Okay, well, as you all know, the Y2K Bug was a bust, mostly in thanks to all those people who approached this pre-panic in a calm and systematic manner. But there was more to my year than Y2K Stockpiling. This was the year I really bloomed in International Operations.
The year started innocently enough. A huge ice storm ravaged the local area, and I lost my access to Silverdragon for a while. But little did I know this would forshadow a greater outage. I was at EveCon and had a great time. I was at Katsucon and worked my butt off running regitsration for a con that boasted a cross of the 2200 mark. I couldn't have done it without my volunteers, either. A lot of lessons were learned during this time, which hopefully will work for a better Katsucon 2000. Christine got to be Con Mom, and loved her job. But her eyes started to bother her early in the year, and when they tried everything, they decided to try a spinal tap, which went horribly wrong due to some incompetant hospital workers. Christine was bedridden for weeks, and when it was all over, they never did figure out why here eyes hurt. Christine celebrated her non-death at Shivacon, where she got (*gasp*) a tattoo of a winged cat around her ankle.
CR's grades and asthma started to improve. We didn't have to put him on the machine as much, and they reduced the Ritalin, a drug I am still on the fence about. I am very glad to have him as my son, he really has an apatite for science and learning. His school still has their head up their butt about a lot of things, though. Most schools seem confused why you can't just drop everything at work and come on their command, often for little things. They have policies like my son cannot have his inhaler with him, they have to dispense it, and we have to come in person and sign in and out refills.
My second book has been put on hold... again. I lost my illustrator, and have to find a new one. It wasn't a bad separation, and we are still friends, but this leaves me in a bit of a pickle, since the second book is 99% done and written. I may publish it without illustrations. I have asked several artists already, and either they don't have the time or the resources to do it. I really hope to have it done and printed by Imaginecon.
Then came a very hurtful period for me. I was part of a local group of people called "Crunchland," as some of you knew, since 1992. About two years ago, for reasons foreign to me, some newer members decided they didn't like me and some other people. They sent vague and threatening letters, and played extremely complex head games. Their base was that my life was too weird to be real, and I must be a 15 year old Star Trek geek who also doubles as a pathological liar and who knows what else. Up to this point, I thought, "whatever," but this apparently wasn't fun enough, so they went on my web site, went to my friend's pages, and e-mailed some of them bizarre e-mails about "Why do you like this loser?" and some were "anonymous friends" who told them tales that I was a backstabbing liar out to get them and so on. The damage wasn't so bad to my friends, since the people who did this were *far* off the mark about my life and friends, but it pissed enough of them off to start a full scale war. So I blew up on the Crunchland message base, trying to flush these idiots out, because I really knew who they were. But their friends came to their defense, and I just thought, whatever, and left. This delighted them, and they sent me more mail, but eventually they stopped. Then someone flamed them while I was away on vacation, and I got blamed for that, and the whole thing started again. I got mail-bombed, and I was really stunned how immature some "adults" can be. To be fair, only about 10% of the group was doing this, but they were irritating little flies in my online life for about 5 months until I started tracing their mail and getting their "accounts" cancelled. After the dust settled, we all agreed to leave each other alone, and I got a blurb on their "Wacky and Memorable Users" page. I guess my whole lesson on this was I am too trusting and friendly. As a result, I removed some of the more... personal... things on this site, and put in more generic or vague comments about my personal life. I don't tell anyone where I work, where I live, specific dates, etc... as well as "pepper" some of my essays with key items (falsehoods) so that if they are used against me, I know the source, and will lead those who play head games further off the mark about my life. I am now more paranoid about how some people are just mean and bored. But the most ironic thing about this is they accused me of being a liar and wanted me off the board, and I ended being a liar of sorts, and leaving the board. Is that a victory? Ah, well.
Then, at around 5000 hits, Silverdragon burned down. Literally. We lost anything and everything in the Silverdragon Server group that was not backed up. Seems while he was gone having a bad time in New Orleans the old SPARC Station grew to a FLAME Station. Poof! Goes the power supply, taking the whole system, hard drive and all, with it. Several attempts to recover the hard drive proved futile. While this was sort of inconvenient for me for having no site for a while, for Brad it was a very significant loss, since we had an extensive collection of dragon images on here, collected over the years of midnight browsing and stealing from odd clip art. A moment of silence for this great loss, please. He has been working on getting a new server up, but has had a lot of hardware and network troubles. Add to that a father who was seriously ill, and a workplace that had him training and working doubletime. I made several attempts at sites for my web page, but settled on Xoom as being the least annoying. At this time, I purchased two domains, but I am waiting to see where I will end up before I release them to the public.
April 13 marked the passing of Pookie, our first cat, to the Happy Hunting Grounds. Pookie lived with us for ten years and nine days before succumbing to what the vet thinks was simple heart failure. Pookie showed no signs of weakness, sickness, or having died in any sort of pain or suffering. She just went to sleep that morning, and died where she lay. I think this is best, even if she had to leave us earlier than expected. She will be missed, though. Very much. She is survived by three companions, Artoo, Oreo , and Storm.
But all was not bad during this time. I have been invited as a guest at Imaginecon in the year 2000! This is a HUGE fantasy/scifi/comic/toy convention in Virginia Beach. I was personally invited by John and Kathy, the con chair and public relations people for the con. They have heavy influences in the wildly successful Dragoncon in Atlanta, and expect ten to forty *thousand* people to be at Imaginecon! Wowsers. Lets see, a paid guest, large con, lots of toys, free self-promotion, and a nearby beach... yeah, I am quite pleased. Good folks, too. Very friendly and motivated to get this convention going. I haven't been a paid guest in years, and certainly not for a convention of this size. I also started my new shift at the International Operations desk. I went from the self-named "Bottom Feeder" shift (Friday - Sunday, midnight to noon) to the graveyard shift (Monday - Thursday, midnight to ten in the morning).
And I saw the new Star Wars movie. Sorry, fandom, I liked it. I give it a B. Nothing, not even the Second Coming, could have lived up to the fan-related hype. But the whole movie, while enjoyable, had the feeling like it was over-edited, and the speed of the story moved with leaps and jerks. I thought Jar-Jar was a lot less annoying than the people who complained about him. But all in all, I liked it a lot. And while I will admit it was no masterpiece, it was worth full matinee price to see it. Although, I should add, I didn't pay full price to see it. In fact, I was in the middle of a European up-training class, and the treat they gave all of us was free tickets and snacks to see the movie. I saw it in a crummy theater, replete with people and their cell phones. But I still enjoyed the movie. So did my son. The Europeans loved it, especially since it wasn't coming to Europe for a few months yet. We got the point. Many of you critics in fandom did not. I especially laugh at those that clamored, "It's a kid's movie!!" And Star Wars wasn't? I think some of you wanted something deep, insightful, and thoughtful, filled with symbolic imagery similar to a Neon Genesis Evangelion saga, where half the film was done with narrative whispers spoke by half-cloaked characters in temples with huge ceilings and sparse mood lighting. This is George Lucas we're talking about, not Ingrid Bergman! And you can't tell me the Sand People taking pot-shots weren't cool. Waaaaugh, power converters!
The big thrill for me, though, came on June 24 of this year. This marked our tenth wedding anniversary. Christine and I went to Salem. Yes, Salem Massachusetts, home of the witch trials. Our fifth wedding anniversary was at the Shaken Tree in Rockville, another (now gone) pagan center. So we're kind of going with a theme here. But the best part is I am married to the most wonderful girl in the world, and you can't have her, nyah! :)
Then CastleCon 12 came and went, the last FanTek con in the Horrorday Inn in Fredneck. It was hard to say goodbye to that hotel, where I spent many a con. But now the cons will be closer to home.
Then hurricane Dennis scrubbed away my beach vacation like God's carpet cleaner. We got to Hatteras Saturday afternoon and later next day, we were evacuated. Blessedly, everyone took it real well. We all went to Busch Gardens, and despite many of the rides being closed due to the oncoming storms, the weather was great. CR got to be on his first *real* roller coaster, the Big Bad Wolf. Actually, there was one person in our group with a sucky attitude, me. I tried to be positive about the whole thing, but I really needed the vacation. Everyone else was really supportive, and without them, I would have probably collapsed into a pathetic heap of self-pity. Thanks guys! :) At least we get some of our money back (yay Traveller's insurance!) We learned our lesson though. Bonnie hit the last week in August last year, and this year, Dennis hit the very same week. So next year, we are going in early June.... waaaay before the hurricane season.
Then I started my new job as a Wardialing Analyst. I get to build, install, deliver, support, and analyze node testing equipment. Kind of reminds me of the movie Wargames. "Would you like to play a game? T-H-E-R-M-O-N-U-C-L-E --" stop that! Anyway, I look forward to this opportunity to travel all across the globe and meeting some of the people I have been chatting online with all this time. I will also have more sensible hours, and get my weekends back.
Christine has surprises in store for the next few months. I won't relay them here, but her work may give us a positive change in our life's direction for FY2000 (no, not a new child yet). CR entered the 4th grade and started taking up violin and chorus. Yes, us Saxons with our violins...
More big news, an addition to our furry family, we sort of inherited a Pekingese named Ahfu from the previous owners, and a few visits to the vet later, we had ourselves a little doggie! "Bwah hah hah!" you may laugh. "Pekes are not gothy-punk! They are yappy little rug-suckers that rich people own." First, you people about the gothy-punk thing are still focusing on looks, not attitude... again. Second, yappy dogs have yappy owners. This dog is well-mannered, smart, and fun to be with, a lot like my friends :). But he does comb the rug like a vacuum, and I hope the reverse is true of the last one, if Pekes are owned by rich people... if one gets a Peke...? I plan to be rich anyway. So we now have in our lives Autumn Sunset of Dragon Meadows, Ahfu for short. It is Chinese for "Sun Lion." Pedigree and everything.
Then my father announced to me he sold the house and he was moving somewhere in South California, and would not tell me where. Our relationship has always been poor, but this was really insensitive. I never got my mother's things, a chance to visit the house I grew up in (I was never allowed back), and now it's all gone. I realize that he is happily married to someone else, and he has pretty much tried to erase his whole personal life from 1958 to 1987, but since *I* am still alive, I'd like at least some respect.
Halloween came and went. We got to have someone else take our son for half the night so we could sit on our front steps and hand out candy. That was a lot of fun. Ahfu liked it a lot as well. We're trying to expose him to a lot of people so that he's a friendly and outgoing dog. He's been a handful, since I have not lived with a dog since early 1989, and certainly never raised a puppy. But it's been great so far. But some people were making fun of me that I have a Pekingese. One friend of mine just couldn't believe it, she just made anti-small-dog jokes all evening. This happened to me before when I was dog-sitting a good friend's well-behaved and cute Pomeranian at EveCon last year. "Look, a football!" said one person. "Lunch!" joked another. "It's like a dog, only smaller..." said about a dozen people, leading me to believe this is a quote from something. But most of the comments were derogatory about the dog's size and the fact that it is cool to hate small dogs. Listen, folks, it's not their fault they look like that. Yes, it is true, centuries of manipulative breeding makes them look very unlike their wolf ancestor, but in both cases, these dogs were rescued from previous owners. A dog is a living, thinking, feeling animal. Maybe it doesn't know when it's being insulted, but it's not good form to blurt out over-used jokes about physical characteristics. I had to suppress one response that I wanted to make, "It's like a person, only fatter..."
Then I turned 31. My birthday was low-key, which is kind of how I like it sometimes. I got some cards, a lava lamp, and I got to see Weird Al Yankovic live, which was a thrill, I tell you. He is really a dedicated performer. He doesn't just sing and wander around, he does a lot of comedy, dance work, and has an impressive light show. His parodies are both overt and subtle on many layers. He did most of his stuff from his new album, "Running with Scissors," but he also did the expected classics, plus a whole lot more in the form of short film clips and medleys. But I didn't enjoy it as much, however, as Christine, who has become his number on fan in our household. We had a great time.
I finally got to pay off a long standing favor. My pal Suzi, who got me a job at this ISP which changed my life, had quit years ago during a layoff. This technical job is great, and I finally repaid the favor by getting her a job back with us. Now she is working my old job on the desk.
Then came a great Christmas. I spent the first 18 years of my life hating Christmas, and I am done. I have no more hatred for Christmas, which was based on unrealistic expectations, anyway. Since that time, I have been better each Christmas trying to get over seasonal depression and the retail blues. I am coming close to marking my four-year anniversary where I broke from the unholy bonds of retail, and this just adds to the list of things I am grateful for. I have a wonderful wife and ten years plus of marriage, a smart and witty son, I am not poor anymore, and I am working in an exciting technical field with people from all over the world.
So there you have it. The last time I will ever write the digits "19" in from of years.