I'd like to extend a sincere apology, for not logging on in a long long time, and keeping in touch with everyone. Timothy's cancer is stage 4 now, but still has that fighting spirit in him, and it's become a lot stronger lately, which is great news. He and I are also still doing wonderfully well together.

I'm into the 4th week of implementing Oracle here at ClearEdge Power. This is software that runs the entire business, top to bottom. It's used by companies like Boeing, GE, Google, Pepsi Cola, etc. This is a great opportunity for me to get something really good on my job history.

I do have 2 friends that live locally, that have my NN login info, and I know that they are still logging in all the time. So the 'Last Logged In' function in my profile doesn't really show when the last time I logged in was. One way to really tell, is when the last time I posted pictures was. 90 days ago, yikes!! Time has been flying fast.

So I am doing well. I am still working, and that is good. We are getting really close to shipping our first 5 fuel cell systems, and the company has grown to almost 90 people so far this year. I was the 29th one hired, almost 2 and a half years ago. We are one of the few companies in our area that is hiring, and growing, and I'm really lucky to be working there.

Till the next, have lots of fun!
-Geoff xo

We (my special friend Timothy) and I found out last week that he has stage 3 gastric cancer. It's in his lymph nodes and a kidney already. He's already been hustled off to a specialty clinic in South. He was basically asymptomatic; the cancer was found during a routine physical, when some of his blood work came back with some unusual cell counts.

My emotions have run the gamut. I'm doing pretty good this weekend; thank god for friends! They are helping to support me, while I try my best to support Timothy. I know that the best thing I can do, is to remain positive, carry on and focus on better times in the future.

Any spare good karma and prayers you may have, send them our direction! We will beat this thing together!

I have come to accept that we aren't going to get Oracle up and running at work until November. That is good and bad. I'd much rather we got that software working before we have our manufacturing area going full blast, because the transition is bound to cause some headaches, and I'd rather get those headaches out of the way before we are going at full speed.

It also means that I need to come up with software to support manufacturing's activity, in the next 5 weeks. Keep track of all the planning, ordering, movement of inventory, and all the financial aspects of that activity. OMG. It's great that work thinks I'm capable, but what a massive task in front of me. I will enjoy meeting the challenge, though, and will be pretty impressed if I do. To make such a complete database will be a first for me, for sure!

This means that I won't have nearly as much time to play here on NN as I'd like to have. That is the really bad part of what lays in front of me. Ugh. I already don't have nearly enough time to keep up with everyone and everything that is going on here...

But I will get it done, and there will be an end to all the overtime I'm going to have to do, sometime in June I'm guessing.

On a side note, my boss is so impressed with what I've said that I learned in California, without seeing me demonstrate a single thing that I've learned, that he has asked me to put together another list of classes that I need/want to take! That is great news! I love going places. And finding new hotels, and checking out their mirrors/hidden cams!

With such a great day outside, there is just no way that I was going to get 25 pm's answered. Try 2.

And I still need to get all my pics off the laptop computer from work. I can just imagine how long my job there would last, if I left one of my NN pictures on the computer, and then someone found it after the computer was put back in the lab. I really don't want that to happen, and am now a little worried about leaving anything, any downloaded video's from here, anything on that laptop. Thank goodness I clued in the IT guy with my desire to use the laptop for such deviant purposes as capturing pictures from my camera. But still, I don't even want him to have to find anything while he scours the computer for me. I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to see me naked, or worse

And it's already 10:30pm (2230)and I need to be at work at 7 in the morning. ugh. But I am excited to get back to work, and start applying what I've been learning over the last 2 weeks, in sunny California.

That previous blog entry had a mentioned the thread started by Saravin. Sandman had a reply talking about posting our favorite pics in our blog. I thought of a twist on that theme. What if users posted the pics they got off to, in their blog?

Would I be brave enough myself to do such a thing? And I'm pretty open sort of person.

Hummmm, I'll have to think about that one. I might try a few. I don't know when, but it sounds juicy.

I know there would be one inevitable result. If I posted every picture that I got off to here on NN, my blog entries would skyrocket! There are an awful lot of pictures I have gotten off to, and I'm sure that there are going to be 1000's more. Twice a day, 3x or more on weekend days, makes for a lot of pictures that I like!

Unless I know it's okay with the other person, I won't post their user name, with the picture. And I'm also thinking that they'd be small, maybe 1" square (6 sq cm). That seems respectful.

Would you be brave enough to post your get-off pics of other people?

i was just searching through the forum to see if NN had ever disclosed how they arrive at "Other NN users think these are my best pics". One of 19 results that came up, was a thread started by Saravin back in January of this year. She was asking about if NN could make it so that us users could also post our own personal favorite 5 pictures of other NN members.

I thought that was intriguing.

Because it is only 5 pictures that we post, people don't need to feel bad if their picture isn't one of the 5. When someone has 200+ friends, like I've been lucky enough to snag lately, it's a real lottery as to who gets to appear in the favorite 5. I mean really, I can't have 'just' a favorite 5, that's plain crazy talk!

My friends have unique things about them that attract me. There are no consistent 'types' I have discovered. And I have to admit, I didn't expect that when I first signed up here. I was pretty finicky when I first joined, but that has changed a great deal since I've been here. Shaved guys, for example, used to turn me off. I've done a total 180 turn on that, though, and have I ever! Adding diversity to my taste in people I think is a good thing, here in my room by myself...

I opened Firefox, and it faithfully opened all 25 instances I had open, when I shut my computer off before leaving for California.

When I get back inside from doing yardwork (things are finally growing around here, and they have while I've been gone for 2 weeks!), I will finally be able to answer a lot of pm's that I haven't gotten around to, in the last 2 weeks. Hopefully I'll catch everyone who I haven't responded to yet. If you still haven't heard from me by Monday USA time, don't be afraid to send me another pm!

I sure wish the NN system had some way of showing which pm's we users have responded to...

Gotta go play in the yard now

I've been wanting to update this blog since I've been in California, but I'm loving it here so much, that I've outside as much as possible. When I do get back into my hotel room, well, you've seen what I do then!

So right now, I'm missing out on the sunshine, but I've been really wanting to write something here, so here's a bit for now... I know that there are some of you, (mdguy, you come to mind right away) that like reading blogs, so here's some fun reading...

A 'few' pictures back, I mentioned something in one of my captions about doing jury duty, and realizing as I'm in the line waiting to go through the metal detector at the courthouse, that I've got the ring on, and I'm not going to be able to get through the metal detector, without being 'detected'. OMG. Luckily, I realized this when I was still 4 or 5 people back in line, and the line was moving ever so slowly. So I reached into my Levi's, as discreetly as possible (is that possible? They're not exactly loose fitting) and extracted it from around my genitals, and then put it into my jacket pocket. When it came to be my turn to go through the metal detector, I put the ring into the little bowl, along with my keys and coins and cellphone. The old guy that was working the security looked at the contents of the bowl, but thank goodness, didn't ask any questions. I couldn't believe my luck. I could just picture him asking "What is this? Why do you need it in the courthouse?" I wouldn't have known what to say to him. I suppose I would have had to tell him the truth, because I can't think of any other plausible explanation for that ring.

Fast forward to 2 weeks ago, when I flew from PDX to SFO. I remember that incident at the courthouse all too well, and I sure don't want to chance something going wrong at airport security. That's happened once at San Jose, California, but that's another story all together (M16 pointed at me OMG I want my mommy!). So I left the ring at home... It's been sorta weird, not having it on for the last 2 weeks, but that's a small price to pay, to be in California!

I have to go back home tomorrow, darn it. I'm really liking being here in California. The first week was in Belmont, about 20 minutes south of San Francisco. Then I flew down here to LA (El Segundo is the name of the actual town that LAX is located in). Can you believe that it was cheaper to fly down here ($144) then it would have been to rent a car and drive the 300 miles myself? I wouldn't have ever guessed that. My plan had been to drive myself down, and enjoy all the sights along the way, but I nixed that plan, when I found out it would cost my company MORE to drive, than to fly.

Go on the web, check it out yourself, if you don't believe me. A basic car, $27.99 a day, grand total for one day is around $150. And of course that doesn't include gasoline [that's petrol, for those of you who speak proper English]. I called Enterprise to verify if that was right, because something seemed wrong to me. They assured me that it was right, because of airport fees and whatever, but the total was right. A Kia Rio for one day, $150. OMG. So I called a local Enterprise place in Belmont, thinking I'd avoid the airport fees, and get a lot closer to the $27.99 total. He told me that because the rental would be one way, he's have to charge me a $600 drop-off fee. WHAT? So 12 hours before I wanted to be in LA, I booked a flight on Alaska. Basic ticket price $134, with taxes and fees being only another $10.

I learn something new everyday...

Wow, folks, I'm really impressed. I wouldn't have ever expected it, that li'l ol' me would ever attract so much attention. I remember in 9th grade, being a wall flower at the high school dances, no one wanted to dance with me. But that probably served me well, in the long run, because I've never suffered from run-away ego, and I prefer that, to being full of myself, and obnoxious.

But with my experience here on NN, I think that my ego is at a healthy balance now. I realize that there are people that think I'm cute, in more ways than one, and that is great!

Thank you all so much!!!!!! xoxoxox

My new shy friend has been listening to me whine all week. I've had a cold, and it's the first one in 6 years. The only sort of meds I had, was aspirin that expired in Jan 2005. He's also heard that I've had zippo lust, the whole time, too. Well, I've started feeling better, and took this pic for him, to show that a little bit of attitude is starting to return! I'm rotfl.

How often do you, NN'er, get flashed in someone's blog? Is there nowhere, where it is safe?