Domestic Geek

Even though Marcus and I are not "officially" married, we celebrate the anniversary of when we became a committed couple every 28th of October.

Today marked 15 years of togetherness.

I can honestly say I love him more today that I did 15 years ago. I'm the most blessed person in the entire world that I found him. I truly believe we are soul mates.

We celebrated this evening by consuming our traditional meal of Endless Shrimp at Red Lobster (the promotion always seems to be going on at the end of October). The cool thing about this year is we paid via gift cards that I got at work. I was just doing something that I felt was part of my job, but the CSR really appreciated my work and felt that I went above and beyond, so he requested to the powers that be that I was given this extra compensation. Yay!!! Works for me and the timing couldn't have been better.

There was a cute elderly couple sitting across the aisle from us. I was "enamored" with them (as Marcus called it). I so want to be like that couple when we're old. You could just tell that they enjoyed each other's company.

Anyway...

Hey Friends and Family!

I have a request for my birthday this year which, I just noticed today, happens to be in two weeks (gasp!).

I don't need things. Gosh knows I'm trying to purge my life and my house of unnecessary and unwanted stuff. What I would like, if you are so inclined, is iTunes gift certificates or donations to my Vegas fund. See, in addition to the price of the actual trip, there are things I need to get before I go, such as a new laptop battery, headphones for my iPod, a new camera, some nicer clothes. That is the kind of "stuff" I do need now.

Thanks!

So, last Friday was SysAdmin Appreciation Day and I tried really hard to drum up support for the holiday for Marcus. Unfortunately, I work with dolts.

First, I went to Marcus' immediate supervisor to get permission to decorate his door and to get her to drum up the day with the rest of the staff. Well, she didn't bother to tell me that she was going to be on vacation for most of last week. Hmph. Turns out she didn't bother to tell anybody before she left, either.

Then I talked to my supervisor and told him we should celebrate for Marcus and the prepress tech guy. It totally slipped his mind (so he says). Nevermind that I wrote it on the CALENDAR that he looks at every darned day.

So, Friday I stopped at 7-11 and bought him one of his favorite canned caffeinated coffee beverages and proceeded to decorate his door.

Apparently nobody I work with learned how to read. All day long, people wished Marcus "Happy Birthday." After a while, he got tired of telling people it wasn't his birthday. Others thought the mini CDs in between words in my HAPPY SYSADMIN DAY banner were letter Os. I thought they might have trouble with the banner, so I printed the sign at work that morning with the URL for the SysAdmin Day site. Clueless...the whole lot.

At least Marcus knows one person in the building truly appreciates him.

[more photos in the SysAdmin Day 2007 gallery]

Just wanted to make a quick note to remind myself and everybody else that July 27th is System Administrator Appreciation Day. Show some love to the guy (or gal) that keeps your computers and networks humming along. When they're doing their jobs right, it's usually a thankless job, so please do something nice for yours.

This year's event is the 8th annual one. Read more at SysAdminDay.com.

Hope everybody had a good Independence Day yesterday. I took a bit of a holiday myself since I wasn't needed at work.

We had a little BBQ with some friends and then watched the Aurora fireworks display from the parking lot of PetSmart over at I-225 and Alameda. There was this one drunk dude there that was throwing fireworks up in the air and getting belligerent when people complained that sparks were falling on them. He made the mistake of throwing one right in front of an Aurora police officer that was patrolling the crowd on a dirt bike. Ha, Loser! I was amazed at all the dumb asses that tried to stop on the interstate to watch the fireworks. This one van load of people even got out of their vehicle. Yeah, like that was smart. Good thing the police were patrolling and moving them along before someone got hurt. Right after the fireworks ended, a really cool wind blew in bringing a heavy downpour with it. It was kind of cool to sit in the back of the Escape with the back door up watch the rain and waiting for the crowd to dissipate before heading home.

The sucky part was I didn't get to sleep until after midnight with all the fireworks being shot off in the neighborhood and a nightmare woke me up at 4 am. Working on 4 hours sleep was no fun today. Thankfully, I got a little nap in after work. It's going to be early to bed for me tonight!