owen

Today is my last official class in Macroeconomics at West Chester University.  Boy, am I glad for that.  Tonight I will take our third test, and next week is the cumulative final.  Hopefully they're not that difficult.

I have vacation over the next few days, and I'm going to do some Christmas shopping, writing of my paper, and possibly taking Abby to Gymboree class.  I keep thinking like I'm done with work forever.  I'm going to be very disappointed when I have to go back on Monday.

owen

You know those desktop daily calendars?  The ones that have comics or "You might be a redneck if..." type stuff on them?  It would be cool it a company could allow you to custom-design one of those calendars online with up to, say, three different attributes, and then print it out and ship it to you.

Your calendar could even have personalized dates in it, like birthdays and anniversaries and such.  You could provide digital pictures for inclusion on combined Saturday/Sunday weekend dates.  Company holidays or pre-scheduled personal holidays could be included directly into the calendar.  You wouldn't even have to start the year with January, nor would you have to include an entire year's worth of dates.

owen

In spite of the fact that the date on the Christmas list says the December 24th, I have posted the list to the site today.  You should be able to find a link to the list at least until Christmas Eve in the Don't Read bar on the left side of the home page.

I have gone to great lengths to provide a couple of places to shop for the items listed.  I am not quite done with the list, though.  I think I will need to add a few more things in the $1-$20 range to round things out.  Everything on the list is so expensive this year.

owen

Last night, Mom watched Abby while Berta and I went out to dinner and a movie.  We tried the new Hibachi across the street and went to see Harry Potter and the Chanber of Secrets.

The new Hibachi restaurant rocks.  Apart from the great food that you usually get at a Japanese steak house, the atmosphere was such an improvement over all of the other places we go for Hibachi.  The place has a large waterfall garden with a bridge in the lobby, and the hallways to get to the many hibachi rooms are lit with futuristic samurai neon green circles of etched glass.  There were a ton of tables, and even a room with a raised floor to give the appearance of traditional floor sitting.  Our chef, a white guy from Colorado, was perhaps the best hibachi chef I've ever had the pleasure of cooking for me.  He did all of the tricks, including the Mt. Fuji onion volcano and the "fire in the hole" trick, where, when the chef for the next table over appears, he lights his hand on fire and sticks it near the other guy's rear end.  (The other chef was oriental, and not very emotional.  Our chef said after doing the trick, "They've got to get used to me eventually.")