Mr. Mosquito,

I would like to thank you for finding refuge in my eye socket. I know that the world can be a harsh place, and it gives me a sense of self-worth to know that my eye can be a secure location for you. I hope you enjoyed your stay. Come back any time.

-Me

Well, now that the dust is settling, I think it's high time I clue everyone in on what I've been up to this week.

Some of you may have seen my Facebook status updates about moving, but have no clue where or why. For that, you need a little back story.

Sometime a couple of months ago, my buddy Efren mentioned that he was looking to get an apartment and was asking me for recommendations. I pointed him towards a couple of different places, but after thinking about it and talking with Emily, I decided to offer splitting a 2 bedroom with Efren, thereby saving us both some cash. He was excited at the offer, and we started the process shortly after that.

Sometime in the middle of November, we took a visit to The Bordeaux and looked at the one unit they had open (2 bed/2 bath). We were both pleased with the apartment and with the terms, so we ended up applying. This last Monday, we met at the leasing office here and signed our lease and started the move-in right away. I had scheduled Wednesday through Friday off to handle moving out of my old place and cleaning it to avoid losing my deposit, but I ended up working Monday evening and Tuesday evening to get the primary necessities (is that redundant?) moved.

During the move, I had to terminate my internet service at the old place and schedule an installation of it at the new place. Luckily, I was able to get AT&T's uVerse service for $20 less than I was paying for the same speed DSL each month. The installation was scheduled for sometime between 1:00PM and 3:00PM on the 3rd, which was Thursday, but the installer didn't call to say he was on the way until sometime after 6:00PM. I had a lot of packing and moving and cleaning stuff to get done at the old place and had planned to head back over there to do just that after 3:00PM, since the internet would have been installed. But no, I didn't get back over there until sometime after 7:00PM. Grr.

Well, the kinks have all been worked out and Efren and I have moved in to the new place. I still have about 4 Rubbermaid tubs to unpack yet, but after spending all of today cleaning I just have no motivation to touch it. I told Emily that I would get it all done tomorrow morning, but I don't know that I'll get all of it done. We'll see.

So yeah, that's it in a nutshell. I'll get some pictures of this new place after I get everything unpacked. If you're in Houston and would like to see the place though, let me know.

(12:14:04 PM) Teddy: there are plenty of steakhouses
(12:14:18 PM) Skudd: in texas? pfft
(12:14:20 PM) Skudd: i don't believe you

Last night I didn't sleep too well; I kept waking up from some really awkward dreams. One of these dreams was incredibly disturbing though, and I feel like sharing it with you.

In the dream, my Dad, a friend -- a young black man who happened to be a county police officer -- and I were driving down I-65 in Indiana, and we were in heavy traffic. At some point we noticed that the traffic was becoming quite erratic, in that some cars were pulling off to the side of the highway while others were speeding up to very dangerous speeds. In order to keep up with traffic, we accelerated and pulled out to the front of the group of cars where we noticed a roadblock.

Because we had no choice, we stopped the car and the police officers who were running the roadblock pulled us from the car and told us to get far far away from it. My Dad and I were really confused, but we saw that our friend was talking on his radio, calling for backup. He was obviously very disturbed, so this was a serious issue.

Shortly after that, I saw the other officers close up a steel box around our car, and sparks started to fly. As this progressed, I could hear screaming and cries of fear, but something wasn't right with them: They were my screams.

I looked around me to see what was really going on, and I saw a young lady (no idea who she was) absolutely terrified by the sounds of her own screams. But what was weird about her terror was that it was being shown by her jumping around; In her face and voice she was as calm as could be. This all escalated to the point that nothing but the screams could be heard, and everyone fled the area.

At that point it had my adrenaline up so high that I had to wake up and walk around the apartment to calm down. I'm a firm believer that dreams can be used by our own bodies to highlight areas we may have overlooked previously, or by God to show us areas we need focus on improving, or to show us answers to questions we may have asked about our day to day life. This dream doesn't fit any of those categories though, and it has me really confused. Usually I am able to trace a dream back to something I had seen or done before, but not this. About all that is consistent with anything I've done is the crazy traffic (yay Houston!).

At any rate, there's an awkward read for you. It might make a good sci-fi film if anyone wants to expand on it.

If you've been watching my Facebook status at all over the last month or so, you've seen that I have taken an interest in learning Russian. I don't know why, but it's this strong burning desire.

I have been dabbling with various resources, including Rosetta Stone, and just haven't been able to feel good about learning the language. Nothing really seemed to provide any feedback on how I was doing, any explanation of the phrases I was reading or speaking, or any pronunciation keys. It was all very frustrating.

Last night as I was taking Emily home after having dinner with her parents, I mentioned that I was going to work on my Russian a bit today. She said she had to show me something before I left her place, and I'm glad she did.

She had me look at the Houston Public Library website with her, and they have a section on learning other languages. In their list of resources was a link to Livemocha, an e-learning site with a focus on languages. Here's an excerpt from their "about us" page:

Livemocha is an exciting e-learning Web 2.0 startup founded by a group of experienced and successful entrepreneurs based in the Seattle area. Livemocha addresses a $20 billion worldwide language learning market fueled by rapid globalization, immigration and travel. Livemocha is a first of its kind web based language learning solution integrating online instructional content with a global community of language learners. Livemocha is a venture funded company backed by Maveron, a leading Seattle based venture firm with tremendous consumer and e-learning expertise.

In the last 14 hours, I've been able to complete lessons 1 and 2 of Russian 101, and I'm feeling good about it now.

If you're looking to learn a new language, I highly recommend Livemocha. It's free for learning one language.

I've made it to day #6 now with the no caffeine and things are going pretty well.

I have only had minor headaches (until yesterday for other reasons) due to the caffeine withdrawal, and aside from that I'm sleeping like a baby at night. I have started taking vitamin B12 in the mornings with my blood pressure medicine, which seems to have helped with the missing "kick" I'd get from my morning cup of coffee or soda.

I have been craving some caffeine but only because of the prevalence in the beverage market; everything is caffeinated. Otherwise, it's been vitamin water, regular water, and the occasional caffeine-free soda ever since last Tuesday.

I made a quick mention about this on Facebook today, but let me give you the rundown.

Sometime this weekend (don't ask what day because they all blurred together) when Emily and I were at lunch, the topic of my shaking came up. She suggested that my shaking may be caused by the amount of caffeine I consume on a regular basis, so I took that as a challenge.

I personally don't think that the caffeine is at fault, but to prove this I suggested that I go without for some time. After I decided that a week should be sufficient, Emily threw down and said that she didn't think I could go a week without caffeine. With that, I called her bluff and raised it to 2 weeks.

My research since then has shown that the symptoms of caffeine withdrawal typically fade after 9 days, so 2 weeks should indeed be a valid goal for this.

However, I am feeling the effects already, even after going just 36 hours without a caffeinated beverage.

The rules to this game are simple: No caffeine shall be consumed at all for 14 days, regardless of the pains associated with the detoxification. If after the 14 days are over the tremors are still present, I will have eliminated that as a suspect and proven my ability to stick to such a decision.

As you may remember me mentioning in an earlier post, I have been going to the gym twice a week for a while now. Each time I go, I meet with a trainer for 30 minutes, then I do 20-30 minutes of cardio.Looking at the calendar, I have been keeping up with this for just over a month now.

People have asked me if I am seeing any results yet, but up until the other morning I have answered with a "no". Now, I can look in the mirror and see that I am getting rid of some of the flab and that my body is coming back into a nice form. Also, I have been feeling better, eating less, and I have lost about 6 pounds.

I hope that within the next couple of months I will be able to squeeze into my pants a little easier and that maybe I'll be able to sit with my doctor and see about getting off this stupid blood pressure medicine.

Hooray for health!

If you read the previous entry, I imagine you're wondering how it's going between me and this lady. Well, I'm not going to give you any explicit detail, but I would like to say that it seems to be going very well at the moment. :)

That is all.

For the last several months, I've been planning to take a trip to Indiana to visit my Dad for his birthday. I did the same for my Mom back in November for her birthday. The only difference this time though was that it was kept a secret from my Dad the entire way.

When I ordered the plane tickets a couple of months ago, I told my sisters to keep it quiet because I didn't want Mom or Dad to know about it until I showed up. A couple of weeks later though, Mom sent me an e-mail and reminded me when Dad's birthday was, and asked if I had any plans of something to do for him. Well crap, I had to spill the beans to her. I made her understand though that nobody else was to know, especially not Dad. She did well.

I landed in Indy around 7:00 local time this evening, and as I was making my way out of town I got a call from my Dad. He asked if I got the message he sent me on the instant messenger, and I told him I hadn't because I was out driving around (not a lie - I was driving around). I got off the phone with him and continued my journey to their house. By the time I got there, he was done for the day and was half asleep in front of the TV.

I don't think he really realized at first that I was really here, but as he woke up he certainly did. After a big hug from him and Mom both, we ate dinner, then Dad and I sat and talked for a couple of hours.

So far it has been a nice surprise for him, and I hope that the other happenings this weekend will be just as nice for him. :D