mochahochabeachside.com

Hi folks...
Normally, I don't write posts like this, but I don't have much of a choice.  Recently, I spent a week in the hospital, after missing most of the previous week of work.  As you may or may not know, I have an open wound - literally a hole in my leg - from a previous abcess/infection that very nearly killed me and resulted in the loss of my leg in June of 2009. That's almost healed.  Around two and a half weeks ago, I started having issues with my leg, again.  It turned out to be a large hemtoma near the existing wound site.  A hematoma is a place - like a bruise - where blood pools under the skin in large quantity.  Think a huuuge blood-filled zit.

I had to go into the emergeny room on Tuesday the 19th of January.  The next day, I had surgery to open up, clean up, and debride the wound area.  This left an open wound area that is 5.5cm wide, by 5.8cm long, by 0.5 - 1.0cm deep. (If you really want to see, pictures can be seen here.) I was discharged from the hospital on the 26th of January.  I have not been released to go back to work until today.

Because of the amount of time I have missed, Joni and I have fallen dramatically behind in our finances.  We have no money in savings - having used it all the previous summer when I was in the hospital for three months, and therefore we are flat broke.  I quite literally do not know how I'm going to pay my rent.  Unfortunately, this means that we may very well face eviction.  Some people you can explain the situation to, and get extra time... and some people, you can't.  Therefore, I am forced to do something I don't want to do.  Beg.

If you can possibly find a few dollars to send to us, "donate" to our rent fund, please donate to us via PayPal. If 100 people donate $10, our rent will be paid (yes, we know it's expensive. We used to have roommates, and yes we're in the process of finding someplace cheaper, and when I actually am able to work normally, it's not that bad).  We're not asking for any specific amount... Just what you feel you can spare, and that you link to, re-post, or re-tweet this posting.  Thanks so much for understanding, folks. We know that the economy sucks right now, so we appreciate even more that extra little bit. So many thanks to everyone that can help, and so much understanding to those that wish they could!

Sometimes my conversations at work just make the whole day worthwhile... the conversation for the day ended on a relatively tame note... we were discussing Houston weather, and I told him be glad he wasn't in tornado country... this ensued (Oh, yes, parental advisory, explicit lyrics...):

(2:49 AM) Me: we broke a record.
(2:50 AM) Me: record was 28 back in 1997.
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: I'm pretty tired of "breaking records" in houston
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: Ike worst storm in x years
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: coldest shit
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: just
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: Houston
(2:50 AM) Co Worker: figure it the fuck out.
(2:50 AM) Me: lol
(2:50 AM) Me: at least you're not in kansas
(2:51 AM) Me: then you'd have to worry about
(2:51 AM) Me: biggest tornado outbreak in x years
(2:51 AM) Me: biggest motherfuckin nasty-ass tornado ever
(2:51 AM) Me: most pieces of straw driven through your little homie while you tried to hold on to a pipe, screaming while the wind tried to drag you away, ever
(2:51 AM) Me: you know.
(2:51 AM) Me: just kansas.
(2:51 AM) Me: normal shit.
(2:51 AM) Me: cows.
(2:52 AM) Me: chickens through telephone poles.
(2:52 AM) Me: day to day crap.
(2:52 AM) Co Worker: hahah
(2:52 AM) Co Worker: in Los Angeles, they'd say the same about Texas.
(2:52 AM) Co Worker: nuh uh, it's too hot over there.
(2:52 AM) Co Worker: Hurricanes!
(2:52 AM) Me: Yeah well..
(2:52 AM) Me: at least I went my whole life without having to learn how to dive underneath my desk every time the ground moved!
(2:53 AM) Me: I may have a lot of things to be afraid of, but _everything that I stand, walk, move, operate, or live on, around, in or near_ is not one of them.

The day started off even better than that....  we have a very few employees that work in our remote offices.  The joke started a long time ago when the company moved from their old location to their current one. Apparently when we upgraded offices, the remote employees, be they in any of the company's remote locations, keep getting downgraded to smaller and smaller offices.  (All joking aside, the remote offices are pretty much like the local ones. Just on a smaller scale.)  Regardless, apparently their are a lot of towers in India, where companies rent tower-top offices for their employees... or at least in my imagination...

(2:26 AM) Me: and they work like 7 days a week or something.
(2:26 AM) Me: eesh
(2:26 AM) Co Worker: Think so.  In a small office.
(2:26 AM) Co Worker: together
(2:26 AM) Co Worker: It's 145pm MOnday, in India.
(2:26 AM) Me: They work with [a remote admin, my superior]?
(2:27 AM) Co Worker: yeah
(2:27 AM) Me: ah
(2:27 AM) Me: let me guess. Small, triangular shaped office.  One on each wall?
(2:27 AM) Me: heh
(2:27 AM) Co Worker: hahaha
(2:27 AM) Me: trap door in the middle...
(2:27 AM) Me: office is at the top of a tower.
(2:27 AM) Co Worker: HAHAHAH
(2:27 AM) Me: rent's cheap
(2:28 AM) Me: but the owl's and bats roosting overhead get annoying.
(2:28 AM) Co Worker: HAHAHAHA
(2:28 AM) Me: have to keep replacing monitors when they fizzle and die from bird crap
(2:28 AM) Me: and don't even get _statrted_ about the white stuff on the keyboard...

...You don't even want to see the living conditions I came up with for the folks in the Florida offices.  Let's just say that beach access is easy to come by when you only have to open the flap.  It's the rogue waves you have to watch out for, though. They really screw with equipment. And rfc1149 networking is a bitch during hurricanes.

...yeah, I amuse way too easily... see this for proof.