CruizerBlog

Grrr

Gee, thank God for windy days, right?
So what has He blessed us with today? Oh! 30 mph winds! Yay!
So far that has completely blown away one tombstone, broken 2 others, and bent the stakes on the other. It's ripped off all the fake cobwebs that I put on the house. And it's taken down part of my homemade spiderweb that I always put so much time into.
And trick-or-treating is tonight, ans the wind isn't supposed to let up, so i might as well forget about the fog machine.

Gee Thanks. *insert pissed off face here*

imagine...

This day just keeps getting better. There are people in costumes everywhere! I don't know what sparked this, because no one has dressed up for Halloween in the years past! But imagine this, 3 of the Exec. Staff are dressed up; one as Darth Vader, one as Casper the Ghost, and one as the Devil. The entire executive staff has been in a meeting all morning. Imagine having to be in that meeting, arguing with the Devil or Darth Vader! How could you keep a straight face? Or would you be intimidated?

Halloween at Work

So I get into work today, and I turn the corner, and there is standing Darth Vader. Scared the PISS outta me. Well he didn't light saber me, so I was all good. So I'm sitting at my desk, and walks by a pregnant nun. Since then, I have seen a lady in a poodle skirt, a gypsie, and captain hook.

All I have on is a pumpkin shirt. I shoulda worn my costume....

Weekend Wrap-up

I've come to the conclusion that I have absolutely no time to rest. Wehn I an mot working or in school, I have so much other stuff that needs done, I don't have the time to do it all. This weekend was no exception.

Friday:
After work I went to work and did an apprasial. then Christina and I went o her frieds' friends house for a bonfire, food, gathering thing. It was alot of fun, although I only knew 3 people of the 20 there. We went on a hayride that night as well, for $5 it was well worth it. About a 30 minute ride, and alot of the women with us were very scared. Apparently on Halloween Night, they have the headless horeman out there. I'd like to see that.

Saturday:
We got up about mid-morning and went to the office so I could finish the paperwork for the friday apprasial. Then we visited a few Halloween decorations stores, again. We're still not done decorating. Afterwards we drove 2 hours to Ft. Wayne for some haunted houses. We went to The Haunted Cave first. It was pretty good, one of the best decorated we have experienced I believe. We paid $7 to get in, a $1 off coupon we got from the web, and $1 off for bringing in a canned food item. We were in the house for about 30 minutes total. That's a pretty long time. Then we went to The Haunted Castle, which included the Black Forest and Pharoh's Revenge. We hit the Black Forest first. It was about a mile ling total, wither people here and there, and a few shacks to go through. Not to bad, about 45 minutes to walk the whole thing. Then we went to the Haunted Castle. While we were in line, it started pouring, I mean absoulte downfall. Fortunately we were under a tent. The house was more like a funhouse than a haunted house. Probably about 40 minutes to complete. Alot of things that messed with your brain, that caused you to lose your sense of balance and direction. A bit of crawing as well. We were eveywhere between the basement and the very top of the ceiling. The house had 3 slides in it as well. One place where you were put in a coffin, and then you felt it turn,. and you came out in a different room. Another area, you laid down in a coffin, and when they closed the lid, the bottom on one side came out, and it turned into a slide. All in all, pretty cool. Pharoh's Revenge was so-so. It was pretty long, but mostly a maze were you had to try and find the treasure room. There was a right and a wrong path. The wrong took you to the exit. We we found the treasure, and got some fake gold coins that were able to be used at the food stands.

Sunday:
Sunday we went to brunch with nmy family, then i spent the rest of the day outside. Christina and I cleared the yard of leaves. Then I worked on the decorating some more. I now have the start of my toxic waste area. When it got dark, we carved our pumpkins. Then I finally got to relax as we watched some sucky movie on CBS.

Wind

Why is it, that EVERY time you are using a leaf blower on the lawn, the wind MUST insist that it be blowing the OPPOSITE direction of which you are blowing the leaves?

Pictures!

Oh My! You won't believe it! I am actually putting up pictures!
Here are the pictures from when we went to Fright Fest Last Weekend.

New Work Computer

I finally got a new computer at work! The old one would lock up every time I got am e-mail, it was so bad. But after about 2 years worth of groveling, whining, and complaining, I fonally got one.
Although it's nothing special, it is a GREAT improvement over the old one. It is a 3.0Ghz P4 with hyperthreading technology, has 512 DDR RAM, and a 35Gb hard drive. I don;t get that one. But the cool parts are the ATi Radeon 9800 Video Card with 256Mb RAM! And the 19" flat panel monitor. I am the first person who doesn't work in the IT department to get one!

Weekend Update

My weekend was so short, I barely had any time to think.
Friday we didn't do much, went out to eat at Smokey Bones, then went home and watched Cat in the Hat. Bleh.
Saturday we went to Six Flags Great America's Freight Fest. On the radio on the way there, they said we were at record lows for October. Go figure. It was all of 45 degrees and pretty windy. We froze most of the day, but had alot of fun none-the-less. We rode pretty much all of the rides that we wanted too, and made it to both of the haunted houses. Then still left before park closing, which is very odd, usually there are so many people, you can't get done everything you want to.
Sunday was paintball. We started at 9AM, and it was all of 36 degrees. The paintballs didn't even splat when they hit, they just kinda blobbed. There was only six of us, but it was still alot of fun. We played quite a few games in a short amount of time. Afterwards, when I got home, I changed the oil on the truck, as well as the plugs and wires. When I went to change the filer, to my surprise, the truck already had a K&N filter on it! I was excited! So I took the newly bought filter back, and bought the K&N filter recharge kit. The I continued setting up my yard decorations. We lost a tombstone in the wind on saturday, and other one was ripped off it's stake, but Christina managed to find that one. I'm still not done with the yard, so I haven't taken pictures yet. I used my homemade cobweb spinner (example here), which is really freaking cool, and works quite well! But none of the blacklight glowing stuff works like I wanted it to. After it got dark, I then baked cookies for work, and we watched The Day After Tomorrow.
Then it was bedtime. *whew* I never even got to sleep in this weekend!

Decorating

As some of you may know, I am a finatic when it comes to decorating for Halloween and Christmas. Well for the last week, I have been in my yard almost everyday decorating. Adding things, moving things, rearranging. I don't think I'm ever happy. The lighting has got me really stumped this year. I try not to set things up the exact same all the time, but it seems I have creative differences with myself when I do. So alot of stuff has been moved back to where it was last year. I have added more, of course, but I am not done yet. I have a few tricks up my sleeve before I take pictures for you all.

Also, you know that torn up netting stuff you see all over at haunted houses? Anyone know where I can get some??

More idiot drivers

Since I went on a rant about this guy on friday, I might as well share my saturday experience with you.
So it's saturday evening, and Christina and I are heading to Statesville Haunted Prision, as mentioned yesterday. We are in Illinois, heading westbound on I-80. The road just went fron 6 lanes down to 4, two on each side. The speed limit is 65, and I am doing about 85 in the fast lane, because I am passing people in the slow lane. I see this truck come up, he obvisouly moving faster than I was. When he comes up to me, he flashes his lights. OK, who the F*$& are you to think that you are so God Dammned F&*%($# special that I should move out of your way so that you can continue on ahead of me. I am already going fast, I am currently passing cars, and you can wait until I am done passing and get over when I please. (Mind you, I think it is a kind gesture that when you are in the fast lane, and there are no cars in the slower lane next to you, that when a faster car comes up, that you get over and let them pass. I do it all the time. In many states, it is illegal to be blocking traffic in the fast lane if there is no traffic in the slow lane, Illinois is one of those states.) So out of spite, I contine my same speed, and stay in the fast lane after I have passed all the cars. He flashes his lights again. Grrrrrrrr. We are comming up to a slower car now, who is in the fast lane. I get over to pass. Truck sees the slower car, and gets over as well. He again flashes his lights. Now this whole time he is pretty much right on my bumper as well. As I pull up next to the slow moving car in the fast lane, I slam on the brakes. This takes us down to about 75 mph, about the speed of the slow moving car. Trucks headlights dip, so I know he locked up his brakes as well. Truck backs off a little. The slow moving guy slows down some more, letting us pass. I stay in the slow lane, truck hammers it and goes around me, I flip him off. I hammer it and get behind the truck. Then I turn on my brights. I realize that he is in a big truck, and I am in a little Cavelier, so this may not be working. So I start flashing my lights at him. Bright, dim, bright, dim, bright, dim, we come up to another car, I stop flashing, pass the car, I start again. After a few minutes the guy apparently gets pissed, and whips over into the slow lane, and hits the brakes. As I pass him, I wave screaming "what, you don't like it either a&&%^#@!? Annoying, isn't it!?" Christina just says "Oh Great!" The truck proceedes to get behind us. I slow back down to about 85 (as the truck was doing 90 or so), and continue on my merry way. The truck stayed behind us for about 10 minuts or so; no tailgating, no flashing of the lights, just following. Then I saw him get over into the exit lane. I slowed down to let him pass, and flipped him off one more time for good measure. I hope he learned he's nobody special, and that flashing of the lights is just rude and inconsiderate, as well as annoying.

Another Good Weekend

I love October because it meens Haunted Houses are open!
This weekend was no different, we love to do haunted houses, and so we did. Friday night, I worked after work, so we didn't have ALL evening, so we staued local. We went to a haunted house in Crown Point called Halls Of Horror. Now I haven't been to this particular place in about 5 years. But I found it while using HauntedHouseChicago.com, it was rated the #2 haunted house last year. It was much better than I remembered it. And what seemed very long as well, I didn't think it would end! Lots of good effects and scenery there. And got a few jumps outta us.
Saturday night, we drive about an hour to Joliet, IL for Statesville Haunted Prision, which also included City of the Dead. It was $25 a piece, but worth every penny. Definately the best haunted attraction we went to so far this year! Long and very well done, we really enjoyed ourselves there. Then we drove about another half hour to Aurora for Nightmares: Basement of the Dead. This one was kinda eh. It was ok, but not very well done. You walked in alot of dark halls, then you would come to a room, more dark halls, then another room, etc. Pretty much no one jumping out at you. Not worth the full admission price IMO.

Idiot Drivers

About got taken out this morning...And I am still fuming! Driving to work, minding my own business today. I am on Rt. 12, the section where it is only 2 lanes. There is a guy in a white truck in front of me, doing 40 on a 45. Then there's me, and behind me a brown car. The guy in the white truck decideds to make a right hand turn. This guy drives slow, and turns even slower, we all know the type. Well we're almost at a complete stop while this guy is turning, and something in the rear view mirror catches my eye. I look uo into it, and there is a red Dodge Ram (newer one) PASSING ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE ROAD! Now mind you this is your typical highway, about 2ft. of pavement past the white line, then about 2ft of gravel, and then grass. So this guy has his left tires on pavement, and his right tires on grass! Directly across the intersection in front of us, the landscaping turns into a valley about 4ft. deep about 2ft past the side of the highway gravel. As soon as the guy in the white truck clears my path, I gun it. The guy in the red Dodge Ram mearly misses the white truck by milimeters! And he's already doing about 30mph. Well I take my truck and inch it towards him, in an effort to run him into that valley, or in hopes he'll hit my truck (I need a paint job on that side anyways). Well this guy has the BALLS to flip ME off! Since he had a pretty good jump on me, and a more powerful engine he managed to get buy without incident, and then just took off down the road. Well he got ahead of me pretty good, but ended up catching a couple lights in Michigan City, well enough where I could still see him. He turned into the construction parking lot at Blue Chip casino. If I wasn't a scrawny little wuss, I would followed him in and beat his ass.

People like this need to be shot. Come to find out that he cut off a couple of my coworkers as well when he made his way into town. I am still fuming so bad I am shaking...

Things you don't wanna do....

Unfortunately yesterday, I resigned from the fire dept board of directors, and as a member of the fire department itself. I really didn't want to do it, I sincerely enjoy being there, and the friends I have made there. I did it because I no longer have the time to be of any use to the fire dept. Working 2 jobs and taking 3 classes has taken up all my time. Especially school. I haven't made an actual fire call in months, and I struggle to make the monday trainings. I was on the dept for about 6 years. I was the senior member at my station, though I wasn't an officer by choice. I've been through 4 different cheifs, one of them twice. And I was directly invloved with the merger of the old Lake Eliza dept with Boone Grove to form Porter Township Fire Dept. I was upset when I called, and the president of the board was unhappy to see me go, but understood that my education came first. If things settle back down after I graduate, perhaps I'll be back.

Weekend

Had a pretty good weekend.
Friday, I worked until 10:30 (yes at night) nothing exciting there.
Saturday was a busy day though. We left the house at like 8:30 in the morning, then we drove to Lowell, where I had to take some pics for the apprasials I did friday night. Then we travelled downstate Indiana to West Lafayette, to go to the Feast of the Hunters Moon. On the way we picked up my friend Scott, and were there from about 10 to 4. While there, I had Buffalo Stew, a Buffalo Burger, Vinesen Ribs, Rock Candy, Buffalo Chips, and we got a big bottle of real homemade Rootbeer. Afterwards we hung at Scotts place for about an hour, then took off back upstate Indiana. We went to Gary to grab one of Christina's friends, then headed up North past Chicago to Melrose Park, Illinois, where we went to Dream Reapers Haunted House. It was opening day, and being early October, there was practically no wait. So we got in and out fairly quickly. We hung outside for a bit and socialized with one fo the Physic Ward escapees, who tried to take off with Christina's friend Sandra. After we left there, we decided the night was still young, and headed to Hammond, Indiana to go to Reapers Realm Haunted House. We did the Triple Dare, and it was much better than Dream Reapers, IMO. Again, no lines, so we were in and out fairly quick. Then back to Gary to drop off Sandra, and then back home. We were home at about 10:30, and we had put almost 350 miles on the car.

Sunday was a lazy day, all we did of effort was go to my sisters and get out hair cut. The rest of the day we lounged around on the couch, and watched Episodes V and VI of the Star Wars Trilogy.

October

Welcome to October! October is prolly my favorite month next to December. I get stupid overly excited about halloween. My sister and I usually have a best decorated house contest. My parents always call it a draw though. I've already bought my halloween costume, and I am so ready to decorate the yard. Haven't decided if I am going to do the 30' spider web yet. That takes alot of time, as I do it all by hand. Thinking of upgrades I can do to the graveyard as well.