archive.tylerdave.com All the stuff from when Dave was actually called Tylerdave.

Since the last post…

• I joined the Delaware Valley Browns Backers so now I have a place to watch Browns games, and thirty other people to watch them with.
• After having given up on finding a “real” job, I decided to apply at Chili’s. I had to study the menu and then pass a test, which I did this Tuesday, so I start training on Monday. I’m actualy looking forward to the change of pace, and the pay check.
• Fatty’s here for the weekend so we’re spending the time that he’s here deep frying. We also went bowling today for the first time in many weeks.
• There was something else but I can’t seem to remember.

After a day without, it was nice waking up having electricity again.

We were pretty lucky. We were only hit with the outermost edge of Hurricane Isabel. Here it seemed like any other summer thunderstorm, with maybe a bit more wind. Wind enough to knock down a couple big trees on a couple big power lines of course.

Our power went out a few times on Thursday night, each time only for a few minutes. Then, it went out again around five in the morning on Friday. Luckily, Megan set an alarm for herself on her cell phone, so she work up in time to leave for school, though because of a bunch of road closures, she ended up getting there late.

I used the lack of power as a break from the online job search. I read for most of the day and then took a nap. In the afternoon, with the power still out, I decided to go for a drive. The main road we live on was closed about a mile away from us. I guess that’s probably where our power outage was caused. Driving down the other main road, I found that the East side had power, while the West side did not. This had the effect of making all of the restaurants and stores on the East side of the road especially busy. It was very strange to see every space in the parking lots full, while the mall across the street was completely empty.

Later in the evening, Megan and I went out for another drive. On our way to the grocery store, we saw a truck driving in the opposite direction. Megan asked if the thing on the back of the truck was a generator, and I said “yeah, a really big one.” We bought a lighter and some canned soup and a couple other things at the store and headed back home.

When we got back to our place, we saw some people working under the water tower next to our building. Then we saw the same big generator we had seen on the back of the truck earlier. The fact that they were setting up a generator at the water tower made me assume that we probably wouldn’t have power for a while longer. We made our soup by candle light and then for lack of anything better to do, went to sleep.

This morning, I woke up to the familiar hum of all of our electronics. Based on the blinking alarm clock, the power came back on around 2:30am. The generator under the water tower is still running (damned loudly).

Hopefully we’ll hear from fatty soon.

After another wonderful drive of the PA Turnpike, Megan and I are back in Cleveland. While it is nice to continue collecting a paycheck, I’m really looking forward to being able to stay in Wilmington on a regular basis.

Hopefully, all of this extra driving and the annoyance of being back in Cleveland will motivate me to get my job search up to full speed.

In the mean time I’ll probably be spending a lot of my spare time at my mom’s house reading and taking pictures of post offices. Well, at least my mom has DSL.

TB got the keys to the new apartment yesterday, so he was finally able to actually see the inside of the apartment. Today, he took pictures so that Megan and I could see it as well (ahead of arriving there on Monday evening).

The apartment pictures will be online until early Monday morning, when the computer that’s serving them will be disconnected. Hopefully, it will be back online by Wednesday morning.

Tonight I drove around some of the western suburbs of Cleveland and took some more post office pictures. I visited nine post offices but only seven of them ended up with usable pictures, as it was raining pretty hard for a while and it got dark while I was still driving around. My goal is to have all of Cuyahoga county done before I move.

For the past week-plus I’ve had a nervous energy and haven’t been able to focus for too long. I haven’t been able to read for very long or even surf the web. I haven’t been able to come up with anything nearly coherent enough to merit it’s own post so here’s a recap of the past little while in Attention Deficit Disorder-style:

Last Friday night I got a call from Warren while Megan and I were at Borders. It turned out that he was in town for a job interview and Becky happened to be out of town for the weekend so he was bored. We went bowling at Lakewood Lanes and he bowled pretty well.

On Saturday night we went over to Megan’s friend’s house to play cards and just hang out. Megan was bit by their dog (well actually nipped). She has a pretty serious-looking bruise.

On Sunday I bought a new pair of dress shoes. They’re shiny.

I’m sure something happened on Monday but I’m also sure it wasn’t at all interesting.

On Tuesday I accidentally left the AC adapter for my laptop at work. Because of that I was so bored in the evening that I fell asleep at 8:00, waking up the next morning just early enough to make it to work on time.

On Wednesday I went to a Lake County Captains (Class-A minor league) baseball game with my mom and two sisters. We had a good time and it was a great game. The Captains scored the winning run on a botched run-down in the bottom of the ninth.

On Thursday night Megan and I went to Sarah’s apartment to help her get stuff ready for her wedding on Saturday.

On Friday Megan bought a bowling ball and bag at a rummage sale for $2. The ball is the perfect size and weight and the bag matches her bowling shoes! In the evening we went to Sarah and Tim’s wedding rehearsal and dinner. Then we set up the tables in the reception hall and decorated. Afterward we went to TGI Friday’s for drinks. I seem to have misplaced my wallet there. Luckily, I had just cleaned it out so the only thing I lost was my driver’s license, one bank card and $11. A week earlier and it would have included my Social Security card and two more bank cards.

Friday was Sarah and Tim’s wedding day. The weather was perfect and the ceremony turned out to be really nice. We had a great time at the reception. For the first time with my new camera I actually filled the memory card at one time (112 photos). Sarah’s family and friends were all really cool and I had a great time hanging out with them getting ready for and during the reception.

Today I woke up and had some left-over wings from the reception for breakfast. Megan and I tried to go bowling to test out her new ball but Madison Square Lanes was closed. It appears that they have new summer hours and they’re not open on Sundays.

On my way to work today, the odometer in my car hit the 100000 mile mark. If I continue driving at this rate, it’ll have to make it to 208000 before I have it paid off.

Last night was my sister’s high school graduation. The ceremony was pretty nice and the valedictorian’s speech was actually pretty good. The salutatorian’s, on the other hand, reminded me of the opening scene of Ghost World.

Once thing I noticed during the ceremony was that the applause after every speaker was unusually long, a couple times to the point that it felt unnatural. It seemed that there were one or two guys who would start to clap really loudly right when the volume was starting to wane, causing the crowd to increase the applause for another fifteen seconds.

I wonder if anyone has ever conducted a study to find what the normal applause length is and how it is controlled. Actually, I’m sure someone has studied it; I just wonder what their findings were.

A week ago Megan and I went to Wal-Mart for the first time in probably nine six months. To our surprise, they had a fairly large selection of grocery items at substantially lower than grocery store prices. While we were walking around the food isles I developed a pretty bad headache so we decided to cut our shopping short and try again another day.

Tonight we went back to Wal-Mart to finish our shopping and within ten minutes I again had a really bad headache. This time it was so bad I felt sick to my stomach. I went outside to get some air while Megan checked out and within five minutes I felt better.

I have two theories as to what could be causing the headaches:
1. The hideously bright florescent lights were bothering my eyes because I was wearing contacts.
2. My mind has some sort of aversion to Wal-Mart and the headaches are just a psychosomatic reaction.

Either way, I don’t think saving a few dollars is worth this much pain.

I’m in the middle of reorganizing tylerdave.com so if you notice some broken links or things that don’t look quite right, don’t worry, it’ll be fixed real soon. I promise.

Every year is seems like spring will never come and then suddenly, it’s nice outside.

It was warm enough today to drive around with all the windows down. Four days ago we had an ice storm and it was 17°F, today it’s 70°F!

I just hope it lasts.

All of the pictures I’ve taken with my new camera are now online. I’d just ask that you don’t link directly to the pictures just yet, as the URLs will probably change.

Tylerdave’s Pictures

Last night I played all of the sample chapter of Neverwinter Nights: The Witch’s Wake. Soon after that I went to sleep.

Throughout the night I kept waking up to the same dream. I was walking from my apartment to the store down the street. Except I was watching and directing myself in the third person, from above, just as in the game. It was just too bad I didn’t happen upon any monsters along the way.

I think I might have to lay off the game for a little while.

While it was nice being on a first name basis with the desk workers at the Broadview Heights post office, I’m relieved that I won’t have to drop off any more grad school apps for Megan.

Now that all the application craziness is over, the question is: Will Megan ever get back to a normal sleep schedule?

Incoherent people on the street, beer, polka, beer, people who think they’re bad-asses, piercing, ugly chicks, and the West Side Market. Unfortunately, there was no bowling in the episode even though they showed it in the commercial immediately before.

For the most part, Dave Attell got Cleveland right.