Updates

6. Play volleyball

I played volleyball last Monday with 6 other people and we're trying to get together every week to do it now too, which I hope works out, because volleyball's a pretty fun game

10. Take Neilly for a walk 20 times a year (2/20)

Amanda and I took Neilly to a park for my grandma's birthday celebration and took her for a walk around while Amanda got to take some great pictures with her fancy camera and and finish off the roll of black and white film.

68. Read 6 books (5/6)

Just about an hour ago I finished up the fifth Harry Potter book - Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I just wish I had the 6th book to read, but I'm asking for it for my birthday, so I'll be Harry Potterless for at least 6 more days. :-(

79. Win 3 free t-shirts (1/3)

A few weeks ago I went to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch the Brock Lesnar UFC fight, and they had us fill out a little thing with our name on it for drawings, and I ended up winning a free UFC t-shirt. Sweet! Not that I'll wear it a whole lot, cuz I'm not so big of a UFC fan that I'd display it on a t-shirt, but it is comfortable and works well as an undershirt.

Wishlist

Wishlist (in no particular order):

--Futurama - Season 2 DVD
--Punch-Out for the Wii (new or used)
--Super Mario Galaxy for the Wii (used)
--The new Mario Wii game?
--Metroid Prime 3 for Wii
--A new TV, 25"+ flatscreen
--A new computer, Dell only
--New sunglasses
--New glasses
--Digital camera
--A new coffeemaker - Kuerig one maybe?

Always wanted:
--Orbit Bubblemint or Stride Uberbubble gum
--Yoohoo
--Rockstar, Shockwave, Nos, or Rockstar/Monster coffee-energy drinks (half-juice varieties preferred, i.e. Rockstar Juiced)
--Gift cards for clothes - Kohls, JCPenneys, Target, Northtown mall, etc.
--Chocolate anything

No longer needed (either I bought it, got it somehow, or decided against it):
--Wired optical mouse with 4+ buttons (must be left-handed or either-handed, NOT right-handed)
--Harry Potter 1-5 DVD set (Widescreen)
--Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Year 6) book (new or used, paperback)
--Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Year 7) book (new or used, paperback
--Wii Sports Resort (new)
--A new computer monitor, 24" wide/flat-screen (something like this one)
--A new cell phone & a new cell phone plan w/ more texting and possibly internet
--Two (or four if they only come in a set of four) lowball (the straight glasses that are like 3-4" tall and about the same width) glasses - that hard unbreakable plastic if possible, otherwise glass
--Running shoes
--Okami for Wii
--Headset or new microphone for my computer (Logitech or Microsoft brand)
--CD wallet that holds 50-100 CDs
--Mousepad from Quirky.com
--Faster internet
--How I Met Your Mother Season 4 on DVD
--Camelback Podium Chilljacket water bottle
--Coffee grinder
--New file cases...gotta get a better filing system going
--Memory foam pillow
--An iron & ironing board
--Futurama - Season 3 DVD

Google Voice!

Google Voice!

I heard about Google Voice (GV) 6 months or so ago, and I was hooked right then and there. Everything Google does seems to be amazing, so I signed up to be emailed when GV service became active. Well, they just started sending out invitations to those who signed up, and I jumped at the chance. I found the perfect phone number, which is what sold me from the starting gate - I got to choose my phone number out of tons of choices, and they let you search for certain strings of numbers to help you find the number you want. I couldn't imagine a better phone number than the one I got.

Features I like (FYI, I don't get phone reception where I work)

• You get to pick your phone number
• I know if I have voicemails while I'm at work
• I can listen to voicemails while I'm at work
• I know if I have text messages while I'm at work
• I can send/receive/reply to text messages while I'm at work
• I can send text messages for free (ones that won't count towards my monthly amount of texts I'm allowed under my plan), so this essentially gives me one and a half to two times the amount of texts I get per month, because a lot of my texting is done while I'm at home in my room because I don't get that great of reception there either
• Cheap international calls if I ever need them (would have been nice for when Amanda was in Germany)
• Gives me further incentive to be logged into Google all the time and use their programs - although this has been a shift that's been happening anyway with Gmail, Blogger, Docs, Calendar and now Voice...all great programs that do what they need to do
• This phone number will stay with me no matter what - if I change cell phone numbers, or get a house phone, or get my own personal work phone number, I can add those as I want, but I'll always have my GV number and that's the main number other people need to know to get in contact with me

Things I don't like:

• The hassle that comes with a new phone number and having to give it out to everyone (but don't get me wrong, I'm sooo happy with my new phone number)
• The even bigger hassle of having to explain to people that this is a new number but it's not replacing my cell phone number, and that they need to put my GV number in as their main number but keep my cell phone number as a secondary number so that when I call/text them from my cell phone, I will still show up on their caller ID
• The fact that nobody is sure what will happen in the future with GV - it's almost all free, and because of this there's not much revenue for Google, so they'll need to find ways to make money off of this. Some speculate that they could charge for phone calls made through GV, but most people are speculating that they'll be including targeted ads in at some point in the future instead

But yeah, if you can't tell, I'm wicked excited about Google Voice, and after playing around with it a ton for a day...so far so good.

Lots to update!

Well, with me being too lazy to post a blog for this long, there's understandably lots to update! I've been keeping up on working towards completing my goals, I just keep putting off posting them on the blog. :-\ Anyway, here goes...

5. Play tennis once a year
8. Ride my bike to school or work 15 times
10. Take Neilly for a walk 20 times a year
19. Buy those elusive marker pens I love from work
45. Wake up before 7:30 a.m. at least 75 times a year
52. Find the perfect boxers, and buy 10 pairs of them
59. Get 10 new shot glasses
68. Read 6 books
75. Watch 20 Twins games a year
82. Go on a vacation out of the state
85. Go to a Twins in a state other than Minnesota
91. Get at least 360 new songs
97. Watch every Matrix movie

5. Play tennis once a year
Amanda and I went to play tennis at AR...we brought Neilly, it was fun and some good exercise on a hot day.

8. Ride my bike to school or work 15 times (1/15)
My car broke down, and the only way I could work was to bike there, so I dropped my car off at the shop and biked to work at 7:45 a.m.

10. Take Neilly for a walk 20 times a year (1/20)
I finally got Neilly out for a walk - after biking back home I walked her to the auto shop to pick up my car.

19. Buy those elusive marker pens I love from work
Amanda had a keen eye in Target in Kansas City and noticed they had the pens I love, so I bought 4 of the black ones.

45. Wake up before 7:30 a.m. at least 75 times a year (10/75)
Honestly I'm guessing that I've done this 7 times since my last post. I do this every Friday when I work, plus I did it once on our trip cuz I had a headache and couldn't get back to sleep all that well (well, I was in bed, but I was awake, and that totally counts). Anyway, I have a feeling that I'll be changing this goal because I don't like it anymore.

52. Find the perfect boxers, and buy 10 pairs of them (6/10)
I've found them, and I now own 6 of them. They're awesome.

59. Get 10 new shot glasses (1/10)
I bought a Kansas City shot glass from a souveneir shop at the city market place we went to.

68. Read 6 books (2/6)
I've been itching to watch all the Harry Potter movies because of the new one coming out, so I decided to dig up my Harry Potter books for the trip to KC - I read the first two and I'm about halfway through the third one now. I think I'm going to Netflix the movies as I read through the books, or maybe just buy the DVDs...I just have to get my hands on the last two books which I haven't read yet.

75. Watch 20 Twins games a year (6/20)
I saw one game in person in KC and one game on TV in the hotel in KC with Amanda and Taylor.

82. Go on a vacation out of the state
This vacation to Kansas City was sooooo needed, and I had a blast. The driving sucked (though it wasn't all that bad really), but it was great just having a few days to relax and get away from work and home and everything.

85. Go to a Twins in a state other than Minnesota
We saw the Twins play in KC. Their stadium was awesome. Seeing a game outside like it's supposed to be makes me really eager to see the Twins in our new stadium next year.

91. Get at least 360 new songs (86/360)
I got a bunch of free song download cards, and I got 68 new songs - something I needed desperately. Some of the new music includes: Taylor Swift (for Amanda), Kings of Leon, Modest Mouse, Incubus, and Keith Urban. All this new music has me craving more...there's a good 75 or 100 more songs I want to get now, but I'll probably put off because I don't want to spend the money on them and I don't want to illegally download songs.

97. Watch every Matrix movie
A few weeks ago or so, I was at Target and saw that they had a $10 DVD set for all the Matrix movies, so I bought it and watched all of them. I remember when I first saw them I was disappointed by the second and third movies because the first one was so good. On the second time around, my opinion didn't change - the first one was the best, but the second and third weren't as bad as I thought.