My hobbies include:
In the beginning of 1999 my floppy drive went
kaput, and ever since I been very interested in
how computers work, from both a software standpoint and a hardware standpoint.
So I bought myself some books, and am learning. My floppy drive eventually
started working again (months later!), when I took everything out, added a new hard drive, and
pretty much started over from scratch. It must have been a loose
connection or something. While I was on vacation in Georgia
(the country, not the state) last November I replaced the screen in
someone's laptop , and it still
worked afterwards. Yea, me! After I moved to New Mexico, I bought a book
to teach myself Javascript, and Jeff bought us books to learn C/C++. I've
been chugging away at them slowly. This summer we are both back in
school at UNM and working on Masters degrees in C.S. (my 2nd, his 1st).
Dance: Yes, folks, after an 8 year hiatus, I actually enrolled myself in a dance class at UNM this summer. I intended to take Modern I, but ended up taking Modern II at the sugguestion of both the Modern I and Modern II instructors. Which just goes to show - if you don't use it, you don't necessarily lose ALL of it. :_) At first it was difficult (if you can imagine trying to touch your toes after being a couch potato for most of a decade...) - I'd come home at 7:30, collapse into a hot bath for about 45 minutes, and go straight to bed. But I had a lot of fun. The teacher, Linda, was awesome. (She's one of Bill Evans' dancers, BTW.) I met some new people, and redeveloped some muscles I'd totally forgotten about. Somewhere in the middle of that class I actually found myself again, too, and it's nice to be back.
Percussion: As a kid, I used to turn my metal trash can over and
bang on the bottom of it, with my hands, or pencils, or whatever suited
me. Or, at least, I used to bang on it until my mom came in and
threatened to send me to live on a street corner somewhere if I didn't stop! That was kinda the end of that for a
while. When I moved to Wyoming, I met a guy named Nathan who wanted to
start teaching private drum lessons. Since I didn't live with my mother
anymore, I figured, hey, why not? I also started playing the tambourine
with the band at my church, and eventually expanded my collection to include conga drums, a tambourine, shakers,
wood blocks, triangles, and just about any other percussion toy I could get
my hands on. And eventually they ran out of people willing to play the
drum set, and I got to do that for a while, too. I was also in a band
for a while, that was first called Lost and Found, but changed its name to
70x7. We played original contemporary
Christian songs written by our lead singer Vic and our keyboardist
Rob.
Here in New Mexico, I am playing drums and percussion toys at my new church, St. Joseph's on the
Rio Grande. I alternate the drumset every third week with a two guy who are in high
school -- Gabe & Matt. Both of the put me to shame! :) On the weeks when they're playing, I
try to play congas & toys.
Keeping in Touch with Friends & Family:
Well, I suppose formeost I do this by maintianing this web page. I also love to talk on the phone, as my Roomie #1 will attest to. I also Email people (when I remember to!) and I chat on ICQ & MMS when I have time (usually at night). If you have either of those, add me to your contact list; I'd love to hear from ya! ICQ# 13171263, MMS: mathochist98@hotmail.com
Creative scrapbooking:
You can thank my mother-in-law for getting
me hooked on this one! It basically involves cropping pictures into
fancy shapes, bordering
them with fancy paper, and mounting them on a page whose layout is totally
up to you. It reminds me a lot of being on yearbook staff, only the whole
book is done according to MY tastes! It's a lot of fun.
Hangin' with my puppy:
We have a three year old Walker Hound named Chelsea. (Okay, so she's not a
puppy anymore. But she will always be "my puppy.") And, no, we
didn't name her after the President's daughter. In fact, we
didn't name her at all. She had that name when we rescued her from
the pound in March of '98. She is mostly a good dog, but is very hyper,
especially when she sees a person, dog, or cat to play with, or a
squirrel, rabbit, or antelope to chase. Every once in a while she
still exhibits some identity issues and separation anxiety (Her
previous owner dumped her at the pound when she was very young and
impressionable. We got her when she was 6 months old).
It was a real advenure trying
to train her, especially since I didn't know what I was doing when
I started. But we came along nicely. Slowly, but nicely.
If you need some tips for training your own dog, there is a
great website you should check out:
World travel:
In 1999 I managed to leave the country for my
first AND second time ever. In June I went to Ireland.
Ireland has always been #1 on my list of places I want to go.
And after having been there, it still is! I ***LOVE*** Ireland!
(One day I will live there! You watch!) I had a blast.
I toured a lot. I just rented a car (or, rather, Jeff rented
it for me, 'cause I wasn't old enough!) and I just drove around,
and stopped at anything that looked interesting. Definitely
the way to do Ireland! I also met up with my cool advisor from CSU (who was
smart enough to move back home to a place much cooler
than Colorado could ever hope to be:). I
went to the Irish Derby (sponsored by Budweiser, of all things!).
And I partied with some drunken Irish soldiers...
And let me tell you, I THOUGHT cajuns were the kings of
all partiers, until I met real Irishmen! WOW! And, yes, of course I
acquired a taste for Guiness while I was there. You kind of have to.
And it is true what they say: the Guiness here isn't anything compared to
the real thing in the real place. So go to Ireland.
*Everybody* should go to Ireland. (Just not all at once please!:)
Then, over Thanksgiving break I went to see Jeff at his job as a U.N. observer in Georgia.
This is the COUNTRY Georgia, not the STATE of Georgia. (Georgia
used to be part of the Soviet Union. It is sort of NE-ish of Turkey.)
It was, of course, great to see Jeff after 5 months. It was very interesting to experience another,
somewhat different, culture. I got a couple of fabulous soup
recipes from Jeff & Owen's cook. I bought some cool Georgian wine
glasses made out of bulls' horns. I bartered at an outdoor market. That was
kinda cool, especially since the old woman and I couldn't understand each others' languages.
(Luckily I had my own personal UN translator there. :) Georgia was okay.
It wasn't Ireland. That's about all I have to say about it.
But that's probably about all I'd have to say about any place... It's NOT Ireland. :)
In October of 2001 Jeff and I are planning on going to Spain. That was one of the places he went while he had vacation from Georgia, and he loved it. I don't speak a lick of Spanish, but again I will have my own personal translator, so I oughta be okay. Roomie #3 might come with us. If you're interested in coming, too, Email Jeff.
Tell me about your hobbies!
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