The Really Swell News Thread

[Bustronaut]

My older brother has lost 162 pounds since January on a modified Atkins program.  Despite our massive differences, right now I couldn't be more proud of him.

[Roman]

That's really impressive! Well done to him.

[Ryan]

Are you sure he didn't just pay a lookalike to stand in for him like Cartman? That's astonishing.

[J.T.]

My boo may have just gotten herself a new job.  If the security check pans out, she'll be hooking up with US Cyber Command at Ft. Belvoir as an InfoSec Analyst and getting out of IT Customer Support at Ft. Meade.

She can finally stop moaning about not working in the specialty field she got her Master's Degree.in.

Now, if only I could get a job closer to home....

[odessasteps]

18 minutes ago, J.T. said:

My boo may have just gotten herself a new job.  If the security check pans out, she'll be hooking up with US Cyber Command at Ft. Belvoir as an InfoSec Analyst and getting out of IT Customer Support at Ft. Meade.

She can finally stop moaning about not working in the specialty field she got her Master's Degree.in.

Now, if only I could get a job closer to home....

How long will that extend her commute?

[J.T.]

50 minutes ago, odessasteps said:

How long will that extend her commute?

There's the tricky thing.  US Cyber Command provides direct support to the NSA, so she will be on site at Ft. Meade at least three days a week..  That was one of the factors that she considered when she was deciding whether or not to take the job.

Her morning commute to Belvoir will always be crap, but afternoons will be easier on the days of the week where she's on site at Meade..

[Bustronaut]

I'm doing my brother's diet for a few months.  162 pounds lost is nothing to sneeze at.

[Tabe]

Competed in my first Rubik's Cube competition over the weekend.  I'm old and I'm terrible at it (relatively speaking) but figured it would be a good time.  I set myself some very modest goals:

 

1) Have a good time

2) Finish not last

3) Get at least one solve under 60 seconds

 

Mission accomplished.  I was surprised by how much nerves affected me and totally wrecked my performance but that's A-OK.  I had such a blast and, amazingly enough, my wife did, too.  Even had a co-worker show up to root me on, which was really cool.  

Just call me Tabe - the 65542nd ranked speed-solver in the world.  

[sabremike]

At an agency picnic they let me take home 2 full Boxes O' Joe from Dunkin that they were going to throw out. I also got to make a tie dye shirt.

[Ace]

On 8/7/2017 at 4:14 PM, Johnny Sorrow said:

So the production of Anything Goes I'm currently in just got a great review. They spelled my last name wrong, but that's been happening my entire life.

This is the first show I've done that actually got a review. 

http://wyominginmotion.com/jesters-dinner-theatre-anything-goes/

I did Carousel back in '97. The one review I got spelled my name 3 different ways throughout the article. None of them were correct.

 

[Brian Fowler]

I think my name got mentioned in a review in my college paper once...

[Ryan]

On 8/29/2017 at 0:03 AM, Tabe said:

Competed in my first Rubik's Cube competition over the weekend.  I'm old and I'm terrible at it (relatively speaking) but figured it would be a good time.  I set myself some very modest goals:

 

1) Have a good time

2) Finish not last

3) Get at least one solve under 60 seconds

 

Mission accomplished.  I was surprised by how much nerves affected me and totally wrecked my performance but that's A-OK.  I had such a blast and, amazingly enough, my wife did, too.  Even had a co-worker show up to root me on, which was really cool.  

Just call me Tabe - the 65542nd ranked speed-solver in the world.  

I can solve a few rows by randomly twisting one for awhile. Damn spatial reasoning and understanding of how it works to hell. (I'm sure there's a formulaic way to do it, but I can't be arsed to figure it out.)

[tbarrie]

Yeah, I'm in the same boat. For a math whiz my spatial reasoning is crap.

[offspring515]

On 8/30/2017 at 7:03 PM, Ace said:

I did Carousel back in '97. The one review I got spelled my name 3 different ways throughout the article. None of them were correct.

 

I won an academic award in the third grade, as did one of my classmates.  We got our picture in the local paper and a small story written on us. My first and last name (both very common) were spelled wrong. Meanwhile my classmate with the last name Grefiecz had his name spelled correctly.

My Mom, good rest her soul, put the clipping in the family photo album and used white out and a pen to fix the typos.

[OSJ]

Today is Mrs. OSJ's birthday and marks 37 years that Kathy and I have been together. Anyone ever tells you that there's no such things as love at first sight or finding your perfect soulmate, tell 'em to go fuck themselves. 

[J.T.]

John, you and the missus have been married nearly as long as I have been alive on planet earth.

[OSJ]

Well, to be accurate, we didn't get married until some three years later. There was this slight technicality of her still being married that we had to work out first.  Something told me to stop off at the local for a beer on the way home and her soon-to-be ex had ditched her at the bar on her fucking birthday no less with no ride home. She came up to the bar to get a pack of smokes and asked me for a light and  one thing led to another and we spent the night together in this gawdawful "hotel" (rooms were $8.00 per night, so you can just imagine...) Anyway, after going home to pack some clothes she ran off with me two days later and we've been together ever since. We both quit drinking some two and a half years later and got married shortly thereafter. Her maid-of-honor was her buddy from work, with a huge Greek family, so while the marriage ceremony itself was a very small scale Justice of the Peace affair, the reception was not unlike what you've seen in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, her friend's family owned like four restaurants between the various uncles, cousins and what-have-you and they pulled out all the stops as though Kathy was family. I don't think I've ever seen that much Ouzo in one place before or since. 

[Roman]

If we had firefighters like this, I'd become a pyromaniac.
 

 

[BrianS81177]

On 9/28/2017 at 10:54 PM, OSJ said:

Well, to be accurate, we didn't get married until some three years later. There was this slight technicality of her still being married that we had to work out first.  Something told me to stop off at the local for a beer on the way home and her soon-to-be ex had ditched her at the bar on her fucking birthday no less with no ride home. She came up to the bar to get a pack of smokes and asked me for a light and  one thing led to another and we spent the night together in this gawdawful "hotel" (rooms were $8.00 per night, so you can just imagine...) Anyway, after going home to pack some clothes she ran off with me two days later and we've been together ever since. We both quit drinking some two and a half years later and got married shortly thereafter. Her maid-of-honor was her buddy from work, with a huge Greek family, so while the marriage ceremony itself was a very small scale Justice of the Peace affair, the reception was not unlike what you've seen in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, her friend's family owned like four restaurants between the various uncles, cousins and what-have-you and they pulled out all the stops as though Kathy was family. I don't think I've ever seen that much Ouzo in one place before or since. 

34 years married is still nothing to sneeze at. Congrats to you and Mrs OSJ

[J.T.]

My boo's last day on her current job is 16 October. After that she joins US ARCYBER (Army Cyber Command) in their Info Assurance office.

[Ramsey]

This is officially my 2000th post here. I love this place. Dig it!

[Sublime]

My wife and I went to look at houses last night as we're shopping for our first house. One of them we really like but we do have one more house to look at tomorrow while also doing second walk thrus for the one we like and one or two of the others we looked at. This is such a huge step that is pretty scary but exciting as well and a big plus is that once we have a house our payment will be half of the rent we pay for our apartment so that's gonna be nice.

[tbarrie]

2 hours ago, Sublime said:

My wife and I went to look at houses last night as we're shopping for our first house. One of them we really like but we do have one more house to look at tomorrow while also doing second walk thrus for the one we like and one or two of the others we looked at. This is such a huge step that is pretty scary but exciting as well and a big plus is that once we have a house our payment will be half of the rent we pay for our apartment so that's gonna be nice.

Congratulations, Sublime. At that rate you should have bought a house years ago.:)

(Myself, when I bought my condo the total of my property taxes, condo fees, and the portion of my mortgage payments that went towards interest added up to only slightly less than I was paying in rent. So in the long run it was the right financial decision, but there was a definite hit to my monthly cash flow.)

[sabremike]

I got a coffee at Starbucks today and they gave me a free banana.

[OSJ]

7 hours ago, sabremike said:

I got a coffee at Starbucks today and they gave me a free banana.

I'm not sure that's "Really Swell News", when your barista is concerned about a lack of potassium in your diet, that's worrisome.