Yes, it is true, I have clothes in my closet that I have had since high school. That is not the worst of it, I actually still wear some of these clothes. There are shirts from Structure before it became Express for Men.

I will be honest, I hate shopping. I hate going to the mall, going through stores, hoping to come across something that I sort of like, and then paying a lot of money to make it mine and then watch it shrink in the washing machine. I just hate that.

If something is not comfortable, I will not wear it, no matter how fashionable it is. I have found things that I really like, tried them on and realized it was sort of like wearing a straight jacket while being dropped in a pool.

Today I realized that I need to shop. Badly. Maybe I will go this weekend… nah, I will wear my jeans with holes in them for a little longer.

With the Democratic party now controlling the House and the Senate the one question I have has to do with the people who are adamantly against the war and show it on their website(s).

The next time that a budget increase or policy change occurs involving Iraq, will those folks, the ones with the “Cost of War” and “Death Toll” counters on their websites, remove them? I mean, now that the Democrats are making the decisions does that not mean that they are supporting the cost?

Maybe I am just way off base, but this should be interesting. I’ll take some screenshots of different page featuring the counters soon and then retake screenshots after the policy change.

One of the hardest things that I have had to learn being a consultant is the fact that I am the bad guy in the eyes of the full time employees. When an e-mail from me hits their inbox I can just imagine the looks on their faces, a rolling of the eyes, and a sigh that proves how annoyed they are with me.

I am not trying to be the bad guy. I am trying to do the job that I am being paid for and sometimes it is hard to prove to people that I am not here to steal their job. The truth is, that is the last thing I want. I am simply here to improve process and help install some kind of structure in the programming methodology.

Sometimes that is just too difficult to understand I guess.

So again I have been questioned on whether or not I was going to bring badice.com out of the 90’s as far as the design goes. Soon; that’s all I can say.

My “busy” factor has been at 10 since I started working in Dallas and has not dropped. I am hoping that over the next few weeks my life will slow down a little bit and I will be able to devote the needed time to this site and my projects.

For one thing, I am not in school anymore so the “Classes” link needs to go. One thought that I had was to turn that into an area for software projects that I completed while in school.

I would like to get some of my writing up on the site and I am still figuring out exactly how I want to do that. Maybe something will finally change on the site. . . Maybe.

I am now trying to decide if I’d rather just catch a flight to London and skip Boston all together. Flights to London are only $40 more each way and I can fly direct into London Gatwick and catch a train into downtown.

Now to get my passport updated…

I have been trying to finalize plans for a four day trip to Boston sometime in March. I really want to see the northeast part of the country and this would be the perfect opportunity.

Airline prices are not too shabby and according to FareCast now is the best time to buy.

I am going to keep planning the trip, hopeful that I’ll be able to go.

I am at a point now where the politics of this country have become so skewed and unrecognizable that I am ready to give up on the system. On one side we have the political left, the democrats, who have made every attempt to take any issue and make it a political stance. On the other side we have the political right, the neo-con, a term I hate. They have a habit of not living up to their word or fully educating themselves about the issues.

The problem that I see now though, is that it is just a back and forth between both parties to try and smear the other one. There is no honor in any of this and the people who fully support either side are ignorant to the simple truths of this mud-slinging that is doing nothing for our country. I can say that I am disappointed with the way the Republican party has handled certain issues but I am more disappointed in the fact that both sides just point fingers instead of trying to actually work through the issues.

What is the most disturbing thing is the audacity of posters on the internet who so adamantly attack the president without knowing all of the facts, or knowing them and simply ignoring them. Let’s get one thing straight, Congress voted to go to war in Iraq based on the same information that President Bush was using to make a decision to go to war. It wasn’t President Bush taking the information he was giving and massaging it to get Congress to vote his way. There were emotions running high in Congress and the vote reflected those emotions.

My plea now is for former President Clinton and his wife to keep their mouths quiet unless what they say is actually constructive for this country.

So for now, I’ll continue to be a moderate.

I was looking at flights this evening and a flight that departs at 7:25am and then returns the next day at 5:55am is $176. Another flight that departs the same day at 3:25pm and returns the next day at 5:55am (same flight as before) is $476. How can this be? Is it just because they are desperate to get rid of tickets for that specific earlier flight?

Just seemed strange.

Google’s release of Documents software came as no real surprise, so as I played with it this morning I was not prepared to be impressed.

I fired up my browser and went to the Google Docs website. I was asked if I would like to import my documents from Writely.com, the original Google Docs. Not having any documents stored there, I proceeded with out importing. I started a new document and tried out the different fonts, export options, printing, etc. Nothing new really, just put on the web. Wrong. Collaboration is where it is at.

I uploaded a document that a friend and I had been working on through email and invited him to be a collaborator for the document. Within minutes we were both editing the document and keeping track of our revisions in a central area. My friend and I talked and decided that we did not want to become dependent on Google for our documents but that we would definitely use them as a repository for our documents, especially if they release an API in the near future. Then, he and I can build a tool for our local collaboration that will upload a copy to the Google Docs area and keep it there for storage.

When I think Leonardo DiCaprio, I think of movies like What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Romeo + Juliet, and Titanic. The last thought that crosses my mind is Leo as a south Boston mobster, but in this film he’s proven himself as an actor, at least in my opinion.

I cannot go into details about the plot of the movie without giving away a lot of the story line and possibly ruining the movie, but I can say that this one of the best mobster films I have seen in a long time. The basic premise of the movie is Jack Nicholson playing a mob boss in Boston and have a strong concern about someone in his crew ratting him out to the police. Nicholson as a mob boss is amazing. I was terrified of him and thought he might have me whacked for laughing at some of his off color humor.

There are a ton of twists and turns in this movie and just when you think you have everything figured out, a change of events takes place that completely wrecks you theory. There is also a good amount of comedy in the film, a lot of it off color and directed at Italians and other stereotypes. The use of the “F” word is fairly rampant and the amount of bloodshed reminded me of a Tarantino film. If you like mobster movies this one is for you. With a great plot, great cast, and tons of twists and turns, The Departed is a must see.