New site to check out (not going to say 'blog' anymore. Rhymes with 'clog' and that's pretty much what I'm doing. Clogging up the internet with useless crap. But i digress.) The Mad Dater. I like her style of writing, plus she does talk of an interesting subject i have no clue of, dating. Anyway, take a peek for yourself.

Two words can best describe what is happening in New York and other cities in the Northeast right now.

Free TV's

'the vultures are circling'

ANT was telling me his ex-wife is having family trouble. She's already lost her father a couple months ago and it was found out last week her mother has a tumor in the middle of her brain. She went back to Cali to take care of her Fri, and today she called saying the other family members are eyeing what they can get when her mom passes.
It's a sad state of affairs when relatives come around all of a sudden to wish her well, all the while 'window shopping' to see what they can grab a hold of when she's gone.
My only wish is for her to have a trustworthy person to act as executor of the estate. I know first hand what could happen if that isn't the case. My grandmother passed back in '94 and the executor of the estate (a so-called friend of the family, and an attorney) took the money. My brother and i are still wrangling with him over getting it back, and it's been 9 years already.

Interesting to see Google listed as a referrer. Makes me wonder what they were searching for that brought my site up. I did a search for my name and i'm ranked 2nd behind someone using the name on Warcraft 3 (not me though).

**SPECIAL REPORT**

2003: THE 'NEW YEAR' SO FAR

Every New Year's Eve we have all seen the pictures of the Old Year, depicted as an old man, 'passing the torch' to the New Year, depicted as a baby. However, we have never witnessed this 'New Year' growing up throughout the year. Here at LCVW, we decided to do just that and set about locating and observing the 'New Year' as he would be like in August. Originally, it was planned to have a 20-part series called 'The New Year: Just Who Is He?' with a panel of our expert analysts (doctors, lawyers, military men, celebrities, a couple of ambassadors, the Professor and MaryAnn) in a roundtable discussion. However, all of our experts were already booked to participate in the roundtable discussion on the California Recall Vote (even Jessica Lynch was unavailable) and therefore the concept was scrapped. Therefore, we took it upon ourselves to go straight to the source, the 'New Year' himself.
Before we go on, it is best to understand that the 'New Year' and 'Father Time' are two different entities altogether. Although Father Time is master of time itself, he creates a being to handle the actual day to day (or in this case, year to year) affairs. It takes the stress off him and places it on someone else. We found out by accident that he is owner and operator of a cloning factory that produces the 'New Year' babies each year. (It is also rumored that he has a contract with the North Pole to mass-produce Santa Claus clones and distributing them throughout the world the beginning of December as decoys in preparation for the Real Thing.)
The first thing we wanted to know was 'just how fast does the New Year age?' We attempted to pose this question to whatever expert we could find, but everyone was either busy covering one of the California gubinatorial candidates or was announcing his or her candidacy and could not be bothered. Unshaken,we then went to the next best thing-our secretary contracted from the local temporary agency. When asked the question, she stopped filing her nails, fluffed her hair, and said, 'Like, he's like realllly old, and stuff. He probably, like, ages a year each day.' Based on that assumption, that would mean he would be old before the year is even a quarter done. We did not wish to believe that were the case and so assumed, for the sake of argument, that he ages about 10 years a month, which sounded a bit more realistic. We can only imagine then, during the War in Iraq, that he was more than likely in his 'prime' and, though he is not allowed to be biased, was probably watching the entire thing and saying, 'Go for it. Get him.' (He could not be biased, but he could be rebellious. This is just an idea though.)
The next part of our quest was to locate him. After numerous inquiries, one of our reliable sources pointed us to an unknown location in an unknown part of the world. We are unable to reveal our source, however you may have seen him walking down the sidewalk carrying an 'End of the World Is At Hand' sign. Also, for the protection of the 'New Year' we are unable to give you the exact location of his whereabouts, however we can give you a vague idea by drawing it in the sand.
(Editor's note: At this point we had no choice but to expel this reporter and embed another one in his place.)
After many cancelled flights, plane delays, traffic jams, wrong turns, and 'mob flashes', we arrived at our destination. If you have ever visited any castles in Europe, they all pale in comparison to what we saw. The door itself stood an incredible 30 feet tall.
There was nobody to greet us when we arrived. We walked in and the first thing we saw was the great hall where, we can only guess, the 'changing of the guard' takes place on New Years Eve. Based on what we could see, the hall itself could hold 2 football fields side by side. Grey marble covered the floor and pillars, and at the far end we saw 12 marble steps (representing, we assumed, the 12 chimes of midnight) that led to the great throne where the 'New Year' sat and watched the world (how he did that is still unknown). Purple carpet about 15 feet wide covered the middle of the hall and led up to the throne. The throne itself was decorated in many different and unknown symbols, with the moon adorning the very top (again, representing midnight). From what we could tell, it was all plated in gold, with the seat and back of the throne in purple velvet.
High above us, the ceiling was approximately 100 feet, and covered in framed glass, to let the sunlight shine in (or the moon to be visible). At each corner behind the throne and meeting halfway across was a draped curtain hanging down about 50 feet and pulled to one side with a gold colored rope that had those dangling tassles at the end. The curtain was purple as well, and looked to be made also of velvet. The sight if it all was magnificent.
There was just one problem. The Man himself was not sitting on the throne as we had expected. What we did find, though, was the '2003' sash he wears sitting upon it. It was dirty, with a few blood spots and burn marks around it. The bottom part of the '3' was barely visible due to it being scorched, as if someone placed a cigarette underneath it.
We continued to search the place in hopes of finding our host when we heard a 'plunk' of an empty glass being tipped over on the ground. The noise came from the farthest corner of the great hall behind the throne. We proceeded cautiously to investigate and found a small wooden door in the corner hidden by one of the pillars. We attempted to open it but found it locked.
Another 'plunk' came from behind the door, so we quietly knocked and announced ourselves. We heard the door being unlocked and watched as the knob slowly turned, then the door opened. What was inside was most shocking.
There was a man, looking to be around 80ish, his silver hair thinning, with a silver beard to be about 6 inches long. He was wearing a dirty white robe and you can see small splotches of blood on the front, various burn and singe marks on the arms. His eyes were glassy and red, and he looked emaciated, as if he had not eaten in days. His legs looked like nothing but bones. He was sitting atop a wooden crate, and all around him were empty bottles of whiskey (one person even noted a couple of empty perscription bottles). You could see his hand shake as he pulled it back after opening the door.
He looked up to us and asked in a slurring voice, 'Ish the Year over?'
We told him no, it was only the beginning of August.
With that he promptly grabbed the doorknob, closed and locked the door. We were amazed at how fast he was able to do that.
Repeated knockings failed to flush him out so we proceeded back to the entry. As we walked we could only imagine the horrors he has witnessed throughout the year thus far. War, incursions, suicide bombers, floods, wildfires, tornadoes. His ears must still be ringing from all the gunfire and grenades.
We can only pray that the rest of the year will be less violent and horrifying. There's a coronation he must perform at the end and we would like to see him in one piece.

Finished sooner than i thought. Proofreading it and will post it a little later (i hope).

I had a vision today, while working at the hotel, and currently writing about it. I'm hoping to have it posted sometime this week. It seemed like an interesting concept to write about. I hope i can pull it off.

Not much to report for the weekend. Did check out Cory's site which i thought to be interesting. Other than that, the big thing was getting an email from an internet friend i haven't seen or talked to in about 3 months. Got to do both last night.