Work, meanwhile, resumed in full intensity. I was actually up at Ed's place on Thurs night till 2300 hours working on his home network. Apparently his internet connection has been plagued with instability for the past several months, and none of the Time Warner techs could figure it out. But as soon as I saw the symptoms I knew that it was a flaky router, which explains why TW couldn't fix it since it is out of their jurisdiction. All's well that ends well I suppose. . . and besides, had some tasty BBQ chicken while I was there.

Yesterday morning was our monthly downtime at work, but after I got home I managed to knock out several more chapters in the Security+ book. If I am able to finish the final two chapters tonight, I'll be ready to take the exam in the next week or so. Yeah yeah yeah. . . its way behind schedule. . . I know already. . .

Work is as busy as usual. Just when I think I have things under control, some widget blows up and its mass chaos yet again. When I finish putting out the fire, rinse and repeat from the top as needed. Its a perpetual Monday, and there's no end in sight. Such a thankless job we have. . . :p

Yanyan is coming in tonight. Tomorrow we head down to San Antonio and get to meet with the dreaded INS in an effort to get her paperwork straightened out. We think we have everything we need to prove our case, but given my past experience with INS, its never enough, and they'll find some way to screw us over. This makes tomorrow feel like a futile effort, but the prize of the battle is what makes it all worth it in the end. . .

The intense military training I've been attending for the past several months has paid off. As of today I've been opted into ODG Mercenaries. Its a loose group of troopers that are in this for fun, and in the end I tend to agree. What would be the point of baking in the sun for six hours three to four times a month and chasing and shooting each other in dense foilage full of creepy crawlies if we weren't out to have fun? One of the benefits I'm looking forward to is more emphasis being placed on squad-level tactics, as opposed to me being my unaffiliated lonesome self wondering who will back me up when the shit hits the fan. . . It was fun working solo, but increased participation in a regular fire team should introduce some interesting dynamics. . . all the more to make me more powerful in the field of battle. *evil laughter*

The beginning of October marked yet another birthday for me. Yes, I'm old, thanks for reminding me. Yanyan came down for the weekend and helped me celebrate, so all was good. Although her leaving is becoming tougher for me each and every time. . . fortunately the end is in sight, or so we hope.

The matron also visited last week, and proceed to stockpile even more food in my supplies. I'm having a hell of a time clearing away food, and my lack of time to do a proper workout is definitely not helping my phyisique.

And then work work work work work work work. . . and some more work while we're at it. Fortunately I was able to slip away for a few hours on the battlefield for yet another training session, so it wasn't all a loss. With any luck, I'll be back on the field again this weekend.

This past weekend I decided to attend the hiring event at CT. Was definitely a good thing seeing everyone again. . . most of whom I converse more in online chat than actual face to face. Much merriment ensued, and the only detriment was not having Yanyan around with me.

Also serviced Shadow Phoenix this past weekend. Her engines were due for an overhaul, so I spent several hours getting that done. Hopefully that will resolve some of the minor power fluctuations I've been noticing on her HUD unit.

And then there's today. Was late at work, came home at about 2300 hours. . . and lo and behold some asshole decided to be cute and parked in front of my docking bay doors. The driver of TX-H23CLW needs to be shot and killed for placing their own convienience over the livelihood of other people. It is this kind of inconsideration that contributes to the world's current set of problems. Barring man-made legal barriers, I firmly believe that a little chlorine in the human gene pool is for the greater good of all.

Although I'm sorely tempted to use their ship as target practice for Rasengan, I've already notified the local authorities and hopefully they can take some kind of action to rectify this. I don't have my hopes up, because it sounds like their hands are tied due to corporate bureacratic crap.

Been fairly busy for the past week at work, and currently banging my head against the wall trying to figure out why the new RIS server is not cooperating (as far as I can tell, it has nearly identical configurations as the old RIS server). At the rate we are going, I am sorely tempted to introduce the RIS server to my M203 grenade launcher. Bill would be pissed. . . so it might behoove me to use the old RIS server as a hostage. . . although the two servers could probably care less. . .