My room mates and i may have found an apartment. Like most places, it has it's good and bad. first, the good: it's two short blocks from the subway stop, in a great neighborhood. the building was built in 1904, and they are preserving it's great character. otherwise, everything is brand new. But that's also where the problem begins. They're still building it. while we were trying to move May 1st (1 month early), this would mean moving July 1st at the earliest, and it could be August 1st. So we would have to get our landlord/new owner to let us stay longer than our lease. Also, the place has kind of a kooky layout for the living spaces. Since it isn't ready yet, we are holding the place for a few weeks while we decide.

Happy Easter! It's been a great weekend: A day off work, a new computer, the NY auto show, sunny days, and Easter sunday service...

I took off work for Good Friday. It was great to take a break. On saturday i went to the New York Auto Show with my friend Ryan. We had a great time just walking around looking at cars. There were a lot of new concept cars, and it's always good to see the new production vehicles, too. I was amazed at how much new stuff there was. Since we went last year, i expected to see a lot of the same stuff. that was the case with the displays themselves, but the cars weere pretty different. i didn't realize it, but we were there walking around for four hours straight.

We met Christina for lunch at a little tiny place in the Village. She had been at a cooking class that morning and was anxious to tell us all about it. so i was hearing about how to make wonderful pasta dishes, deciding whether to get brunch food or a hamburger, watching Matthew Broderick walk up to the counter, thinking about if i should splurge on that grape soda... wait, Mathhew Broderick is here? yeah, well, would you look at that. I felt a little bad that he has to get take out; if he was normal like us he could sit in this cute little place and have brunch. I guess it's one of those New York moments.

okay, i have to go. my roommates called; they bought so many groceries that they can't carry them all home by themselves. Columbia grads...

it's done. last night i assembled my new computer. and it rules.

there were only minor glitches in putting everything together. the first was getting the case open. i just could NOT slide the side off. it seemed to be caught right were the lock is. i though, "great, they shipped it to me locked with the keys inside." so i broke through the drive bays, reached way in, and snagged the keys. turns out, it wasn't locked. instead, the handle near the lock moved to release the catch, and then it swung open. no wonder it wouldn't slide.

so then i just followed the directions that came with the motherboard, and most everything went alright. i sort of bent a pin or two when i finally got the processor open, but it was so minor that they straightened right out and slid into place. whew! i had to connect a gazillion wires for the front case USB and firewire ports since they were all individual instead of just being bundled into one 'outlet.' and when the labels didn't exactly match the motherboard chart, i just took educated guesses... and they all work!

the scariest part was hitting the power switch. ryan came home just in time to help me install all the drives, so that sped things up. and since the case has a side window, he made sure to bundle some of the wires out of the way. he also moved my front case fan so that it brings the air past the hard discs. smart move, i think. but i had to hit the power button by myself. when i did, we had a good laugh. all four case fans came with multicolored LEDs; each one has a blue, red, and green light. pretty corny.

speaking of fans, i sure have an abundance of them. the case has four, and there is one for the CPU, the motherboard chipset, the power supply, and even the graphics card has one. what is that, seven? no, eight!

anyway, i just got all my data back from ryan's computer where i was storing it through all this. and now i'm getting ready to start installing software. that's not going to be as fun as building the computer was.

my computer bits and pieces came via fed ex yesterday. whoo-hoo! i just have to lug the case home, using my home-made, tape handle (note: the comma indicates that the handle is home-made, not the tape), and i should be set to build my super computer. well, super compared to my old one. i hope it works without too many glitches.

we had our last rehearsal for easter sunday last night. (that's a bad sentence, but i don't feel like fixing it.) we're singing five new specials on sunday. they're pretty cool. one of them is a medley of five really old songs. the mass choir is about a hundred people, but only this one little old lady knew any of the songs. so she gets to lead one of them! and we're stealing one of the songs from the brooklyn tabernacle choir. so sunday should be fun. strange, though; they don't do anything special for good friday. but i am! i'm taking off of work. i figure that i'll probably finally go see mel's "the passion of the Christ." and put together my computer!

stress sucks.

my room mate and i have been apartment shopping. we found a beautiful loft on williamsburg waterfront that was big, clean, had great amenities, and a great landlord, but we just couldn't configure rooms in it. not that we didn't try.

so we looked at some places on roosevelt island, which is in the east river between manhattan and queens. the place was really nice, with a south-facing balcony great manhattan views, but no neighborhood to speak of. well, not the cafe and shopping kind of neighborhood. it's more of a park and activities kind of place. so we'll see.

and our broker is tired of us not taking a place. of course, we haven't managed to get out of our lease (which ends the end of may). we just want to get out of this place, and before the summer rush.

and i still don't have a computer. but i'm about to buy the pieces for one... we'll have to see how that goes.

it's too bad the weekend is gone already; i enjoy them so much.

friday night i had a leisurely dinner out with some friends. i took a cab into manhattan with ryan, who was going to his friday night hockey game. taxis seems so luxurious. anyway, people just kept showing up. i of course was there first. when connie arrived we chatted at the bar until c showed up. we relaxed while we waited for kathy to show up, and then chatted more over drinks. we took forever to order, because we kept forgetting to study the menu. this didn't seem to please our waiter much. whatever. so we ate. then rebecca showed up and ordered food. and ryan came from his hockey game and ordered more food. so by the time we had dessert and paid our bill, it was already 11:30. a three-and-a-half hour dinner is great!

saturday i had to focus on my room and computer. ever since my computer blew up, i've had computer pieces strewn all over the room. no, it didn't really explode, but all the scene was missing was some scorch marks or something. besides the deep cleaning, i tried to put my new hard drive on my old computer. but no matter what i tried, it wouldn't recognize the drive. i tried all sorts of IDE cable configurations and jumper settings. nothing. it either saw nothing, or it just sat there and thought about it. so frustrating. i need to order new computer parts soon; i can't take not having a computer. well, at least i'm able to surf the web, etc on my old computer.

and to finish off the weekend... sunday was church, spaghetti, nap, church. wow, i could use a nap right now.

DAY 3, and it's still snowing. barely, but it's still going. where's global warming when you want it?

the telemarketers are driving me nuts at work. five times a day people call and demand to speak with the person in charge of the telephone account. no, no, no, never call again! i just got a call from a women askig if i'm interesting in obtaining a pistol license. i asked if she meant like a gun. yes. that gave me a good laugh. until she called again.

work is boring, but my hard drive comes today! i hope this solves my computer problems. if not, i may just have to use my tax money to upgrade like crazy!

wow, it's a bliazzard! i can't even see the sky scraper down the street. it's been going since 10 this morning, and it's really piling up now. I hope this is winter's last hurrah, because i'm sick of it. bring on spring!

spring is also tax time. i e-filed the beginning of last week (?) and i just noticed while i was at the atm that i had a lot more money than i expected. sure enough, my federal tax return has already been direct deposited into my account. hopefully my new york cash will come in soon too.

it's come to my attention that i am not very consistent with my blogging. i guess i forget that people might actually be reading this. sorry.

the three-day fast ended well. that last day, though, my tummy protested once in a while if i accidentally started dreaming about food. i tried to avoid the thought of food and what i was going to eat once it was over. i thought i was getting lasagna from my roomies, but they didn't come through. it was for the best though, since the tomato soup that i had was a better way to ease back into eating.

the services each night were great. we sang a sort of off-the-cuff song service. the pastors interrupted a lot with things to pray for. we usually had a ten minute sermon, tops, and the rest of the time was spent praying. We prayed collectively, independently, in groups, out loud, and quietly (well, mostly loudly) for purity in our lives, against fear of sharing our faith, and similar topics.

but now my computer got sick. i have to figure out how to get past these stop errors. they can be pretty devastating. and i don't know if this is related or not, but i'm sick too. i almost didn't come in to work today--i've been saying that i need a day off--but i was feeling better today, and it is payday; you don't want to miss that, right?

what i really need is a trip to the beach.... ahhhhh.

it's lunchtime on day two of the three-day fast. my stomach is growling in protest, but it's not unbearable. i usually can't go two hours without shoving something in mouth, so i know that i'm not doing this all on my own. i've allowed myself to drink juice, but otherwise it's only water. i bought some chicken broth for dinner last night because i heard somewhere that it was acceptable; too bad i didn't know it was gross. i guess i was expecting chicken noodle soup without the noodles or the two chunks of chicken. yech. i skipped it and had a glass of water instead.

oh, yeah, my church is doing a three-day fast this week, and holding services each night. i don't think i've ever fasted more than a day... actually, i think the last time (only time?) i fasted, it was just morning and afternoon, and then we ate. But it has been a good experience so far... and dinner thursday night or breakfast friday morning should be fantastic. i wonder when we break the fast? i'll have to find out at church tonight. To find out why we are fasting, you'll have to listen to the sermons from Februrary 8, 2004, on the Times Square Church website.

what a night.

yesterday, i was exhausted and ready for bed at 9:00. I had taken my first bike ride of the year earlier that afternoon, and i never thought to ease into it. well, i thought about it, but when i ride, i like to go all out the whole time. i crossed the williamsburg bridge into manhattan, something i'd never done before. I'm not sure why i haven't until yesterday, since it is just a few blocks from my house. anyway,getting onto those bridges is just one long continuous, steep hill climb. once in manhattan, i rode along the east side highway through a long park that i never visited before. It was full of people playing soccer and baseball on large astroturf playing fields. (since the long sliver of a park is between the highway and the east river, i think it's probably hard to get maintenance equipment over the pedestrian bridges.) I rode the bike path down to the tip of manhattan, battery park, and continued around to the west side, familiar territory. i took the bike path there up the west side to perry street, where i stopped for a water break in a nice little park on the hudson river. there were tons of people out lounging or playing with kids and dogs. i snapped a few pics of the richard meier apartments across the street and turned back for home.

so for my first exercise of the year, i went pretty hard. admittedly, i stopped a lot to take pictures--like the brooklyn bridge, the parks, the WTC--but i was pooped once i got home. all i wanted to do was put my feet up and moan. and i did for a while, until my room mate sliced his finger open in his haste to dish up some much-anticipated ice cream.

accidents happen, this is life, but why must they be such an ordeal? our first problem was getting christina to stop saying, "oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!" then we had to convince ryan that he shouldn't stitch it up himself. most importantly, we had to find out where the nearest hospital was. we had no clue. we were looking online, through the yellow pages, asking the operator, etc. we ended up grabbing an address in manhattan and walking a few blocks to hail a cab. well, our address was wrong, but the cabbie had a little book that gave us info on a close hospital.

and after about four long hours of chatting with christina, watching the corner television, trying to guess what the other people were in the ER for, ignoring the crazy cane-wielding voodoo lady, and dozing in poorly designed waiting room chairs, ryan came out with six stitches and we were able to return home.

so then it was about 4 am, and i was supposed to get up in like three hours for church... r i g h t . no, i called the choir hotline and told them i wouldn't be making the morning service.

what a night.

computers:

i got a new computer at work! it came thursday, but i waited to set it up until friday. my work load was pretty heavy on thursday, and i thought that setting it up would be a fun thing to do on friday. i needed to transfer all my documents from the (barely) older computer, so i brought in a crossover cable and just networked them together directly. it worked great.

my boss, steve, is taking my old computer to replace his relic; you have to give it a good kick to shut it up. it's so outdated that it's last upgrade was to windows 98! but it's still working, and since he's bringing in someone to update his database into a newer program that can print through a usb printer, he doesn't really need my old computer yet. so friday was a day of multitasking to the extreme. i thought that dual monitors would be nice, but i had two computers to work on. while one scanned, i cadded on the other. i was really having fun. but then i got sucked into some construction documents, and the old computer basically just played music.

and speaking of playing music at work, i'm kind of in a dilemma. well, it's not really a... anyway, the new computer came with five speakers and a subwoofer! do i really want to set it up? what i really want to do it keep my old speakers and bring the new set home for the computer in my bedroom. it would be nice for watching movies... but i don't know if they'd go for that. but do i really want all those speakers at work? maybe i can just set up a few of them.

and one last item. all this windows xp at work, and trying to network with ryan at home... i gave up and 'upgraded' to xp on my machine. at least i got the network to work, and now have 3dmax 6.0. ;)

i just finished my first full week of choir. i must say that's it's pretty fun. i've gotten the 'sway' down, but i still worry that i'll open my eyes and find myself going in the wrong direction. thankfully, that hasn't happened yet, and i'll try not to dwell on it any more. since i've just started, i don't know the specials that we sing during the service, like during the offering, etc. i kind of chuckle as the music starts, because i don't have a clue as to when to sing, what notes to sing, or any of the words. i should be terrified since thousands of people are watching me. but i watch the director and listen to those around me, and pick it up easy enough. other than that, i was a little worried about how large a time commitment this is, but i think it might be okay. i mean, i really don't have much else to do outside of work. and it keeps me from watching too much tv.

another thing about choir is that i have to start wearing ties, since it is a requirement to be on stage. now, one of the big benefits of being an architect is that we don't generally wear ties. (maybe it's the one thing we do to try and make up for the low salary.) and then i go and join something that makes me wear them again. sheesh. so i'm still trying to determine what kind of ties i like. sunday i wore a brand new tie from barneys, and tonight i wore an old tie from salvation army. i guess i've already about run the gamut. and by the way, the barneys ties was from their warehouse sale, so i didn't pay $80; it was 75% off. can you do the math? no? well, that means it was only twenty dollars.

speaking of saving money: i know this is not the blog about being frugal--that's tracy's--but i just got a notice that since i signed up for direct deposit for my giant school loan repayment, they lowered my interest rate by a quarter percent. that's not much, but it means that it's down to 2.750%. plus, i've overpaying a little. thanks, Dad!

i've eaten really well lately. first a lamb burger with spicy stuff (francilla or something) and then chicken in a red wine sauce with dill potato salad (thanks christina). food is so good. oh, plus i made chocolate chip cookies.... ahhhhhh

positive: MoMA Queens was good this weekend; finished a little side job; the aforementioned food; "you have rainbows in your hair! . . . oh, it's gone."

poopie: too much work today; fording the streams and ponds on the walk home from work in the cold; a nasty paper cut under my finger nail (oww!); you, for laughing at my spelling of poopy.

it was like hitting the lottery. friday night, to kill time before a church event at 7pm, i swung down to herald square to hit a few clothing shops. i took an unfamiliar subway line because of trian delays and ended up in the manhattan mall. i discovered a new store, but that's not the point of this. on the way, i saw a shop window sign advertising "no tax." i thought, "how so they get away with that?" then i saw huge banners all over macy's proclaiming tax free sales... wow! that little store's sign was legitimate. but, alas, i had to run off to my church event. (story note: the church event i tried to attend wasn't going on that night. either it wasn't happening because of a special youth rally, or it wasn't the weekly even that i thought it was. oops.)

anyway, i found out that night from christina that it had been tax free "week" and that the next day (saturday) was the last daythat clothes were to be tax free. i guess they do it a few times a year now. so saturday i went on a small shopping spree and bought nice jeans and a great button down shirt. not on sale, really, but i saved the 8.5% tax that i'd normally pay. does this qualify me as frugal?