Cowtown Chronicles

I know you’ve all been wondering where the hell I’ve been lately. The sad truth is that I’ve just been too busy with work and trying to get things set up in the background at Panther City Media to write much of anything for either site.

I also got a new job this week, which I will be starting at on the 19th. I’ve been hired as an Apple Systems Administrator at TCU. That’s really nice, because I can ride my bike to work! I’m really excited to get started, and it looks like it’ll be a great environment, based on my interactions with the staff there so far.

One of my photos of The Stockyards was chosen to be included in the Schmap guide to Fort Worth! It doesn’t pay anything, but hey, it’s a bit of an ego stroke, at least!

First news comes out that Sir Edmund Hillary has died at age 88.

Then I have to put mental effort into trying to determine if Hillary Clinton was genuinely choked up in New Hampshire, or if it was just a political stunt designed to make her look more human.

If she was truly choked up, then WTF is wrong with the media for hyping it to no end and speculating this way and that about what it meant and how it will help or hurt her?

If she wasn’t, and it was an act, then WTF is wrong with our politicians and the public which continues to buy their shit?

Either way, who the hell has the right to make fun of her?

If it was genuine, then I’m glad, and she really does look more human and concerned to me. I’m still not voting for her, but it’s great to know that she’s in it for the right reasons.

If it wasn’t genuine, then she’s a damn good actor and political strategist, and I think she’d do well in our current political climate. (And I’m still not voting for her.)

Join me tonight at the Flying Saucer (Now with 100% less smoke!) for the BCS Championship Bowl Game at 7 PM. If the big screen TV is broken, or if can’t get a seat at the bar, we’ll move to a bar to be named later. I’ll try to update this post with details if you’re interested in following.

UPDATE 4:30PM: I just called the Saucer (they have a phone, who knew!?) and the TV is STILL broken. Seriously, guys, get a plasma already…

Anyway, let’s move the party to ummmm… Baker St. Pub on Camp Bowie. Looks like they have decent drink specials, and you un-Americans what don’t drink beer can get a girly drink there.

Look for the big bald guy in a red hooded sweatshirt. (I don’t have any Buckeyes gear at the moment.)

fort worth, personal, football, buckeyes

But it turns out that my loathing of making left turns is good for the environment AND more efficient.

w00t! Pete turning right FTW!

This is the second of my series of posts on the changes I’ll be making in my financial life. The first discussed setting specific goals and making sure that you’re in harmony with your significant others about what you want to achieve. This post will discuss the next step, coming to grips with the situation.

The Reckoning

In a lot of these “we got out of debt!” stories, people will say how the debt snuck up on them, as if their brains and their bank accounts had never met. That’s not the case with MY debt (and I say MY debt, because I’m the spendy one). I spent us into declaring bankruptcy 4 years ago because I couldn’t tell myself NO when the question was “can I have…”. I figured that I had a good job, with tons of upside to my earning potential, so I might as well enjoy myself. I was in denial about the total amount of debt that I’d piled up, but I was fully aware that I was spending money I didn’t have while I was doing it. Like so many others, I did the math and the numbers told me that if I was able to make the credit card payments, then I must be able to afford whatever it is I’m considering buying.

I think it’s pretty obvious that this line of thinking got me into some serious financial trouble. Before the bankruptcy, we had nearly $60,000 in debt, both secured and unsecured. (And no mortgage!) Afterwards, we just had our cars and one credit card which we affirmed during the process so we would have something for “emergencies.” But when you’re living paycheck to paycheck and can’t control your spending impulses, EVERYTHING is an emergency, and we weren’t able to make any headway on paying down our debt.

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You might have heard me say that I abhor “green” as a descriptive word. Unless it’s describing the color of something. Let’s talk about another word… Sustainable. The dictionary built into my trusty Power Mac provides the following definition of sustainable: “able to be maintained at a certain rate or level.”

What does that mean when someone uses it in reference to a lifestyle, building, city, etc.? Fortunately it means exactly what it sounds like. To live sustainably means to conduct your life in a way that makes you able to maintain your lifestyle at a certain rate or level. To build sustainably means that you use only what you need and that the built environment respects the balances necessary in nature both for sourcing materials and for heating/cooling and landscaping maintenance.

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As I’m sure you might have noticed, there hasn’t been a lot of activity around here lately. No, I haven’t quit, nor have I focused ALL of my attention on my OTHER project. (Okay, maybe I’ve focused an unusually large amount of attention on it.)

What’s been happening is that I’m totally slammed at work, and in keeping up with school. Yes, I work full-time, attend school nearly full-time, and am trying to launch a full-featured and active blog, all at the same time.

“How do you do it all?” you ask?

Well, honestly, I don’t. I completely spaced out a week ago and didn’t take a test for an online class that I should have. I’m failing tests in my Philosophy class (failing tests is a new experience for me). When I’m at work I’m thinking about West and Clear, and when I’m at home I’m thinking about work. You’ll notice that none of the things that I’ve listed are Cowtown Chronicles.

The semester is winding down, and my workload is increasing, but I should hopefully be able to better manage things here in a couple of weeks. Please don’t give up on me, and if you’re not already, hop on over to West and Clear for some timely and topical infotainment.