The World of Joel

As most fo you read from my last post, it was a pretty long and hectic weekend. I think in total I got 10 hours of sleep from Friday-Sunday. However before all of this happened Jenn and I had a whole day planned for yesterday June 18, 2007. Jenn is now going down to UCI with me (who by the way just took out Cal State Fullerton in the College World Series) and so she had her orientation at 9am yesterday down in Irvine. So we figured since we were in the OC we would go down to Disneyland which we have year passes for. On the way down we stopped at Benihana’s a place I had never been and Jenn just once. I love the whole habatchi grill, and chef’s cooking your food right in front of you, you really just seem to enjoy your food more. I had scallops and shrimp and Jenn had a really good Filet. We went to Disneyland which was just a complete zoo but we managed to enjoy our time there nonetheless. However after some time we realized that we would just be waiting in gigantic lines so we headed down to the beach where Jenn literally fell asleep for a good half an hour.

It was one of those days that we had both been looking forward to, a day that we both desperately needed, and just made for a great day. With the constant ups and downs of life, it is nice to still have those days to just let everything unwind.

Hey everyone I am sure there are a few of you who were surprised not to see a post in a few days. Well in fact there is a reason for the absence. On my way to work (the bank) on Thursday afternoon I received a phone call from Jenn’s mom informing me of the serious condition of her grandfather who had been struggling from lung cancer (having never smoked a day in his life). I was blessed by my manager to be able to leave work, pick up Jenn at the end of her shift and go visit her grandpa. The last few days up until extremely early this morning (at around 1am) we had spent at the hospital with her Grandpa and much of her family. The decision was made late last night and early this morning to take him off of life support as his internal organs were beginning to shut down. The process was one of the most excruciating processes I have ever been through and to see her Grandpa go like that was hard for everyone.

Jenn’s grandpa was a real character. After losing my grandpa over five years ago it was nice to still have someone to look at like a Grandpa, which was exactly what Jenn’s grandpa was. The last I spoke to him was a week ago or so when we were just stopping by to see how he was doing and helping with a few things around the house. I spoke to him for a few minutes and he was struggling to talk but he did tell me to not let anything really get under your skin or to let things stress you, he said looking back on his life everything that he ever worried about worked out.

We all loved Jenn’s grandpa (Al Carpenter) and we will definitely miss him.

Having been in college since September 2004 I have to say I am starting to feel the burn of my brain telling me it never wants to read another text book, cram for another exam, and stress about grades ever again. Making the change to UC Irvine has been a challenging one and has made me choose to really rack my brain to the point of no return. In some sense its a good thing, the place is extremely challenging and definitely keeps me on my toes. On the other hand it means that the majority of my time is spent reading, studying, doing homework, and oh did I mention studying? Well what does this have to do with a need of a change?

So today as I was hanging around my girlfriend Jenn’s house we were checking out our expanding DVD collection which we have building for a year or so. I believe it was a year ago now we decided to buy two DVD’s each a month, these DVD’s would be taken from our list and tht way we could really have something to look forward to each month and have a nice collection. Well that trend stopped at the end of 2006 and I haven’t bought many movies recently. So I decided it was time to expand a bit and get a few of my favorites that I haven’t gotten around to buying. The total for all four was like $20 on Half.com which were either Brand New or Like New. Here is the list:

- Antitrust
- Spider-Man
- Batman Begins
- Oceans Twelve (Order Got Canceled)

We (Jenn her Dad and Myself) have spent all year since the very first episode watching Jericho on CBS every Wednesday night at 8pm Pacific. In fact we have been big enough fans of the show to have a special to-go dinner ready for the season finale. The theme going into the show was “someone is going to die”, but Gerald McRaney the one viable actor on this show was killed off. The man literally ran the show, ran the town of Jericho, and had some of the best moments of the season, and yet was killed off. I am interested to see how the show manages to get along with there only reputable actor, but I have to ay the final did disappoint. Unlike the rest of the season which was in your face action packed intensity, the finale dragged with moments of the past and present that had very little impact on the climax of the show.

Will I come back for Season 2? You bet your bottom dollar we will. The show couldn’t lose its three biggest fans on one poor outing. Plus who doesn’t want to see what would happen to the US after a major nuclear attack.

Well Jenn and I even before Movie-Stop.net have tried to build up our DVD library so when we get married we have an extremely elusive and impressive collection. I recently purchased Rocky Balboa and Casino Royale and have some movies I am looking to add to the collection. So right now I am searching eBay and Half.com for the best deals. Here are some of the movies I want to buy that are out now or will be sometime this year:

- The Office Season 3
- Jericho Season 1
- Heroes Season 1
- The Pursuit of Happyness
- Blood Diamond
- The Prestige
- Batman Begins
- World Trade Center
- The Godfather Trilogy
- Greatest Game Ever Played
- Breach
- Antitrust

I want to start by clarifying that my life is not anything I can complain about, in fact I quite possibly am the luckiest guy in the world. I have the most amazing girlfriend in the world, I have great family and friends, I have a job in which allows me to review video games, and a good “real” life job that allows me to live as comfortably as a college student can live. However with my recent transition to UC Irvine which I knew was going to be challenging in its own merits, has come some unfortunate events that have happened in literally a five day span.

Case #1: It all began on Thursday April 12th when I was ready to go leave for work (Bank of America) when I found my Hyundai Tiburon wasn’t starting. It has 30,000 miles on it and sure enough the battery died. So no big deal, my parents let me borrow there car and I was off to work making it in time. My parents were also nice enough to buy a new battery for me and install it. So that was not a big price tag and thus not a bad deal.

Case #2: The same day of Thursday April 12th I brought my brand new less then two month old Mac Book with me to work, so I could do homework at my break. Like I mentioned I had to change cars and I think I was in a rush and through my backpack into the back of my parents Honda Pilot. No harm no foul right? Well I got on break and was on the phone with Jenn when I opened my Mac Book and saw a major crack at the bottom of the screen. Now I have 3/4 of my Mac Screen un-viewable. Now I call up Apple and they say it to the Genius Bar to get it serviced. I thought it might not be under warranty but the sticker shock of how much they were going to charge me to replace the screen could basically buy a new Mac Book. Luckily I was with Jenn who asked a question of what else we could do and the guy asked if I bought it with an American Express. Luckily Jenn recommended me to get a Gold Card which I did and bam I find out they cover accidental damage to products for the first 90 days. So now I am in an ongoing effort to get American Express to cover my repair of my Mac Book. More information on this will come, I am just praying that American Express covers it.

Case #3: So you would think my unfortunate events would stop there right? After one of the best days of my life when Jenn came to surprise me on Friday the 13th of April, we decided to drive my Malibu which sits at the train station back into Riverside as we had missed the Train. The drive home was great and the evening was topped off with a great meal. I left my Malibu at the train station in Riverside to drive back to Irvine Monday morning. Well of course my luck hasn’t been going to strong and the car began overheating right when I got on the freeway. I managed to get off the freeway without stalling and got towed back down to Riverside to the dealer. Let’s just say the news wasn’t good from the mechanic and it looks like I busted my block (not sure if that’s right). I was happy to hear that it doesn’t seem to be cracked which would have basically meant I would have wanted to dump the car. In short the Malibu is going up for sale and I am going to be looking for a new car all together. I am thinking of a Toyota Prius Hybrid. We will see.

Case #4: After what seemingly was all of the bad that could have happened, the unthinkable happens, something else stops working. So I was just ready to go to bed last night and I had my cell phone in my shirt pocket. I bent over by the sink and bam there goes my cell phone into a nice pool of water. I rushed to get it out of there, probably was in there for a split second tried drying it off. The cell phone seemed fine, and I gave a sigh of relief. Walk into our den and bam it turns off. So I fiddle around with the battery and it seems like it might turn back on and now it’s completley dead. That’s right my cell phone has now been damaged and is dead. It is an old phone, one I didn’t spend a lot of money on, however the fact that my plan has 6 months left means I need to get a cheap phone for time being. Just another expense!

I am not asking for anyone to feel bad for any of this .As I mentioned before I am truly blessed, in fact the more I think about it I am so blessed to even have these problems to begin with. When you see the terror in this world like what happened at Virginia Tech or anywhere around the world where people are being massacred, I have nothing to complain about. I am writing this mainly so one day I can look back and remember this time in my life and laugh. Also I figured it would give you all a little insight to the outlook of my life right now.

So as you all know I have a wonderful girlfriend named Jenn who I have been with for almost four years now. Well when I decided to transfer out of Cal State San Bernardino during the Fall I knew I would see a lot less of Jenn as we used to carpool down to CSUSB together. Well that did happen and due to my work/school schedule we did end up seeing each other a lot less, and even less now in the Spring. So this has been tough on both of us and I can honestly say it has been stressful. We have managed just fine its just the constant running around trying to get thirty minutes with each other which is difficult.

Well to make a long story short I was coming back from seeing Reign Over Me during one of my long gaps at UC Irvine. I was driving back to school while talking to Jenn on the cell phone. She was supposed to be busy doing birthday shopping for her dad, and she kept asking about where I was, and where I usually parked. Well anyways I park at my normal area and I was tired and wanted to lay down in the back seat where I can stretch out. I see a girl walking up to the car, not paying attention to who it was I shut my door to let her pass. Well then the girl opens the door and wouldn’t you know it, it was Jenn. I don’t think I have ever been that happy, it was one of the most amazing surprises I have ever had. And to top it all off she took me out to eat at one of our favorite little spots in the OC, Spaghetti Bender. It was such a memorable surprise and one that I just couldn’t resist posting.

This week for spring break Jenn and I have made every attempt to spend as much time with each other as humanly possible. This has involved a previous post which was talking about our adventure down to an art museum. Earlier today we went down to Santa Anita to go to the Horse Races where for the second in a year in a row we got box seats. Going on a Thursday was actually realy nice as we got to go on a pretty slow day for the race track and made it a lot more relaxing. then on the weekend.

Well anyways I really enjoy the race track mainly for the thrill of gambling without dropping a ton of money in a few minutes like at a casino. Unfortunately there are those days where things just don’t go your way and today was one of those days. I bet on the first five races and went 0/5. Jenn went 3/5 which made it even harder when all I could do was lose. It was truly a great time and I for one am going to miss having the time off.

So I have probably been to many one or two art museums in my life, and those were in elementary school when I was forced to go to these sort of places. I never thought I would go to one of these art museums for pleasure. However the love of my life Jenn has a facination with art and thus my trip last weekend to the Orange County Art Museum. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the art museum but here are some things I did learn while was there.

- Playing with lego’s can be considered art, they had a big Lego city representing The Tale of Two Cities
- People really get into there art. There was a peice that looked like something from the old road runner cartoons and this guy sat there laughing about how brilliant it was.
- We were walking past this guys self portrait where he used some sort of weird mathematical sequencing to create the art and this lady was balling. I don’t think she knew the guy, but maybe the numbers were significant. I don’t know I must have missed something.
- Probably the most interesting piece was a guys portrait of his wife made from his own finger prints. Now that is what I called talent.

All in all I have to say that I am not a big art person so maybe if you like art you are pulling your hair out reading this blog post. For me I enjoyed my time at the museum but a lot of what they considered “art”, I considered something else. If you get a chance I guess it’s worth a look. If nothing else it was pretty relaxing and you only have the beach five minutes away.