www.jclaudius.net/blog

Last week I made the plunge and decided to sell my 2006 MazdaSpeed6.  The girly generously put together a sweet little for sale sign that I could hang up in my car.  I even posted my car on a few online sites hoping that someone would be interested.  At some twist of fate, on Friday I ended up in a head on collision with a 1997 Dodge Intrepid (AKA: The Tank). Please send all inquiries to my email address (claudijd<at>yahoo.com).

More updates as soon as I hear whether or not it’s “totaled”!  Check out the girly’s site for more picture.

Exterior

 Interior

***Update December 12, 2008***

I heard back from the insurance company this week and my car in fact was “totaled”.  The estimated damages were above and beyond $17,000.  Considering engine damage, airbags and the body work needed I’m glad this was the final result.  The next day I went to go pickup my new ride (2009 Volkswagen Rabbit).  It’s no where near as fast as my old car, but it does make me feel much better leaving this one at home while I’m off gallivanting around the nation for work.  Not to mention, the payments are much less and are doing wonders for my “house fund”.

**Update December 17, 2008***

It’s been about a week since I bought the rabbit.  Who knew that I fall in love with this car.  It’s prefect for what I need it for and it’s not too shabby in the snow either.

So this past weekend I made the annual trip back to NY to celebrate my birthday with the family.  Some of the highlights of the weekend were the annual father-son golf scramble at Big Oak and the Timber Creek fishing tournament.

• Saturday (Timber Creek Fishing Tournament)  - The tournament was broken into four categories Biggest Bass, Biggest Perch, Most Weight of 5 Perch - Largest Perch, Most Weight of 5 Bass - Largest Bass.  I am happy to report that I ended up catching a 66+ oz. (4+ lbs) bass for our team to win the biggest bass of the tournament.  The next closest bass was within roughly 1oz. difference so we barely squeaked by with the win.

• Sunday (Big Oak Golf Scramble)  - We (My dad and I) played our typical horrible once a year golf game and had a blast with my uncle (Ron) and my cousin (Nate).  This marked my third year in a row and think it was the first tournament that I made it through the day with only having just a few beers, but this was severely canceled out when the birthday shots (prairie fires of course) were broke out to celebrate the big 25.  This year we seemed to come away with a large number of the raffle wins and walked away with the following items which also included 18 holes of golf, a steak and clam dinner and lunch on the turn for only $75 bucks.
  • One folding camp chair (a small little tripod)
  • One umbrella (works perfect for my golf bag)
  • A horse statue? (which was later exchanged for a heavy duty igloo cooler)
  • Three bottles of wine
  • Branded shirts, hats and other clothing
  • A life-size toy fire truck (I’m sure this will be under the tree at Christmas time for little Ben)
  • Three pack of Top Flight 2000XL golf balls (I lost more than three during the 18 holes )

I also had the pleasure of meeting up with a few other family members that I hadn’t seen in a while to celebrate my birthday and saw my sisters new apartment. However, I did miss the chance to do a guys night out because I got some crazy throat sickness that resulted in having to go to an urgent care center.  I’m only now starting to feel better after about two-three days of Z-pack treatment, but I’m hoping to have the sickness cured soon as I’m slated to hit up a corn maze with the girly and some friends this weekend.

So last Friday through last Tuesday I took a mini vacation up to Maine with the girly.  The main reason for our visit was to part-take in the wedding festivities of the girly’s best friend’s wedding (Congratulations Leya and Nathan!!!).  The wedding was a great time which was topped off with a rocking reception.  The reception band was not your typical wedding singer affair and before the night was over the hall was filled with the rocking sounds of Lynard Skynard, Metallica, Nirvanna and the like.  Let me tell you one thing, people from Maine love to throw down, get crazy and have a blast.  I managed to find their MySpace page online.  I would highly recommend giving them a shout if you need a band who can throw down!

The remainder of the trip was devoted to relaxing, handing out with the girly’s family and trying to forget about work for a few days.  One highlight of the trip was making the trek back up to freeport to hit up the LLbean store.  I just love that place! I think whenever you can keep the doors open 24/7/365 on a outdoor clothing and goods store you have to be doing something right. I found this great device that would me to listen the radio and weather alerts, have a camp lantern and charge my cell phone from solar and hand cranking power.  Being a huge advocate for renewable energy sources I think this is definately going to make my Christmas wish list.  I’m keeping my fingers crossed and my eyes out for as good if not better deals

The second big highlight of the trip was that I got to go fishing for the first time ever in Maine.  We went “striper” (AKA striped bass) fishing in the Saco River and had a great time.  I actually ended up catching the biggest fish I had ever caught while fishing so it was quite a big deal to me.  I was also really facinated how we ended up snagging our 1ft long “pogies” (AKA menhaden shad) which where then send back into the river only be gobbled up by the much larger “stripers”.

I had a great time with the girly, her dad and their good friend Rick even though the girly ended up reeling in the biggest fish of the day.  Maybe I’ll beat her next time!

So this week is the first time I’ve been home in a whole month (**Long exhailing breath**).  First it was Alabama for a week (Business), Vegas for the weekend (DEFCON16) and then Puerto Rico for three weeks (Business and Pleasure).  It’s been a roller coaster of great experiences mixed with the feeling of missing home.

DEFCON16 was, as always, a blast.  It’s always great to meet up with old faces and catch up. I stopped by the lockpick village at the Sky box and picked up the ward lock key set.  Unfortunately, I haven’t had the opportunity to check it out a client site, but I’m keeping my eyes open.  I think the talks this year were on par with previous years with Fyodor’s Scanning the Internet talk, the NTML is dead talk and the VoIP talk in the skybox being the highlights for me.  As with every trip to Vegas, even three days feels like I’m overstaying my welcome.  I’m happy to say I made the parties that I wanted to and I didn’t end up outside the gas station over by the Hard Rock on my hands and knees.

As for Puerto Rico… I was surprised.  It was not what I expected what so ever. I think the bigger item that started to wain on me was the language barrier.  Although the tourist areas had a number of bi-lingual individuals I had a difficult time trying to communicate when I visited the more remote areas.  I now have an informal commitment to the girly to learn some more Spanish before my next trip to PR.  By far the best part of the trip was the Tropical Rain Forest.  I didn’t know that Puerto Rico had a Rain Forest until I arrived at work the first day, but sure enough it was in my weekend vacation schedule as soon as I found out there was a mountain (El Yunque) to climb.  The girly and I took a trip up to a smaller peak called Mt Britton (40min) the first weekend and after a week of talking smack to my coworkers I decided to make the impossible trek from the mountain base to the El Yunque peak (3000+ Feet).  I made it to the top, surprisingly, in about 4 hours of straight hiking, but it was well worth the view once I got to the top. I wish I had my camera with me, but nothing could erase the image of sitting on the edge of the mountain face staring down at the clouds :).