Construction on our house is progressing rather quickly. I've posted my latest photos here.

Mery and I got married. A good time was had by all.

Mery went to Atlanta with me for my annual Peachtree Pilgrimage. We ran in the Peachtree Road Race, climbed Stone Mountain, went to Zoo Atlanta, and I proposed to her at the top of the Peachtree Plaza. She said "yes". A good time was had by all.

Today I went on my first 'date' with Mery. We walked 8 miles in Blanchard Park, went out to dinner, had Marble Slab, then watched Moulin Rouge. It was a long date, but it seemed to go way too fast. I really like this girl.

Today was Edwin's wedding. I was a groomsman. Everyone went to Pleasure Island after the wedding and reception. I wore Chuck Taylors with my tux. A good time was had by all.

Went to the first Jordan Raddick Film Festival in lovely Metro West Orlando. I met Mery, watched some movies, drank too much rum and Mountain Dew, went to Krispy Kreme and generally enjoyed the whole day. A good time was had by all.

Went to Edwin's Bachelor Party. A good time was had by all. Details will -NOT- be disclosed.

Good news! I made it to Colorado and back without breaking any legs, arms, or other appendages! The ski trip was really great. I went from "falling on my ass" to Johnny Mosely in just three days. The only major problem was that just as I was feeling confident in my ability to cruise down the slopes, we had to pack up and head back to Sunny Florida. I was bummed. That's ok though. If we had stayed any longer I might have never come back. Beckenridge has got to be one of the coolest places I've ever seen.

Pictures are available here:
http://ucf.edu/~tchristo/skitrip

Other than the ski trip, not much has happened lately. Edwin's SuperBowl party was a huge success. A good time was had by all, even though Bill Jr started rambling about CIA/Mafia conspiracies in the game after polishing off nearly an entire case of Natural Ice. Trust me, it was frightening.

I finally graduated from UCF. I am officially a full college graduate. It seems weird. Oddly enough, I got my dimploma and the Apocalypse didn't come. Like I said, it's weird. I did hear that Hell's dropped a few degrees though...

I'm pondering the musical genius of Goldfinger covering 99 Luftballoons as I write this.

Speaking of music, I did manage to catch the last two stops on U2's elevation tour last month. I was really impressed with both shows. The Tampa show was awesome. I had never really seen U2 in concert in a decent venue with decent seats. It was one of the best shows I've ever seen. Then there was the Miami show the next night... Well, Miami made Tampa look like a lame rehearsal. I was really disappointed when the concert ended and it was time to go home. Now I just have to wait until the next tour. (Luckily Krystel managed to get a pretty good recording, so I can listen to the show anytime I want now.)

I didn't realize just how long it's been since I've updated this thing. The holidays came and went. Another successful EHS alumni rugby game was held at Thanksgiving - no injuries this year. I got to see Trish, Fly and Eva at Christams (always a good thing). New Year's was spent with Edwin and Michelle and a few others, watching and waiting for Ed to either set himself on fire or blow himself up during his fireworks show. Unfortunately we ran out of high explosives before that could happen. Maybe next year...

That's pretty much all that's happened in the last couple months. Aside from some hardcore programming assignments, useless presetations, and meaningless tests I had to push through to graduate, it's been really quiet. I've mostly been trying to stay healthy for more than a week or two at a time as I've dealt with the occasional cold, flu, and bronchitis. If things don't improve I'll have to start looking for a lung donor.

I guess that's it for now. In less than 36 hours I'll be on a plane headed for Breckenridge, CO. I've never been skiing in my life, haven't seen snow in over 12 years, and hope I don't come back with a broken leg or a busted ass. Well, I guess one of those is inevitable as a first-timer.

Meanwhile, I finally saw the fake Star Wars Ep. II trailer yesterday. It does look pretty cool at first, but then you realize how totally fake it is, and that just ruins it. There's a copy of it posted on AdCritic.

However, I am motivated enough to make an update to the journal tonight.

It's funny to me that it's already November. I've got just over a month until graduation now. Things are starting to get really exciting as I anticipate the end of this long journey.

In other news.... I finally got it! I picked it up last week and I've been exstatic ever since. That's right - I am the proud owner of a new 2002 Acura RSX. This car is absolutely beautiful - black on the outside, ebony leather on the inside, power everything, perfect 16-inch rims, climate control, sequential sport shift, cool red gauges, smooth bucket seats that wrap all around your body to hold your ass firmly in place as I go zipping around corners, etc. But best of all - it has a power moonroof! And this is the best time to have a moonroof too. Fall/Winter in Florida is great for driving around with the windows down and enjoying the fresh air. I love this car. Hopefully I'll get motivated soon and I'll get some pictures of it posted on the site.

Speaking of pictures, my Dad pulled some kind of miracle and managed to get us copies of our rafting picture from Labor Day weekend this year. Naturally I scanned it and posted it here. That's Michelle on the left, Jim and Ken on the right. The little guy at the bottom is a hitch-hiker we picked up along the way. I'm the guy in the center who looks like he just got a shot of ice-cold water straight up his shorts. :)

Ok, time to wrap it up... I went to see Monsters Inc. last night. It was very good. I highly recommend you see it, if for no other reason than to check out the amazing quality of Sully's computer generated fur. We also saw the appropriately named teaser trailer for Star Wars Ep. II. I think George Lucas would make an excellent drug dealer. "The first one's free... then you have to pay for the rest." Why does May have to be such a long way off? I need my fix!

That's all I have time for this week. If you need me, I'll be in my car...

Looks like I'm going for a new record this time. A few more days and I would've neglected this page for a full three months! Much has happened since my last update, so this one will probably be quite lengthy. (Probably? Yeah, right. Grab a Snickers - you're not going anywhere for a while.)

Since our last installment, I have successfully completed the Summer from Hell. Five classes finished and I managed to pull it all off with only two C's! Luckily the 15 hours I took have set me up to easily finish in December.

This semester I'm only taking three classes, and two out of the three are pretty much a waste of my time. Systems Implemetation sounded like it would be good, but it's focusing 90% on planning and estimation and management buzzwords, and only 10% on the actual programming project. If I have to write one more Gantt chart I'm going to seriously injure somebody! Then there's the Strategic Management course that's required for graduating seniors. This one is another complete waste of time. They merge all of the majors back together so that everyone on your team can add different skills and talents. Luckily we screwed their system and formed a team entirely from MIS majors. Of course, we had to name our team "Strategery" just for added fun. That class will be mostly over after next week, and then I can be happy again. The last class I'm taking is C++ for business majors. This one is actually useful, but I can't devote enought of my time to it right now. I'll have to work on that in the next few weeks. Anyway, I'll end this rant now.

So my brother finally got married last weekend. That was quite a little adventure. I was coerced into being a groomsman for the wedding. It wasn;t all bad. But since my other brother was the best man, and he's from Atlanta, I was left to plan out the bachelor party. As it turns out, most of the groomsmen are either poor, or extrememly religious, which meant the traditional activities were out. That was ok though, because we still had a great time getting really really drunk at various Orlando bars. It seemed like we all had a great time that night, but Saturday morning was pretty rough. Luckily the wedding wasn't until 5pm, so we had plenty of time to recover.

The wedding went pretty well. Everyone showed up on time, and no problems came up while we were there. Pete finally realized that as the best man there were certain duties that he needed to fulfill, such as keeping an eye on the groom, etc. The ceremony was pretty nice, and best of all it was fairly short - I think I heard 35 minutes start to finish. We had the reception at Lee's Lakeside in downtown Orlando, overlooking Lake Eola. Everyone seemed to really enjoy the festivities, including the obligatory YMCA dance.

Later on we decided that since we were all dressed up we needed someplace to go. So, it was off to the downtown bars again for round 2. Of course, since we had the tuxes, we had to visit the Ybor Martini Bar again. Shaken, not stirred. From there it was back to Howl At The Moon to drink some more and do the sing-a-long thing. I got to hang out with one of the bridesmaids while we were at HATM, which was good since she's pretty cool. Hi Lorrie! It was just fun to be out around downtown with a big group in tuxes and gowns, mixed in with all the club people.

I really must admit, as much as I was dreading the whole wedding participation thing, I really did have a good time. It was fun to have family and friends looking at me in a different way since I was one of the groomsmen. I guess it was like I had finally "grown-up" for lack of a better way of describing it. Anyway, it was really great to see all the family and to meet new friends. Dad, you were right.

Alright, time for another subject change. Anyone want to see my new car? Guess what? I do too! I've been waiting on this thing for over a month now, but my dealer tells me it'll definitely be here within a couple weeks. As patient as I am, I really hate waiting. But good things come to those who wait, right? Well, I've waited long enough. I want my RSX now dammit!

Ok, last bit. I have to talk abuot my listening habits before I finish this one. First, I went to see Tori Amos a couple weeks ago. I saw the first show in Clearwater with my good friend Alex, and another show the next night with Krystel. The Clearwater show was simply amazing. It was held at Ruth Eckerd Hall, which is a really nice performing arts center. Tori was, of course, perfect that night. The second show was at the Tupperware Center in Orlando. That one was a bit of a disappointment. It's just a really bad venue. It doesn't matter how great the performance is, it's still tarnished by the horrible setting. I mean Tori was still really great, but it wasn't anywhere close to the quality of the Clearwater show. I still had a really great time at both shows though, and I got to enjoy a really great evening with two of my close friends.

Ok, here's the very last bit, then I'm done. I have to talk abuot my new cd's. It's like a requirement. I recently picked up the new Tori Amos cd (obviously), called Strange LIttle Girls. It's really good. Go buy it. I also grabbed the new Garbage cd when it came out. It's also very good. Go buy it. Seriously. Go. Now. Other recent additions include a Blur compilation cd, new Orbital, and some other thing that I can't remember right now.

Ok, that's it. I'm sick and tired. No, seriously, I have a nasty cough/cold thing happening here, so I really am sick. And it's late, so I'm tired. Good night, and thank you for visiting!

Once again, distractions have taken their toll, and the page remains neglected. I've got a decent excuse this time - 15 hours worth of summer classes would be enough to drive most people insane, especially when juggling it with a "full-time" job. Luckily, the fruits of summer labor have paid off. The fall semester will only be three classes, followed by a joyous graduation ceremony, and soon after - the end of the world as we know it.

Another successful trip to the ever-hip Park Ave CD's has certainly made life much happier. $60 later, I walked out with 7 great cd's to add to the collection:

So what's been taking up all of my time? Let's call it a "pressing need to finish my degree and graduate from UCF" Summer classes are taking up most of my slack time right now - 20 hours per week. 6 hours a day on Mondays and Wednesdays. It's pretty bad. I don't even have time to watch Miami Vice anymore. Sleep deprivation is a terrible thing, especially for slackers. It's ok though, 4 more days of this f*cked up schedule and it will be over for another two months.

I'm also counting down the days to the Peachtree Road Race in Atlanta. Tradition requires that I make a pilgrimage to Atlanta every July 4th to run the race with my father. There's nothing like running through buckhead at 7:30 in the morning on July 4th with 55,000 other psychopaths, listening to live bands along the side of the road, and picking up bagels and donuts from the Publix as you run by. It's a truly amazing and rejuvenating experience.

Another treat from Trish this week....
Ever wonder what your hip-hop name is? Apparently someone was so distraught by this dilemma, that they created a hip-hop name generator and placed it on a web page. My hip-hop name is Tru' Pimp. What's yours?

Meanwhile.... Yesterday's IT Expo at UCF was pretty successful. I collected lots of free goodies from the vendors - pens, frisbees, keychains - basic vendor junk. I did snag a pretty nice camera bag from the Kodak display. That was a real highlight.

I gave a couple presentations on Network Security in the morning. I had a whopping crowd of five in attendance for the morning session. Apparently word travels fast, because the afternoon session was standing room only when nine people showed up.