Sean and I are celebrating our 2 year anniversary. While we’ve known each other for more than two years, we’ve only been together since July 21, 2006. Knowing that we’re tight on cash, when we happened to be running errands last night in New Hyde Park we wound up stopping at this place called “Charlie Browns Steak House”. I’ve never been there before but Sean went numerous times when he was living in New Jersey. I picked up some ribs and the salad bar came included. He got himself a burger with the add-on of the salad bar as well. It’s a bit healthier than picking up the mozzarella sticks for an appetizer. Dinner was relatively nice, the food could have been a bit better (something we both agreed upon) but it was nice to just get out for a little while and have it be just the two of us.

For the last couple of weeks it’s mainly been family-time for me. I’ve been around my mother’s, I’ve hung out with my aunts, grandmother, father, sister, friends from around town (which are considered family in my opinion) so it really just hasn’t been the two of us, so it was nice to get out for a bit.

We’re in the process of figuring things out in regards to who’s going where. Unfortunately, I have too much going on up here where my life in Delaware is just not an option anymore. I love DE, and I adore Sean’s mom, I just can’t be down there at this point in my life. Too many family members are sick, and I’ve really missed my friends. I only have two people in Delaware. Sean and I are fine, and I get along great with his mother but I do need the friend input and I don’t go out and ‘make friends’ I’m comfortable with the people I grew up with. I know if I were ever able to FIND a job down there I’d be able to meet some more people but with every 100 applications sent, I’d get one phone call back and it would either not work out or just be such a shitty job that even wasting my time there just wasn’t worth it.

So the answer - I move back to New York. I’ve put in some applications up here so that I can bring in enough money where Sean and I can afford an apartment here on Long Island. My most recent application was sent to human resources as the hospital. It’s per-diem work, which isn’t even ‘Part-Time’ it’s a “call you as we need you” position. It’s my mother’s old job and per-diem work can very quickly turn into a full time job with the way people are rotated in and out of departments. When my father first started at the hospital he was working per-diem on the weekends, the guy he was covering for (full-time employee) decided to pick up and move to Florida a week after my father started. Dad was then asked if he wanted to switch to full-time and the rest is history. Five years later he’s still with them and making pretty decent money. He’s still in debt but at least there’s a solid paycheck coming in to take care of the bills.

So it’s my hope that I’ll be able to do that. I think it’s kind of funny that at this point in my life I’m about the same age as my mother when she first started working there. While I, in no way, see myself going down her route in life, I know there’s a lot of stability working for one of the top 3 employers on Long Island. Unfortunately, even with the economy, medical based jobs aren’t going to change, especially in the ER.

After a few months of working I’m hoping to be able to refinance my current loan so I can get some money for a down payment on a car for myself. I’ve narrowed it down to three choices - Chevy Cobalt, Honda CR-V, or VW Jetta. At this point, however, anything with reasonable mileage that I’m not going to be putting a lot of money into will do just fine for me. Maintenance is one thing, having to constantly fix engine parts is quite another. So I’m setting myself up with a budget of about of $12,000 MAX and I’ll see what I can come up with. I’m sure I’ll be able to find something really good with that amount of money, especially if I’m working at the hospital considering employees get a discount at numerous different stores, including car based ones.

Once everything else is taken care of, Sean and I will begin looking for an apartment up here. We just need something big enough where we can have a less-cramped bedroom, a decent sized office and it would be nice to have a formal living room, so I guess we’re looking into a two bedroom. On Long Island that doesn’t come cheap but we’ll also have a budget so we’ll be able to work it out. He’ll get to experience life with a very attached puppy, based heavily on the fact that she’s never been away from me. We’ll also be able to start our lives together without any outside influence from family members.

Should be interesting.

I don’t think that today could have gone any better. Sean and I were able to get the car fixed at $100 less than the original quote. We then hung out around the house for a little while. Dad, Sean and I went out to dinner at some diner that used to be an IHOP. After taking the long way home (half hour detour of just traveling around with the windows out on the jeep) we basically just relaxed and enjoyed the ride.

I have everything up and running with AGn Solutions. The new hosting plans are in place, the new pricing is in place, and thank god for the new company I’m going through because I now have a proper billing system that should help to keep everything running at ship-shape. Now all I need to do is push the advertising on it a bit more, but money talks so of course that will have to show up before anything. I have been able to figure out how to integrate things to another provider in regards to email management so I should be able to stay on top of things a lot better than I’ve been able to in the past.

So everything just seems to be looking up right now.

I’m working on a few things here as far as content goes. I’d like to finally get some of the templates up that I’ve been working on for the past few months, so we’ll see how much I can accomplish there. Maybe I’ll be able to finally come up with something that I like enough to publish to the rest of the world. I was contacted about sponsorships but I never responded due to my lack of creativity for the templates that they’re willing to sponsor.

Either way something will be done soon. I do have a lot of pictures to go through as well, there are a few creative entries that I’d like to throw up here as well.

A lot to do but no drive to do it - story of my life.

Being in New York I’m faced with the reality of my past. It’s not a bad hit for me, it’s a good one. I’ve been spending a lot of time with my friend Lucy, and I’m itching to get in touch with Pat but he’s been very busy lately. His band, Stealing Jane, is doing absolutely amazing work these days and they just recently launched their first ever video. I’m so proud of these guys. I remember going back to my high school days and hanging out at the Rock Lobster to watch these guys perform. They were great back then, and they’re even better now. So to give their band the extra push that I think any band needs, I’m linking their new video here.

I can assure you that you’ll enjoy what you hear, so head on over to StealingJane.com and show your support.

PS: Pat’s on Sax.

I don’t know if it’s due to the fact that I’m back in New York, or if it’s because I have the drive to make enough money to move back up here - but - I’ve had no trouble finding inspiration for new templates.  Maybe it’s the change of scenery, I don’t know.  I just know that I’ve spent the last 12 hours or so working on the new template for AGn Solutions, this way when everything is up and running I can work in the new billing/support software and go from there.

I really can’t wait to get everything transferred over.  I have to say that this eCheck business is bugging the crap out of me, but that was my own fault - I didn’t click the right button and now I’m going to have to figure out how to go about fixing it in the future.  I can’t change it now because the initial payment hasn’t cleared yet but come Monday morning I’ll be jumping for joy as I’m creating all of the back-ups and getting all of the DNS transferred over to the new company.

I’m changing things up a bit, and I’m bringing back Reseller accounts because off the increase in room.  I’m offering up enough resources where I can really do some serious business so hopefully my advertising efforts pay off.

While I’ve been in New York I’ve been searching around numerous Job Search websites and I’ve submitted my application to a couple of businesses here on the Island.  The ‘dream job’ might not actually come through but I can understand why the company wouldn’t want to shell out $70,000 a year on someone with no college degree.  Either way I’ll wait until I hear something from anyone before I get too excited.  I just really would love to be back up here and that’s something that a one-week stay has proven to me.

I miss New York.  I miss the congestion, and the rude people.  I miss the fantastic food and the fact that I know more people in town than I ever thought I did while I was up here.  Sure, you don’t think about it when you were up here for 20 years but if you just go through the supermarket and you’re stopped by old friends and family that you haven’t seen in a long time - it really takes it toll on you.  You realize just how much you’ve missed over the years.

Sure, Delaware is great.  I love Sean, I love the complex we’re living in but it doesn’t feel like “home” to me - not the way that New York does.  Even Sean seems to have more inspiration up here, on top of the concentration he’s been able to find.  Unfortunately he’s under the weather - so he really hasn’t done very much in the past 24 hours (work wise) but it’s easy to lose that new found concentration when you’re heavily congested and it hurts to swallow.

I think he has an ear infection, he claims it’s just his throat, but somethings telling me that it’s a little stronger than that.  I’d like to get him to the hospital but with the way New York works, you’re better off losing your ear before you want to sit in a damn E.R.. See, in Delaware when I went for my nasty abscess I was shot with all kinds of pain killers and loaded up with antibiotics.  It only cost me $125 - and yes that cost is with ZERO medical insurance.  Up here in New York? The same treatment would run about $1,200 for someone with no insurance.  Who the hell has that kind of money?  Thankfully the last time I got really sick up here (my first ever ear infection that went down my ear canal and took over the left side of my neck) I was still under my father’s Medical Insurance from the same hospital (he works there) so since hospital employees tend to get first priority (as do their children) it didn’t cost me a dime - I was fully covered. We did get the bill though, if we had to pay out of picket it would have been about $2500.

So yea, we’re obviously not going to go up here, but maybe I’ll be able to rummage through the cabinets and pick up something for him.  I want to get some ear-drops from the store but my usual 24-hour hotspot up here is no longer 24-hours.  Oh well…I’m sure I’ll figure something out.

In any event, it’s knocking on 3am - guess I should get to bed.

Thanks to the support staff of my current host, things are looking up.  There was just a minor issue with my IP address and now everything seems to be taken care of.  Come Monday my eCheck for the first account should clear and I’ll then be able to get my clients setup as well.  The new system will slowly be implimented and I have to say that I love the idea of a program that directly connects to the control panel and sets up everything for you.  It helps to keep track of things, and it makes things a bit easier for clients as well, especially when it comes to upgrading/downgrading packages.

In any event, it’s knocking on Midnight and I’m pretty tired.  I think it’s time to head off for the night.