Took off at 6pm. Got back around 11pm. Watched a full moon rise over the ocean.
The coast line along Florida is so very much different than what you see in California.
On thing that's missing is a beach. We hardly saw any sandy places at all.
At most of the places where we could see the ocean, trees and grass grew right up to it.
Kevin (at M2) said they actually truck the sand to the beaches. I guess I never thought of that...man made beaches.
528 takes you over a kind of bridge to Cape Kennedy...it's actually just a mound of dirt, that takes you two miles over the ocean. I noticed there were people camped near the water in their vehicles.
Cape Kennedy is on an island with Cocoa Beach. A sign said there was a casino someplace there.
We ate a Steak House in Cocoa Beach. My steak was smoked and it was great. Becky had sage chicken.
So, we were on the Atlantic Ocean, eating inland food...hmmm.

I can't wait to hear what the people at work did (if they even talk about it).
I'd also gotten a camper shell, and went to Seminole County's land refuse.
And, we saw a racoon, and buzzards bigger than Becky!

---It was pretty cool---

Actually, we were destined for the Hard Rock Hotel/Casino in Tampa.

Our purpose was to purchase a volume of cigs at a decent price.
As it turned out, the only deal they offer was no taxes.
They didn't offer discount brands, and they limited the quantity to three cartons per person.
In other words, the trip to buy cigs wasn't worth the gas it cost.
It would be cheaper to go to Mexico by boat, which isn't that bad of an idea.
The casino was different. They had slots and live poker...but next to no Video Poker.
Later, we explored Tampa, St Petersburg and Brandon. Its was okay, but I still like Orlando 100 times better.
One note about Florida drivers
We were driving across a 5 mile bridge over Tampa Bay. It had no exits and no reason to change your speed.
And the traffic was packed for miles.
People were still racing, switching lanes like crazy, slowing down, speeding up, creating clusters and open areas of traffic.
This would indicate Florida drivers are quite insane. But I like them. I can drive offensively too!
I actually like driving like a madman. If everyone's doing it, I fit right in.

That's what I get for using Internet Explorer's contenteditable tag.
I have no idea how to fully control the entries written in this blog area.
It seems flaky...some times I'll click on Bold, then Italic, and the font will change. Its strange...

I'm am proud of you, Robert. I'm so glad you passed that Class "B" test.
You're on your way to creating the kind of life you want.
You're doing so goooood dude!
You're customizing your life to being what you want it to be.  And that's probably easier than customizing Windows.
It won't be long before you become that big rig driver you picture in your mind, transporting nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain...lol. 
Somewhere along the way, I'd realized that all the people that I had admired were just normal people like myself.
Something pushed them into the path they took. It could have been a job, a parent, someone they admired, or something they read.
So I studied electronics, air conditioning, dealing, and even went to college just to prove I could customize this life to anything I wanted it to be.
I proved it, too.
So, when you look at a big rig driver, an FBI agent, or even your doctor...you should know that you could be that person,
if something had pushed you enough to take that path.
Somewhere in my mind, there's a dream of a home in someplace beautiful, with me driving a truck that I own for a living.
I see you in that dream Robert. It could be real.
I'm going to blow off this place in maybe a year and try something different.
Maybe when you get you Class "A", and make some connections, I'll take a driving course, get a license, buy a rig, and we'll go into business.
In a dream, Florida, Colorado, or even Missouri could be great places to call home. What do you think?

It looks great too!!! And it's about 30% cheaper than what they wanted in Las Vegas.
Talked to Dad tonight. He called while we were enroute to Daytona Beach.

He's still stuck on his stock scam. For some reason, he thinks stocks have a predictable pattern, like a timed beat.
They do go up and down, but predicting when they're going to go either way is impossible to tell.
If it were possible, everyone would be doing it.
 Just like the new gamblers who come to Las Vegas and say, 
  "Winning is easy. You just bet more money when your winning and less when you're losing"

Dad is trying to predict the future by using probabilites...he doesn't understand the difference between odds and probabilities.
Daytona Beach is a party town...or at least is was tonight!
There was a Harley Davidson rendezvous party all over town tonight. For being just 40 minutes down the road, it's a pretty cool place.
The ocean looked so cool.
The next module I put in LVDUDE will be the ability to upload pictures! I need to show people what we've seen.
Robert called us when we were driving home tonight

He said Amy's starting to walk, but she's hanging onto things still.
The loan people repossessed his Ford Ranger. That's probably a good thing.

It relates to when I went back to Paducah and I couldn't find the house I grew up in. It was gone!
The roads I bicycled on, my elementary school, everything was gone or had changed so much that I couldn't recognize it.
When we go back to Vegas, it probably won't be home any more.
- Jennifer is going to have breast
- Dustin won't sound like Bart Simspon anymore
- Sonny's going to lose more hair
- Robert and Joy may not even be living in the Nevada
My only anchor in Vegas was Sonny, the condo and the house on Gabriel.
I feel homeless.

Just before the sun comes up.

I want to see the sun rise over the ocean. 
I've wanted to see this since I was a kid.
I want to see that special color I've read about that flashes as the sun just begins to touch the horizon.
It's supposed to be beautiful, but you have to be aware when it happens.
How could it not be beautiful though? Everything else here is beautiful.

And wondering if we made a mistake by coming out here.
Everything is so unfamiliar. Money is tight. We have only a few hours each day to spend together.

We've lost the luxury of freedom.
I've feel like a king who has chosen to be indigent just to be in someone elses world.
If I come clamoring back to Las Vegas after falling back a few steps here in Florida,
then I was just lucky in the decisions I made in Las Vegas.
However, if I can do well here, then what I did in Vegas wasn't luck, it was ability.
My life has been a perpetual experiment trying to prove this one theory 
- That we are the creators of our own lives.
- and that we (not some glowing entity in the sky) are the god that we pray to in our solemnity.
If this experiment fails, then my theory must be wrong.
I also think we chose to be here in this world. We aren't just an accident of nature.
But, I'm more than happy to wait to find out if that theory is true or not.

To those who ask the question "what are we doing here", the answer will reveal itself in the end.
I guess, no matter where I go, my soul searching will go with me.
I apologize to anyone who reads this and wonders why I talk this way. I'm just curious.
I believe that if Dorothy closed her eyes, clicked her heals three times, and said there's no place like home,
she could have been back in Kansas at anytime. 
Becky and I can do that too.
  :^)

I love when nice things happen to nice people like us...
I LOVE YOU TO PIECES!!!

We buy small quantities of groceries now.
We don't order pizza because the dumpster is 1/4 of a mile away.
Everything we do seems to be based on carrying things up or down the stairs.
Someone should invent a portable balcony wench for apartments like these, just to haul grocery bags up and down.

And also, it goes to the right spot now when you click on an entry.
I've got to remember to enclose my Href's with quotes.
It took about an hour to figure that out.

I still smell like curry fried rice. It was good food, especially the lemon chutney stuff.
This morning I got my Florida plates.
The Tax Assessors Office had no signs from the street. In fact, it was in the middle of a little mall.
There was no line, but there were a few snags.
- The tax guy needed to see my odometer (which has a mind of its own).
It didn't work.
- I could have gotten my personalized plates overnight,
but he said if my Schwab debit account didn't work, we'd have to do everything all over again.
- They took my Title to my truck.
I'll get a Florida one in 3 months. Now, I've got to wonder what will happen if I want to sell my truck.
The good thing about this is, I've got my ex's name off of the title.
The bad thing, of course is, I may never get my title back.
I've hit snags before, where a date/something didn't match, and I ended up with nothing.
Whatever the case, its all much cheaper than Vegas.
My plates cost $230, my insurance is $260 (I think), and I don't need a smog test

He's moving to Pleasantville, Ca.

I love your eyes and your smile. It's great to be in love with you!

Paging back and forth was a mess. As it turned out, I got to rip out a bunch of code.
VB has a DateAdd("m",-1,mydate) function that manipulates dates very nicely.
Finding these functions is a pain without a manual or online help.

He's 1/4th of the reason we came up. The reason definitely wasn't money.
My reasons for coming out here were
- Health Insurance

- See the East coast and get out of Las Vegas
- Fix up my Resume with current activity

- Hang with Mikey, because he's one of the few friends I have left.
Oh well, if he goes to San Francisco and works full time, maybe he'll be able to pull me in. That would be nice.
San Francisco now seems stained though, since Skip died there.

Here in Florida, the Tax Collector takes care of vehicle license plates, and there's not many of them around.
To make things worse, they're only open 8:30am to 5:00pm., the hours I work.
So, I HAVE TO TAKE TIME OFF, and that sux.
Becky and I went to Tony Roma's last night. Man, that food was very good, and reasonably priced.
We also swung by Walmart to pick up a sheet, table, and clock. Much needed stuff.

And I don't get something in Tampa, we should become truck drivers...what do you think?
We could have a little house near Ida...

** Smiles **

He's got an interview next Tuesday with a company in San Francisco. Yippee!!!
I think he's going through a headhunter named Kaiser.

You're logged on as me right now though...so it looks like I told me I love me....haha

I love you so much. I felt really bad about what you
said yesterday. I know you didn't mean what you said.

I know that you would ever leave me,we are too good
for each other. We love each other so much. I do miss
you when you are at work. It makes me feel good
when you call me. Today I'm doing laundry, watched
the movie Phatom of the Opera. Now I'm watching
ZZtop the music vidoes. I love this screen it is so cool.

 

 

 

 

                 Love you

                 Becky

I wanted Becky to overcome her fear of riding roller coaster's.
I told her an 8 year old that was riding this one coaster was braver than she was.
And then I told her if she didn't ride the coaster, she'd be on the next flight out to Vegas.
That makes me an asshole.

I don't know why I'd say something so cruel to someone as special as my sweet Becky.
I must be changing for the worst.
I don't like my job.
I don't like being poor again.
I don't like what the future is going to turn out to be if I stay in this situation.
I'm going to make a choice soon. It will be finishing LVDUDE or truck driving.
With either decision, I'll get to finish the condo and get some permanent income coming in.
None of the above is an excuse for saying what I said to Becky though. That was inexcusable.

Channel 8 in Las Vegas rewrote their website. It kind of looks like this one, which is scary.
LVDUDE has a very open format. There isn't anything else like it on the internet.
You can copy links, enter a personal blog and easily enter ads.
If I don't do something with this site in a year, the design will be worthless. So, I've got to keep trying to improve its looks and functionality. This is one of my opportunities to get rich. I must either finish it, or give it up.

The rides were great! We almost rode everything in 8 hours. A few of the rides were closed.
The worst thing that happened was when I ate a leg of turkey and the darned thing got stuck.
Man, that's painful. I kept riding the rides though. The pain lasted for two hours this time. sheesh.
We'd gotten what turned out to be an excellent deal on Universal Studios from Costco.
$64 for three months in either Universal Studios, or Universal Studio's Islands of Adventure.

The gate price for 1 day, 1 park is $54.

I've only been here three weeks, and it feels like I've been gone from Vegas for years.
I'm getting caught up in the day-to-day living. I may never know the answer to the what-if's I had.
What If: I'd finished this website instead of moving here?
Keep in mind, I wrote this program in a weekend---> http://www.lvshots.com/games/

What If: I'd gotten Rainbird to buy my A/C energy saver?
Would I have gotten rich?
As it stands now, I may never know.
6:00am - I get up  and  work on LVDUDE.COM for maybe an hour.
7:30am - I take a shower at 7:30am. 

8:30am - I'm at work.
6:00pm - I get home from work

6:30pm - I have to feed Becky and myself. 
10pm    - I'm in bed.
I'd estimated completing LVDUDE in about a month, working 10 hours a day on it.
As it stands, it'll take 10 months because I'm only working on it 1 hour a day.
My budget is tight, because I'm not making much money. It will be December before I break even from just moving.
In other words, I'm becoming just like everybody else. I'm losing my dreams of a better future.
I'm not controlling life. Life is controlling me. It's trying to drag me into its little pits of hell.
It's my belief, that when a man's dreams die, he loses his soul.
He becomes a robotic zombie, doing the same routine every day of his life, until his life is expunged.
Soon, I'll be balancing pennies in my checkbook, thinking I can't afford to take vacation time.
I'll be thinking I need this job and fearing these people are going to fire me.
I'll lose my feelings of self worth.
If I cared about this job, my esteem would have already been crushed.
I've got to keep site of this one thought: "I am somebody. I can change the world.".

And I think Becky and I both agree, it's pretty cool. The bedroom has a 12' projected TV screen on one wall, an air bed to lay on, and some fold up camp ground chairs (bright orange). It looks like a giant ate an M&M factory and puked furniture all over our apartment. So many colors.
We picked up some 1 park/3 month tickets for Universal Studio and Universal Adventure Island this after noon. They cost about $60 (a few more $$ than a one day ticket). What's confusing is, if its one park, how come they mention two parks on the box. Everyone says it like one park, but in different directions. Anyway, I think I read somewhere its 44 square miles, so, we will get lost without a map.

Did I tell you today how much I love you?
I LOVE YOU!!!

I got up and went out on the balcony to watch it. Across from us, three floors up, I saw a couple in their kitchen. They were moving funny.
SO, I got my binoculars. What happened next was a surprise for Becky.

They went to their balcony. He took off her pants and went down on her.
My binoculars by this time were zoomed in at maximum!!!
About then, I had to let Becky know.
When I went back out on the the balcony, they were still going at it like wild dogs!
She finally flopped off of him and back into her chair.
WHAT A COUNTRY!!!

It was 11:30pm here and we were sleeping. It's funny, because when I woke up, it felt like I'd slept for at least 6 hours.
They got a 99 Ford Escort for $1,000.
Now ain't that cool? He said the Blue Book on it was $2,000.

I could use one of those little go carts in this town.
They are getting a landline soon.
That'll be much better. I love cell phones, but they still cut out a lot when you're on speaker phone
Renee got kicked out of BADD
She wasn't bad though. Her toe was. It looks like they mainly want PYT's to spread the word.
She's moved in with Grandma, which, if my guess is right, she'll be kicked out of there pretty soon.
I'm guessing she never got her diploma or GED. She knows nothing about real work, and she's 20.
It'll be interesting to see what's going to happen with her.
I guess Robert and Sonny are the only two people in Las Vegas that miss us.
Noone else has called us out here from Vegas.
You'd think Grandma or Renee would have called us by now. They have free long distance.
That's pretty depressing when I think about it.
The people who call us are my Dad, Sonny, Robert, Ida (in Missouri) and Jeanette (in Sacremento).

They'll get nice Christmas presents this year...haha.

Hmmmm. It could even be a relief.
Jeff was working one of my previous projects. He merged my stuff into it, and I retested my stuff.
I was told that was a waste of time. I'm so confused. Either I'm supposed to test something to death, or I'm not.
I can't win here. I'm playing a loser's game.

?DICTIONARY \CAESARS.$DATA3.DDL
?OUT $S.#JRC
?ASSIGN CCAGENT-REC,\CAESARS.$DATA6.CCFILE.CCAGENT
OPEN    CCAGENT-REC;
 title     @date as date *
           TAB 20 "* * *   C A E S A R S   P A L A C E   * * *"
           TAB 70 "PAGE " @PAGENO ;
  subtitle @time as time *
           TAB 20 "            BRANCH LISTING        "
           TAB 70 "CCAGENT";
!----------------------------------------------------------------
LIST
    BY CCAGENT-AGENT       HEADING "BRANCH/CODE"
          CCAGENT-DESCRIPTION HEADING "BRANCH/DESCRIPTION"
          CCAGENT-STATUS
          CCAGENT-TYPE
WHERE CCAGENT-STATUS NOT = "I" AND CCAGENT-TYPE = "DI";

RECORD CCPITDTL-REC. FILE IS "CCPITDTL" KEY-SEQUENCED.
  02 CCP-KEY.
    03 CCP-PITAREA                PIC XXXX.
  02 CCP-MARKERAMT         PIC S9(9) COMP.
  02 CCP-SETSHIFT                PIC X.
  02 CCP-SHIFT                      PIC XXX.
  02 CCP-SETACTDATE        PIC 9(5).
  02 FILLER                             PIC X(5).

 
KEY IS CCP-KEY DUPLICATES NOT ALLOWED.
End

Last night, Jeff, Becky and I went on a search to find cheap cigarettes.
We went all over looking for a smoke shop. One downtown was supposed to be duty free, but it was closed.
The businesses here must change frequently, because the phone book and online yellow pages aren't up-to-date.
I talked to Jamie and asked her to submit me to JP Morgan in Tampa.

It would mean a 25% increase in wages, so, I'd be crazy not to give it a shot.
At M2, there is absolutely no chance for bettering my position. They just barely recognize my existance.
Hanging out there is a daily grind of deadlines and one line changes. Its a good way to waste your life if that's what you want.
I'd be doing well to write a simple report. I think they'd think I'm to stupid to write a requester/server pair.
I had to increase a working storage field from PIC 9(8)V99 to PIC 9(9)V99 yesterday.
I increased it to PIC 9(16)V99.
I wanted to increase it to PIC 9(16)V99 COMP, but didn't dare to do it.
WHY? Because, when I increased it to 9(16), I was asked why I did that.
I said, so the field will never have to be increased again, and there was no reason not to.
If I comped it, it would be smaller than what they had to begin with.
So, improving anything is probably a mistake. They make their money by billing hours for petty changes.
If I were the owner, I might be thinking that not having to change the field again and again cost $$$ in billing hours.

All I have to do with my site is to make it look prettier, and to figure out the best way to make money with it.

It seems like it's pretty much good to go.
I need to test it for the kind of people who'll be using the site though.
They will be deep country folk, probably with dial up connection and low-computer skills.

I'm not using our internet connection because its being dominated.
The phone and cable I could care less about.
However, I picked up a wireless router at CompUsa on the way home.
Since the internet is down, I can't set it up.
Mikey said he'll set it up, SO, I'm going to let him.
Its not enough to just want something.
If you want something, but aren't willing to work for it, you must not want it very badly.
Besides, the router should set up easily.
I've done my transactions over the net...not the way I'd like to have done them...but at least their in.
So, I'm happy.

These two hour projects leave no time for anything extra.
I may be terribly misplaced at M2.
1) You have to fudge everything. They only think they have a test system.
2) You rarely see a screen that immulates production.
When I've set up test systems,
- They've had a whole day's worth of data that can be replayed, 
- A pathway system where a screen can be displayed and sent and a server can be debugged

Anything but entering raw data through notepad, then sending it through a program.
I'm back in the stone ages as far as work goes.

AND, I'm not going to get anytime to improve it.

The last hour of working in this quiet place just draaaaaaaaaaagggggggggssssssssssss on.

I wanna snore so bad.
I'm going to swing by and pick up a "D-Link DI 524 AirPlus G High Speed 2.4 Ghz wireless Router" on the way home.

With a name like that...it's gotta be worth $20...haha.

That's how I'd describe this trip.
People are either happy or crabby. They're sane or insane.
I'm both glad and sorry I came here.

My most recent pain is my roomie, who hasn't had wired internet in a long time.
He insisted on it before I even took off, and instead of getting wireless we got wired internet for ONE user.
That one user could have been my PC that could share the internet.
His laptop didn't even work using wired internet.
Wired internet is more difficult than wireless. Technology is working its way away from wiring codes.
I brought hardware that won't work. We have the WRONG cable modem.

 

By his expressing a desire to go backwards in time to a setup that everyone is getting away from,
I'm burning out trying to figure out if we can still do it and it's going to get expensive.
In other words:
- We have one internet connection.
- We are living in a apartment so we can't drill holes in the walls for wires.
- We don't have a shared internet connection device of any type unless its my PC that's setup for it.
- I don't think what he wanted can be done with out one.
I based my thoughts on being able to share a dedicated connection on Paul's cable modem.
It was probably designed for internet sharing, which is why he had an extra port on his bridge.
I'm having to connect to the internet through a connection we pay for,
I'm connecting though my neighbors internet connection. 
I'm doing it on a bar stool with my ass hanging out in the kitchen.
I rely on the internet for my finances and my knowlege. I spend at least 3 hours a day learning, and reading.
I almost never play games on it. I need this, my bills are back in Vegas, not here.
And I'm having to pray my neighbor doesn't move.
For this, I'm sorry we came. This internet is going to cost me dearly.
I get every day, and I write code for LVDUDE. Now I can't do that in comfort.
If I don't finish it, it'll cost me a lot money.
And LVDUDE is path for early retirement.

It's a great apartment. What isn't great is our furniture. I guess it's always best to buy furniture for the place you are moving into.
I'm hoping we'll finally get a chance to relax today.
They have a couple of pools, jacuzzi's, excersize rooms, and some gazebo's set up around the lake in back.

Ain't you 2 Becky?

To: 818 Renaissance Pointe #301, Alamonte Springs, Florida 32714
Today should be a real HOOT!

Truck Driving - $.25mi/6 days/10 hours/480da/2,880mi a weekAvg 48mph=$37,488 a year
Truck Owning - $.85mi/6 days/10 hours/480da/2,880mi a weekAvg 48mph=$127,488 a year
Current - $62,000
Mgm - $135,000

It would be:
Zombie: 1 a : a person held to resemble the so-called walking dead; b : a person markedly strange in appearance or behavior. One who has no will.
We are close to Haiti aren't we?

After Monday, all I'll need is a small nudge. It won't take much. I need to read my contract.

I went to get some coffee.
Standing there next to the coffee pot and putting sugar in his tea was the second highest up guy, Dave.
I said with a smile: "HEY, YOU'RE DAVE. I'M JIM. I'M YOU'RE NEW PROGRAMMER!".
He said: "uh huh". I felt worse than if I'd farted in a plastic chair in church during prayer.
The guy didn't even offer me a handshake. He didn't even look at me.
Two people, ONLY TWO PEOPLE, have had the decency to give me eye contact when I first met them.
The grumpiness doesn't appear to be just in my group. 
Everyone in that building seems grumpy.
I hope that kind of courteousy doesn't rub off on me.
If I become that way, I'm joining Skip.
I hate when I miss the opportunity for making a new friend.
I've learned so much by being friendly.
We are social creatures. Until we learn to self replicate, our race can't survive outside of a colony.

I suggested an obvious change in M2's environment that would save time....
- They are logging on as someone else then back to themselves just to see a report.
- Instead of just making a simple change to allow programmers to see the reports they generate

.

And instead of fixing this obvious oversight, I get, nah...we're used to doing things a certain way.

So this is Tandem hell.
'We're used to beating our clothes with rocks to wash them.'  

Who am I to say the world could be a better place.
I'll make things better for myself then.
This version of Guardian has more security holes in it than I have pores on my face.