Via BoingBoing

As I'm watching the winter storm engulf the Salt Lake Valley this afternoon, I remembered how I was complaining to myself last weekend on my Sunday walk about how it's so close to Christmas and we haven't had a decent snow storm yet! ... and at the same time thinking of how bad it would suck if I were a duck. 

..stupid power outage killed my server..

Happy Holidays (or HawleyDays if you're my parents) to everyone! I haven't been blogging much at all over the last several months. I've been focusing on other things I guess. Anyway, it is the Holidays, and that means all sorts of things. One of them is the inevitable reflection on one's past, present and future. Sometimes it can just be too easy to get down on yourself for some mistake in your past. Be it something that happened an hour ago or 10 years ago. Or maybe you get down just by looking at the bank account or someone less fortunate on the street or any number of things. Or, you may not even have a reason but you still feel down.. (you get my drift).

There are a lot of reasons to feel a little low during the holidays, but there are also many things you can use to help you overcome the blues. I try to go on weekly walks or drives to try and put my mind in the right place, maybe I'll go somewhere I can people watch for a while on the weekend. I'll hop online and play games with my friends (I've been slacking doing that lately too, however).

Zenhabits had a good clip courtesy of Gretchen Rubin, on how to make yourself happier in 30 minutes a couple days ago that I found worth sharing:

(Thanks for the linkage Fighting 69th)

Want something a bit more my style and pessimistic as to the current times?.. right here.

ohh, oh! and one more good clip that is a must see for any Apple fan... so true.

Classic

And God loves the ZUNE. Ipod is of the Devil.

I just leveled IRL! (In Real Life). ...

In some games you work for Experience Points or 'XP'. When you gain a certain amount of XP, you gain a level, some gamers say "DING!" or (Wooties! in my case) to signify their level gained. Gaining a level can get you more loot, higher stats and gain you access to harder levels or areas where you can gain further XP.

Well, for some of us geeks, games can transcend to Real Life in many ways. You grind away XP while at work or doing real life stuffs and eventually (hopefully) you gain an RL level and or loot. That's what makes the grind worth it all.

I've worked at my current employer for 4 years now and have learned immensely. I have no doubt that no other job could have given me such diverse experience points. Aside from the great XP, I've created great friendships both inside the organization and through many a great client.

I'm going to miss them all.

I have decided that my life is at a point where I need to move to another 'instance' in order to gain higher levels. I've accepted a new job and I'm very stoked and hopefully will grind much XP and gain many a level at this new job. 

GG all!

Since I spend so much time working on-site for our largest client, it's only fair that I can join in on some of their fun, right?

A coworker (Tacosauce) and I had an idea to liven up the start and ending of a XanGo sponsored 5k race.

We had fun.