While I have had a good bit of good things happening in my life lately, there have been several things that are really frustrating me. These range from stupid code-related issues at work all the way to turmoil in the government. I don't want to spend all evening detailing every little thing, but let me give you a taste of it, starting with the code.

I have been using jQuery in a lot of my project lately, thanks to Dustin's recommendation in a previous blog entry I can't seem to locate. At any rate, jQuery offers a user interface library that makes sprucing up your applications really easy. In the UI is a dialog "widget". While establishing the widget is really easy to do, styling it is nigh impossible. I spent about an hour on it this morning, which overlapped with our quarterly conference call at work, and I gave up in favor of the dhtmlwindow widget provided by another group entirely.

The government issues are pretty touchy for me right now. Now, I have been given a lot of names according to my beliefs and values, some as demeaning as "redneck" or "hick", and others downright shameful, such as "bigot" or "racist". I'm sorry, but if you want to stereotype me, I believe I should be granted the same rights and liberties of labeling other groups and individuals according to their respective stereotypes. I mean, as you're reading this and thinking I'm being a whiney redneck republican, you're just as wrong as I am for asking for this right. Why? Because you're doing what I would like to, but are getting away with it.

Let's take this government thing further though. I'm sure you've seen the reports about the Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment report issued by the DHS over the last few days. What really irks me about this report is the fact that many of the claims they make in the report are unfounded, or at least have no cited references, but also that they are calling the beliefs that this country originally lived by propaganda. I mean, come on; "end times prophecies" are in the book that Christians call the "divine word". If I remember right, the pilgrims fled to what is now known as the U.S.A. to flee the religious restraints that the Church of England had on them, and to continue practicing Christianity. Thus, this "divine word" has a lot of historic value to the country: The USA would probably not exist as it does today without the belief of Christianity and that the Bible is truth in its prophecies. So why are those beliefs now being called radical or extremist?

I maintain that I am not associated with any single political party. However, many recent profiles on my beliefs have shown that I am "extremely republican". Let's set that label aside though. I just want to know why the "Leftwing Extremists" are not being placed under such fire? Do we really want this country to become the socialist nation it is heading towards? I said I would give the new president a chance, and I continue to do so, but it is very hard when these things are happening in our government. To date, I have yet to see any benefit from any of his choices and orders.

These things really frustrate me.

When I left Houston (I'm back, by the way), I dropped my car off at a long-term parking facility. The car sat there for about a week and a half, and everything was fine when I got back to it, sans one thing.

The car has had issues before with coolant being consumed somehow. I have never pin-pointed it, but I have had a suspicion that it was leaking from or near the water pump. My incident today confirms that it is the water pump.

I believe the shaft on said pump has a seal of some sort. When the car is running, this seal is exposed to hot coolant, which causes it to swell and create a better seal between the shaft and housing. When the car sits for a long period without being started, the seal dries up and shrinks, causing the car to lose the coolant.

Anyhow, what I walked up to was a wet spot under the front-right corner of my car. I assumed it had just rained or something, but in the back of my mind I knew it was coolant. The car started just fine, but there was an ugly light being displayed on the dash: The "low coolant" light. I had a little bit of pre-mixed anti-freeze in the trunk, so I just dumped it in. I hurried out of the parking facility, and stopped at the Shell station just down the street from the airport. After spending $15 on a jug of pre-mix, I was able to re-fill the reservoir on the car, and it was fine all the way back to the apartment.

I'll be checking things over in the morning before I head to work, but I suspect it will be just fine (for now). This is just one more reason I need a new car though. :)

Good lord, how far is this going to go?!

I was just sitting here watching a movie, and the group of brats that normally sits on the porch making noise late night weekends came storming up the stairs. One of them decided to jump down on his hands and knees in front of my window and plaster his face against said window, staring in at me. I yelled at him to go away, and he went and stood on the steps looking in for a bit.

I can appreciate the curiosity of kids, and the friendliness of Texas, but this is over the friggin' top!

This isn't the first time those kids have tried to cause a ruckus either. Last time they decided to annoy and startle me, they were messing with my bike (which is locked up on the porch, tied to the railing) and kept opening and closing my door.

At this point, I'm not quite sure how to handle it, aside from standing my ground. I'm tempted to take a trip down to the sports store and buy a baseball bat. I don't want to get violent with any of it, but if that's what it takes, that's what it takes.

I have a fair bit of expensive toys sitting here in my living room that would probably only entice them further to try to get in here. While I do have insurance and I am not too entirely attached to anything material I have (there are a couple of things with some sentimental value), I'm not about to have some falsely over-confident kid come in here to run off with my TV, XBox, or computers, especially not while I'm here.

The loud music problem started again this last weekend. I let it slide through Monday because of the holiday (I figured she may have had family in town, etc.), but I got on it right away after that.

This morning, on my way to work, I grabbed a copy of my lease from the leasing office. I read over it and saw that tenants were not to cause any disturbance, including loud music. When I got home from work, I saw that the neighbor's car was gone, but when I got up to my apartment I heard the music clearly.

I left it until 10:00, because I was watching movies and had some music playing as well. After that, I started down the list.

I first went to knock on the door and ask that they turn the music down because I was going to bed soon, but I got no answer.

I called the answering service and informed them of it, and they sent a security guard out. He knocked on their door for 5 minutes, but received no answer. He then left for a moment, but returned with someone for just a quick minute, after which they both left. The music is still playing.

I don't know what the situation is, but I suspect that the lady either forgot to turn her music off before she left for work (she tends to work 18 hour shifts at night from what I've noticed), or someone killed her, left the music playing, and left in her car.

It's now an hour later than when I first made an effort to put an end to this, and it's still going. I'll be heading to bed soon, and I'm going to be upset if I can't get to sleep because of it.

After Hurricane Ike blew through, the property management was quick to have all the units checked for damage. The building where my apartment is located just happened to be one of the (no so) few to have tarps strapped to the roof. This indicated to me that they may begin roof repair at some point, but I didn't sweat it as over a month went past with no action.

Last week, they started on some of the adjacent buildings and I thought "okay, they're going to tell me I'm next soon..." Wrong.

Last night I got home from work to find the driveway obstructed by piles of shingles and heavy machinery. I was able to get around all of it, but when I got to my parking space I saw that it was roped off with "CAUTION" tape. Since there was an open spot in the unassigned parking directly across from my assigned space, I just parked there and went about my business.

I began my stroll up the sidewalk, but found myself stopped by more "CAUTION" tape half-way to my apartment. I started to get frustrated at this point and just walked on through. But when I got to my steps in front of my apartment, there was more caution tape, ladders in the stairway, and piles of shingles laying everywhere. I pushed on through to get to my door, when I heard a voice come from the roof saying "Hey, you can't go in there."

I ignored it and went on in anyhow, and sat for the next 3 hours listening to the music sounds of hammers.

Tonight I got home and found more fun: My parking spot was being blocked by sheets of plywood and tool boxes, and the unassigned parking was full. Angry, I headed back out to the front of the lot and just happened to find an open spot on the street, but it's not where I wanted to park.

I'm thankful that I'm getting a new roof, don't get me wrong. There's nothing that I like about the thought of snow and slush dripping through in the winter (if that happens here anyhow), and the roof was in questionable shape anyhow. But the fact that I'm being blocked from my place with no previous notice is simply absurd.

I'm going to move my car this evening after they leave. If I find that my spot is still being occupied by tools and building materials after the workers are gone, I'll be moving stuff to the middle of the driveway, followed by a very angry call to the leasing office.

I'm not stressing because of the storm. I'm stressing because everyone else is stressing, and is therefore acting like a complete and total idiot.

RELAX, PEOPLE! It's not the end of the freakin' world!

I'm worried about flooding and power loss and all that, but jeez. I'm far enough inland that the storm surge won't be that big of a deal. I'm also right on a major highway, so if I had to evacuate, I could relatively easily.

As for work, I may have to take a trip up to the Dallas office to work for a few days, depending on the orders from higher up the line. If I do, I have clothes and stuff packed already. I'm not worried about it; I'm prepared!

Everyone just needs to keep updated on the situation and otherwise chill the heck out. Just because "it's gonna rain" doesn't mean you have to go acting like an idiot.

I was up until about 2:30AM this morning, trying to get some stuff done for work so I could sleep in until 11:00AM and go to the office at noon. This plan went well, until about 9:00AM.

For some reason or another, the city decided to send out a large, articulated payloader with forks instead of a bucket, to push back the k-rails at the end of 18th street. There are 5 or 6 of these rails, and they happen to be right outside my bedroom window.

Now, this wouldn't be such a bad thing, because I do live in a bit of a loud neighborhood - what with the Arni's distribution center and the freight rail - but this had an incredibly irritating twist to it: The payloader's back-up siren sounded just like an alarm clock, and it would sound for 3 "beeps" about every 2 minutes.

Why can I never get more than 8 hours of sleep, even when I try?!

Before I go to bed, I feel the need to rant about something else: Gas prices.

I don't get what's driving the price of a gallon of gas up so much. I went to see my parents for the weekend, but had to put gas in my car before I left town. What used to be a $20 tank of gas just a few months ago is now a $40 tank of gas. Why? Can anyone explain it?

I've heard the following used as excuses:

• Hurricanes: Okay, so a hurricane hit the middle of the Saudi desert...
• Domestic Wildfires: ...but don't we get our oil from other countries?
• Increased Transportation Expenses: o_O Okay, so we're applying recursion to life. Great.
• Political Turmoil: Yeah, so President Bush had a bowl movement and we're not speaking with {Insert oil producing country here}. Let's turn to the reserves.

In short, someone needs to figure out how to fix this problem and actually do something about it. I'm inches from using public transit and my bicycle in place of my car.

At this point you're probably wondering how much gas costs now: About $4.00 per gallon.

I have lived in this apartment for almost exactly one year. During this time, I have had little to no problems with the other tenents. However, since the start of 2008, this building has been driving me insane.

It started with the neighbor downstairs. I'm not sure what the situation is with her husband, but he is only ever around once in a great while. It makes me think that he is incarcerated but on the work release program, and is allowed to go home once in a while.

At any rate, he was home one Sunday evening, and decided that he was going to play some loud music in the garage. It just so happened that my bedroom was over the west half of the garage, and I was trying to sleep since I had to be to work at 8:00AM the next morning. I ended up burying my head in the pillows enough that I didn't have to hear the noise from downstairs, and I fell asleep.


Not too long after that, the couple who lived in the apartment directly next door, my current apartment, started having marital issues. My guess was that they worked the night shift somewhere, and lived their "daytime" late at night. Well, they decided that even though it was 2:00AM, they would fight about the stupidest things, and would do so with a very raised voice and lots of profanity. It was bad enough one night (that I was staying up late anyhow), I had my music turned up somewhat loud and could still hear them. Luckily they moved out, and I haven't had any problems with them since.


More recently, the older gentleman across the hall at the other end of the building was having problems with his daughter. They came home one afternoon when I was working from home, and were yelling and cussing at each other from the moment they entered the building. A little while after they both went into their apartment, someone left and slammed the door so hard that the dishes in my kitchen cabinets rattled.


Yesterday when I was cleaning my kitchen, my doorbell rang. I dried my hands and went to see who it was, when I found nobody but two young males sitting in their grandparents' car with a nervous look on each of their faces. I looked around and found nobody else, and asked if they rang my doorbell. When they said no, I asked if they saw anyone else. After they told me that they were the only ones out there, I came back up and went back to my cleaning. After a few minutes had lapsed, the doorbell rang again. I went to see who it was and found nobody but the kids outside. It continued for about 15 minutes, then stopped for a while. When it rang again, I went downstairs to see if someone was indeed outside. When I got down there though, I saw the grandmother walking from her car to the apartment. I informed her that the kids were playing with the doorbell and I was getting annoyed by it, and she said she would take care of it. Not 5 minutes later, it rang again. I ended up just unplugging the indoor unit of the doorbell, and all has been well since.


Just a little bit ago, someone was in the hallway yelling. I couldn't tell who it was, but it was shortly followed by slamming doors and more yelling. My hope is that it doesn't continue tonight since I have to work in the (late) morning.


I'm just getting really frustrated with the inconsiderateness of other people. Why can't they respect the quiet people and live by their lease? When I go to pay my rent this week, I will say something about the doorbell and the slamming of doors. I'm not expecting much to be done about it though.

I just got back from my normal Wednesday night outings, and I found out what 87 octane fuel is priced right now:

$3.49/gallon

I'm not going to be traveling for a very long time because of this. :(