That’s me - takin’ care of business.

Last night I worked for an hour or two on my Halloween costume and got it quite a bit further along. Hopefully I’ll be able to nearly finish tonight. There are a couple of alterations I want to make to the pattern (like putting in buttons or snaps instead of velcro for closure) which I have to figure out when I get it closer to complete. But that makes me happy - getting something done there.

I also watched the 1969 version of The Italian Job, which was pretty good. I had never seen it before, and now some of the choices they make in the recent incarnation make more sense. There are lots of behind the scenes things on that disc I need to check out.

I ordered a new computer today. P4 2.66GHz, 40GB HDD, 1GB RAM, nVidia GeForce4 MX 440 video card, DVD-ROM, Windows XP Pro, IBM ThinkCentre M50. All for $971, plus $10 shipping, which I can’t complain too much about. I’ve been meaning to upgrade for quite some time now, so I seized the opportunity. That should be here in a couple of weeks.

I worked some more on my new pMachine blog and I think it’s just about ready for prime-time. I hate putting things out there that are “almost done,” but I think it’s just about time to move on from GreyMatter and upgrade to a more complete blogging system. Better for you guys, too. I’m going to have to import all of my entries from GreyMatter to pMachine, which is going to be a bitch, but we’ll get there. Maybe this weekend if I take the time.

Or maybe I’ll be playing Time Crisis 2 instead.

I have a two-in-one traffic asshole for you today.

On Tuesday of last week, I was coming home and I noticed that my usual exit to get home there was quite the backup. Turns out there was a car parked diagonally across the right-hand lane of the two-lane exit.

Normally I might feel bad for the guy whose car this was, since a broken down car is not fun. But then I thought, “You know, a nice person might have rolled the car around the corner into the emergency lane so nobody would be blocked.” That, coupled with the fact that the exit was backed up for like a mile, made me much less sympathetic.

Okay, so that was Tuesday. I took a picture in case nothing better (or more frustrating) came along. But something did.

Friday as I was coming home I noticed that my exit was backed up again! What could it be this time?

Oh, look, there’s a bus blocking the left lane. Not even a full bus, either - one of those retard busses that only show up if you schedule them. ARGH! I ended up having to pass my exit, get off at the next one, and then come back on side streets. The backup was so far back I couldn’t even get in line.

Clogging up my exit has become quite the epidemic here. It’s a good thing I’m not armed.

Found some stuff I want…

Remote controlled Acura RSX from Radio Shack. Just like what I drive, except mine’s black and doesn’t look like a rice racer.

Light gun games, many of which aren’t available in the US. The Police 24/7 one looks especially cool, but isn’t over here yet. I’m hoping it’ll show up soon.

This was the first truly decent weekend I’ve had in a while. I’m not ridiculously tired this morning and I don’t feel like I wasted my time. What made it better? In no particular (or chronological) order…

We quit Atkins. After a week and a half and eleven pounds lost, we quit. I’ve been known to say, “If someone said I could never have chocolate again, I’d be fine. But if someone said I couldn’t have bread, I’d want to kill myself.” I think I proved that I was right - it was the lack of bread that made me hate everything and everyone. Now that I’ve had a bun on a burger, I’m doing much better.

I’ve decided to get a new computer. I’m going to get a pretty decent deal on a P4 2.66GHz machine through one of the myriad employee purchase programs that we’ve got set up at work, and it’s about time. I’m tired of fighting my computer to go, and the boot up time is ridiculous.

I got time to work on my Halloween costume. I’m going to be a Grammaton Cleric from the movie Equilibrium (which looks a lot like Neo from The Matrix, but is much cooler). I’ve got it about halfway done, and I’m actually enjoying the sewing of it quite a bit. There’s something about making something tangible (as opposed to, say, computer code, which is vastly intangible) and having something to show for your work that is extremely rewarding to me.

I played a load of Time Crisis 2. I really dig the light gun shooting thing, and this is a damn fun game. Hell yeah.

I bought a few movies at Costco. I got the 1963 edition of The Italian Job for $12.99. I also got a two-pack of movies for $20: Payback and Face/Off. And the two-pack has a $10 off coupon for the Indiana Jones Trilogy coming out on the 21st. So, basically, I got two movies for $5 each. Not bad.

That’s about it. It doesn’t sound like a lot got accomplished, but the relaxing part of the weekend was nice. I’m hoping to continue that into this week, finishing up my costume (which I can see will potentially become very frustrating as I near the end) and watching some of my new movies.

I figured out what was giving me the shits so bad earlier this week. Maltitol.

See, when the candy company makes sugar-free candy, they have to put something in instead, right? Sometimes it’s aspartame, sometimes it’s Splenda, sometimes it’s sugar alcohol, and sometimes it’s maltitol.

Turns out, maltitol has a laxative effect. Which is putting it mildly since, for me, it has more of a Montezuma’s Revenge bent. I ate a candy bar with maltitol in it at the hockey game last night (which was AWESOME, by the way) and about 20 minutes later I was making a break for the bathroom. I almost didn’t make it home in the car, either. Terrible, terrible, terrible.

So now I have to figure out what kinds of sugar-free treats I can eat that don’t have maltitol in them. I think I found some jelly beans, but I’ll have to check the package again to be sure.