My company, it appears, will actually be merged in a few days. We'll see how things shake out...I'm less optimistic than I used to be, because it appears that my boss, whom I really like, who was going to head the new, larger firm, may now end up being the coo, instead of the ceo. But I'm sure there's a reason behind the switch. I just hope I get the chance to show the larger firm what I'm capable of.

The power in my office was out from 8 this morning until 1:00 this afternoon. No phones, no computers, no lights. It took another two hours afterward to coax several servers back up from various errors. Altogether a pretty awful day.

At least I'm not living in Baghdad.

Disgusting

I hated Pombo before...I hate him even more now.

Whew. For the first time in several weeks, I wasn't shuttling stuff between my old house and my new one. But since my impromptu trip to NYC, I have somewhat fallen off the radar, both socially and news-wise. (I just found out, a week late, for instance, that Mr. O'Connell recently joined Mr. Arquette in the inspirational Roger Rabbit club.)

With all the stuff in the new house, my final insurmountable task loomed large Saturday morning. An enormous ladder had been placed in the backyard, and with the help of Kevin, we managed to get said ladder up to the second floor of my house. Ugh. Annoyed and sweaty, we gave up the attempt and I contemplated simply giving in and purchasing a stand-alone TiVo for the new house. After reading up online though, I discovered that regular TiVo units only have one tuner which is idiotic. For the same amount of money, I could build my own mythTV box and at least incorporate a couple different tuners. Being lazy, though, I really just wanted my DirecTV system to work.

Therefore, since I'd blown off unpacking (yes, I've just begun phase II of the Edward Moving Trilogy) on Friday night to drop Jenna off at the bus-stop (a mistake) and then watch Flight Plan with Leto (not a mistake...but I'll review the flick later) I decided to work a bit on unpacking, since the ladder experiment had failed utterly.

Yes, yes, the time is out of joint. Nevertheless, lunch and familial-related-events with the 'rents on Saturday were enjoyable, followed by events perhaps described as taking place earlier. In the end, I found myself at dinner with Fincher at Firefly followed by a nightcap of conversation with Helena on the walk home. Altogether, a pleasantly efficient day, despite the setbacks in the morning.

Sunday dawned cold, and with the help of one of my parental units, I was on top of my roof. With a tiny adjustment, DirecTV and TiVo were both back in business. Suddenly my earlier sloth seemed appropriate, as without the proper ladder (not too small, nor too tall) it would've been impossible to perform the adjustments. But now, with the satellite connection coming in strong, I felt suddenly tired. The last remaining means of procrastination had vanished, and the piles of unopened boxes in my room seemed slightly taller than before.

Nevertheless, I set to work opening, closing and moving boxes. Nothing helps attacking kipple quite like moving it around. Somehow, the very motion itself helps, almost as if it's a micro-level reaction mirroring the macro-level law about losing items when one moves from one house to another. I have no doubt that were I too keep moving boxes too and fro, eventually all would be empty.

Another movie, Lord of War, was attacked in the evening, again with Leto. I found it much better than Flight Plan, but I'll say no more until an official review comes up. The evening ended with an aborted trip to the old house, and more box shuffling, culminating finally with the enjoyment of the first two shows recorded by my TiVo in over two weeks. Thank you, Seth MacFarlane...

Tragic.

Regardless of Tillman's political ideology, his family deserves to know the truth. I found the media's focus on his enlistment annoying at first, disingenuous after his death, and just plain disgraceful after the cover-up became known. Every single American deserves the truth if their son or daughter has died serving their country.

(yes, yes, certain stars excluded)

The other day (while in NYC with Helena) I realized that I definitely prioritize certain lines of communication over others. Here's the list:

1. text messaging
2. e-mail
3. face-to-face contact
4. snail mail
5. cell phone
6. hard line - cordless
7. hard line - wired
8. a messenger

Obviously, #1 and #2 are simple to understand. Unles I'm riding my bike, watching a movie or in a non-cell-phone area (like certain parts of the rents' area), I almost always answer text messages within minutes. I'm a bit slower at #2, but it's still the best way to get in touch with me, because it gives me a bit of time to compose a reply at my leisure. #3 and #4 are actually almost tied, because the people I'd rather have face-to-face contact with are typically the people I'd enjoy a letter from. Those that I wouldn't enjoy face-to-face contact with, I'd still enjoy a letter from, which normally would mean #4 should be above #3. But that seemed disrespectful to the former group. #5 and #6 are again standard. If I'm going to talk to someone, far better it be on my cell than a phone with a wire. #7 really only applies to my office. I really don't like talking to people in my office on my work phone. #8 seems a little cryptic, so here's the explanation: I hate when people give me messages:

• A to give to other people
• B that are from another person

That, in my mind, is the lowest form of communication. So the weekend question to everyone is simply this: how do you rank your communication methods?

Drat. I found the perfect gift for Brad but it costs $1400...which is probably too much, even for a robot. We'll see if I can swing it.

When Helena informed me a few weeks ago she'd be back in town, I thought to myself that I'd have a good time. Sure enough, over the past several days, between a knock-down drag-out affair for Brad and several days of hanging with Helena, it's been great.

But yesterday was even better.

The reason Helena came to town was to hit a few meetings for work; unfortunately her office also wanted to send her to NYC for a pair of back to back ones which meant she'd blow the entire day on a plane just going back and forth. So she asked if I was up for a road trip.

I was.

With that in mind, we popped in the cooper early Wednesday morning (after I ensured that everything at work was smoothly running) and headed north on 95. At our first stop, I managed to snag The Enormous Omelet Sandwich which was extremely tasty. Later, I got a crash course in air toxins just in time for us to drive through the scenic state of New Jersey. Finally we got to spend some quality time inside the Lincoln tunnel. Ugh.

After I dropped Helena off at her first meeting in midtown, I made three or four loops before finding a perfect parking spot a mere two blocks away from my first destination: the guggenheim. I'd only made it through the front door before, but this time, with the museum no longer under construction, I made it to the ticket counter. Ugh. Almost a full jackson later, I was spinning up the spiral for their latest exhibit entitled Russia!.

It was actually a great exhibit. I've never been a fan of early Russian art, but there were tons of pieces I enjoyed from other periods. Near the very end, I caught a tiny triptych of pieces by Francisco Infante-Arana that were amazing.

I emerged from the Wright masterpiece to a sunny, perfectly cool day. A couple of books by Nabokov in hand, I headed into Central Park to explore. Almost an hour later, having traversed almost 3/4 the length of the park, I found a series of rocks near the southern end to tackle my two books. Some significant sunshine later, Helena called to tell me her meetings were over.

Because of bad traffic, we ended up approaching MoMA with only an hour left to go before closing time. One quick look at the price tag left us numb, so we retreated to the safety of the design shop across the street where Helena, with expert eyes, picked out something interesting: a glasses case. I looked it over, noticed that it was the same color scheme as my car's interior, and then discovered it was no ordinary case. Instead, it was a jacob's ladder! Combined with Helena's earlier purchase of comfortable shoes, we were prepared to stroll back to the vehicle. On our way north, we happened to run into an old college friend who was going to tutor a kid in music. He seemed somewhat skeptical of our explanation for why we were in NYC, when I lived in the district and Helena was showing the west-coast some love, but it was good to see him regardless. Even in a big city, you can always run into someone you know.

Once we'd changed into our evening attire, we walked down Madison Avenue to find an establishment to eat. Luckily, we avoided several tempting prospects, eventually setting on one particular one with good ambiance and reasonable prices. Some tasty Italian food later, we rolled out with a black-and-white cookie and some ice cream. A perfect ending to a perfect day.

Of course, there was still the matter of the four-hour drive home, but some caffeinated products later, we were back in the district. The less crowded, less-smoky, less-fashionable, less-expensive, less-ostentatiously-rich, less represented capital city of America.

Ruben, once again, is hilarious:

I might have added "San Francisco has disastrous earthquake" as a card, but the t-bill/china one is good too.