The New Musings of a Quiet Geek

The last several weeks at the library, maybe even for more than a month, I've been working on a project. To determine which books belong in our library and which books belong up in Bangor, there is a colored stripe on the spine. We found a ton of books with no stripe at all so it was placed upon me to first make sure the books do indeed belong down here and then place a blue stripe on them. This morning while I was working on this project, checking in a book to see if it was ours brought up an ILL hold alert. We're not sure if this was a new request placed after we checked that morning on an old request kicking around the system for awhile. My boss told me to just prepare it for shipment as even if it's not a current request, they'll just send it back. It was very weird. And yes, I did stripe it! Last evening, I finished the second book in the new Genesis of Shannara trilogy by Terry Brooks: The Elves of the Cintra . I've read some really good books lately, and s...

In case you all were wondering, I finally have found a dentist but that's just the end of the story. Tuesday, I call another dentist. They inform me that they haven't taken new patients in five years. I call the next on the list and they enthusiastically tell me they do. I then tell them about my spinal rod and that I have to take a pre-cleaning antibiotic so the rod doesn't get infected. I went without it once but why chance it? This is where the story turns fun. They tell me that the first time the previous dentist calls it in and then they take over. I call my old dentist in CT and the secretary gets all huffy about it says she wants to talk to this other office because of how irregular it is. She calls back about five hours later for the number of the pharmacy near me. She didn't sound happy. An hour later, I walk over to the pharmacy to pick up the meds. Hadn't been called in. I call them the next morning and am told they recieved the prescription but need mor...

I don't think either women read this any more but, if you do, I apologize for this in advance. Awhile back I discovered that a woman I attempted a relationship with was getting married. I was a little bummed for awhile that not only was I not The One, I was seemingly The One Just Before The One. Recently, I discovered, basically the same way, that this "phenomenon" for lack of a better word has happened again. Do I give women greater insight into what they want? I can be cosmically pessimistic and interpret this as a reward for attempting a relationship with me but even I'm not that bad. (Well, not any more anyway...) I suppose in reality it's just some rather cruel coincidence. Please don't get me wrong. I'm very happy for both of them/you but I needed to get that off my chest. Some clarification wouldn't go amiss either... In less, well, just lesser, news, I've decided to join Technorati. Will it give me more readers? Probably not but really why...

Since I've been living up here for about a year, I figured it was about time to set up a doctor and dentist up here. My planned first step was to find a dentist as I'm due for a cleaning. I found a dentist within walking distance but I called them and they apparently aren't taking any new patients. I go online and find the name of another dentist who's not within walking distance (Well, not safely anyway.) but on the busline. I call them but they're closed. The secretary calls me the next day and informs me that they only do extractions not cleanings. There are a few more dentists within city limits including one slightly closer than the extractionists. The search continues. I began my search for a doctor at the same time. Mapquest's listings are apparently not updated often as the first name I found was apparently now in another town which is not on busline. I found a practice on the other end of the main street here but I was really hoping for someone closer. ...

What did you do in 2007 that you’d never done before? Moved out of my parent's house, to a different state at the time, to an apartment. Did you keep your new years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I doubt I made any and I'll probably hold that trend. Did anyone close to you give birth? Not really but one of my good friends from kindergarten's sister apparently had baby... Did anyone close to you die? Nobody comes to mind for this question at all. What countries did you visit? Other than go to CT a couple times and Springfield, MA once, I didn't even leave the state. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007? A paying job and an SO wouldn't go amiss... What date from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? Forever? I don't think there is one. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Getting a huge Christmas bonus from my volunteer job. What was your biggest failure? Thinking that temping would pan out up here...

Remember how I said I really liked the soundtrack to Love Actually ? Yeah, well, I bought it off eBay and received it in the mail yesterday. The problem with soundtracks more often than not is that the really good music you liked from the movie is never on the soundtrack. The disc is compiled of music playing during the closing credits that you didn't hear because you already had left the theater. This soundtrack doesn't belong in that category. It belongs with the great soundtracks of Forrest Gump or Boys on the Side . There's maybe four or five songs I don't remember but even the Wyclef John song ("Take Me As I Am") is very catchy. Eva Cassidy's cover of Christine McVie's "Songbird" is indistinguishable from the original so that's very cool. (I'm sure I've said this before, but, McVie was the best songwriter of Fleetwood Mac.) I also love the piece of Craig Armstrong's score included here. I can actually picture the scene. ...

The good news was I got listen to my Ringo Starr Christmas album. I was worried it was too badly scratched but it just needed a massive cleaning. Yay! I received a lot of CDs this year. From my parents, I received Kelly Clarkson's new album, My December . She's at the same place with her third album that Sheryl Crow was with her first. What I mean is Kelly wrote all the songs with the help of one to three other people. (Read the liner notes of Tuesday Night Music Club .) If this holds true, Kelly's sixth album should be pre-ordered now... Clive Davis didn't want this album to see the light of day. Why? While I don't like it as much as "Breakaway," it's very good indeed. I've only listened to it a couple times which is not enough time really like anything (Of course, there are exceptions in either direction.) so this may change. From my aunt and uncle I received Raising Sand from Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. When I had heard of this album, I was...

I'm glad Joe Biden especially dropped out of the race because, from the very beginning, he had about as much chance of winning as John Kerry would if he ran again meaning slim to less than none. I mean he called Obama "clean and articulate." Chris Dodd dropping out is a bit less, um, pleasant for me because I liked him to a certain degree. He didn't have a shot to win either, though, so it was the right move. And, briefly, what is up with Dennis Kucinich reporting ABC to the FCC for dumping him from the debates? Did anyone else get to go on The Colbert Report and empty their pockets? No. Dodd dropping out leads me to what I really wanted to discuss. Joe Lieberman first endorsing Susan Collins for Maine's junior senator then John McCain for president. I have no problem with cross-party endorsements in the name of friendship but I really can't buy that from a guy whose response to losing his party's nomination was to run as an independent. It's all abou...

Maybe this topic is a stretch to be added to my series but I finished two books a couple days ago that I was reading over vacation so I think it counts. First, I finished Star Trek: Federation by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens. Written between Star Trek: Generations and Star Trek: First Contact , it tels the story of warp drive developer, Zephram Cochrane filling in the blanks between when he broke the warp barrier, him disappearing in space, and then being discovered on a distant planet by Kirk, Spock and Dr. McCoy. It further allows him to encounter Picard's crew as well. I realize how complicated this may sound but it ties together well. Because it was written before First Contact came out some of the events taking place in Cochrane's own time contradict what is now cannon such as how he developed the drive but that's a very small portion of the book so it really can be overlooked. I was thinking that Generations would be the movie that would really screw things ...

My roommate had a friend from his first college days come to visit starting New Year's Eve and she loves to watch movies so we watched a bunch. She brought Hairspray with her so we started with that. That movie was not as sophisticated as Once but was definitely F-U-N fun. At first, I wondered why Travolta was putting on a Philadelphia accent if they were in Baltimore but maybe it's a Mid-Atlantic accent? Hmmm. I didn't know Amanda Bynes, Michelle Pfeiffer or Christopher Walken was in this movie so that was a cool surpise. Rent it today. We next flipped around the channels and found American Pie Presents: Band Camp so we watched that. As with Girl Interrupted, but perhaps more so with this movie, I was amazed what made it on the air. At the moment, I don't feel the need to rent the full version but, overall, I liked it. As their was nothing on TV, we raided our stash of recorded Christmas movies beginning with Christmas Caper with Shannen Doherty which may have been ...