You Win!

On my way to work this morning, the rock station was having its usual “Topic Tuesday.” The topic this week: The Big Win. They were looking for people who won big, like thousands of dollars, or won completely off the wall things. I decided to call in with the pumpkin I won. Backing up… When I was 8 or so, there was a contest at the local mall to guess the weight of this gigantic pumpkin. If you got the weight right, you won the pumpkin (and a $50 mall gift certificate). Well, I came within a quarter of a pound on a guess and won the enormous gourd. Turns out they like my call so much, they left a message on my answering machine telling me they want to send me a prize. ^_^ I won again!

Another day flew by at work. I decided to use the downtime I have in between calls to study my CCNA materials. I was able to finish Chapter 1 and take several of the chapter labs and post tests. I did pretty well on them, so I think I’m getting the hang of this stuff… I wish I had enough room (and privacy) at my desk to brink my notebook so I could take notes too, but that just wouldn’t fly. I’m eager to move briskly, but not eager enough to lose my job over it.

I did some yard work when I got home. I pulled up all the weeds from around the dying bush next to the door and tilled all the ground around it with the cultivator I bought this weekend. It’s amazing how much trash there was not even an inch under the ground. When our house was built, KB went through so many contractors that I guess the lot was never cleaned up between build crews. The whole “Not my mess, not my job” mentality… And instead of cleaning up like they should have, the landscapers just planted on top of the trash. The result: wire sheathing, nails, bits of insulation, chunks of rotten drywall, wooden stakes and all manner of construction debris have choked the bushes and portions of lawn to death. The utter lack of rainfall didn’t help, but some of these sections were never healthy to begin with. I’ll have to till up the rest of the ground around the bushes and see what else was left behind.

I’m nearly half a week ahead of my study plan for the CCNA, so I decided I could afford to static tonight. I logged in, we assembled in Whitegate and went back out to the rat camp. Amelisa has come down with a bad cold, though, so we didn’t party long before she needed to go lay down. We popped our exp rings, though, so we all dinged 60 before disbanding. I put on my hat and wizard’s robe… -.^

I decided to round out the evening getting the new warp spell for BLM. It teleports you to your home nation in the past – really handy for hitting up campaign battles. The quest requires one game day to pass, so I spent that time getting all the new gate crystals for the new teleport (called “Recall”) spells for the past. I’ll get the recall scrolls next time I have goof off time online.

Tomorrow is another study night. I’m finishing up on Chapter 1, taking all the rest of the tests and making sure I get this foundation before moving on. I’ll probably do some reading at work, but I don’t want to skip out on taking notes, so I’ll need to limit how much of my studying I do there.