Rap Wisdom

Occasionally I'll find a nuggest of wisdom in some rap lyrics. Here are two of my favorites:

• "I'm not a business man, I'm a business, man!" - Jay-Z"


• "If you get dealt a bad hand, than play your cards right" - Unknown

But seriously, the over indulgence in self confidence is the kind of bravado needed to get motivated when things look bleak. When I was testing for my Series 63 I listened to Jay-Z's Black Album on a constant loop and that kept me thinking, essentially, "I'm a bad motherf*cker and this test ain't sh!t". Yeah, I passed.

Diggnation Night

It's been a long couple of weeks. My grandmother is out of the hospital, but now the long, hard road of home recovery and constant monitoring begins. I've got some big projects going at my wireless store. Sophie is going through the "terrible twos" and Roman is just starting to walk which means more running after him. Ugh! Thankfully, tonight is Diggnation night. And, as an added bonus, Bill Gates and John Hodgman will be on The Daily Show tonight.

Gideon Yago

I just found that Gideon Yago is leaving MTV/MTV News to pursue a film career. Apparently, Gideon wrote and a sold a screenplay titled Underdog that relates to war in Iraq. I don't want to come off as a starfucker, but I always like Gideon. Perhaps what I like most was to see somebody my age interviewing the President and many other figureheads. Anyways, even though I rarely watch MTV, I will miss his presence and I wish him the best of luck.

Discarged

My grandmother got out of the hospital on Saturday afternoon with a new list of medications and, most importantly, a new pacemaker. She's still got a long road to recovery and needs to build her strength back up, but she's doing well for the time being. Mickey flew back to Little Rock this afternoon. I was sad to see him go; I really enjoyed spending time with him, but he's got a family back home that needs him.

Not Yet

My grandmother was supposed to get out of the hospital today, but one test or another showed the possibility of internal bleeding. So we wait another day and maybe, with a little luck, she'll get out tomorrow. Mickey was supposed to fly back to Little Rock tomorrow, but he decided, after speaking to my aunt, to stay until grandma was released. He should be departing on Sunday.

Mickey, my uncle, has been a tremendous help and I can't imagine having to do this by myself. He's always been such a great guy, but this is going far beyond the call of duty for any son-in-law. I wish more people could be like him. The only other person that comes to mind that comes close to this type of selflessness is my good friend Jess. Although I never needed him to spend a week in a hospital room tending to my ailing grand-maw, I'm sure if I needed him he would have done it in a heartbeat.

Here's to the good people in the world!

Bionic Bobbie

My grandmother had a pacemaker inserted just under her collar bone yesterda afternoon. This was recommended by her cadiologist as a treatment for a severe irregular heartbeat. The whole procedure lasted about an hour and a half. We had been told that some patients feel a marked improvement in their overall health and well-being almost immediatley; however, the cardiologist stayed conseraive and told us he couldn't promise guarantee anything.

When we left the hospital last night, after the recommended 4 hours my grandmother lay absolutely flat on back and motionless, she looked more vibrant that she has in a long time. She ate better than she typically does. And though her voice was weak, she sounded more upbeat and maybe even slightly optimistic about possibly gettign out of the hospital on Friday.

On a sad note, Mickey has to go back to Little Rock to be with my aunt and nephews. Of course he does, but having him here for this trial has been absolutely priceless. I will miss spending hours upon hours sitting in a hot hospital room and talking about his MBA program and how to get the most out of his MacBook.

MacBook v. iMac

Since my uncle Mickey is in town and he doesn't have an Apple store in his hometown (c'mon, get with the times Little Rock), we stopped by the Apple store La Cantera the other night. It's no secret to anybody who knows me that I've been pining over the MacBook Pro since it was introduced about a year ago; and even more so now that it has been upgraded to a Core 2 Duo. But I started using a 24" iMac at the Apple store and really enjoyed it. I had more screen real estate that I've ever had before on Mac OS X. Obviously it was faster than anything I've ever owned. And the ability to play a movie/DVD and have an experience similar to watching my Sharp Aquos was also really nice. And I didn't have the problem that I currently have with my 12" PowerBook in that when I play a video (i.e. Diggnation) I'm struggling to get the audio levels up on the tiny little speakers on the backside of the PowerBook's tiny frame. I might have to reconsider what my next Mac purchase will be...Hmmm.

In a related story: Chances are good that I might purchase an 8GB iPod Nano today...but what color?

Since grandma's surgery wasn't scheduled until this afternoon, Mick and I decided to spend out morning catching up on household errands. Unfortunately, the doctor had a different agenda. Dr. Roman Gonzalez decided to take my grandmother into surgery around 11am. Mick, Henry and I raced to the hospital and arrived just as grandma was being wheeled into the surgery room. I was stranded in the parking lot looking for parking. Methodist Hospital is a great facility and we've more positive experiences than negative, but they have the absolute worst parking lot every. By the time I got my Accord nestled between two yellow lines, my grandmother was being wheeled back into her room for recovery.

The good news is that the procedure went very well. The doctor reported that my grandmother did very well. So far her blood pressure and tempature are where they should be and she's showing no sign of infection. I hope the rest of her convalesence goes as well.

Pace Setter

Grandma first came to the emergency room because she was so severely weakened by a long bout with the flu. A few days into her stay at Methodist Hospital, the doctors have identified a list of medical issues that need to be dealt with. The most surprisingly of which is that my grandmother's heartbeat is irregular (we've known that for some time) and as such her cardiologist is recommending she get a pacemaker. She'll probably go through the hour-long procedure tomorrow night and (hopefully) go home from the hospital on Friday.

My grandmother is still in the hospital. Fortunately, Methodist offers free WiFi for patients and visitors, so I'm able to stay connected while I sit here. If only more places in San Antonio were forward-thinking enough to offer free connectivity to the web. My store finally got Sprint's USB EVDO modem. I'm so tempted to buy one, but I'm not sure if it will work with my G4 PowerBook. I'll need to do some more resarch.

Sick Grandma

My grandmother has been sick for about three weeks now. It started out as a cold, than went to the flu. She stopped eating and taking her regular medication. She took the wrong cold medication and got doped up on codeine. Now we can't seem to get her strength up. It looks like we're taking her to the emergency room this afternoon.

Thankfully, my uncle Mickey is flying in from Arkansas to help out. I'll pick him up from the airport this afternoon and than we'll probably take grandma to Wilford Hall.

I hope everything goes well!

You Know You're a Father When...

You know you're a father when you're Googling "Doodlebops" to see what they look like without make-up.

You know you're a father when slobbery kisses from a 10-month-old mean everything to you.

Why are there so many religions?

If there is only one God, as many religions are want to teach, than why are there so many religions? I believe that the answer lies somewhere within anthropology - at least that's one way of describing this theory of divine extrapolation.

My belief is that there is only one God. And when God reveals himself to a people (Native Americans, Arabs, Japanese, etc) he does so within the context of that people's culture. For example, the Native Americans were a group of people whose entire existence was based on their understanding and use of natural resources. So when God revealed himself to them, he did so in the form of the "Tree Spirit" or the "Water Spirit", simply because that is what they could understand best. Their form of worship may be different, but is no less than that of, say, the Catholic Mass or Jewish Services.

Ultimately, what I'm getting at here, is that despite what religion a person is (based on their culture, ethnicity and geography) if they choose to worship, they worship the same God as every other religion, just in a different way. When a Buddhist monk sits in meditation, the act is not dissimilar than a Lutheran who prays before bed. They are both rituals of metaphysical awareness and meant to exercise ones spiritual state.

These are the things I think about since being unemployed.

Weather Widget

Weather Widget, originally uploaded by Joseph Palumbo.

San Antonio, and most of Texas for that matter, are going through a bit of a cold spell. The city all buy shut down yesterday because of ice on teh roads and the potential for more sleet and snow. Our house and everything around it is covered in ice, which makes for some great pictures which I'm going to put on Flickr later today.

Perian

Picture 2
Originally uploaded by Joseph Palumbo.

Besides maybe VLC, there is no one media player that handles every single codec on thet net. It's rare, but even with Quicktime I run into error messages when I try to play certain media files. I downloaded Perian and installed it this morning. I'm going to see if tis can run some of the .AVI files that I've downloaded.

Liz and I just finished watching the MacWorld edition of Diggnation. Alex is sporting one of the limited edition, Microsoft-provided Vista notebooks that people have been talking about. What kind of audacity must a person have to bring a limited edition Microsoft Vista notebook to the mother of all Macintosh conventions. I'm kind of surprised he didn't get jumped (they talk about the possibility of Alex getting shanked in the episode). Liz and I laughed at the outtakes at the end of the episode, where Alex is using his microphone as though it were the controls to a quadraplegic's wheelchair. I know, I know, but nobody ever said good humor has to be classy humor.

Rough day at the store! Due to some kind of scheduling oversight I was the only one in the shop today. During the week that wouldn't be so bad, but on the weekends, it's kind of a nightmare. This has happened to me one time before, but it was on a Saturday and that was much worse.

It's going to be really weird not going to work tomorrow, not having to call in. I almost feel like getting up at my regular time and showing up like nothing happened. I wonder what people would say/do?

And what to do with my free time? I was thinking of going to the gym more often. I was thinking of playing some golf. I can hang out at Scott's house and play Xbox 360 with him on Mondays. I'm sure Ephrain and I will still get together on occasion and hang out for the sake of old times. Of course I'm going to spend more time with my wife and kids, but I'm also going to try and squeeze a little "me" time in as well.

When will I start looking for another job? Soon. I don't want to put it off for too long, but I also don't want to rush into anything. I'm going to start early but take my time.

So, I guess I'm supposed to be well enough to go back to work now. Do I think I'm well enough - no. Am I well enough to no drop dead while at work - yes. I guess there's your logic behind it all.

Liz and I spent out evening watching Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. It's a very involved movie and if you try and watch it casually, it just doesn't work. Kurosawa didn't really do any movies from the "Bill & Ted" genre. I wonder what he was like. According to his Wiki, he didn't pass away that long ago, 1998, and is credit for influencing most of the great contemporary filmmakers.

To date, I've only seen two of Kurosawa's films: 1)Ikiru and 2)Severn Samurai. I think the next one I'll Netflix is Yojimbo.

Big shout-out to my man, Jess! If you're out there, give me a buzz.

And although I know way more about daytime television than I ever should, I'm glad to announce that I'm my health is on a much well-received upward trend! If everything continues to go as it is, I should be back at work (both jobs) no later than Tuesday of next week.

I haven't been this sick in a while. Really, not since high school. It's always a little bit humbling to really get sick. People are always saying they're sick or they don't feel well or this or that in such a casual way, that when you're really sick, I don't think it registers with people like it used to. Even though I had pneumonia, people were curious why I didn't want to do anything besides sleep and *cough*.