Hello 2010 & 2009 Holiday Wrap Up

Yes, BAFW has been on a sort of hiatus while I was on vacation the last couple of weeks of December 2009. What was I doing? Pretty much enjoying some much needed family time. Christmas came and went and it was better than last year. So that's a plus. My wife told me she didn't need to return/exchange a single present I gave her for Christmas, which is a rousing success for me, since in the past I've gotten her things that have left her scratching her head wondering if the gift was really for her.

And don't get me started on what she got me. I won't list everything, but she got me comics, videogames, movies and some other geek-related goodness. That woman knows me well.

After Christmas, we ventured to Las Vegas for the third time this year, but this time, we got comp'ed rooms and we came back without any of our gambling money, but all of our entertainment money was still intact. So, it's not exactly breaking even, but we had a great time there. Set us up with massages at a spa and get us some penny slots and we're in heaven in Sin City.

We didn't stick around for New Year's in Las Vegas. I've done that a couple of times and it's never been great. Just crowded. And drunky. We found our own crowded and drunky spot here in Los Angeles at my wife's friend's work party. Open bar and free food guaranteed our presence. And for the most part, the party was fun, but we did leave before midnight. Why? We felt like it. And we're non-conformists . . . OK, we just got tired and wanted to get back home.

Other than that, not much else happened. I've been back at work (ugh) since Monday of this week, not really loving it, but I realize it's a necessary evil. I should start posting again within the next couple of days. Don't worry, trailers and funny videos will make their way onto BAFW soon enough. 'Til then, later.

BAFW's Escape from L.A.

It's been a few months since my last vacation, so I guess it's time to head out to Las Vegas again, BAFW's favorite vacation destination . . . by default. It's just cheap I guess to take vacations there. We'll be staying at the Orleans, I know, not on the strip, but we got a terrific deal (that was helped out by a Hotels.com coupon) for a 3 night stay, so you can't pass that up. We're also cutting loose out there. The wife and I don't drink or smoke cigarettes, or even eat meat while not on vacation. But during those fleeting moments where we can escape the reality of bills, 9-hour work days, and responsibilities, we do every thing we don't do. So, smoking is on. Drinking is on. Eating meat is on.

While I'm away, I'll be employing the Robo-Poster again. I have no idea what it's going to throw at you, but expect to see something tomorrow, around 8 AM. It likes to sleep in I guess. Robots . . . what can you do.

Wish me luck. I might hit a penny slot jackpot and come home with $10! 'Cause that's how I roll. I don't mess with the Benjamins. It's all about the Lincolns. I will return for irregular posting on August 7th. See you then.

BAFW's Analog Review - The Zombie Diaries

So I've been on vacation. Maybe I should have said something before I left. But, to make it up I have this review up at Analog Medium of a zombie movie I watched while I was on vacation from you. I don't want to spoil it for you, so just click on their name and see what happens.

The BAFW is In

Hello people. Hope the robo-poster kept you entertained while I was gone on my well deserved vacation. I know I should have started posting new material this past Tuesday, but I was still, technically, vacationing at that time. I wasn't out of town, mind you, I was just sitting around the BAFW HQ, catching up on video games and recorded television. I'm glad to report that since all of that catching up has been taken care off by now, I can devote some time to running BAFW again.

Although, I don't have much of anything to post right now. I did vote this past Tuesday. And wouldn't you know it, my first time and I picked a winner. Won't tell you who it was, since that stuff is supposed to be confidential, but I'm sure there's a pissed off hockey mom and a Vietnam POW out there who might be thinking to themselves: "Where'd that landslide come from?".

In other, non-politics related news, the wife and I have turned vegetarian. We want to hug animals, not fillet them. Vegetables and fruits, watch out, 'cause we're hungry. We don't care about your feelings. Turning vegetarian is more for health reasons really, rather than not wanting to eat cute animals. But wouldn't you know it, as soon as we become vegetarians, I get an e-mail from an uncle of mine that lives in Illinois inviting us to go hunting with him with an attached picture of a dead dear hanging from a crane.

We had to pass on the invite. Anyway, I'm off to getting ready to get to work. See ya suckers later.

The End of A Week that Felt Like an Era AKA: BAFW Vacation Pre-Cursor Post

I'm sure you've heard (or in this case read) me harp about my disdain for the end of the month. My job gets intense around then. Everything kicks into high gear and my teammates and I are doing anything (within the realm of federal and banking regulations) to meet and hopefully exceed or goal to ensure a nice fat bonus check the next month. Two fifteen hour days (5 AM - 8 PM) followed by a 5 AM - 2 PM day that caps off what I like to call "Collections Hell Week".

Today was specially tough on me as not only did I have to get through that, but I also needed to prepare to take a trip out to Utah to meet my wife who flew out there Thursday morning. My work obligations kept me in Los Angeles until now. But that meant that, after work today, I couldn't really just kick my shoes and vegge out in front of my big screen. No. I had to get to the store to pick up some stuff up that I needed for my 12 hour drive (I heard I could probably do it in 10) tomorrow morning. Which means I had to get my car in tip-top shape. Oil change, tire rotation, etc. I also had to drop off my dog at my mom's, who graciously offered to dog-sit for me over the weekend. I also had to take my wife's car to the body shop to mend a fender bender so that my wife could have her car back by the time we're back in town, which also meant I had to take public transportation (gasp!) home after that.

A pretty full day after having to wake up at 3:30 AM to get to work by 5 AM today. But now it's all winding down. I'm making a ton of CD's to keep me entertained (and awake) on the road. And it's also, officially the beginning of BAFW vacation # . . . . umm . . . I lost track of which vacation number this is this year. I know it's definitely the last one for the year. After this, I think I have 3 hours left which will shorten one of my days sometime between now and the end of the year.

So, I'll be gone for a few days. I'll set the robo-poster to throw out some video posts while I'm gone. There are some pretty cool things hitting theaters that you should know about. Keep posted while I'm gone for more details. In the meantime, I'm off to some relaxation and well deserved rest. I'll see you cool kids around.

BAFW Out!

Yes, a Seacrest joke. I was feeling ironic.

BAFW on Vacation (Again?)

Just how many fucking vacations do I need? Not as many as I'm getting. This is just a quick trip down to San Diego to see a relatively unknown band. I think they're getting to be known by the mainstream and we'd like to have a chance to see them in concert before they get too big. What? Radiohead is already a huge, multi-national and successful band, instantly recognized by their wondrous musical achivements?

I guess it's not a small band after all. So yeah, we got the worst seats imaginable for the concert. Seats that are in an entirely different city. But it just creates an excuse to get out of town for three days and two nights. Away from work and bullshit. I don't have anything scheduled to post for the next couple of days, but the guys over at Analog Medium (also accessible through the links menu in the sidebar) might be posting up a review of mine within the next couple of days. Check them out, they don't get nearly enough vacations.

BAFW Vacation in Progress

Some of you might not have noticed that since Friday afternoon, I've been on vacation. I set up BAFW to keep posting things (mostly videos as you have seen) during my absence using Blogger's future posting option. It's pretty cool. I spent Saturday through Monday in Las Vegas, gambling and drinking giant margarita drinks (and subsequently feeling like shit) the whole weekend. We even caught a burlesque show over at The Palms casino courtesy of my cousin Mig. The whole weekend was a great time and I only (technically) lost $100 bucks. My sister won $1000 on a dollar slot machine (I think she said it was a Wheel of Fortune one) and my brother in law came up even after spending way too much time at the blackjack tables over at the Paris casino. We even saw some sharks over in old Las Vegas, along with a trippy as fuck light show on Fremont street. The whole weekend was jam-packed with fun shit, and I wish I could give you an event by event breakdown of what happened. Unfortunately, I don't remember much. But, I did snap this picture while at the Golden Nugget's parking lot in downtown Las Vegas.

It's hard to speed when you're only walking

BAFW Vacation 2007 Recap Part I

Sunday 11/04 - This day started with a time change, which totally fucked us up, because we had not been able to sleep at all the night before, and now we were getting an extra hour to sleep, which wasn't going to happen. So, we were up at around 7 AM. We got some coffee, got everything in the car to head out to Las Vegas, got some donuts and gassed up the car. By the time all of that was done, it was just about 9 AM, so we were on schedule. We stopped in Baker en route to Las Vegas for some brunch. We ate at a place called "The Mad Greek" at around 11:30 AM that day. If you've ever traveled from Los Angeles to Las Vegas on the I-15 highway, you've seen the billboards for this place. They advertise fresh strawberry shakes and the best gyros. I had a sampling of both, and I have to say that the shake was too sweet, and the gyro, while good, was just not as good as the ones we get here from our local Greek cafe.

We continued our little journey and arrived in Nevada at around 1:30 PM. Since Heather had never actually been to the Primm outlet stores, we thought it would be a good idea to check that out first. We walked around, Heather bought some stuff in stores that had great outlet prices, and also in stores that had regular prices. I picked up a shirt for 12 bucks that I probably would have paid 30 if I had bought it at a regular location. We also picked up a couple of souvenirs for a friend of ours who is going to have their birthday soon. Just a couple of shot glasses. We hopped back on the freeway at around 2:30 PM and continued our trip to Las Vegas after this little spat of commercialism.

We were not really in a hurry, due to the fact that check-in at the resort we were staying at was not until 4 PM. So, we drove around a little bit once we got to the city. We hit up the Hard Rock Hotel first, because that was the place closest to where we were staying. They had an interesting array of rock and roll photography on the way from the parking structure to the actual hotel/gambling area. But that was pretty much the only thing that caught my attention. Their actual gambling area was dismally small. We played a little bit of slots there, and we took off for our next destination.

After checking out a couple other hotels, it was finally time to check in. We had some great accommodations lined up that we got from my father-in-law. He's an owner of a timeshare through Wyndham Vacation Ownership, so he let us use some of his unused points to book our stay in Las Vegas. The whole time we were there, we only paid $25 for our room. That's not per day, that's from Sunday - Thursday. And we could have stayed until Friday, because they told us that was the actual day that we had opted to stay through. But Heather worked that Friday, so we had the option to check out any time we wanted on Thursday. Our room was great. It was not just a room, but more like a mini-one bedroom apartment. It had a kitchen, living room, bedroom and bathroom, very spacious, and overlooking the pool area. And this was their more modest unit.

We unloaded everything and then took their free shuttle to the Harrah's casino, were we played until about 9 PM. At this time, we were pretty exhausted from not sleeping the day before, and all the driving and walking around, so we took the shuttle back to the resort, where we tried to watch a DVD (Sid & Nancy) but fell asleep a few scenes into it.

BAFW Vacation 2007

As of 1:49 PM yesterday, BAFW is on vacation. My regular day job gets 2 weeks of vacation, and I'm taking my 2nd one of the year to go to Las Vegas this week. We leave tomorrow, and I won't be posting anything until I return. I would have done some on-the-trip blog posts, but my wife is adamant about us not taking the computer with us. I know, it doesn't make sense to me. She's worried that it might get stolen while we're there. So, I'll be back Friday, November 9th with a re-cap of what we did . . . nothing sexual though.

Maybe sexual. Depends really. OK, everything sexual.

Travel-log (6022007-1036)

It's morning on Saturday, the 2nd of June, and we've now been in Utah for a solid 3 days. We're working on our 4th. Spending time with family is fun and all, but the air mattress we've been provided does little for comfort. I'm not complaining though. There's always a price to pay for a good time. But my wife and I can't wait to get back home to our mattress.

Seeing the little ones has been fun as well. My nephew Noah is a hoot. All he likes to do is sneak up on me, smack me on the leg, and then run away while I pretend to not be able to catch him. My niece Caitlin is adorable. She does that to, but she spends more time with my wife because she's her favorite aunt. Then there's Nick and Colton . . . who are just a couple of blond tazmanian devils. But, it's good to see them.

All in all, so far, it's been worth it coming to Utah. There was a time when my wife and I were seriously considering moving here. Now that we've experienced it, we've come to the realization that it's a nice place to visit. Maybe if we hit the lottery (you know, if we ever start playing) we would buy a vacation home out here so we could come and go as we please back to civilization. It's very rural out here. But, if you're ever in Tooele, UT, stop by a place called "Leatherby's". Ice cream sundaes that could put you in a diabetic coma. They're awesome.

We also attended my brother in law's high school graduation. It was held in a barn. Well, actually, it was where they hold the cattle during state fairs, which is technically a barn. It's a good thing his graduating class was not as large as mine, or I would have died. The seating was cramped and uncomfortable, and it felt like it was in the 90's despite air conditioning.

My wife is calling me now. Breakfast and then I'm pretty sure we're going to a couple of little leauge baseball games. We come back to Los Angeles tomorrow. Our backs can't wait.

Travel-log (5302007-03:39)

It's Wednesday morning. Extremely Wednesday morning. I'm trying to shake off about 4 hours of sleep. Yesterday's 11 hour work day is still weighing me down. I think I broke a record yesterday, at least a personal one, when I took over 210 customer service calls in one day. I'll find out when I get back to work in a week. But now, we're on vacation. Why no sleeping in? We have a plane to catch.

Our flight leaves @ 7 AM today, but we need to get to the Burbank airport first, and my wife and I are having my mother chauffer us to the airport. She'll be here in just under an hour. We need to get there early to go through whatever check-in process and security checkpoints there are. It's only a domestic flight, but I haven't actually been on an airplane post 9/11, so I don't know what to expect. This should give us a wide enough berth that we won't miss our flight.

Otherwise, everything is going according to plan. Despite an overwhelming feeling that I am forgetting something, I'm doing OK. I'm sure that whatever is nagging at the back of my mind will finally become clear to me halfway to our destination. It'll be a very "Home Alone(ish)" moment. My wife is getting her decidedly larger suitcase together which has been in the process of packing for the past couple of days. I just hope nothing happens to these bags en route to Utah. I told her already to not put any valuables in them. We're taking those on our carry-on, which is just one messenger bag that is pretty much filled to the gills (if bags had gills) with our iPod Shuffles and digital camera.

Which reminds me . . . I need to empty the porn out of the USB drive so that there aren't any embarrasing moments downloaded into any of our family's computers while were there. That's what I was forgetting. I think. Let's just hope that's all. Got to take care of that. I'll continue travel-logging as possible.

BAFW on Vacation - AKA "Vacations are for Wusses"

Starting tomorrow, I will be gone for about 5 days while I enjoy time away from Los Angeles. It will be a sort of scientific voyage though, as I will spend those five days in the midst of Mormons. Yes, I am going to Utah, and will be in the Salt Lake City vicinity. It'll be kind of like Jane Goodall studying gorillas, but much whiter.

Why am I going to Utah of all places? Well, my wife's family is currently conglomerated in that state. Her oldest sister has been living there for quite some time with her husband and two kids. Her other not so older sister just moved there this past February after her husband got out of the Marines, and they're there with their two kids. My wife's younger brother, who lives with one of the sisters, is graduating from High School this week, so that's the catalyst that initiated this whole trip.

I managed to get five days off while only using 3 vacation days at work, and I didn't even have to trade in sexual favors for that. The days I'm taking off were completely blacked out, but the floor manager told me he appreciated my proactive stance on the issue, letting him know months in advance rather than a week before that I needed this time off. Plus, we had bought the tickets and made these plans way before I even had begun working for my current employer, and the tickets were not refundable. At least I think they're not. Which really helped me in the end, because there's no way I'm wasting 200+ dollars.

So, what does this mean to you? Loyal reader(s?) of "Blogs are for Wusses"? No posts until I return. I don't even know if they have the "internets" in Utah. I've never been there. And no, I won't return with more than one wife. Let me tell you . . . one's enough. So, enjoy whatever Lindsay Lohan does for the next five days and laugh as Paris Hilton begins her stint in jail . . . which should last about a week.