Archive for the ‘Lingering Failure’ Category

Worst Day Ever

Saturday, August 21st, 2010

It’s been a while since I’ve posted I realize, but I’ve actually had real things to do so I haven’t had the time to post every little thing I mess up on a day to day basis. However, this last Sunday was such a monumental day rife with failure I just have to tell you all about it.

The day started with moving a car-load of things to my new apartment, the one I started renting July 1st. The place still isn’t fixed up. The kitchen is a disaster, the carpets aren’t clean, and they stopped painting half-way through the place. Wow. A great start to a Sunday.

I then drove out to Mayfair Mall to replace my DVR which failed at installing an update last week. They gave me a new one and I headed home.

Or so I thought, but the traffic to the Brewers game had other plans.

45 minutes later, I arrive at home with the DVR, I plugged it in, and it read “Illegal Cable Box” or something to that effect. They gave me a number to call, but it only took me to the unpaid bills office, which was closed.

Wow, a terrible day so far, so it was time for some lunch. My roommate decided it would be awesome to make fried Limburger cheese sandwiches. What do you know, the cheese known as “stinky cheese” is capabable of making an entire apartment smell like death once heated, and frankly, the sandwich was so pungent it was barely edible. 2 days later, our house still reeks.

Due to the smell and the fact that we are moving and need to clean anyway, we went out to buy paper towel and other cleaning supplies. We somehow forgot to actually buy the paper towel though, so wow.

Ok, it was time to take a shower and just stop trying to do things and relax for the night, right? Oh right, the hot water heater broke on Saturday, so it was an ice cold shower for me.

Wow, I could at least fire up the grill and slowly roast that brisket, right? Out of gas. Literally the last day I ever planned on using that grill it ran out of gas. But wait! We had extra charcoal sitting in the basement… sopping wet due to the recent rain.

Fine, onto video games. Oh, they’ve been moved already.

Just sit and do nothing, the only way I can’t fail.

meh

Monday, June 28th, 2010

meh

Still Tired

Wednesday, May 12th, 2010

I slammed my finger in the door leaving the house, I biked 2 miles through 40 degree weather, and I had a coffee and donut when I got into work and I’m still falling asleep. Seriously, I need more sleep tonight.

Same Old Story

Wednesday, April 28th, 2010

Ok, so this blog has turned into being only about my commutes to and from work, but I’ll be damned if they’re not full of inordinate amounts of fail. After my bike fell apart last week I pieced it back together and ended the week well. I thought I’d finally have a problem-free week but on Monday I discovered a flat tire. I aired it up and it seemed ok until it was flat again this morning. I guess I have a slow leak somewhere so I’m using the backup bike for the rest of the week. 4 weeks of bike commuting, 3 weeks of massive fail so far.

Out of it

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

I was ridiculously tired last night and this morning and it showed as I finally made it out the door for work. I biked about one mile and then realized I forgot to bring a dress shirt to wear at work so I had to turn back and pick one up. I then repeated that leg of the journey, now a full 20 minutes late and managed to cut off a fire truck with lights and sirens blaring. After the 30 minutes of biking and the near collision I am finally awake but I think I’ll be going to bed earlier tonight.

Only a Flesh Wound

Wednesday, April 14th, 2010

I’m 25, could I stop getting bad pimple outbreaks already? It looks like I took a 9mm to the forehead right now.

The Week of the Bike

Saturday, April 3rd, 2010

So, this last week was the very first week of commuting to work via bicycle. Sadly, this is something I’ve always dreamed of doing because it’s completely free, it’s pretty decent exercise, and it is actually quicker than taking the bus – or it least it can be. Predictably things got off to a very rocky start though.

In order to get to work and back with all of my things I realized that I’d need some sort of bike cart so on Monday I stopped at the local bike store and dropped $120 on a rear wheel mount and two saddle bags for the bike. That pretty much negated the “free” factor of bike commuting, though this purchase will have paid for itself within two months as two month’s bus fare is $128. Despite appearing to be a simple installation process, I spend a few hours on both Tuesday and Wednesday night floundering and failing at installing the damn thing. One lost bolt and a couple of hacks later I finally got the thing on in preparation for Thursday.

Thursday started off great until I realized I was going very slow and was getting ridiculously tired. At this point I noticed that the rear brake was clamped down and not releasing at all. It appears my wonderful installation of the rack and saddle bags messed the brake up. Huzzah. I was able to release the brake and just had to avoid using the rear brakes for the rest of the day. When I got home I tried to fix the brakes with the only tool I had, a monkey wrench, but after 30 minutes of getting nowhere I walked over to the hardware store for some real wrenches. That made turning the bolts that much easier but then I was faced with the realization that I had no clue what I actually needed to do to make the brakes work better. Nearly two hours after I started the brakes were finally operating almost normally and Friday’s commute went pretty smoothly.

Well, except of course for the super loud honking that the rear brakes now make. I suck at mechanical things, I sure do.

But I won, right?

Friday, February 19th, 2010

So, last week our office held a Wii Tennis single-elimination tournament. I decided that I had a good shot at this so I would spend the weekend before training at home. I was doing so-so, but as Saturday wore on I started playing like absolute crap. In a moment of pure juvenile rage I kicked the couch and instantly regretted it. Ok, so it was more of a stomp onto the arm rest, and I apparently completely missed the cushy part of it. The corner of the wooden frame beneath the cushions dug so hard into my heel I couldn’t walk straight for another 3 days. That kind of a hobble really sucks when one must walk about 20 blocks a day, but hey, the practice paid off and I won the tournament!

Wrong Button

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

Over Christmas weekend I borrowed my mom’s car so that I could actually get around to all of the various activities and errands I needed to do. The weather was not terrible, but the windshield washer was refusing to work so after only about 5 minutes of driving I’d have to start squinting out of the few unsalted spots on the windshield to see. I bought new fluid figuring that it was empty but when I looked under the hood I saw this was not the case. I managed the rest of the weekend by splashing cleaner from the surplus bottle right onto the windshield any time I got out of the car.

When I returned the car my mother kindly pointed out I’d been hitting the wrong button to activate the perfectly functioning washers. Way to go me.

Cold

Thursday, December 10th, 2009

I attempted to put the plastic wrap window insulation on some particularly drafty windows in the house today and majorily failed. Out of a thee pack I actually got one sheet of plastic up. The first one was mangled by scissors that were too dull, I managed to get the second one up, and then I ran out of tape before the third could be finished. It only took 2 hours.