Emerging From The Other Side of Busyville

Sorry about the lack of posting. Things have been amazingly busy lately. For the past few weeks, I've had to do actual work at work during the day, as we were getting ready for our annual Convention, and at night I've either had a class to go to or TV shows to catch up on (damn you, Heroes, Lost, My Name Is Earl, Smallville, and Survivor!!!). The need to keep the Netflix DVDs moving hasn't helped either.

But the Convention's over now and I have a week off from class (thanks to Columbus Day), so I've found myself a bit o' time to work with.

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I started classes at JHU CCI on Sept. 25. For the next 8 months, I'll be there every Monday and Wednesday night. Except for this week, because the school was closed on Columbus Day and they decided it wasn't worth throwing off the weekly schedule so they cancelled the Wednesday class too, and Christmas week.

So far it's going well. The first night, I could have taught the class myself, but since then I've been learning all kinds of stuff. Right now, we're learning design concepts, like the Golden Section. Eventually, we'll be tackling the programs in-depth. I have a good feeling that these classes are going to help tremendously.

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M and I had our first wedding anniversary the Sunday before last. We celebrated by going back to the restaurant that we got married in. I was going to have the ever-popular Shrimp Creole again, but they don't have it anymore.

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I was in Chicago this past weekend for our annual Convention. I did the following things while not doing work-related stuff:

* Took pictures of the Sears Tower and the John Hancock building, because the gazillion pictures I've taken of these two buildings during my last 2 or 3 visits to the Windy City were apparently not enough.
* Went to the Kinzie Chophouse. Twice.
* Watched Batman Begins on the hotel TV.

I was a few blocks from the Sears Tower (I think), and I didn't go. I did go 20 years ago, so it's not like I've never been. Still, I probably shouldn't have opted for the nap on Friday afternoon.

Back to The Scene of The Crime

I made a post earlier that never made it through the publishing process, due to some wonkiness somewhere in the post's journey along the Information Superhighway.

I won't go through re-typing the whole thing again, since it really wasn't all that interesting. It can basically be boiled down to: We went back to the restaurant we got married in (first time since the wedding), the wait staff all recognized us, I could have had yummy Shrimp Creole (a fan favorite during the wedding), but chose not to, due to time constraints and portion sizes too voluminous for my appetite at the time.

Also we, saw Wallace and Gromit and The Curse of The Wererabbit after dinner. It was a very good movie.

Edit: The missing post finally made blogfall when this post published. I guess I just needed to send something else through to dislodge the blockage. I deleted the earlier post, due to redundancy.

Two Years and Counting

On October 17, 2003, I opened up my e-mail to find a message from Match.com. It was a notification that I had received a Wink from a young lady, the profile of whom was provided so I could decide whether or not to respond. I decided to respond, but further decided to wait a few days until my head cold made me a little less loopy. When I finally had my wits about me, I sent her an e-mail through Match, telling her that her Wink had brightened my day.

The officiant at our wedding made a reference to that little sentiment.

Happy anniversary, Sweetpea!

Greetings From Niagara Falls

Hey all. Thought I'd just check in to keep things current.

I'm at an internet kiosk at the Marriott Fallsview on the Canadian side. We have a room with a spectacular view of the Falls. Pretty sweet.

A longer description will be provided once I get home. I only bought 20 minutes access here, and I still need to do my Southwest online check-in tonight at midnight.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention before that we ended up too tired to go see Serenity on our wedding night. We ended up having dinner with family instead. A better time was had, I think. We also canceled plans to see Serenity on Sunday night so we could hang out with M's sister. We're hoping to see it when we get home tomorrow.

OK, definitely gotta go now!

The Wedding

This is my first post as a married man.

OK, first thing's, first: I went with the Star Wars music. The consensus among those in attendence is that it was a very good choice. There was a slight snafu wherein the music did not come on when it was supposed to. And when it did come on, the volume was too low. I started making a thumbs-up gesture to the girl managing the wedding to bump up the volume, but she thought I was just giving the thumbs-up indicating approval at first. So the first few seconds of the music was kinda quiet. Otherwise, it went over very well. The Star Wars geeks in attendence really loved it. One told me that I was her hero.

Now, going backwards in time a little. I ended up cutting it really, really close as far as my planned arrival time was concerned. I wanted to get there at 10:45 or 10:50 at the latest. I got there at 10:55 or so. As it turned out, Margaret was at the Zodiac (the restaurant where we got married) until a little after 10:50, so it ended up working out I was a little late, since I wasn't supposed to see her before the wedding.

Once I got there, I was so focused on getting the CDs up and running, helping my soon-to-be cousin-in-law get the flowers to the appropriate people, and hobnobbing with relatives, that I managed not to let the impending event sink in and freak me out. Of course, I did insist on putting "Going To The Chapel" at the end of the pre-ceremony CD, so that kinda drove it all home at the last minute.

So the ceremony went well (except for the minor glitch with the Star Wars recessional), as did the reception. The choices for the buffet met with widespread approval (a couple of Karenworlders wanted to go back that night for more shrimp creole.)

We did have an unexpected change of plans, thanks to the photographer. Margaret had instructed him to just take candid shots, but he insisted on posing all kinds of pictures for a long time. So long, that we didn't get to spend as much time with friends and family as we would have liked, and the shrimp creole was all gone by the time we got to the buffet. The chef made us each a full plate of shrimp creole, so that worked out, but we couldn't get the lost time back. But on the plus side, we'll have a lot of pictures to remember the day by. So it will probably be a wash in the end.

All in all, the day went off very well indeed. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

The ring still feels a little weird on my finger, and it still feels a little unexpected when she refers to me as her husband. I'm sure that will all pass soon enough.

And Here We Are

I woke up this morning feeling something close to terror. It's the same feeling I get when I something important is happening that day, and my participation therein might make or break the success of it (company convention, job interview, now a wedding). I got over it once I was out of bed (which happened about 50 minutes after I woke up), and I had more pressing things to deal with, such as finding my flannel shirt to cover up because it was fa-reakin' cold in my bedroom.

The CDs are done, after numerous burnings and re-burnings as new and better ideas occurred to me. I have my dress shirt in the dryer, trying to get the wrinkles out. Somehow, my iron got sand in it, so ironing quickly proved to be the less desirable option for wrinkle removal. My other clothes are laid out and ready to be put on. I got a nice razor yesterday, so I should have an especially clean and close shave today. Now all I have to do is get ready!

So I'd better wrap this up. Especially since I just realized that I still have to pack some regular clothes for the next couple of days (staying at Margaret's apartment in the city tonight).

This will be my last post as a single guy. I'm outta here.

It Begins

I got an e-mail this morning from my Sweetie. The wedding officiant had sent her the schedule for the ceremony and some suggested stage directions, which she forwarded to me. And it was then that the freight train from Anxietytown finally smacked into me. The wedding has, at last, made the inevitable transition from Vague Future Event to Actual Impending Event.

I guess it's better that it happened at T minus 3 Days, rather than at T minus 3 minutes. Gives me some time to reign in the freaking out.

The Star Wars music thing

Here's where we stand on the topic of using the Throne Room March for the wedding recessional.

My brother: Don't do it, especially since it was already done at G$'s wedding (though he also used the Imperial March for the bridesmaids processional, so I'd only be half the Star Wars geek he was).
Dodi: On record in Ye Olde Comments section as thinking it would be very cool.
My Sweetie: Last I checked, was cool with the idea and encouraging me to do it. But...
My Sweetie's Co-worker: He's a big Star Wars geek, but, when told by her of my conundrum, he weighed in on the side of not doing it. He was afraid I'd think he sold me out by saying so, but I think no such thing. Not sure if this revelation has altered my Sweetie's opinion (the revelation that he votes against it, not the revelation that I hold no grudge).

So where am I on the debate? I stand by my statement in the comments section that it seems a bit militaristic, though I definitely agree with Dodi that it's also triumphant. An interesting (to me) thing is that I can't listen to that music and not hear Chewie growling towards the end (perhaps he's saying, "Why didn't I get a medal too?"). I know it's not really there, but I've seen that scene so many times (a conservative estimate would be 40 times) that it's impossible for me to not hear it in my head.

Not sure if that's a reason not to use it, especially since I'll probably be too busy hobnobbing with all the well-wishers by that point in the music to really be listening to it, but I do have to wonder if I want a Wookiee yelling in my head during the first minutes of my married life. I suppose there are worse ways to begin such a life.

The decision will be made soon. I probably won't tell, just to keep up the suspense.

Back by Kinda Popular Demand

A friend I've known since high school recently asked if I was still writing. I told him I wasn't, but that I was considering posting to my unused blog. He encouraged me to go ahead with that, so here we are.

So, what shall we talk about? I could talk about work. I don't think anyone at the office even knows what a blog is, so I should be safe. Still, I'm not taking my chances.

My big project right now is putting together the music for my upcoming wedding. A co-worker was kind enough to count down the days to my wedding on the calendar in my office, so I can see that I have 5 days to get that project done. I have most of the ambient reception music figured out, and maybe half of the dancing music. The bridal procession music has been selected, and I suppose the trial-run CD I made a few days ago is good enough to serve as the final product for that. The recessional music has yet to be determined. It's down to either Mendellson's traditional recessional march or the Throne Room March from the end of Star Wars. The future Mrs. Trackrick (I won't be using real names in this blog) is cool with either. I'm debating whether or not I am, in fact, a big enough geek to use the Star Wars music.

The other big news is that Serenity is finally coming out in theaters this Friday. I will not be able to see it until Saturday night at the earliest (I would be willing to see Serenity on my wedding night - I haven't consulted the future Mrs. TR on that one yet).

I should be excited by the Serenity release, but I'm not because I'm so nervous about how well it's gonna do in the box office. Good box office will mean sequels. Bad box office will probably mean no sequels and no resurrection of the Firefly series.

So I highly recommend that everyone within the sound of my voice goes to see Serenity at your local purveyor of motion pictures at least once.

2 hours later...

I tried posting the above, and couldn't get anything to go through. Was it due to high traffic on Blogger, as the high schoolers came home from school and posted about what went down that day? Who knows.

While I was waiting for the machinery to work again, I discovered that, had I heard about it sooner, I could have gotten a press pass to an advance screening of Serenity tomorrow (they were giving them out to bloggers). Not sure if my one previous post would have qualified me for such a pass, but it's academic now, because all showings in my area (in all areas, actually) have been filled to capacity.