Hotness

Check out the EW link if you want to see pictures of their Top 25 Hotties.

Hotties '09: EW Readers Top 25

I've posted them below for your perusing:

25. TINA FEY, Liz Lemon on 30 Rock
24. NEIL PATRICK HARRIS, Barney Stinson on How I Met Your Mother
23. HUGH JACKMAN, Logan/James Howlett in X-Men Origins: Wolverine
22. MARK HARMON, Leroy Jethro Gibbs on NCIS
21. ELIZA DUSHKU, Echo on Dollhouse
20. EMILY DESCHANEL, Temperence ''Bones'' Brennan on Bones
19. COTE DE PABLO, Ziva David in NCIS
18. YVONNE STRAHOVSKI, Sarah Walker on Chuck
17. ZACHARY LEVI, Chuck Bartowski on Chuck
16. STEPHEN MOYER, Bill Compton on True Blood
15. ZACHARY QUINTO, Spock in Star Trek
14. ERICA DURANCE, Lois Lane on Smallville
13. JOHN BARROWMAN, Jack Harkness on Torchwood
12. DAVID TENNANT, The Doctor in Doctor Who
11. JEFFREY DEAN MORGAN, Edward Blake/The Comedian in Watchmen
10. STANA KATIC, Kate Beckett on Castle
9. DEBORAH ANN WOLL, Jessica Hamby on True Blood
8. JARED PADALECKI, Sam Winchester on Supernatural
7. DAVID BOREANAZ, Seeley Booth on Bones
6. TOM WELLING, Clark Kent on Smallville
5. SUMMER GLAU, Cameron on Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
4. EMILY PROCTER, Calleigh Duquesne in CSI: Miami
3. ALEXANDER SKARSGARD, Eric on True Blood
2. JENSEN ACKLES, Dean Winchester on Supernatural
1. ROBERT PATTINSON, Edward Cullen in Twilight

For the most part, this is a good list. But, dude, where's Nathan Fillion? I'm a straight fellow but I must say he deserves to be on here. And, heck, where's Jessica Alba? Until further notice, she deserves to be on EVERY single one of these types of lists from now until... ummm... further notice.

Who do you like on this list? Who's missing? And what's up with all the vampires (even David Boreanaz/Angel is on here)?

Role Reversal

I made a trip to the airport today to drop off family. My mom and her sister (visiting from Guam) were going to Las Vegas to visit my aunt's son. And my mom's brother was heading back to San Diego. I had lunch with them before their flight. Good thing considering I haven't had a chance to talk with them in the weeks they've all been here.

But, dude, we had such a weird lunch. First off, the hot topic was the arguments the three of them had with another brother. "He said" and "she said" type drama. Bringing up the past, screaming, crying, physical threats... dude! What the heck? These guys in their 50's and 60's sounded like they were a bunch of kids.

Then, they were laughing it up about how they've spent the past few weeks. They've been going to all kinds of parties, dancing, gambling, karaoke nights. Sheesh.

Shouldn't I be the one talking about partying it up? The highlight of my past few weeks has been watching classic movies, taking a tour of a lighthouse, and reading New Moon.

HOLY CRAP! I'm an OLD MAN/girl!

Sweet Dreams Are Made of These

I had an interesting dream last night. It involved my dad who passed away four years ago... and my older sister who's been gone for eight years now.

In the dream, the house I'm in is unfamiliar. But it's a bright sun-shiny type home. My dad's sitting in the kitchen, behind a small dining table. He's eating a snack while reading a book. My mom, little sister, and older brother are in the background doing their own thing.

My dad's talking about a new federal government restriction requiring him to return some books and movies he's checked out from them. He's complaining about this process and I tell him about the city library. Don't worry about those movies 'cause you'll be able to just turn around and borrow from the library!

While we're on the topic of movies, I start talking about the old movies I watched for my Intro to Film class.

I ask, "Have you seen Grapes of Wrath?"

My dad hardly acknowledges my question as he's extremely involved in the book he's reading.

"How 'bout Sunset Boulevard or Rear Window?"

I barely get a nod from him but I continue on 'cause I know he'll recognize the next movie.

"How about The Searchers with John Wayne?"

My dad says, "Oh, yeah. Reminds me of [a movie I can't remember the name of]..."

Hmmm. Nope, they're not similar. I disagree with his comparison but he tells me that he disagrees. We go back & forth a couple of times but I decide it best to continue on. I sense he may be annoyed but continue to ask about several more movies.

He finally says, "You know, I'm really trying to get through this book."

Okay.

Fine.

He wants to be left alone.

With my head down, I exit out the door leading to the back of the house. I stand in the middle of the walkway leading to I-dunno-where. I'm very depressed. So sad. I'm wishing my dad had taken just a moment to pay me some attention. But he didn't.

I start walking slowly, passing people along the way. Nobody cares. They just keep walking. This includes my little sis and my bro.

But, from the corner of my eye, I see my older sister, Raeann. She's carrying some heavy items but, seeing me distraught, she sets them all down and follows me along the path. She puts her arm around me and I lean against her shoulder. It's comforting having her there by my side. She was my protector when I was a kid. Even in my dreams, years after I've seen her alive, she's there for me. There are no words exchanged between the two of us. She was, after all, deaf. But just having her there helps me forget my sadness.

And that's when I woke up.

It was great to see my dad, even if he wasn't too nice to me. But it was even better to have my sister helping me out. I love these dreams where I get to see them again. Rare to have them both in the same dream. 'Twas very sweet.

Never ever again

I should already know better. Still, I do attempt an occasional text while driving. Well, from this day forward, never... ever... never ever again.

This video is quite graphic and very scary. Real-life type of scary. What a helluva public service announcement.

Yachats

Yachats. That's a small Oregon coast town six hours away from Seattle. That's where I'm headed with G tonight. I'm on the ferry to Bremerton right now. Off to pickup my 12-year old nephew. The trip to the beach is meant for him. It's intended to be a fun way for him to hang with G's nephew and niece. Hope he appreciates the effort and is a good boy this trip...

Technology

As Kip from Napoleon Dynamite sang, "Yes, I love technology."

Late last night, I decided to figure out the random order for my league's fantasy football draft. Because I wanted to let everyone know it was legit, I filmed my methodology with my webcam and posted it on YouTube.

Please don't watch this because, honestly, you won't get the five minutes back. But, still, 'twas somewhat amusing.

Incomplete

Before I went to Vegas two weekends ago, I was writing back & forth with the instructor from my web design class. Because I like to share, I wrote:

FYI, I can't wait for this quarter to be done. In addition to this class, I have three 1000-word papers due for my Intro to Film class. And, I've got a week worth of data to recreate at work.

Long story short, the server housing our accounting/manufacturing software system crashed. We restored days later but our only backup is from 7/26. Our I.T. people are in big trouble for that. Finance, Sales Support, and Production have to re-input all transactions from the last week of July. And, add to that, three people who handled these transactions were let go on 7/31 (they knew months in advance). That leaves me to do a lot of it. Woe is me. :)

AND, to top it off, I have an out of town guest for the weekend to prepare for.

Yeah, I know what you're thinking.

T, M, I.

I do like to share too much with people sometimes. But she writes back:

This sounds really tough. If you need the option, I would agree to an Incomplete since I'm sure you'd actually finish the work.

At first, I replied back to her and said I'd be okay. Buuuuut.... what did I do today? I called her up and requested to, yes, please allow me take an Incomplete in the class. The only thing I have left in the class is a final project template and the actual project itself.

I feel relieved right now. I've been go-gO-GO lately and just stressing myself out so much. Now, I can just relax a wee bit and take care of the final project before the end of next quarter.

Feels good. Relief. Woot.

Inspirational

I'm cleaning up my inbox and filtering through emails from my coworker who enjoys sending videos. This particular is quite touching.

Moments

When you're on Twitter and following EW PopWatch, you get little gems like this:

Grrrrr x 10

Last week, four people were let go from the company I work for. They're all good though 'cause they've known for months that this was coming. Actually, leaving a job does not create an "all good" feeling - but, at least they had lots & lots of notice.

They all had different roles with the company. They were responsible for posting cash, creating accounts receivable adjustments, billing, order entry, and yada-ya-da-yad-a. Those are pretty important tasks, huh? That's right, they are important. Last week, we had a lot of system activity because it was the end of the month. Busy times equals lots of work. But, remember, they're now gone.

Well, it is now the third day without these people and guess what? Our Accounting/Manufacturing software system (called Avante) has been down the whole week. We are having hardware problems with the server where the software resides. Boo hoo. Yes, very sad. And that's fine. Shit happens. But guess what kind of shit is really going down? The data from the server is corrupt. We have to restore the server with one of our tape backups. AND... AND... AND... whadayaknow? The last good backup of our data is from... [drum roll please!]... July 26.

That's July 26, 2009.

Four critical employees left July 31. THEY entered a whole week's worth of transactions since July 26. And, now, guess what? They're not here to re-input all that data once the system is restored. It's gonna be me and only a handful of other people who will have to reenter everything that was lost. Shit, shit, shit.

Dude. I'm so not feelin' this. I have a headache and I've never felt worse. This is a more horribler feeling than when I was told I was losing my job. And I can't believe I typed "horribler" as a word.