Never mind. Oh wait, I take that never mind back. Lets just say if something good happens to you today then that is great. I won't have had to predict it.

I did a few chores yesterday. Maybe I will continue on some of those today for a little while. Then I need to get going on a few of these design projects that I have been sitting on. Maybe I'll go for a drive later. I do need to figure out something to do with the lawn. It's pretty dry and dead but I may need to trim it up in some areas. Ah, that can wait.

09-13-02 Friday 8:14 AM
Good morning everybody! How are you this lovely day? You know, I think I may be up a little too early today. I'm still a little sleepy. Maybe I should go back to bed for another hour or so. Nah! Shake it off Noodle! I have a bit of a headache this morning. Oh my goodness, it is quite gorgeous outside. This week sure did turn out to be pretty nice weather wise. Yes I think my lovely lady friend and I need to go to the beach or something. It's suppose to get raining starting Sunday. We really need the rain so that's good.

I had quite a funny dream last night. I dreamt that K and I were walking around downtown. I think we had just been to a wedding or some sort of formal event because we were wearing really nice clothes. Suddenly K lets out this crazy mix of a honk and a squeak. I thought that was pretty funny at first and we kept walking. She keeps doing it as we walk. HONK SQUEAK HONK. She thinks it's so funny. Then I start to get annoyed and I'm like "Hey alright already, enough honking, that's really funny, ha ha". She keeps on doing it and I get even more angry. When I finally wake up from the dream I can still hear the HONK squeaking! Low and behold it was Phillip snoring really loud HONK SQUEAK. I had heard him in my sleep!

Today I think I am going to try to do some reading and creative writing. Two things that I enjoy doing but don't spend enough time with. I am still reading "House of Leaves". It's really good but it's not going as fast as I thought it would. Mat and Nikki said it went really fast for them. Perhaps they read faster than me. Writing wise, I sure would love to write a novel. I don't have enough patience for that right now. It would be pretty fun though I bet.

09-16-02 Monday
We've got rain out there right now kids! At last. The yard and gardens really needed it here at the Noodle compound. I hope it rains all day. Gosh, I am really going to have to get that furnace fixed soon.

We had a superb weekend. So much fun. Yesterday was K and I's 2nd year wedding anniversary! 2 years of heavenly bliss. We celebrated the moment down at the coast camping. We went back to Newport. I really like that area of the coast. Phillip, Martin and Lianne went with us. It was really hot here so we thought that It would be 20 degrees cooler at the coast. Which it was and then some. When we drove into town a huge bank of fog creeped in from the ocean and blanketed everything. It looked so cool.

The camping was good. We only got sprinkled on a little bit the very last evening. We stayed at the Beverly Beach state park. It was okay as parks go. There was a lot of characters populating the campground. The raccoons came after us a couple of times in the night and we lost a carton of eggs in the battle. The beach and ocean were as beautiful as ever. We went and saw the tide pools during low tide.

I checked out a few of the galleries while I was down there this time. Moving to the coast and painting pictures of the ocean and making drift wood sculptures is something I have been toying around with for some time now. I went to a few of the ocean oriented galleries and saw some of that stuff. Most of which was surprisingly pretty good. When I got to the Triad gallery in Waldport just outside of Newport, I was floored. They had some amazing stuff. Robert Nelson's work was great. It had nothing to do with the beach either. Cool drawings and painting of fantastical machines, figures and animals. Some future primitive, steam punk looking stuff. Turns out that Robert is a art professor in his 70's who had moved to the Oregon coast to retire. His resume of work and places he has shown was pages and pages long. So cool. See, exactly. That's what I'm talking about.

The fun doesn't stop there! Last night after getting back from the beach, I went and saw my new favorite band, "Interpol" play at the Black Bird. Holy cow! Those boys were awesome. This is the first time I'm sure of many to come, when I was surprised at how young they were. For some reason, their music gives the impression of a little bit of age. It was cool. The place was absolutely crammed tight with people. It was so crowded. The music was excellent. If you haven't heard them yet run out and get their album immediately! It kind of felt like we were witnessing a band right on the edge of becoming a major World power. "Yeah I saw Interpol when they were just coming up back in 02." I hung with my buddies G and Matt. Martin was suppose to show up but I didn't see him. It was so crowded though that he could have been and I missed him. K stayed home and prepared for her early Monday morning school day.

See, God that's great! Two little bursts of inspiration and I'm pulled back up out of the pit. The Robert Nelson paintings and the Interpol concert is all it took to fill me back up with energy and desire! Now I feel like I have enough strength to fight the evils of Monday dreariness. I have got to hang up here and get to work before the moment passes.

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09-18-02 Wednesday
Wednesday is here! Hooray! It's hump day. Almost the weekend. The sun is shining right now and it's fairly cool outside. Actually it's fairly cool inside also. I need to call the furnace people, I really do. I'm sporting the microwaved coffee this morning. Tasty! So what are you guys up to out there? I don't think I have much planned for today. I probably will just try to do my chores. Wash some dishes vacuum and maybe attempt to clean up this laboratory. God it is starting to get so messy that the mess is starting to look organized. The lab has one of those Hollywood movie set looks of the crazed, quirky, genius rooms. There's no rotten food or anything sticky in here, just papers, notes, drawings, books, computers, skateboards, the cover to the escort's hatch back, two kitchen stools used as separate desks, CDs stacked up everywhere, comic book boxes, and clothes on the floor.

We finished watching the Sopranos Season 2 the other night. Great stuff! We need to keep going though. Gosh those season finales really leave you hanging. Things really pick up heading towards the last few episodes, and bodies start piling up.

I acquired Cool Edit Pro the other day for my computer. It's music editing, recording software stuff. Pretty fun. Watch out everybody Jack's got the music bug again! I don't know why but I keep coming back to the idea of making music every few months. Kind of like the whole "I want to make a comic book faze". The music started up again I think because of working with Geoffrey on the multimedia project. Boy though, if any of my fazes ever went anywhere that would be so freaking cool. For now I will make infectious dance grooves. Well after I finish my chores.

09-20-02 Friday
This week absolutely just flew by didn't it? On with the weekend! It looks really nice outside right now. The Sun is shining brightly for us this morning. It's a little bit cooler though, just like I noticed the other day. Folks I will totally call the furnace guy on Monday I swear. Hmmm... Hold on. I've got a pot of coffee brewing right now and it smells marvelous. One second.

So what's been going on? Anything happening? It seemed like this last week was pretty mellow and not much was going down. I didn't really do anything. Except for the concert on Monday that was cool. Oh wait that was Sunday. I worked on the graphic design, layout and packaging for the Fantastic Idea Project CD this week. That was way cool. Everything has been sent off to Spain where their record label is and where they are producing the CD. Popchild Records is the name of the label. Super cool. You all should check the CD out when it gets released. It's great. Hopefully we'll be able to find it here in the states.

I finished my first hit single yesterday. I recorded it with my new band of one I formed this week. I'm still trying to keep the whole project under wraps for now, so I won't tell you the name of my band. The song is up on the transmission now so if you listened for a while you'd probably be able to pick me out. Yeah the whole day went by with me sitting in front of the computer, all for just a minute and a half song. It's all samples and clips now. I borrowed a keyboard from G but haven't got the right cord to plug it in to the computer yet. I decided this morning that I wasn't going to rush things with my new band. For now I will just learn how to use the software, learn how to play music and experiment. I don't need to hurry into a recording studio and make an album right away. I should practice a bit first. The songs I'm doing now will be learning experiences that could go together as a collection on an experimental album, but I really shouldn't worry about that now.

We've got birthdays this weekend! Mr. Baptist is another year older this weekend and the eldest Noodle nephew is turning 3. Those kids! They just grow up so fast. K and I got him a pretty cool toy yesterday. Buying stuff for kids is fun. My Mom's birthday is next week. Lots of September babies.

09-22-02 Sunday
Good morning all. Gosh I don't think I slept very well last night. Too much on my feeble little mind I guess. You know, one of those nights where you can't turn your brain off. I should go back to bed. Hold on one second, let me go microwave some coffee. Today feels like a Monday. I guess that's because all day yesterday I thought it was Sunday. Things will turn back around for me I'm sure once I wake up here. Gosh, my right eye is itching like crazy. Maybe I have something in it.

We rented and watched the movie last night called "CQ". It was pretty good. I knew at the video store that someone had recommended it to me but I couldn't remember who. It was the story about this director guy in 1969 that who was working on a Barbarella type sci-fi movie. The sci-fi clips were excellent. Awesome 70's style computers and ships. The music sound track for the movie was good also.

Well shoot. I don't have much planned for today. Just farting around I guess. I finally got the proper cords for G's keyboard, so I will probably hook that up to the computer and make some music today. I need to get to work on making some hit singles. I've posted some stuff up on MP3.com so everyone will be able to groove to the Noodle stylings. I'll give you guys the link in a day or two so you all can check it.

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09-24-02 Tuesday
I think they said that Fall officially started yesterday or the day before? You wouldn't know it around here. It still feels like Summer. Gosh, September sure did go by fast. What the Hell? I can't believe I don't have a job yet. I guess I'll send out 50 to 100 more resumes today and not hear back from any of them. I don't mind if you guys turn me down and tell me you've found someone more qualified. The thing that really bugs me are these assholes that don't ever acknowledge that they have even received my resume. Hey just let me know you got it for crying out loud. WHEW!.... Hold on one second. Let me get a hold of myself. You know it's probably not a good idea to call possible future employers assholes is it? I am just so gosh darn tired of being a poor unemployed looser. Alright Noodle, quit being a cry baby.

Hey the new fall season has started on television! Have you guys been tuning in? Tonight is the season premiere of Smallville. K and I are looking forward to that one. That Superman is SO cute. I can't think of any others that we're that excited about seeing. Oh I guess we're interested in seeing the Alias season opener. Oh and of course the Simpsons. I wish we had cable so we could see the Sopranos. Having the Summer off of TV viewing makes you forget the routine of what you normally tuned into. Which is fine actually I guess because TV rots your brain.

So the handsome Martin brought some recording equipment over the other day to hook up to the computer. One of the things he also brought was some different speakers. Man! I can't believe how much better music sounds now coming out of the computer. I've been listening to more new music now. One site that G reminded me of again was Epitonic. I know I don't usually have links in the midst of the journal, but you kids should check this one. I like how you can stream the whole page or listen to transmissions of a certain genre.

Today I've got to get the bills organized maybe mail some off, and fill out some paperwork. Pretty boring. I'll continue on with the music making. That has been pretty fun. I've got to go take the puppy for a long walk today. I don't think he's been getting enough exercise lately. Me neither actually.

09-25-02 Wednesday
Gosh people, it is just gorgeous out there this morning! Summer is still here, folks. It has been very dry this week. I wonder if we are going to have a dry Winter? I went on a nice walk with the dog yesterday and may have to do the same today. It was nice getting out into the fresh air and out of this stale laboratory. Phillip is a fun dog to walk. He gets a lot of attention. Phillip loves the ladies and they love him back. He's kind of unruly when you first start out walking him with a leash, but he mellows out and is quite pleasant by the end.

How have you been doing? Is it just me and a false since of hope, but are things starting to look up for people? It seems that some of the friends I have been talking to that have been anxious about problems or changes have been starting to get through them this week. There's been some events going down that I think will be good. People I have talked to this week seem a little more positive. I don't know, it's like people are getting excited about a new start that seems to be coming up real soon. I hope there's a new start in my future. I'm ready for it.

Have you been watching the news lately? Man, what the heck is going on with our government? Hey our economy is in the toilet! Why the Hell do they keep talking about Iraq? Hey our economy is in the toilet! What are they doing about getting poor slobs like me jobs? Not that I expect the government to hand me a job, but they at least could pretend like they are concerned. I think we have enough concerns domestically to take up all our time with. We don't need to go over and bomb Saddam do we? God people, it's not 1991 anymore. Where the heck are all these approval polls being taken? Nobody has asked me if I think the President is doing a good job. That Bush. Every time I see him I just shake my head. Actually anytime I see any of those governmental types. Who do they think they are? Hey our economy is in the toilet! What to do though? Am I worried enough about the current state of affairs to get off my butt and do something?

Gosh I'm sorry. I just got interrupted there by a telemarketing person. Geeze she wouldn't take no for an answer! Now what was I saying? Oh man I just lost my train of thought. Dang it! Well, I'm outta here!

09-27-02 Friday
I can't believe it's already Friday again! It seems like I was just writing a Friday journal entry. I feel a little chilly this morning. The Sun is shining through the overcast sky, but it's starting to feel like a fall morning out there. I'm tired again. I think that I sleep fine in the first half of the evening it's just the second half, early morning I'm having trouble with now. I've got to go microwave a cup of coffee. After this pot of coffee we are out again! NO! I guess we are due for some grocery shopping this weekend anyway.

Happy Birthday mother! The lovely lady's big day was yesterday. I gave her a call and wished her well last night. She is coming to town next week so we will get to see her and give her a present then.

Yesterday was a pretty good day. Looking back over the entries for this week I kind of seemed annoyed in my writings. I guess I have been pretty annoyed. Yesterday was good though, I loosened up and mellowed out. I went on a nice bike ride in the afternoon and went and saw Eugene at his shop. I went home and listened to some music. When K got home we went downtown and had dinner at Ringlers. Later we took the puppy out for a nice evening stroll. Ah, nice relaxing day.

Oh man! When we were downtown, we stopped into the record store. I previewed the new UNDERWORLD album. It is SO good. I almost started weeping at the listening station. Damn I love those guys! I am going to buy it for myself as a celebration gift when I get a job. The name of the album is "A Hundred Days Off". I think I have them beat by a few more days, but that's what I've been doing, taking days off this year. When a job comes around the days off will be over and the album will help ease me back into the work environment.

So I was going to try to go to the Sleater Kinney concert tonight, but it's sold out. Oh well, I really only know a couple of their songs anyway. It kind of stinks though because Eugene and a lot of the crew are going. I think it might be nice to chill at home this evening and rent some videos. Yeah, that will be the plan.

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09-28-02 Saturday
Well, well, well. Good bright and shiny morning to you all! I think I got up too early this morning. I couldn't sleep though! I'm up, I'm up. Gee wiz. We got some coffee yesterday. That's a good thing. I'm brewing some right now. Do I seem a little anxious? I've got one of those get back to you on Monday things going that I hoped I would get a resolution to on Friday. I'm left to stew over the weekend. That's okay, just relax Noodle, take a deep breath. I can't give any details yet of course but keep your fingers crossed for me.

I went to rent the first volume of The Sopranos Season 3 but they were out! Argh. This is a Sopranos town, man. I rented Panic Room and Monsters Inc. K and I have it good now days because all of the movies coming out on video now are ones that were in theaters when we weren't watching movies, so we have lots to choose from. We watched Monsters Inc. last night. I thought it was great. Beautiful animation. Those Pixar cats really kick some ass. The story was pretty good also. The hair effects on the John Goodman character, Sully were amazing. It looked so real. I remember reading an article on that a long time ago about the new tools they invented to get that effect.

Martin and Lianne came over last. Martin cooked a yummy meal for us. Pasta and mushroom dish. So good. Maybe I will go have some left overs for breakfast.

I'm not sure what we are going to do today. We don't really have anything planned now that I know of. I do need to start getting to work on the redesign of this here web site. I've an Idea of what I am going to. I don't know if I will have it done for the October 1st anniversary, but maybe.

Dang it. Left to stew.

09-30-02 Monday
The rains are coming down, friends! At last. The brown lawn looks so relieved. The grass is coming back to life and now I'll have to cut it a few more times. I think Fall has arrived. The start of a new week and the end of a month today.

How did your weekend go? My was just alright. We didn't do much. Yesterday I didn't do anything. I caught up on my napping. Eugene, Tracy and new friend Joel came over on Saturday night. That was pretty fun. The kids had been packing up all weekend to move into different apartments. We watched "Panic Room" staring Jodie Foster. Boy that was a disappointing film. It's sad too because David Fincher is one of my favorite directors. The movie just wasn't very believable and you really didn't feel like the characters were ever in that much danger.

Well, I should really try to do something today. Oh you know, I guess I did start the web site redesign yesterday. Maybe I should keep going with that today. I probably won't have it ready for tomorrow's self-imposed deadline, but maybe this week huh? I should continue on with my music project also. Only 2 songs does not a rock star make. G had mentioned something about letting me borrow a different keyboard, so maybe that will help with the tunes.

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