Thanksgiving & Tennessee

A great vacation I'd have to say. This year instead of the Thanksgiving and football game I ended up having Thanksgiving with Erin and her family and then traveled the Eastern part of TN to visit some of her friends. Here are some pictures from the trip:

Here is Erin & I in front of her old College Dorm.

JC and I.


All in all it was a great trip and it was good to know that her friends approved of me ;) These next 2 weeks should be rough as I adjust to a new schedule of getting up early and working out. Today was pretty tough as I was tired (and still am) all afternoon. As for now, I am headed up to Salem to have dinner as a guest for helping to move Erin & Betsy into their new place. Yeah, it was a while ago :) Tater-Tots here I come!

It's a Short Week!

Monday night I came home and slept, Last night I attended the first DaySpring home basketball game. Then I worked on a web page for this season. Tonight I am going to catch "Rent" in Roanoke with Erin. Seems like there is a lot going on, can't wait for vacation to start and everything can slow down a bit! Just wanted to say that it's been a very busy short week and that I wish you a HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

And the answers are...

The answers to last week's pictionary game are
....
#1 answering machine
#2 dough (official answer doe, Jilian get's creative points)
#3 tusks (maybe Monica can explain?)

Trip to D.C. and why I like Georgia Tech

Another good weekend, this one took place in Washington D.C. visiting Mike & Ashley Brody. Erin and I headed up Friday night and woke up in time to grab a muffin breakfast and head into the city. The plans were pretty fluid and we saw as much as we all could in the time allotted. So what did we see:

- Lincoln Monument
- World War II Memorial
- International Spy Museum
- Museum of Natural History
- Capitol Building
- Washington Monument

Saturday evening we went to go visit my brother and then headed back to the Brody's place for a delicious dinner and watching the TIVOed Virginia Tech vs. UVA football game. VT dominated the game and as the game made the third quarter the ladies (Erin and Ashley) were out like lights. Before Mike and I indulged in dessert we noticed that the Miami vs Georgia Tech game was on at 7:45pm. Since it was 10:45ish we thought that maybe we could catch the end of it. When we turned it on there were under 2 minutes and GT was winning. They went on to win the game 14-10, putting Virginia Tech back in the driver's seat for the ACC Championship game! So a great ending to the day. Thank you Georgia Tech!

Sunday we all headed to see the Redskins play the Oakland Raiders, a close game that the 'Skins lost 13-10. After a trip to Wegman's (I could live there) for dinner and some snacks for the way home we returned to SouthWest Virginia. All in all a really good weekend, will have to do it again soon.

The Dog Days of Winter?

A quick story about how random I am. It is a date story and not nearly as strange as Jilian's, that was just weird. So last night was a short 4 months that Erin and I have been dating. I like making a deal out of dates and know that Erin would be just as happy with me saying happy 4 months and giving her a hug. But I am creative sometimes and my creativity comes out in strange ways. Case and Point -> Last Night.

I'm not sure what to call it, but dog night sounds good. I show up at Erin's place around 6:45 after locking my keys in the building at work and stopping by Kroger to pick a few things up. The Kroger stop took a while because I do not know where anything is at the Kroger next to my work. I shop and head up to her place. Upon arriving I start putting together what becomes a spaghetti and Meatball dinner. The meatballs were homemade (garlic, onion, egg, breadcrumbs, seasonings) and were really good. I then gave her a card with nothing but a puppy on the front. After a candle-lit dinner where I first played "On Top of Spaghetti, All Covered with Cheese..." and other classical tunes we headed out. Out to a local pet store. This was no ordinary pet store, but one that was part aquarium (a little yellow fish took a liking to Erin) and part zoo. There were lemurs, a monkey, a parrot, mice, snakes and of course puppies (one looked like Chewbacca!).

After looking at animals, especially puppies we returned home to watch a DVD. You mix Spaghetti & Meatballs with Dogs and you get...


"Lady and the Tramp" that classic Disney film from 1955. So we feasted on Chocolates, sipped a dessert wine from Chateau Morisette and watched Lady and the Tramp eat Spaghetti & Meatballs. It was a good night.

How my mind works, I will never know...

Have a good weekend, I'll be in D.C.

Thanksgiving Feast! & A Game.

Last night was delicious. It is not often that one describes a day by an word connected to the sense of taste. Yesterday deserves that distinction. Last night was the annual friend Thanksgiving gathering. The great thing is as my friends get older the food just keeps getting better. The menu was as follows:

- Deep Fried Turkey
- Stuffing
- Fresh Green Beans
- Whole Wheat Blueberry Muffins
- Green Bean Casserole
- Homemade Pumpkin Pie
- Cranberry/Apple Casserole
- Homemade Mashed Potatoes
- Gravy

GAME
And now for the game. Last night we all played Pictionary and drew some pretty strange things. The game is, can you guess what the drawings below are? Comment away. And if you know, don't give it away ;)

#1

#2

#3

It's Wednesday already?

Wow, where is the week going? Maybe I am surprised it is Wednesday because I went to bed around 9PM last night? Maybe because lots of things have been going on? Who knows, but I would like to outline some of what's going on. First last weekend I traveled to North Carolina to visit family and catch a Nickel Creek concert. Nickel creek is a lot of bluegrass and (as I found out) sometimes this! If you are a Brittany Spears fan be sure and check out that link. The concert was great and we were sitting front row, center. And by that I mean I could have tied the band member's shoes. Check out these videos:

- Chris Thile plays the mandolin
- Chris Thile up close

The rest of the weekend played itself out with the family and some board games. Monday rolls around and I have a Phi Sigma Pi, LPJ family dinner. I hold one of these each semester for the students at Virginia Tech in my fraternity family line.

So with all of that going on what do I have to look forward to? How about a FULL Thanksgiving dinner tonight with friends? And then there is the trip to visit friends in D.C. this weekend. We might even hit up a Redskins game. Life is good.

Just a few reasons why I like my new job...

Rex to CEO:

So what is...
The dress code here? Thought I'd throw it out there since you'd mentioned Friday.

CEO to Rex:

Look professional like you have been Monday –Thursday – Friday is dress down, I like surf shirts and vans but that is me. On game weekends most wear TECH or VPI items. During the summer some folks wear shorts that look nice on Fridays.

Later that day...

Oh yea did I mention that CEO’s love the newbees to by them Guinness.

Almost the end of week #1

It's Friday and it's been a pretty good week. With a new job starting, much of my focus has been there. There has been a lot to learn and the training has been flowing together nicely. I feel extremely well organized and now just have to dive more into the documentation to get a better understanding of the products that I will be working on managing. I have a general overview of the products, the workflow and am now coding a demo application to get a better idea of the technical aspects of the customizable product that we sell.

Another thing has kind of happened this week and that is that I have enjoyed working. I know it is the first week, but I find myself leaving for the day and looking forward to coming back in to get things completed. The folks I work with have been extremely helpful and I've had people contact me that are not even in the office this week to say hello. After one week I am impressed with not only this companies product base, but with my new fellow employees.

This weekends plans lead me down to North Carolina after getting together with Jeff Lang & Jeff Rendell. North Carolina will be a trip so that Erin can meet my family & also to catch a Nickel Creek concert on Saturday night. We have great seats and I've heard them once before. We'll head back to Virginia Sunday evening where I will help Phi Sigma Pi with final vote counting. Should be a good weekend, hope you enjoy it!

My Roommate Joe Lanman

I wrote asking where he was, here is his reply:

We just left Vegas and we are headed to death valley, sequoia, and yosemite national parks. Then on to san fransisco area. Kristen and I just hiked to the bottom of the grand canyon. The hoover dam was pretty cool also.

New Job!

So yesterday was day #1 of the new job and what do I think? I think I'm going to like it. Went to lunch with 7 others and it was a pretty entertaining event. I've met roughly 20 of the 30 people that work here and everyone seems pretty friendly. Heck they even knew my name before I introduced myself. Saw random people in the hallway coming up to me saying "You must be Rex." Incredibly refreshing to know that the reasons I enjoy working for small companies are so quickly showing themselves.

Yesterday was basic HR things, getting on my computer (they had it completely set up & I am the admin!), and getting acquainted with the surroundings. As for what they do here, it is some pretty cool stuff. Basically intermixing telephony and the internet to create all kinds of web based applications used by telephony devices. They even have created their own language for their products.

I was hired as a Project Coordinator and it will take a good deal of time to get to where I will have individual project responsibilities and I welcome that. As for training I am going to get into the really technical aspects of the systems the company develops. To completely understand the coding aspect and slowly work with my fellow Project Coordinator so that I will get an understanding of the job's responsibilities. It will take a while, but I will be working hard to learn as much as I can and have faith that I will get where I need to be.

Kind of a semi-serious post so the next one will have to be something pretty random...

Blacksburg in the Fall

This is where I get to live, it's amazing in the fall...


And a Close-up:

Betsy Crocker?

Her name is Betsy. She likes to Crock.
Perhaps I should call her "Betsy Crocker"?


What do you think?

On my way to work

Crock Season

Had a nice long blog written about croc season, it's dates, what one does, etc. The post messed up, so you now get a picture. Enjoy!



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