NicholasYax.com

Not alot has happened.  Went to school for a week, pulled an A on my MATL test, played some disc golf.  Went to a party last Thursday at Miles and Mike’s.  Then more school for a week, and a party at John and Frank’s.  Saturday we went to Bay City and saw my Mom and Dad, went to the Johnson’s Giant Pumpkins and the River of Time.  Had dinner at Famous Dave’s with Dad and Grandma then came home.

I got two new discs last week.  I actually do quite a bit better with them.  We were out discing one night and decided to play highland games with some logs, and ended up quite filthy from them.  Greg and I ended up tying though.  Neither of us could get the log to flip, just land and plop.

This weekend we are going up to East Jordan for Jenn’s Aunt’s wedding, and reception near Gaylord.

Uhm, think that is it.

More some other time.

nick

Well, birthday went well.  Had Applebee’s a few days before, and went to Schubergs the night of.  Had some mini burgers and chili cheese tater tots, yum.  Went with Jenn, Greg, and Dane.

Classes for the week went fine, especially since I got to miss a day.

IMTS was very interesting.  Saw a lot of stuff that I had barely heard of, and more that I had no idea existed.  Some of the machines and robots were really impressive.

Apple introduced new iPod nano, iPod touch, and iPod classic on Tuesday, full details on their site.

Jenn and I went to a bridal show last night (Friday) in Grand Rapids at the museum.  Was a lot of women running around crazy excited of nothing, I was glad to get out of there.  We headed over to Beltline to Johnny Carrino’s which was decent, but not great.  They are trying to find a niche between Olive Garden and Carraba’s that I don’t think actually exists.  Since we were nearby, I persuaded Jenn to go to Woodland Mall and look at the new iPods which are very nice.  She made me promise I wouldn’t buy one before we went though, so I was good.

So, that was my week.  Only other thing I could add is that I have been disk golfing more.  Three times this week.  Would be more if not for the rain.

nick

1. It’s my birthday.
2. School is good so far.
3. Still one class I haven’t been to, will have it at 4 I think.
4. Going to Chicago Thursday for IMTS.
5. Updates resume and started thinking about jobs this past week.
6. Put down deposit, Wedding is officially 10/10/09 at Garland Resort, Lewiston, MI.
7. Began considering where we want to live in 9 months.
8. Fitness/Medicine balls are fun.
9. Going to have homework this semester, which is a change from Winter.
10. Did I mention it’s my Birthday?

Today was my last ever day of summer vacation, ever, for the rest of my life.  Tomorrow though, will be my last ever first day of school (in theory, though I will likely get a MS or MBA eventually).

Last weekend, we went to bay City, hung out for a while at my Mom’s, then to Hooligan’s for a while.  Good to see all the guys from the Library, and talked to Todd for a bit about his wedding to get some ideas for ours.

Sunday morning, Casey (Dad’s dog) got sprayed by a skunk, so he had to cancel going to Ren Fest with us to clean him up.  My brother was short on cash, so he was a no.  So, Jenn and I went off on our own.  My dad called us when we were about to Bridgeport to see if we had left yet, we offered to wait for him but weren’t up to going back.  He said no, so we kept going.

Ren fair was a lot bigger than Battle Creek’s, but kind of blah since we had just been to one a few weeks ago.  I was complemented three times on my kilt, and once on my “Pluto Replies” t-shirt.  We shot some archery, saw a 4 man joust, I got a t-shirt, and got a nice tan.

When we were finished there, we drove up to Garland to check them out.  We got half off as we were looking at a wedding there.  We had dinner, slept for the night, then met with the wedding coordinator in the morning.  It is a very beautiful place, and we are certainly interested.  Too many questions left though that we need to figure out on our own, and were not ready to commit to it.

Spent the week relaxing.  My biggest accomplishment was probably attaining Pro level at WiiSports Golf.

Yesterday Dane and Greg moved in so we went to El Burrito to catch up then went for a round of Disk Golf.  We made it through 14, played 15 – 17 as speed rounds, and called it too dark to do 18.

We gained 2 new family members Friday night.  Got a second Jack Dempsey and a snail, that are in a second aquarium.  As they are rather small, I don’t trust Jill not to pick on or outright eat them, so they are in my old 2.5 gallon.  It is way too old to keep them very long, but until I feel thay can go in the big one it will suffice.  When we move next year and are settled in, maybe I will get a 55 or 70 gallon for everyone to stay in.

I was right on my computer, it returned on Monday.  Unfortunately, I wasn’t here, so I didn’t get it until Tuesday.  It’s all fixed though so I am happy so long as it doesn’t reoccur.

OK, thats all for now.  Will let you all know how classes are Wednesday evening or so.

BTW, 1 week to my birthday!

nick

Well, my box arrived today for the MacBook to go in for repairs.  That crack in the palmrest that happened in March is finally going to get fixed.  Hopefully it doesn’t happen again.  If it does, hopefully its in time to ship in over Christmas break.  Still, preferably, it hopefully doesn’t happen again.

Weekend with Jenn’s sister and family went well.  Sat around Friday night, went to GR Saturday, and they left Sunday morning.  We had some Red Robin which is always good, and tried to get my computer fixed at the Apple Store, but they wont ship so would require a trip back which sounded un-fun.

I got my PPG paycheck a week and a half early, always nice.  Will be useful when we got to Bay City this weekend, and to Ren Fest in Holly.

School is down to about a week and a half now, and my birthday 2 and a half.

Still haven’t gotten another crawfish.  Aquarium looks kind of empty.  At least need some plants.

OK, think that is all.  Will update hopefully Monday, if my computer is back.  Can always use Jenn’s though too.

nick

I am free!  Yesterday was my last day of work at PPG.  We tried to work out something for the fall but my school schedule just didn’t allow for much.  Despite feeling like the $10/hour peon sometimes, I did enjoy it.  It’s too bad it took so long for them to start giving me more engineering assignments though, as that was sort of what I was there for.  I did get a lot of quality management though.  I should be back for a visit with SME in October or so.

I just checked Nearly Free Speech and my bandwidth has finally exceeded 1GB, which now means I pay under $1 per GB of transfer ($0.991 currently).  It goes down in a log type formula as I use more bandwidth.  Sadly, this deal began February 1st, so it took me six months to get in that first GB.  It goes down constantly, so I keep paying slightly less to transfer every single page load though.  Once I reach 10GB of transfer, my cost will be down to $0.50 per GB, in about 5 more years.  Unfortunately, bandwidth (obviously) is not my primary cost but server space.  Still, I only use about $4 or $5 per year excluding domain name.

Jenn managed to plan about half of our wedding in the last week.  She gets a little obsessed sometimes.  Tentatively (very), it is scheduled for 10/10/09 at Garland Resort, but that could change overnight.

School is down to about 3 weeks away now.  August 2nd.  I am looking forward to it, nerd that I am.  It’s my last year of school, it is very sad.  :-(

Sunday morning I went to feed the fish, and we had lost another one.  Rosy, the remaining rosy barb had perished.  Not sure how, but somehow overnight.  She was oldest, now it is Kitty.  She was about 2 weeks over a year old.  Was much smaller than Jill or Sunny, and were kind of expecting her to go in the next couple months as Jill keeps growing.  We still haven’t replaced Bubba yet, but maybe in the next week or two I will go to the pet shop since I am off.

I watched MST3K: the Movie tonight.  I was never a fan of the show (not that I didn’t like, but just never watched) but that was funny as hell.  A lot of the comments are very so-so, but they just throw one after another after another, and suddenly you break out laughing at the stupidest one-liner.

Uhm…

Apple has refurbished iPod touch for $199.  I really want one, but my extravagant spending for the year was my kilt.  There are nanos for like $149 too.

On that note, my birthday is one month from yesterday.

That would be it I think.

nick

Well, to be honest, not much has happened up to this weekend.

Back on the morning of the 10th, I woke up and went to feed the fish, and noticed Bubba was missing (the crawfish).  I searched through the gravel, looked for bits in the tank, even looked around the apartment.  Finding nothing and running out of time I got ready and left for work.  When I got home, I looked some more, and still no sign.  We pretty much concluded he was eaten by Jill and gave up, though it seemed weird that there were no remains at all.  Saturday (the 12th) I was getting the pop cans to take in, and noticed something behind the can.  It was actually pretty far from the aquarium, and I can’t believe there was no smell.  At least we found him, and he wasn’t eaten so we can try and get another crawfish without worrying what Jill will do.  Still, kind of amazing he crawled out of the auarium, that has a hood.

More nothing up to this weekend.  Work, sleep , eat, work, work.  heck, I even picked up a Saturday (the 19th).

This weekend Jenn and I went to Battle Creek.  Went to the Silver Leaf Renaissance Faire Saturday.  It was pretty darned cool.  Was our first Ren Fest actually.  There were alot of people dressed u, vendors, good food, and even jousters.  The real kicker though, is I finally got my Utilikilt.  Yes, I now strut around in a black original model.  Following the fair we went to the mall for a bit and used her B&N gift card and we headed to the hotel.

Sunday, we went to Binder Park Zoo.  That, too, was really fun.  We got to feed a giraffe, watch a tortoise walk really slow, and see a 4 horned sheep’s lips vibrate really weird (should have got video of that).  Following that we headed toward home stopping in GR to see Dane.  We ate at a XO which was interesting, and fairly good.  I had green curry scallop, which was a little too weird.

This week, more work.

Also last week, Jenn started at Mecosta Medical Center.  Cuts her commute time by about 50 minutes.  Seems to be liking it so far.

Will update on Monday with info on our trip to Bay City Friday and Saturday.

nick

Oh, duh, pictures of Zoo on Picasa, sadly none of Ren Fair.  Maybe the Holly fair in August…

So, first up is another weekend trip.  Jenn and I wanted to go somewhere Friday night and decided on north.  We packed up and headed out around 7:30, and by 10:30 were in St. Ignace.  Saturday morning we started at the casino and with our $40 in free tokens ($10 each for joining players club, 1 each for staying at a hotel in St Ignace, and 2 for Jenn for birthday in June) we won $31 in cash.  Next was breakfast that took a while to find, but ended up being at King’s Fish Market in Moran.  The food was very good, and the smoked fish was very tempting, but we knew we had a while till we headed home and thought it best to wait.  We continued further north to Paradise where we stopped at a roadside park to get a look at Lake Superior.  next we turned west to Taquaminon Falls.  We checked out the falls, took lots of pictures, and had a stop at the brewery on site.

Our next destination was Sault Ste Marie.  We looked at taking a ferry through the locks, but the price was a bit high.  We also considered the museum ship but it too was pricy.  So, we went downtown and headed into the locks viewing area.  As there were no ships at the time, we headed across the street for dinner at Goetz Lockview Restaurant, which included the best and probably freshest whitefish I have ever eaten.  Following dinner we went back across to the locks and watched as a ship began to enter.  Unfortunately, this is a very slow process, and as jenn is impatient, out time came up and we ventured on.

Next stop: Canada.  We crossed the International Bridge and once across the border headed to the visitor center.  Here, I did something really funny, but that I feel I should not mention.  We then went to a Canadian Tim Horton’s (the most canadian thing in the US, in Canada) then to the Duty Free Shop, and back to the US.  On our way to St Ignace, Jenn’s parents called to see if they could meet up with us, so we returned to the casino to see them for a while.

Following the casino again, we went to see if we could find some smoked fish and pasties, but everywhere was closed.  We stopped off to look at the Mackinac Bridge, then returned to the hotel for the evening and ordered a pizza.

Sunday, we headed out early and got some pasties.  We then crossed the bridge and in Mackinac City we ate our pasties, then bought more and some smoked fish.  We did a little more shopping and then headed toward Big Rapids.

On the way home, we passed some of these, which we had seen Friday on the way up.  We think they are pretty cool.  We then went to Cadillac and had dinner at Pizza Hut Bistro, then, finally, home.

So, The rest of the week, so far, has just been work.  Except today…

Back on Friday we sent out some glass samples to a PPG facility in Troy for testing.  This morning, we received an email that they had broken in shipping.  Due to the need to get new samples there quickly and to avoid more breakage, Dvid (Engineering Manager) asked me to drive them there.  Yes, from Evart to Troy, 3 hours each way.  Alright, why not.  Three hors down, here you go, 10 minutes, and 3 hours back.  I did stop and see my mom and brother quickly, since I went through Bay City, but that was like 5 minutes each, and those were my ONLY breaks.

So, today, between the trip for work, and actually driving to and from work, I drove 400 miles.  Plus, the miles we put on Friday – Sunday, plus the 50 miles I drive every day, comes to probably over 1000 miles this week.

OK, thats all.  I need to sit around and not move for a while longer.

nick

Oh, pictures of the weekend are up.

Hmm, 3 weeks, suck.

Something HUGE I forgot last time, was that Jenn bought a new car.  I came home from class that Monday I spent working on Amerikam and there was no Escape in the parking lot, but instead an 08 Jetta in is place.  She gets REALLY good milage and it is a very nice car.

Trip to Bay City was fun.  I was the drunkest I have ever been Saturday night.  There was a point I ate a french fry and though I could taste it, I couldn’t actually feel it.  I stopped drinking about at that point.  That Monday I went to go see Iron Man with Scott, which was really good.  Nice to see Scott too.

Big news recently is I got a job.  Had interview on the 14th with PPG in Evart, which was a good 3 hours, drug test right after, and following Monday they told me I had it and go get physical on Wednesday the 21st, start on the 27th.  Physical was actually my first, and I got abnormally excited at the hernia exam.  Not real sure what i will be doing, but will let you know when I find out.

This past Thursday Jenn and I tried fishing, though we didn’t have any luck.  We also did a bit of shopping downtown, and bought a crawfish for our aquarium.

Yesterday we went to the <a href=”http://www.almahighlandfestival.com/”>Alma Highland Festival</a>.  Was decently entertaining.  The games were pretty good, we missed the herding.  Not sure it was worth $15 each though.  From there we went to Mt Pleasant for food (the Green Spot I think) and then to Clare for Jay’s and home.

So, for anyone who doesn’t remember, Tuesday, May 27th, is he Blogversary.  Something I just found out a few minutes ago though, is not only is it the Blogs 5th Anniversary, but it is WordPress’s birthday as well.  Seems kind of fitting that I use it I suppose, even if the first 2.5 years I didn’t.

So, next post will absolutly be Tuesday, for the Blogversary, and to let you know more about the internship hopefully.

Unrelated, I am not 99% sure that my cousin Cindy has a Mac.  I kind of wondered if the stats program was just goofing up, but have had repeated confirmation from it now.  Strangely, it reports OS 10.4.11, and 10.5 has been out since October, but the Mac didn’t show up until January or February.  So, either I missed it for 2 months, which seems unlikely, or she bought used, which also seems possibly unlikely.  Maybe is something Sam or Rach used at school, and left home after Christmas?  I don’t know.

Uhm…

That may be it for now.

I played Halo Monday, Tuesday, and Friday.  Is done now.

Yeah, thats about it.

Tuesday…

Nick

So, this week…

Exams

Monday was our Metrology exam, Tuesday was Production Processes.  They were both pretest/posttest exams, and following the Metrology exam he graded them immediately, and I was actually WORSE by 1 question!  Still, I had the highest grade in the class though.

Tuesday Greg, Dane, and I payed our last game of disc golf.  That night, since exams were over, Jenn and I had a little dinner at Bennigan’s, where they had $2 long islands, which was nice considering the circumstances.  Next was a friends house for a party to round out the night.

Wednesday Jenn and I went to Holland for the Tulip Fest.  It turned out to be a bunch of old ladies on tour busses.  We did have some fun at the New Holland Brewery again though.

Thursday (finally up to yesterday) was a sit around day, though Jenn and I played a round of disc golf.

And finally, today, Jenn and I went for a bike ride.

So, what did I forget…

One morning we woke up, and rather than two rosey barbs, we only had one and a half.  Also, Monday, just before my exam, Jenn and I went to the driving range for 45 minutes or so.

Yesterday, I randomly called a few companies, and PPG in Evart asked me to email them my resume.  I woke up this morning with an interview on Wednesday.  Hopefully this will finally be it.

Last weekend, we got DVR from Charter, which is freaking cool.  Sadly, I haven’t figured out the real cool shit, like getting shows form the computer to DVR and back.

Saturday (tomorrow) at 9:00 I will be at Hooligans for some fun.  Anybody who sees this is welcome to join.

Anything else I will update on after my weekend in Bay City.

nick