Author: Cupcakey

When it comes to music I have phases of bands I listen to. Last year from February up until maybe late November all I ever listened to was Milemarker (check them out!) and I just finally listened to them last week, for the first time since November ’05. I’ve done the same with Explosions in the Sky, Lifetime, Refused, Gorilla Biscuits, and a few others.

But there’s honestly one band that I have not stopped listening to when I first heard of them. I remember that it was 1998 when I heard the song “For Your Lungs Only” by Alkaline Trio. And since then I never stopped listening to them. I can’t say that I know all of their songs, but I know all of the ones from Goddamnit, Maybe I’ll Catch Fire, Alkaline Trio, and From Here to Infirmary. For some reason I never really got into Good Mourning and Crimson, though there are some songs of theirs from those two albums that I know.

I’ve seen this band way too many times for my own good, and I’ve screamed at the top of my lungs to most of their songs. Listening to some of the songs reminds me of certain events over the years, and the more “deep” songs are attached to people. For instance whenever I hear Radio I think of one of my first serious boyfriends, Nick. That’s one of his favorite songs and he’d play it all the time and sing to it. Stupid Kid and This Is Getting Over You are thee songs I played over and over again when Chris cheated on me and broke up with me.

It’s just weird how I can go through phases with bands, but Alkaline Trio is the one and only band that I’ve never left behind. The past couple of months I’ve listened to more Alkaline Trio than anything else in the past year. I’m also starting to get that way with Rise Against. I’ve been playing their album Siren Song of the Counter Culture when I haven’t been listening to Alk3.

Favorite Alkaline Trio songs:
• Goodbye Forever
• Sadie
• Take Lots with Alcohol
• Cop
• This Is Getting Over You
• Clavicle

Favorite Rise Against songs:
• Blood To Bleed
• Paper Wings
• Life Less Frightening
• Remains of Summer Memories
• Worth Dying For

Oh, and in case you didn’t notice, I put up a new uber-simple theme here at atourworst.org. I think it’s pretty shibby. o.O

The other theme bored the crap out of me within the first few days, so for a bit last night I worked on editing up the Blix theme to give it a more web 2.0 look since that’s the look I’m obsessed with right now. Any errors, please leave a comment about them; I’m still tweaking here and there but I’m trying to rush it since I need to leave in 40 minutes while squeezing in a shower/getting ready.

Today is pay day for Caribou Coffee, so after I run out to pick up my the school carpool, I’ll run out to pick up my check and cash it. I have a feeling it won’t be as nice as my last one since I won’t have any overtime on it, but oh well, it’s still money. Speaking of which I also need to pick up my Best Buy check, pending that those fuckers fixed my number issue and created a manual paycheck for me. If not I shall raise hell!

I was up until 5:30am last night. That’s the first time since late July that I’ve been up that late, and quite frankly I would rather pass out at 11pm than be up that late. Granted, my reasoning for being up so late was because I happened to be talking to the guy that I have a slight liking of. So obviously a guy that I like > sleep. Go figure.

Honestly, I swear that any guy that works in Best Buy: PCHO plays WoW outside of work, and while at work, talks about WoW. Like yesterday for example: Mike and I had a customer that was asking about Medal of Honor and then we got into Xbox:Live (Halo2) and then… WoW. And that conversation lasted more then it should’ve, but I only say that because these guys talk about it all the time.

So when I came across warcraftunderground.com, I thought of them and figured I’d go ahead and write it down so I could give it to them. I’m sure they obsess over anything in regards to WoW. Personally, I’m not that into it.. (yet?) But being around all of them talking about it, I’m sure it’ll be a short time until I get redrawn into the world of … haha, warcraft. It happened at my old store, and it’s going to happen here again!

But warcraftunderground.com seems to be pretty full of information, and it’s even got a section for myspace layouts (rofl). Honestly though, the only part that turned me off was the little pop-up to join their newsletter of sorts, but hey, whatever, all I had to do was click “No, Thanks.”

Either way, I have a feeling that come payday on Friday I’ll be buying a new Nvidia card to hop back onto WoW, and probably frequenting that website. /g33k

Eight days ago I wrote about how wireless networking is cake, right? Well, guess what, it took eight days from that post for me to get this fucking networking fixed and running properly. And the best part? I don’t know what the fuck I did to make it work, aside from rebooting the laptop. Go figure.

Last night I was to the point of returning the Linksys WRT54G and getting a switch so I could just run some CAT6 and get over the wireless woes. I mean, I spent hours googling up on my DSL modem, the Speedstream 5100. I was trying to decipher whether this was the A or B model, which made a difference. The A model doesn’t handle PPPOE, and is already in bridge. The B model handles the PPPOE and has to be switched the bridge.

After browsing and cursing at dslreports most of the night I finally came across the perfect FAQ that even included pictures to decipher the models (since the Efficient site was fucking useless.) So I went ahead and took off DHCP from the router and set up PPPOE. I hoped that it would work so I went wireless on the laptop–absofuckinglutely nothing. So I got stressed out and just wanted to give up. Add in the fact my dad was going ballistic downstairs, so I opted to sign off and drive around to get off some steam by listening to Alkaline Trio since that’s all I’ve been playing on my iPod when I’m in the car.

This morning I wake up, wonder around the house aimlessly freezing my ass off, and decide to hop onto the computer. Since we’ve got DSL, there’s a PPPOE login set up on XP to get the internet connectivity going, and like usual I open up Thunderbird before connecting, but this time instead of getting connection warnings, the little shit brings up all my new e-mail. I’ll be damned that this son of a bitch is working. And it took my dad turning off the laptop. Honestly, I hate technology.

And speaking of freezing my ass off, I looked out the window only to be greeted with FUCKING SNOW FLURRIES. I absolutely hate living in the midwest during mid-Fall and winter. DISGUST!

At BB today I realized how much I’ve changed over the years in regards to my personality. I’m a lot more outgoing, and able to start conversations with random people then when I was younger. Granted, working in retail is a lot different then say, approaching someone random at a mall or when you’re out and about but it’s almost the same. They’re random strangers that you’ve never met before, regardless if it’s your job to greet them and start up a conversation.

I’ve just noticed that after I help a customer, I’m surprised at how I feel like I’ve known them for years and how I’m constantly smiling as is the customer. Or how I can make them laugh with my cheeky comments. I think what really made me notice this was that whenever I was having a good conversation or interaction with a customer my co-worker, Mike, would come into the picture and join in on it. The last one we had of the day he said to me “Man, I heard laughing going on and looked around and saw you and those guys smiling so I had to join in on the fun.” Granted, I’m not quoting verbatim but it was something to that extent.

I mean hell, I just met my Slingbox REP today and we hit it off amazingly well. I won’t try to say that it was because he was absolutely gorgeous and had a fantastic smile and voice, but I’ll leave that for another entry! But seriously, it just amazes me that I can hop into a conversation at work and just flow right into it as if I was already in it or I’ve known those people for forever.

I’m sure that this new “talent” is also why I’m perfect for retail. I may not have the body for various other jobs (Damn, I was surely hoping for my career to be with Hooters!) but I definitely have the smile, laugh, and personality for it. I may not always get customers that appreciate my knowledge and how I approach their needs, but for the most part, I typically do a slamdunk job.

I’m also starting to apply this to my life outside of work. Okay reverse, it’s still in work but it’s with the guys that I work with. I’m able to talk to them with no problems whatsoever, and I get along with them (with the exception of Tim who I think has a distaste for me after my little incident with being overly competitive and bragging about a sale I had). Or maybe it’s the fact that they’re guys that I feel more comfortable around. I definitely haven’t made any girlfriends at work, so that honestly might be the case. Either way, I prefer having guy friends over girl friends. Amy is my main girl, and I like it that way. I’m just not one to get along with the same sex.