Thursday

Today and everyday have been quite busy days. Jonny has started a new book called The Long Suit. It is a detective novel set in England. The cover is neat because it shows a guy in a suit in a contorted pose. Lorraine picked a duet of books for Jonny to read. Jonny steered her toward The Long Suit and then her eye fell naturally toward another book. The second book is Bongo or something like that. He got these books from a book store worker who gave Jonny about 18 books because Jonny said he liked to read. This guy works with the secretaries at the college so that is how their paths cross. Today Jonny got a new computer. He was really tired and went out to his car and took a nap. Even though it is 15 degrees without the wind chill effect. A noisy mail woman talking on her hands free cell phone woke him up several times. Jonny had another afternoon meeting in Death Valley and thus the lack of blog entry yesterday. Kristina sent an email clarifying that indeed only one school in the UK has stopped teaching the holocaust due to concerns with upsetting moslem students. In other bad news, the neighbors lowered their price from 175 (a mere 5 more) to 165 (now 5 less). Will Angelina lower her price from 170 to 160?

Tuesday

Jonny has been busy. There are so many meetings in this job. Yesterday he had a meeting in Death Valley and another is scheduled for tomorrow. Friday there is another one.

Yes, Jonny finished a book. The book was 446 pages. It was a real thriller called The Juror. The author wrote one other book and none others. There is a movie too with Alex Baldwin and Demmi Moore. Jonny will let Lorraine pick out another book. In the meantime he might play with his ink pens.

The house sale seems to be on track. There is a realtor open house today and a general public open house Sunday. There was a showing Saturday, right after services. The family had to clean up for an hour. The viewer might take another look. There is another showing tonight. And another appointment is being set up for this weekend.

This is Jesse's week of tests. So Angelina and Jonny are a bit stressed out about that. In the politics, Clinton is winning because she has the most delegates. As it turns out the republicans strip half the delegates for the states that have not played by the rules. The democrats strip all the delegates for Michigan and Florida. After Tuesday February 5 it will be all over. Probably Romney and Clinton. Clinton won't get us out of the war so it really is an issue over style. Honestly it would be great if Clinton choose Romney as her running mate. Of course they would be running against no one!

Jonny is listening to Brachos 28b. He hasn't started Jerimiah yet. He listened to Mishpatim chanted today. He also listened to the Mishpatim chumash discussion today. There was a lot to do with dogs being more quiet than people.

Thursday

Only one more day until the weekend.
6:45 wake up
7:00 clean up dog poop
7:15 walk dogs
7:30 Jonny does his hair
7:45 he packs his lunch
8:00 Jonny drives listens to the end of Sunday the Rabbi Stayed Home
8:15 he calls Dolly
8:30 tries to find hat and gloves
8:45 Angelina calls
9:00 more infomaker pts under tx, while listening to Yithro
9:15 new infomaker reports
9:30 new reports
9:45 Rob
10:00 email Dolly
10:15 hat and gloves
10:30 drive
10:45 drive
11:00 meeting in Death Valley
11:15 mtg
11:30 mtg
11:45 mtg
12:00 drive
12:15 drive
12:30 lunch
12:45 lunch
1:00 lunch while reading The Juror and Jonny is up to page 154.
1:15 report
1:30 date time in sybase
1:45 select statement in sybase
2:00 blog

Tuesday

Jonny is sitting here in Hotel California, disenchanted, disenfranchised and disheartened. Penny as usual is the source of the trouble. Tomorrow he'll go back to Hollywood but will be in this area for a training class. Jonny is on page 80 of The Juror. The book is creepy and horror laden. He didn't start Jerimiah or listen to the Rabbi Grossman version of the parsha yet. The dog Lucy pooped on the new carpet this morning. He has another meeting to go to at 3:15. For lunch he used a free coupon he got for the cafeteria. This week's parsha is Yithro and this is also Tu B'Shevat. Jonny was doing schoolwork last night as usual and trying to get to bed early. No sit ups either. He is getting lazy and trying really hard to exercise more and eat less in an effort to lose wait. Angelina said to get his boss Rob's home address for invitation to the Bat Mitzvah. Angelina is home right now with the new realtor taking pictures and listing the house. Jonny tried to call his brother last night he also helped Alberta with homework. Jesse came running out to greet Jonny when he got home to tell him that the new carpet was there. Jonny still has to put the wii system and dvd player back up in place. He set up the tv to play out the stereo. That is a guy thing.

Monday

OK got the title of the blog out of the way, now what to write about? Jonny's eyes are bleary. Too much reading on the internet. He has just completed Isaiah, Chapter 66, which is the last chapter. Today Jonny is thankful for his neighbor. He needed to get to work and the mother of Robert Patrick and Lili Flanders was able to watch the kids. Angelina and Alberta went out this morning. Alberta has her camp physical today. This was scheduled so she would not miss time from school. In the meantime, Jonny was stuck with Jesse and Lorraine this morning from 8 am to 9:30. He eventually brought the young ones over to the neighbors house. The young Lili answered the door and admitted them. Then Jonny went back home and warmed up his car. He went inside and checked email. He came back out and went to work. He was quite late but still went to work before 10:30 am. Angelina was being considerate of the neighbor's feelings because after all today is MLK day and there is no school. So there was no reason for them to jump out of bed just to watch Angelina's kids. Now Angelina is home. Jonny sent out a fax so she could get some financial aid from a charity organization. Angelina was at Kohl's. Probably an attempt to bribe Alberta and reward herself for the heroics of the appointment. Jonny will be bringing home chocolate brownies furnished by one of the senior programmers here in Hollywood. He had a football party and these were leftover.

Jonny completed A Cold Day In Paradise and started The Juror. The first book mentioned was 271 pages. He is on page 68 of this horror based novel. He is still on CD 4 of Sunday The Rabbi Stayed Home. Jonny emailed Kristina and received an email back. Kristina is having a colonoscopy tomorrow and Wendell has a bad cough.

Friday

Today someone at the Hospital was having a going away party. So Lea and another lady and Jonny drove to Hotel California from Hollywood. Lots of people from Hollywood ended up there. Angelina just called. She is working hard on getting the house ready. She took Jesse's art work off the refridgerator. Jonny talked to his mother last night. His father's brother's wife emailed today and wanted more information about the Bat Mitzvah. Jonny has been sleepy all day. Yesterday he was running to the bathroom. But it didn't stop him from going to Burger King. He wanted to got to Kentucky Fried Chick but they were out of their spicy hot wings. So he went to BK instead. So today Jonny has been holding off on the coffee. He had a nice beer last night and still was sleepy all day. He listened to the parsha and talmud. He is up to Brachos 26b now. He is on page 250 of A Cold Day In Paradise by Steve Hamilton. Jonny just might look up some more of his books. Lorraine is picking up two books at a time for him. Jonny's mother just sent an email hold on. Ok a long letter and the usual digs we never see the kids or you. But on the positive side she enjoyed the long letter Jonny sent her. So the next book Jonny is reading is The Juror.

Thursday

Up to page 159 of A Cold Day In Paradise. Jonny and Angelina just finished a meeting with their new realtor. She'll be coming over the weekend to sign the final papers. On January 29, her company will be giving a tour to all the realtors in the company. Jonny is going to look at the house next door as well this weekend, checking out the competition. Jonny's stomach is killing him today. He is going over to Death Valley and then forms training for the afternoon.

Wednesday

A Cold Day In Paradise. Jonny forgot to mention he is on page 106. He has been listening to the parsha today on and off. It isn't really the parsha it is in fact Rabbi Grossman explaining this week's parsha. Jonny is up to CD 2 of the Rabbi Small audio book (Sunday). There are 7 day books and 4 others. Alberta likes to sometimes listen to them in the car. But she is only 12. The books Jonny reads are usually adult books. In this one the handyman asks the drug store guys for a couple of "safes", and my girl thanks you too he says. Ha ha. On law and order an chasidic community was a major portion of the story. Fortunately they were portrayed in a good way. Angelina asked if this was "ripped from the headlines" too, as Jonny thought at first it was. It turned out later the villian was another boy who was a "victim" of watching too much tv. Perhaps the chasidic way in some communities to drop out of modern society helps shelter their group from the moral depravity of this world. Lea is going to be on vacation next week so Jonny won't do much with billing programming. But this week it is all velos support, but you can't shift things around just to fit your schedule. Steve Hamilton writes a pretty decent novel and Jonny recommends highly A Cold Day In Paradise. True Michiganders and people like Jonny will like this local book in the detective hard boiled PI genre.

Tuesday

First of all Jonny finished a book as indicated by the tag below. The book was called DaVinci Cod, and it is a niche book. The book is funny and has the same kind of British humor as The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul. The book was written by David Brine who also wrote Salt. A lot of slap stick humor as mentioned already. They even mention things like the search for the Holy Grail, the Monty Python version. That book was a quick read 180 pages. It was a library book and Jonny returned it last night. Today is the Michigan primary oh well. Jonny went over to Hotel California. He had to take two buses and froze quite a bit. He got a doctor who works in Hollywood to give him a ride back to Hollywood. Jonny is all excited about doing a good job at school, the Winter semester is about to start. He and Angelina haven't slept well in days. Jesse keeps coming into bed. The cat wakes them up and Lorraine gets up early. Alberta stays up late and Jonny barely has time to make his lunch and do sit ups. This new book he started last night is about Michigan and the upper peninsula, or the UP or yuppers as they are called in Michigan. Since Jonny lives in Michigan the book is interesting. There is a murder in the "soo" a short name for an area in the "you pee" and the wind whips, there are lakes, cottages and the weather changes fast. The main character was from Detroit. He retired from the police and then became a PI. The usual genre set up. It is quite amazing that the detective novel genre is so clearly defined by a road map, most of the time. On the other hand Jonny took Alberta to the library and got a Rabbi Small book on CD. He started listening to it this morning. Jonny also listened to the Parsha yesterday. He is up to chapter 64 of Isaiah. Lea is out for lunch and Penny is out of the office, so no one is stopping Jonny from relaxing.

Monday

Today Jonny hasn't gotten around to listening to the parsha. He did send his mother a long email. Over the weekend the girls went tobogganing. Don't you think Jonny got that word right. He watched a little tv over the weekend and saw CSI where one guy made another guy eat his words in a scrabble like game. Since he missed the middle of the show it didn't make a whole lot of sense. Jonny's neighbor is trying to sell his house for $175 and Jonny is meeting with his realtor to list the house this week. Last week he had an eye appointment and things went well with that. Lorraine and Jonny played mancalla. Jesse and Jonny played little people and leggos. Everything is a big mess in the house now. Alberta had a basketball game so this weekend will be the weekend they go to Saturday morning services. But the moment of truth is here Jonny finished a book and started another. The Final Country was 310 pages. Not recommended. Perhaps Laurence would like it. It has lots of guns, drugs, bars, fighting and confusion. On amazon it was highly recommended either. But the Rabbi Small series is good. Jonny finished listening to that book on tape Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red. Now Jonny must get back to c sharp and console application programs that read from sybase databases and write to log files if there is an error.

Friday

For lunch today Jonny had Cottage Inn Pizza. He is up to page 213 of The Final Country. Tomorrow the plan is to go the temple for Saturday morning services. Today Jonny has an eye doctor appointment. He listened to Brachos 24b today. This week he listened to Bo three times. Angelina went today to visit the house two doors down. It is listed at $175. The wet blanket realtor that Angelina fired on Nov 1 was a real downer. She said to Angelina that the other house will sell first. Jonny asked Angelina, which house do you think is better yours or theirs. She said hers was better. So Jonny said who cares what the realtor says listed yours at $185 since you think it is better and wait and see. They'll have to take it off when the time for the Bat Mitzvah comes closer. It is so amazing that Clinton won in New Hampshire. That was certainly an upset victory. She was losing in the polls. Jonny is getting sleepy. He'll probably finish the tape Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red on the way to the eye appointment. Jonny convinced Angelina to let him light her new 32 ounce pumpkin scent candle. Jonny helped Lorraine with math homework. Alberta is interested in colleges already. Jonny wonders, what does it take to get into UM?

Thursday

Today for lunch Jonny had the final sandwich in the roast beef sandwich trilogy. For breakfast it was two apple Trader Joe cereal bars. Right now Jonny is drinking coffee and enjoying his stay in Hollywood. He'll be working there 5 days a week for the next two weeks. It doesn't seem to be a problem for anyone. Last night's dinner was noodles and sauce. The carpool ride from religious school was awful. Jonny walked from Hotel California from 5:15 to 5:45 but it wasn't enough to counter balance the behavior of these children. Lorraine, Margo and William were terrible. Th youngest William was screaming, cake and chicken nuggets. He also was kicking and fighting. Alberta was very upset. Lorraine and Margo stuck their heads out of the sun roof. At dinner it was discovered that William never screams when his father Bill Maul picks them up. Onto literary matters. Jonny picked up a book at the library called DaVinci Cod it is a spoof on DaVinci Code. Jonny could never read such a non-Jewish book. Clearly as Rabbi David Small would say that book is about theology and the Jewish religion makes no comments on theology. This book will be humorous and will be a break from page 171 of The Final Country a crime fiction novel, possibly. Jonny called Kristina on his cell phone and she called back saying she wasn't sure who called her. She was hoping it wasn't "the house". This comment was an obvious dig into the relationship between Angelina, Jonny, Kristina and Wendell. Well Jonny is pretty tired now, eyes burning so back to work.

Wednesday

Rob said he would call to find out if Jonny can stay at Hollywood next week or even starting Friday. Right now users can't get into velos. Jonny was doing work on SMTP. He is did a little prep work for his new class starting soon. He had lunch with the database staff today. They ordered Chinese. Jonny had to borrow $6 from Rob because he left his money in his car. Jonny walked from the temple on Washtenaw and all the way to Hotel California. Tonight he has to walk back by 5:45 to do the car pool run. In the car will be Lorraine, Alberta and Margo. Margo is the neighbor. Angelina said it could be worse, at least Margo's brother William won't be in the car. He always balks and being placed in a car seat. Jonny didn't sleep well. Of course he dozed off around 9 PM but didn't actually go to bed, he was napping on the couch. Later he went to bed after reading more of The Final Country and is now up to page 146. The time was almost 1AM. Then he didn't sleep well, the book caused weird dreams. Jesse came into bed sometime in the middle of the night. The storms last night were tremendous. Angelina just called and Jonny talked to her on his cell phone for about 10 minutes. Jonny wonders what the kids are learning in religious school today. Maybe more about the parsha Bo. On the way to work Alberta and Jonny listened to some more of the tape Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red. Tonight Alberta has foosball after dinner.

Tuesday

It was a dreary rainy day as Jonny set forth to walk the dogs this morning. He is up to page 106 of The Final Country by James Crumley. Jonny finished reading Death of a Red Heroine on Saturday night or maybe it was Sunday night. The book was 464 pages long. Angelina called today to nag about the retirement account. Yesterday Jonny listened to the drash of Rabbi Grossman on the parsha bo. He is listening it to again today. Last night he took Alberta to basketball practice. On the way he listened to part of the book on tape Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red by John Kemelman. The book was written in 1974 when plumbers received $9 an hour. The other book Jonny is reading is about a private investigator in the rough and tumble of Texas. Some of his encounters are very wild. This guy writes like Hiaasen but for Texas instead of Florida. Probably the main character is a series. Last night was hot dog night. Jonny did situps but he also had a late night snack. But he is working hard on losing the weight. Lea and Penny are both pulling Jonny in different directions. Rob reminded him that Dolly is pulling him also. Last night Jonny helped Lorraine with math homework and helped Alberta with math homework. Jesse helped him walk the dogs in the rain.

Wednesday

Happy New Year. Jonny just woke up. He fell asleep right here in Hotel California. Jonny is up to page 293 of Death of a Red Heroine. He is also up to chapter 60 of Isaiah. Jonny is up to Brachos 23a. Penny is just on the other side of the door but she didn't come out of her office and see Jonny asleep. He hasn't been too bored lately. Tonight he takes Alberta to footsol. Jonny has been spending time trying to get FTP to work in c sharp. The problem is getting it to work on the VAX. He also gave up on his candle. Jonny's other hobbies include pen making, and soap making. There was a big snow storm here as well. Jonny made some lasagne with Jesse's help. Next time he plans to make it meatless. Lorraine had her friend Annabella sleep over new year's eve and they were up until 2 something in the morning. That didn't stop her from making Jonny play the board game high school musical. Jonny has to get back into the sit ups routine. He has been sick. No not from drinking but just a flu-like cold. He has listened to the vaera twice this week. He is wondering if Angelina is planning on Saturday services this week or not? Tomorrow is a big blood bank meeting with Penny over at Hollywood. Will Penny remember the meeting?