It's been a minute...

I know I know I know..."Erik, why do you even have a blog, since you never post?!" It's how I are. That's all I can say. I get hooked on something for a bit, and then the next thing takes over and my attention is gone. I don't have that many readers that come here to my little corner of the world any way, so I don't feel too concerned that I've alienated many of you. A bit of advice, if you don't already, you should use an RSS reader and just add my blog to it. Then you'll only have to come to my blog when you see I've updated. The rest of the time you just not worry about if I'm posting or not, because you'll be notified when I am. If you truly care to see me post more on here, feel free to let me know. If I know I have people who actually give a rip about me posting on my blog, I'll actually put more on here!

What's been going on lately in my world? It's been crazy, but crazy perfect most of the time.

We had some friends, Nick & Mary, and their son, Nate, move down here from Iowa. They lived with us for a month. THAT was some crazy times right there! We were glad to have been able to help them during their transition to H-town by offering up a room for them to live in. It was nice, but after living with anyone for a month, you long to have some normalcy back, and to not feel like you should be entertaining them. They never asked us, or made us feel like we should be, but you know how it is...we're good people and we just wanted to make sure they were doing alright. They moved out a few weeks ago, and things are going well for them. The Sheldon household has returned to normal, and now we're just getting ready for school to start.

Speaking of school starting, this year, we'll have three kids in the same school at the same time! That will be nice in the morning, as I'll only have to go to one place, instead of when I had to take Braden to his preschool. Of course, that'll change in two years when Evan starts that up. This year though, Avery will be a fifth grader...the head honcho in the school...runnin' the show! He says he can't wait for school to start. Who can blame him, since he'll be in the highest grade? It's sad though, since kids don't really pick on other kids in grade school, and all that will change for him next year. I don't see it happening too much to him though. He's got friends of all shapes, sizes and colors now, and he's pretty popular, with friends already in middle school, so I'm sure he'll fit right in. J will be a third grader, and she's ready to get to it as well, although she'll have the hardest time, since she likes to sleep a little later than the rest of the kids. Like mother, like daughter! And lastly, Braden starts Kindergarten! He's not really said much, but I'm sure he's really excited. He's a little shy normally, so it'll take him a second to get going, but he will. He's the strong, silent type. Evan will be the only one at home now, and will get lots of attention from his mother and grandmother.

Baseball tryouts are this week for A & Braden. J is skipping sports this season, which will give us one more break, meaning we'll only have to go to two different practices/game schedules like we did last season. So we're used to that. When she picks back up with softball or volleyball (she was hinting at this last week), adding that to our schedule will be crazy! We have options of people to help us with the kids and taking them to/from practice, but you just hate to have to ask for that, or rely on people like that, ya know? Any way, this is Braden's first real time going out for a sport, but I don't know of a better sport to sign him up for. He loves to hit the ball in the backyard, and he actually CRUSHES it! Aaaand, he's a switch-hitter with power from both sides of the plate! It'll be fun watching him this season. I plan to be an assistant coach most of the time, so I'm praying B can get time off during the days he has practice/games. A has always been amazing at baseball, and in the offseason he upgraded his bats with his birthday money, so we're excited to see how he does against pitchers 1-2 years older than him. We've hit the batting cages, and have picked up the ball for some catch lately, to try and get him in the "swing" of things. I LOVE WATCHING MY KIDS PLAY BASEBALL!

Saw some movies lately..."17 Again", good flick with a couple parts that barely make it a PG-13 rating, but it had a lot of great life lessons for us all..."Transformers 2", I thought was better than the original! Being able to actually see them fight and being able to tell what you're seeing was a nice bonus..."G-Force", was much cuter than I thought it would be, but still, just a decent movie. There are too many other movies I want to see that are out now, or will be. "District 9" is a MUST see for me, and I plan on catching that this week if possible! Gotta do it before the baseball season starts for the kids! Won't have time after!

Fire ants suck, m'kay? Seriously, they piss me off royally! I put fire ant killing stuff on my lawn like I always do, but I JUST did it two weeks ago, so I shouldn't have any issues like we had this weekend. It usually takes around 6 months or more before you start to see ant hills popping up. The pouring of rain we've had lately must be the issue. We've had a ton of it in the past week or so. All the directions say that as long as it doesn't pour for 24 hours after you put it on your lawn, you should be fine. Over the weekend though, about five minutes apart, B and I got attacked by those damn things. I have about eight stings on my feet, and B has a few as well. They just itch like freaking crazy! So, today saw me spending an hour putting more ant poison on the four mounds I found. Stupid ants! ANTS...I AM THE DEATHBRINGER!!!

I gave B an iPhone for an early Mother's Day/Anniversary present back in late May, and she's loved the thing as much as she and I hoped she would. My BlackJack2 phone died a couple months ago, and since I couldn't get a discount on a new phone until my contract renews in September, I was freaking out on what to do for a phone until then. With me needing one primarily for work, let alone as my home phone since we don't have a land line, I was trying to think of any and everything I could to replace my lost little friend. Enter a coworker of mine who had upgraded her old 2G iPhone for a new 3G one. She said she'd sell her old 2G model to me, and I didn't think twice about it! I've had it for two months now and freaking LOVE this thing! It's all of my devices rolled into one! Phone...internet...iPod...mobile applications...gaming...etc! It's amazing! Back to B, she turned her head one minute yesterday and Evan dropped it in the kiddie pool we have in the backyard. It turned on, but the touchscreen wouldn't work. So, good but bad news. I took it to the Apple store, and they showed me the "alarms" that went off because of it being wet and said they couldn't do anything for me. It violates the warranty, so barring a miracle, B was up a creek. We put it next to the AC vent in the car and turned it up to full blast. Thirty minutes later, things started working again! HALLELUAH, thank you Jesus! All I kept doing was praying, because if it didn't work, she wouldn't have a phone for weeks until I could get a new one, and then she'd have to use my old 2G one, instead of her new, nice & shiny 3G one. So, with all of that working, that then leaves me with the ability to upgrade my phone on September 10th or later, to a 3GS one! Can't wait to have the iPhone and actually have it run as fast as I am! That's the only downside with the 2G, is that it's two years old, and so the technology was just slower then. And with me being an IT guy, and proficient with button-mashing, me be needing the fast as I can get phone! ;)

Tonight, B and I were feening for some ice cream, so B went and got some. She got a chocolate cookie kind, a peanut butter cup kind, and caramel chunk kind. It's ice cream...they're all good. My favorite ice cream nowadays is the Ben & Jerry's Cherry Garcia. Why does ice cream have to be so dang fattening? For real?

On this past Thursday, we had a Social Networking "expert" come and talk to the staff about how we need to be more involved with it, how to be "in" it, and how "not" to do the wrong things while using it. It's all common sense here people. If you're going to put your company in the Social Networking scene, you use the main things that everyone uses to reach the most people...you use the Facebooks, the YouTubes, the Twitters, etc. It was hilarious how he'd throw out buzz words, and how all these other people who used it on the staff all talked like they were the pros. It was KILLING me. I'm a social network pro, and I didn't even know it. Seriously, I don't know how companies need to pay someone to come in and tell them this stuff. It's not hard, and in fact, it's pretty basic. GET OUT THERE AND USE IT! Don't be afraid of new "avenues" like the social networking world. Get your company out there! Make sure to use common sense...update your information, events, "status", etc, when common sense would tell you to do it. Only give access to your account to the people who NEED it. Don't put anything out there that you don't want spread across the internet. And lock down your privacy on the account, so you only show what you want to show, and only give people access to what you want them to have access to. Do you want only your followers to see what you put on there, or do you want any and everyone to have the ability to see what you have on there. Common sense people. Don't be afraid of the social networking scene. The internet, just like the world, changes everyday, so just keep your eye out for the next Facebook, the next YouTube, the next Twitter, and follow where your audience is. Okay, I'll get off my soapbox.

So, that's my update for now. Alot of posting since it's been awhile. Again, if you care to see more on here, let me know. I update my Twitter all the time, every day, so you can follow me on there. I tend to be a little "loud" on there though, so be prepared. I am on Facebook as well, but I don't really get on there much any more. Twitter's 140 character updates are about all I need. Sometimes I need 380, though. ;)

Peace and chicken grease,
E