Mike's Grand World

Haven’t done a lot today. I painted some rough spots on my front door. I painted a small wall that was very marked up. I went through a few rooms and used the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser to clean up some marked up walls. I need to get my house ready to sell. I just don’t feel like doing any more. Add to that, I am not really a handyman. I am more of a hungryman! 😀

So, what else have I done today? I played through a few races on PGR3 on the Xbox360. I watched Batman on DVD. Chatted with Stephanie on Yahoo! IM. Now, I am watching the last 3 episodes of the season 1 of the X-Files. I wrote a blog…well filled a blog on MySpace with some YouTube clips from the Muppet show. The Swedish Chef, Waldorf and Statler, and Pigs in Space. Yes, I know, I have great taste in games, TV, and movies…

So, yeah, I really have been a lazy bum today. I need it after my drinking purge last night.

Where do I start? Well, most of what I might say is in my pet peeves post, but …

I got up at 6:30 this morning and went downstairs…and what do I hear? Bass protruding from the wall between my house and my neighbors’s house. Remember, this is 6:30AM. I don’t get it. It lasted the whole time I was getting ready to come into work. I am beginning to wonder when the hell he sleeps. I get this at night and in the morning. About the only thing I can do is fire back. I do have the firepower to throw it back at him. Most of the time, this works, but in the morning, I like it pretty quiet.

Oh, man, do I want to move. The other people in my neighborhood don’t respect the rules. Parking on the street, parking in the visitor’s spots, running stop signs… Even if I wasn’t moving into an apt, I might end up moving just to get away from these people.

The HOA rarely does anything about this behaviour. They just want your money. They have to pay the landscapers, after all. Sigh.

Anyway, I am a bit pissed that I had to listen to over an hour of bass this morning and I just didn’t feel like firing back. But tonight…well, tonight is a far different story. To use a Dream Theater song title… “Light Fuse And Get Away.”

Well, it should go on the market in a couple of weeks. There are a few issues I need to work out on it. Plus, my agent and I want to watch the market for the next week or so to see how the other houses in my neighborhood are moving.

There are several reasons why I decided to sell:

1. Traffic. It’s getting worse and worse. My commute times are getting longer and neither I nor my office has moved. Getting stuck on a 4-line wide highway is just insane.

2. Road conditions. The roads around me are not improving. Potholes and patches and just overly rough surfaces. This is hard on a small car like mine.

3. Construction. There are so many new townhouse communities popping up around me and I am tired of the construction. I survived while my neighborhood was being finished, but now, I just wanna get away.

4. Liquidity. Living in an apartment will make it easier to pick up and move to Alabama, should the opportunity arise. Selling my house is one step towards making this happen.

5. Townhouse. The glorified apartment. The biggest benefit of living in my house is the tax deductions I get for my interest paid. Otherwise, I feel like I live in a glorified apartment. Might as well live in one. At least, I won’t have to do my own maintenance.

6. The HOA.  My HOA is non-existant except when it comes time to pay the fee.  No meetings.  No conact.  Just pay your money.  That’s all they want.   They don’t want to hear from you.   Yeah, pretty pathetic.

It is a pretty tough thing to move and move again. I have lived in 4 different places since I moved to the Metro Atlanta area in late 99. I guess I am a nomad. I am going to move back down to Roswell. I really like this area of the Metro, so I plan to stay in this area as long as I am here.

I know just about as much about what I want to do with my life as I did when I was 18. How did I let it get this far without any real direction. I wanted to be a professional musician (aka rock star) as a teenager. Well, that plan sure failed. So, I went with what appeared to be the next money maker, computers. Got my AAS degree in Electronics Technology. That’s great but could only lead to a life in manufacturing. I found myself right back in school and finally got my BS in Computer Information Systems. That led me here to GA.

This is exactly what I had in mind, either. So what do I want to do?

1.) Own my own business. A bar/nightclub/restaurant. This is a pretty competitive business and I have no business sense. This is bound to fail. Not to mention, you need lots of capital to start up a business, which I don’t have.

2.) Systems Admin. That is the most likely scenario for me. I have a few Microsoft certification tests I need to take and get some certifications that I can put on my resume. MCP is far too common to be impressive.

3.) Forensics. If only shows like “The Forensic Files” had been on TV when I was in college, I might have changed my major. It would take too many hours in college now for me to go back and get another degree.

4.) Retail store manager. Depends on which one, money can be made but it is a huge operation to keep going and when things fail, you are the one to blame.

5.) Bum. This would be easy to obtain but hard to live.

Hard to belive that after all these years of thinking I knew what I wanted, I am still thinking.

Maybe it’s the lack of confidence. The low self-esteem. Or just my natural shyness. I have to warm up to people for a while before I can really talk to them. It has always been like that. I guess I don’t really have an outgoing personality.

So, where can I meet people? Social clubs? Let’s see, what do I like:

Music (metal, progressive rock, progressive metal, rock, grunge)

Video Games

Computers (Specifically Macintosh)

These kinds of social clubs (well, is there a video game or music social club?) are probably not big with girls, so …

Anyway, something’s gotta give… sigh.