Joe and Jamie’s Blog

Over the weekend I got together with Andrew to make the baby pool spreadsheet. You know that traditional thing where everyone bets on the date and time of birth, weight and length of the baby. Once it was done I really wanted to make it a website for people to just come and enter in the spots they wanted and their guesses, especially since some family is far away and it would be hard to keep faxing/mailing them an update piece of paper.

I buckled down this weekend and most of the night tonight and started coding the pool. It was really tough in the beginning for me because I don’t know any how to write to MySQL databases using CGI or PHP, I really only know ASP which I can’t use since I’m on a Linux server. Sorry for all the techno-jargon, it’s almost over. So I spent many hours learning and testing writing with PHP and MySQL to get this thing to work. I eventually got it to work and then of course figured out easier ways to code it, after it was all done. Let’s just say I took the brute force method in the beginning instead of being logical and doing loops. I guess my programming classes did me well after all to notice such silly mistakes and correct them.

The point of this post? Just to let you know that I learned how to do something and the end result came out pretty great. Check out the pool here. I’m thinking over the summer I can clean up the code even more and get it working so you can click on the square you want and just enter in the information instead of using the form. This will let me create some good super bowl pools.

Today I had a chance to go down to the registrar at the college and finally fill out my graduation paperwork. I don’t really know why I slacked off last semester and didn’t do it then, but here I am now and its filled out.

What does this mean? It means I can officially call myself a college graduate. I worked hard over these past four years going to school and work, more than one job during most of it too. I earned an Associate of Applied Science degree in Computer Information Systems and an Associate of Science degree in Information Management. While I was at it, I earned a certificate in Web Administration too.

I have three other certificates I am working on. All I need is one class waivered per certificate and I will have all three to add to my list. They would be in Computer Networking, Computer Software Support, and Business Programming.  I know my professor will waive these classes for me, I have taken almost every class in his department (not kidding). Also it’s not really my fault that the courses I am missing haven’t run in over five years. I hope I can meet with him soon to go over things and don’t have to wait until August to see him again.

I am off to do a little celebrating, very minor scale. Today was a really good day. Nice and sunny with a feeling of accomplishment in the air.

This weekend our phones me their New Every Two date, which is a program through Verizon where they give you a discount on phones every two years. It’s an incentive to get you to upgrade your phone.

Jamie has had the LG enV for the past two years. She wanted to upgrade to either a BlackBerry or a similar PDA/Windows Mobile phone so she had a reliable way to get her email and surf the internet. Since Verizon still has its buy-one-get-one on BlackBerry’s, I figured I would upgrade mine as well. I didn’t really have any issues with my Treo besides the casing near the antenna starting to break, but a brand new touch screen BlackBerry beats the Treo 700wx any day.

After an unsuccessful attempt to get the phone Saturday, we went this afternoon and picked them up. Unfortunately Saturday the Verizon store’s system went down while we were there and they couldn’t check us out. With our discount and the bogo on the phones, we were able to get $400 worth of new technology for $100. Now that is what I call a deal. We even decided to family share the plans together to save a bit of money too. Hey, anyway helps at this point I guess.

So far I am very impressed with this phone. It has a gazillion features built into it. So many that I haven’t put the phone down since noon when I got it. I have always wanted an iPhone, but around here the AT&T service really sucks, so I haven’t switched. Now that BlackBerry introduced their App Store, I think the iPhone finally has true competition. The App Store was the only thing the iPhone had over the Storm. I will wait a few days of fiddling with this phone before I bother to start with the thousands of apps that are available now.

I signed up for the new Visual Voice Mail plan. This negates me hating voicemail. My past post was about how much I hated dialing in and wish they could just email me the voicemails. Well Visual Voice Mail gives me a list of all my voicemails and allows me to choose the one I want to hear. I then just hit the play button and it starts to play. No dialing in and listening to all those messages in a row. By tomorrow I should have some voicemails so I can take a picture of it and post it here.

Pair of Verizon BlackBerry Storm 9530 smartphones

Happy Birthday to me! Sad that I have to blog about my own birthday, (grrr Jamie) but that’s another issue.

I am 24 years old now, getting pretty old I guess. I asked for a simple birthday, just a nice family dinner, wanted everyone to save their money really. There isn’t any need for a big hoopla in between 21 and 30 anyway. To celebrate, I asked to go to O’sho Japanese Steakhouse on Route 9 in Poughkeepsie. We all haven’t been there in many years, so it was time for a visit.

The dinner was great. By some stroke of luck we got our own table which was nice. We all were stuffed by the end of the meal. I felt like the guy from Monty Python’s Life of Brian (hope you all know what I mean). Everything that came off that hibachi was delicious, couldn’t get enough of it.

After we took some pictures in the rain of the building for this blog, we went home to digest some food before cake. A few hours later we sat around the table and had cake while I opened my presents. Everyone hates shopping for me because I either want stuff that is really expensive, I already own everything they think of, or the gift that they want to get me is technical so I would have to ensure they purchase the right one. I am a big movie buff and own quite the collection of DVDs, up near 400 last time I checked. Like usual, I only asked for some DVDs for my birthday. Love getting a whole bunch and adding to the collection.

To my surprise, my parents got me a very awesome gift. They gave me tickets to the 20 Mile Super Speedway Program from Stock Car Racing Experience at Pocono Raceway. This program puts you behind the wheel and driving a 600 hp Stock Car on the 2.5 mile Super Speedway for 8 laps, reaching speeds of 165mph. I am in 100% complete control of the car by myself. No instructors or experienced drives in the car with me, just me and an exact model NASCAR stock car. I don’t think awesome is quite a powerful enough word. I have to go through a few hours of lessons and training first, but I just can’t believe I get to drive the thing! I also get to go on a three lap ride along in the beginning, which is fun in itself. Can’t wait to experience 160mph G-force going through a turn with a 20+ degree embankment.

Enjoy some pictures from the night.

As you read from the previous post, February 21st was Jamie’s 21st birthday. To celebrate, Jamie’s sister, Casey, and I threw a small gathering of family at Bonefish Grill in Poughkeepsie, where Jamie likes to eat. Everything went really well, great service and food, everyone was happy. Jamie got nice presents from everyone and enjoyed the dinner.

After Bonefish we headed back to Casey’s in-laws house to play some card games until we were all ready to go out to the bar. Once all the food was digested, we headed out to the bar of Jamie’s choice. She chose to go to Mahoney’s Irish Pub at Dooley Square in downtown Poughkeepsie, near the train station. We all had a good time at Mahoney’s, a nice way to end the night. Here are some pictures from throughout the day.

Presents for Jamie - that cake box is awesome, isn't it?

Always read the cards first

Bonefish Grill in Poughkeepsie, NY

Jamie blowing out her candles - Pucker up!

Yummy bday cake

From left - Jamie's sister Casey, Jamie, Marie, and Matthew

Saturday night crowd at Mahoney's

Happy 21st Birthday Jamie!!

PPPPAAAAARRRRRRTTTTYYYYY!!!!!!

Now we can finally order a drink together when we eat out! :)